uls. Some one _had them_, had them with a vengeance! Whatever
would they do now?

Sally May was not in the least daunted, whatever the others might feel.
"I'll tell you," she said; "it's some one who wanted to come to the
party doing it for a joke"--but that brought little comfort. The party
was a secret, and who would know where to find them? Forebodings as to
to-morrow's punishment filled their minds.

Sally May, however, was accustomed to punishments. "Sufficient unto the
day" was evidently her motto. "Come on, let's tell ghost stories," she
said, and the others obediently seated themselves on the floor again.
Sally May produced a large box of chocolates which they were keeping for
another time, and began a long tale of a ghost who followed, and
followed, and followed a man up and down, up and down, the corridors of
an old manor house. The hero could hear the ghost's footsteps and its
blood-curdling laugh, but he was afraid to turn his head, and when he
did--very, very, very, slowly--the muscles of seven little necks
stiffened obedient to Sally May's suggestion--he saw a terrible--but
here Rosamond broke in with an hysterical cry, "Please, Sally May, I
can't bear any more"--and Sally May's spell was broken.

Indeed they all began to be frankly miserable, for they were chilly by
this time, and even schoolgirls' stomachs are susceptible to unlimited
cake and candy. Nancy fell asleep and leaned on Judith, making her most
uncomfortable. Sally May confessed quite openly to a feeling of
sickness, and in a steady whisper poured into Judith's ear the ghastly
details of how ill she had been at Knowlton after a lobster supper. The
night wore on. Most of them finally went to sleep in uncomfortable
attitudes, but about four o'clock in the morning, Judith, who was much
too unhappy and too uncomfortable to sleep, got up stiffly from the
floor and walking about the room, tried the door once more. To her huge
astonishment and joy it opened! Catherine had come up a couple of hours
before, but the striking of the big clock in the hall had covered the
very slight noise of the turning of the lock.

"It was open all the time," protested several unhappy voices.

"You didn't try it properly."

"We did," said other cross voices, and sulkily and stiffly they creaked
down the hall to their longed-for beds.

The rising bell rang in about an hour's time; at least so it seemed to
eight very sleepy girls. Pancakes and maple syrup, the favo