"We are not going to hurt you now!" Jessie's voice was once more menacing as she advanced upon the cowering girls. "But we're watching you, and the next time you say anything mean or sneaky, the least you'll get will be a ducking in the lake. Now, just remember that!"
There was a cry from two of the "ghosts" as the captives again made a dash for liberty.
"Let 'em go," said the speaker, in sepulchral tones. "And we, too, will vanish into those mysterious realms of ether from which we came. Farewell!"
When Lottie and Kate had finally disappeared, the ghosts disrobed amid a chorus of giggles.
"Well, that ought to fix 'em," Sadie said.
"But it won't make them love us any more," prophesied Jo.
"We'll have to look out for trouble from that quarter," Nan agreed, and added stoutly: "But you may be sure we'll be ready for it when it comes!"
By a miracle of good luck the conspirators managed to get up to their rooms undetected. They fell asleep chuckling at the thought of Kate Speed and Lottie Sparks and their chagrin.
The Knights of Darkness, once formed, was not disbanded. The girls enjoyed their secret club and their secret watchword, and more than anything else they enjoyed the curiosity their organization aroused in the girls who were not members of it.
They even took up a collection and sent away for club pins, an emblem of skull and cross bones over which they giggled delightedly in the privacy of their rooms.