e child, a girl. She married and died,
leaving a baby for her father and mother to look after. A few years ago
John's wife died, too, and the old man came back here to the old place.
He didn't have any money, and I expect he didn't have any other home to
go to." Mrs. Preston paused. She had driven around the haunted house,
but her visitors were more interested in her story than they were in the
sight of the deserted mansion.

"Then, I suppose, poor John died," added Miss Betsey sadly, her face
clouding with memories; the John Randolph she had known had been so full
of youth and enthusiasm.

Mrs. Preston flapped her reins. "I reckon so," she sighed. "You see,
John Randolph did not have any real claim on the Grinsteads. They were
his brother James's wife's people, and I suppose they were not very good
to him; or it may be the old man was just sensitive. Anyway, John
Randolph went away from the Grinstead place about six months ago. No
word has been heard of him, so I suppose he is dead."

Miss Betsey surreptitiously wiped away a few tears for her dead romance.
They were not very bitter tears. Of course, her old lover, John
Randolph, was only a memory. But it was sad to hear that he had had such
an unfortunate life; he might better have been less "touchy" and not
have left _her_ so abruptly. Miss Betsey's tears passed unnoticed. Miss
Jenny Ann was also depressed by the story, and as for kind Mrs. Preston,
she sighed deeply every five or ten minutes during the ride home.

But Miss Betsey was so quiet and unlike herself all the evening that
Madge, Phyllis and Lillian decided that she must feel ill. The girls
would never have believed, even if they had been told, that Miss Betsey,
who was on the shady side of sixty, could possibly have been sorrowing
over a lover whom she had not seen in nearly forty years. But girls do
not know that the minds of older people travel backward, and that an old
maid is a "girl" at heart to the longest day she lives.

Miss Taylor went up to her own room early.

Madge and Phyllis were undressing to jump into bed, when a knock on
their door startled them.

"Girls!" a voice cried in trembling tones.

"It's poor Miss Betsey!" exclaimed Phil. "I'll wager she is ill or
something, she has been acting so queerly all evening." Phil ran to open
their door.

"Take me in, children," whispered Miss Betsey, shaking her head. "Sh-sh!
Don't make a noise; something so strange has happened. I couldn't wai