“That’s the way with May,” she smiled. “You will get used to her by-and-by, no doubt. She pictures the wildest things, and accepts the freaks of her own imagination as gospel truth.”
“But,” interrupted May, whose face looked comically anxious. “There is a ghost, isn’t there? And there is a treasure, isn’t there?”
“I’m afraid that the Grange possesses neither of those hall-marks of antiquity,” I responded, as gravely as I could. “At least, I have never heard of them.”
“That’s just it!” cried May, renewed hope sparkling in her eyes. “Perhaps you are rather nervous, and they didn’t like to tell you about the ghost. But it’s there, all the same. Have you never heard it pattering along the deserted corridors, or tapping gently against the window panes, to attract your attention, or sighing mournfully through the keyhole, or—”
“May, do be less absurd,” pleaded Mrs. Marshall. “You will not be ready to go down with us to dinner if you do not hurry up, instead of standing chattering about rubbish.”
“Rubbish, indeed! Ghosts are not rubbish. Treasure is not rubbish. I wish I had some of the latter now, so that I could have a maid to dress me. Dora, you must, you really must, let us make a start at solving the mystery to-morrow.”
“But there is no mystery.”
“That remains to be seen. At any rate, you will take me to the Grange to-morrow, will you not?”
I was glad that just at this moment we were summoned to dinner, as May’s persistence about visiting the Grange worried me a little, and I did not want to commit myself in any way until I had had the private talk with Mr. Garth that had been agreed upon. So “We will see about it” was all the reply on the subject which May received just then. But it satisfied her for the time being, for she immediately went off into ecstasies of thanks and speculation, which bubbled over even after we had sat down to dinner.
“What do you think?” she exclaimed to Mr. and Mrs. Garth. “I’m in for no end of adventure. Dora has promised to take me to the Grange, to exorcise the ghost and recover the buried treasure. And we’re going to spend our wealth abroad. We shall wear our diamonds at the foreign courts, and I intend to marry nothing under a duke. And my children will be princes, and perhaps—Good gracious! who’s the next heir to the throne of Germany?”