Beyond the iron gate, in the garden area, a white-robed figure slowly paced back and forth!
“My Aunt!” whispered Penny. “Am I seeing things or am I seeing things?”
For a moment she sat very straight, watching. The ghostly figure, white from head to toe, moved with measured steps toward the high gate.
“There aren’t any ghosts,” she encouraged herself. “But if that’s not a spook, it must be someone dressed up like one! And who would play Hallowe’en games on a cold night like this?”
Alone, frankly nervous, Penny had no overpowering desire to investigate the white-robed figure at close range. A large, spreading evergreen half-blocked her view of the gate. She could not see the ghost plainly, but she distinctly heard the rattle of a chain as the apparition tested the lock.
“Real or imaginary, that spook is trying to get out!” Penny thought with a shiver. “If Mose were here now I’d challenge him to a race!”
The white-gowned figure shook the gate chain a second time, then slowly retreated. Penny watched for a moment, before abruptly swinging open the car door. She had decided to investigate.
As she crossed the road, the white figure moved away from her. By the time she reached the gate, it had disappeared around a corner of the house.
“At least Mr. Spook wasn’t carrying his own tombstone!” Penny observed to herself. “Mose exaggerated that part.”
She waited, leaning against the gate post. Within three minutes a light went on in the upper part of the house. For a fleeting instant before the blind was pulled, she saw someone standing in front of an old-fashioned dresser.