Miss Drewitt, firmly. "Please don't
say anything to my uncle about it."

Mr. Tredgold looked disappointed. "As you please, of course," he
remarked.

"Old things always seem a little bit musty," said the girl, softening a
little. "I, should think that I saw the ghosts of dead and gone players
sitting round the table. I remember reading a story about that once."

"Well, what about the other things?" said Mr. Tredgold. "Look at those
old chairs, full of ghosts sitting piled up in each other's laps--there's
no reason why you should only see one sitter at a time. Think of that
beautifully-carved four-poster."

"My uncle bought that," said Miss Drewitt, somewhat irrelevantly.

"Yes, but I got it for him," said Mr. Tredgold. "You can't pick up a
thing like that at a moment's notice--I had my eye on it for years; all
the time old Brown was bedridden, in fact. I used to go and see him and
take him tobacco, and he promised me that I should have it when he had
done with it."

"Done with it?" repeated the girl, in a startled voice. "Did--did he get
another one, then?"

[Illustration: "'Done with it?' repeated the girl, in a startled voice."]

Mr. Tredgold, roused from the pleasurable reminiscences of a collector,
remembered himself suddenly. "Oh, yes, he got another one," he said,
soothingly.

"Is--is he bedridden now?" inquired the girl.

"I haven't seen him for some time," said Mr. Tredgold, truthfully. "He
gave up smoking and--and then I didn't go to see him, you know."

"He's dead," said Miss Drewitt, shivering. "He died in---- Oh, you are
horrible!"

"That carving--" began Mr. Tredgold.

"Don't talk about it, please," said the indignant Miss Drewitt. "I can't
understand why my uncle should have listened to your advice at all; you
must have forced it on him. I'm sure he didn't know how you got it."

"Yes, he did," said the other. "In fact, it was intended for his room at
first. He was quite pleased with it."

"Why did he alter his mind, then?" inquired the girl.

Mr. Tredgold looked suddenly at the opposite wall, but his lips quivered
and his eyes watered. Miss Drewitt, reading these signs aright, was
justly incensed.

"I don't believe it," she cried.

"He said that you didn't know and he did," said Mr. Tredgold,
apologetically. "I talk too much. I'd no business to let out about old
Brown, but I forgot for the moment--sailors are always prone to childish
superstitions."

"Are you talk