"H—sh!" said Betty again.
"I—I don't want to be like a c—camel!" whimpered the boy. "R—remember about rich men getting to Heaven."
"Stay close here with Baby," ordered the little ghost, and the next second she had glided away over the path to the verandah. She went close to the window—three blinds had been left undrawn and the window panes ran down to the verandah floor. Surely the room had been designed expressly for this night.
Cyril, in horror, beheld his sister creep to the first window and peep in; creep to the second—to the third.
All the other windows were darkened; only this one room in all the great house seemed to be awake.
Then, in the silence which lay everywhere, a blood-curdling thing happened. Betty's "clanking chain" came in contact with something of iron reared up near the window and gave forth a fearsome sound. Cold chills played about Cyril's back, a distant dog barked—and Baby awoke.
Betty at once perceived this to be the one moment. Many people can recognize their moment when it has gone. Betty's talent lay in seeing it just as it arrived.
If truth must be confessed, fear had once or twice during this campaign tugged at her heart; when Cyril had urged home, her greatest desire had been to flee. But Betty never quite knew herself—was never in any crisis of her life absolutely certain what this second terribly insistent self would do.
Instead of scampering away with Cyril through the night, her feet had taken her to the windows, and the proportions of her plan had grown gloriously, albeit her heart-beats could be heard aloud.
Now, when her chain clanked, it seemed to her the war drum had been sounded. She darted from the verandah across the path and snatched the baby from her brother's arms; then, running back to the verandah, her chain clanked again and again, and she rent the air with a dismal wail—