"Is what gone, child?" asked Mr. Bourne.
"The ghost," she answered. "It came right up, sir, just after you left me. I'd rather die than see it again."
She was shaking from head to foot. There was no mistaking that her terror was intense. To attempt to meet it with confuting arguments would have been simply folly, and both gentlemen knew that it would. Mr Bourne concluded that the same sight, which had so astonished him, had been seen by the girl.
"I sat down again after you went, sir," she resumed, her teeth chattering. "I knew there was no mighty hurry for my being back, as you had gone on to mother, and I sat on ever so long, and it came right up again me, brushing my knees with its things as it passed. At the first moment I thought it might be you coming back, to say something to me, sir, and I looked up. It turned its face upon me, and I never remember nothing after that."
"Whose face?" questioned Jan.
"The ghost's, sir. Mr. Fred Massingbird's."
"Bah!" said Jan. "Faces look alike in the moonlight."
"Twas his face," answered the girl, from between her shaking lips. "I saw its every feature, sir."
"Porcupine and all?" retorted Jan, ironically.
"Porkypine and all, sir. I'm not sure that I should have knowed it at first, but for the porkypine."