e the horrors over a kitchen! Sha'n't I tell of your fright when
we get home--how you didn't want to open the door, and wanted to 'let
well enough alone'? The place _might_ be haunted by the ghost of
a chicken or a rabbit, but, my dear, you should not allow that to
terrify you.'

"'Perhaps it was the ghost of a chicken that you feared last night,
and that caused your presentiments this morning. I hope you will
inform the police of what you have discovered here,' I remarked
quietly.

"'A truce, a truce, good Jane! I will say no more. We were both
boobies. But wouldn't it be 'cute to live here, you and me, and make
our own breakfast? Look at the hole for charcoal, and the little
cupboard, the nails for the pots and pans to hang on: everything is
complete. That room could be for dining, the other a parlor, and--'

"'The only drawback would be that, except at the North Pole, the night
comes once in twenty-four hours.'

"'Don't be mean, Jane! Do come in here a minute: it's a dear little
place.'

"'You will certainly make a housekeeper if a kitchen gives you such
ecstasy. Come out, I am so hungry. Put on your bonnet and leave this
elysium: I have had enough of it.'

"'You come in for a second: it will shake the terror off and you
won't dream of it. That is a cure my old nurse once gave me for laying
ghosts.'

"'It may be a good plan to shake off the terror, but the dust on you
will not be shaken off so easily.'

"'Suppose,' and she stamped her foot--'suppose that the floor should
be hollow, and that this were only a pretended kitchen after all, or
that there was a trap-door painted to resemble tiles, or a sliding
panel.' Here she felt over the surface of the wall. 'Why should I feel
so queer last night if this was really nothing but a kitchen?'

"'Because you are a goose,' I answered impatiently, 'and if you don't
come I will leave you. If you like, you can engage boarding here for a
week, and raise the tiles one by one with a knife and fork. As for me,
I am going to breakfast.'

"'But don't you think it really has an uncanny look?' she asked,
giving a last glance over her shoulder as she came out.

"'If you call dirt uncanny, there is plenty of that. Shut the door,
and I will push back the bed.'

"'Jane,' she again remarked as she was trying on her bonnet before the
crooked glass, 'if ever I tell of this night, I think I will say that
there _was_ a trap-door in the kitchen: you know there might be one
and we