“I can’t play,” he—or she—mumbled shyly.
Then a voice, over by the door, said quietly, “I’ll play a march, if you like.”
Elizabeth Ann was so surprised she clutched Doris by the arm and pinched her, though she didn’t mean to at all. There, just coming in the door, was Roger Calendar in his embroidered blue silk Chinese costume.
Roger was masked and apparently no one knew him, but of course Elizabeth Ann recognized the suit. Doris didn’t know anything about it, so she continued to stare placidly. Doris had not been home the afternoon Uncle Hiram showed Elizabeth Ann the chests and she had been outdoors, playing, when Roger stopped in to have Aunt Grace fit the suit to him. Uncle Hiram had suggested that no one tell Doris, because she sometimes revealed secrets when she was excited. So Elizabeth Ann was confident she was the only one at the party who knew who the guest in the blue silk suit really was.
But Roger couldn’t play the piano—Elizabeth Ann was sure he couldn’t do that. Why, the Bostwicks, with whom he lived didn’t have a piano. She had heard Mrs. Bostwick tell Aunt Grace that the reason they bought a radio was because she liked a little music in the house.
Yet there was Roger, walking toward the piano. While Elizabeth Ann watched him—and for that matter everyone watched him—he sat down on the piano bench. He began to play—the liveliest of marches rippled from under his fingers, and feet began to go tap-tap-tap, all over the barn.
Elizabeth Ann was sure Catherine was the fairy princess when she saw how that girl rushed to take her place at the head of the line. Catherine would want to lead the march—in school she always wanted to lead, and she was always disappointed when Miss Owen declared all the pupils must take turns.
Aunt Nan paired off the children, and Elizabeth Ann found she was to march with the ghost. All she could see of him, except the sheet around his body and the pillow case around his head, were two merry eyes that twinkled at her through slits cut in the pillow case.
“Bet you don’t know who I am,” said the ghost, his foot keeping time to that enchanting music.
“No,” said Elizabeth Ann, “I don’t know you. Do you know me?”