He replied that it WAS true. Every Christmas Eve, for twenty-five years, had he and they fought in that room; but they would never trouble him nor anybody else again. One by one, had he laid them out, spoilt, and utterly useless for all haunting purposes. He had finished off the last German-band ghost that very evening, just before I came upstairs, and had thrown what was left of it out through the slit between the window-sashes. He said it would never be worth calling a ghost again.
"I suppose you will still come yourself, as usual?" I said. "They would be sorry to miss you, I know."
"Oh, I don't know," he replied; "there's nothing much to come for now. Unless," he added kindly, "YOU are going to be here. I'll come if you will sleep here next Christmas Eve."
"I have taken a liking to you," he continued; "you don't fly off, screeching, when you see a party, and your hair doesn't stand on end. You've no idea," he said, "how sick I am of seeing people's hair standing on end."
He said it irritated him.
Just then a slight noise reached us from the yard below, and he started and turned deathly black.
"You are ill," I cried, springing towards him; "tell me the best thing to do for you. Shall I drink some brandy, and give you the ghost of it?"
He remained silent, listening intently for a moment, and then he gave a sigh of relief, and the shade came back to his cheek.
"It's all right," he murmured; "I was afraid it was the cock."
"Oh, it's too early for that," I said. "Why, it's only the middle of the night."