rs they won't come down. You can come back to
dinner."

"Well, you darling!" gasped Jessie.

Her chum leaned against the door jamb while peal after peal of
laughter shook her. She could just put out her hands and make motions
at the freckled little girl.

"She--she--she----"

"For pity's sake, Amy Drew!" exclaimed Jessie. "You'll have a fit, or
something."

"She--she didn't even--stop--chewing!" Amy got out at last.

"Bless her heart! She's the bravest little thing!" Jessie declared,
shakingly. "We two great, big girls should be ashamed."

"I guess you ain't so much acquainted with snakes as I am," Henrietta
said, sliding onto the bench again. "But I certainly am glad it wasn't
Carter's ha'nt."

"But," cried Amy, still weak from laughing, "it _was_ the ghost. Of
course, those snakes had a home upstairs there. Probably in the
chimney. And every time anybody came here to picnic and built a fire,
they got warmed up and started moving about. Thusly, the ghost stories
about the Carter house."

"Your explanation is ingenious, at any rate," admitted Jessie. "Ugh!
They are still writhing. Are you sure they are dead, Henrietta?"

"That's the trouble with snakes," said the child. "They don't know
enough to keep still when they're dead-ed. I smashed their heads good
for 'em."

But Amy could not bear to sit down to the bench again until she had
taken the stick and poked the dead but still writhing snakes out of
the house. The rain was diminishing now and the thunder and lightning
had receded into the distance. The two older girls ate very little of
the luncheon they had brought. It was with much amazement that they
watched Henrietta absorb sandwiches, cake, eggs, and fruit. She did a
thorough job.

"Isn't she the bravest little thing?" Jessie whispered to her chum.
"Did you ever hear the like?"

"I guess that girl we saw run away with, was her cousin all right,"
said Amy. "How she did fight!"

At that statement Jessie was reminded of the thing that had been
puzzling her for some days. She began asking questions about Bertha,
how she looked, how old she was, and how she was dressed.

"She's just my cousin. She is as old as you girls, I guess, but not so
awful old," Henrietta said. "I don't know what she had on her. She
ain't as pretty as you girls. Guess there ain't none of our family
real pretty," and Henrietta shook her head with reflection.

"What happened to her that she wanted to leave that dreadful fat
w