iard contemptuously, without looking up from the
stick he was whittling. "What's eating you, Toady? There ain't any
ghosts, and you know it."

"What about that haunted house in the east end of town?"

"'Tain't haunted."

"Susie says it is."

"And Tabitha has lived alone near it for six or seven years and she has
never seen anything stirring there."

"But ghosts walk only at midnight. She's never been there at night."

"Aw, you softy----"

"Susie says the Gates boy declares he saw a ghost in the graveyard one
night."

"Well, that's different. I don't blame a ghost for walking there."

"Why, Billiard McKittrick, what do you mean?"

"Did you ever see a lonesomer place on earth than the Silver Bow
graveyard?" demanded Billiard. "Why, it's the worst looking cemetery
in the country, I believe,--just heaps of rocks and wooden sticks to
show where folks are buried. Tabitha says they _blast_ out the graves
with dynamite, six at a time, and fill them up with people as fast as
they die. Would you rest easy if you were planted in that style?
Wouldn't your ghost want to get out and walk?"

"_Billiard McKittrick_!" Toady looked positively shocked. Then after
a moment, as the older boy made no reply, the younger one continued
thoughtfully, "Maybe that's what is the matter with the ghost in the
haunted house."

"Oh, pshaw, Toady, I tell you there ain't such a thing as a ghost!"

"I'll stump you to go down to the haunted house some time and find out."

"All right, come along!"

"Not during daylight. It must be after dark. Midnight is the best
time, Susie says."

"Bother Susie! Why don't you get her to go with you?"

"You are afraid to go!" jeered Toady.

"Am not!" retorted Billiard angrily.

"Then why don't you take my dare?"

"It's all tommy-rot," insisted Billiard, with a fine show of scorn.

"'Fraid cat!"

"Oh, I'll take you up," cried the other, stung into recklessness by
Toady's taunts. "We'll go to-night."

"To-night?" stammered Toady, much abashed at his brother's sudden
acceptance of the dare.

"Yes, to-night!"

"What's your hurry?"

"Who's the 'fraid cat now?" taunted Billiard.

"Not me! To-night's the time. We'll set the alarm-clock for half-past
ten."

"Suppose it wakes the rest of the bunch?"

"They'll think it's a mistake, and in a few minutes will be asleep
again, and we can steal outside without their hearing us at all."

So it was decided, and though each boy, deep