“WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU SAW A GHOST?”
This last query of Evelyn’s was passed around to the girls. Lilian wrote, “Watch it go by.” Diane wrote, “Run.” Isabel stopped her rapid note-taking long enough to answer, “Try one of the boys’ tricks,—stick out my foot to see if I could trip it.”
“Diane’s answer is the only sensible one,” whispered Evelyn as she read the different replies. Tucking away her pictures in her note book she proceeded with the more serious work for which she had come to the library. The other girls were also absorbed in their books. But later, when they left the library for Greycliff Hall, there was laughter, and stories of mysterious doings were told. “Of course I believe in ghosts,” insisted Evelyn, who had never outgrown the coquettish ways and naive speech with which she had come to Greycliff. “Didn’t my mother’s old Mammy bring me up on ‘ghos’es’ and ha’nts? I never saw any, but she did.”
“You just want to for the excitement of it,” said Isabel. “I wish the seniors would give Hamlet this spring, for their play, and let me play the part of the ghost.”
“That isn’t much of a part,” said Lilian. “I should think you would want Hamlet.”
“I would, but the seniors would want that themselves. ‘To be or-r-r-r-r not to be. That iz-z-z-z-z the question!’ I heard an elocutionist do it that way once. What are you girls going to give for your senior play?”
“We haven’t decided yet, but we thought of having it outdoors and giving ‘As You Like It’.”
“That will be wonderful!” exclaimed Isabel. “There are so many places about the campus that would make a fine setting.”
“Come around to our room after dinner for the ghost stories,” reminded Evelyn, as she and Diane left the other girls on their way to their respective rooms. Like Isabel and Virginia, Evelyn and Diane were occupying a large single room this year. But Greycliff seniors have not so much time for ghost stories and the like, and Evelyn herself, with her knitting, was in the parlors after dinner, listening to some singing, and chatting to Isabel, Lilian, Hilary, Cathalina and Betty.
“I believe that Evelyn has begun two or three sweaters,” said Isabel. “Which one is this for?”