berty to
mention to any one."

"Though we have met here, Mr Deane, I shall be glad to see you at the
Grange, to speak to you more at large than I can now," said Mr Harwood,
as he shook Jack by the hand.

Accompanied by two of the persons present, Jack returned once more to
the room above, where, having advised him to go to sleep instead of
listening to the voices of the ghosts, they left him. He wisely
endeavoured to follow their advice.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

JACK AGAIN VISITS HARWOOD GRANGE.

The next morning when the old couple and Burdale made their appearance,
they did not in any way allude to what had taken place during the night,
as if they had been totally ignorant of it. Breakfast was got ready by
the aged dame; and afterwards Jack stole about the building, and found
his way without difficulty into the vault below. Not a trace of any of
the occupants of the previous evening was to be seen, but how they had
gone he could not discover. Certainly they had not come up by the steps
by which he had descended, and passed through the hall.

As the afternoon approached, Jack became more impatient than ever to pay
his proposed visit to Harwood Grange. Mr Harwood had spoken so kindly
to him, that he could not help hoping he would not reject him as a
son-in-law. At length the hour fixed by Burdale for starting arrived,
and Jack eagerly threw himself into the saddle.

"Why, your horse partakes of your spirit," observed his companion, as,
clapping his spurs in the horse's side, Jack galloped over the
greensward at a rate which put his guide's steed on his mettle.

He would willingly have gone by himself, but unacquainted with that part
of the forest, he would scarcely alone have found his way in the dark.
A couple of hours' hard riding, sometimes across cultivated ground, and
at others over what remained in a state of nature, brought him to the
neighbourhood of the Grange. Leaving the horses with Burdale, who
promised to remain concealed with them under a thick clump of trees, he
went towards the house on foot. Jack found the Squire waiting for him
in a sheltered walk at a short distance from the house, and having
delivered the messages and letters he had received from the various
persons he had visited, gave him a full account of his adventures.

"You have indeed managed admirably, my young friend," said Mr Harwood.
"You would make a first-rate diplomatist, and I shall have very great
satisfaction in reco