rd I'll never be so frightened
again in all my livin' days. I set there in a transom from fear an' friz
ter the spot. I don't know nothin' o' what Buck was doin', as my lamps
was glued ter the spook. It jumped down from the wall, callin' an'
whistlin' an' begin runnin' round the little stone heaps. I seen it was
comin' our way, but I couldn't move or make a sound; I jus' set. All of
a suddent Buck he jumps up an' makes a dash an' a leap at the spook, an'
there's a terrible yellin' an' they both comes down crash at the foot of
a rock pile, rollin' on the little pebbles; but Buck is on top an' the
spook underneath an' lettin' off the most awful screeches. Gosh, they
jus' ripped the air, them spooks' yells did, an' they turned my spell
loose an' I howled fer all I was worth. Then Buck, he commenced
a-yawpin' too, but me an' the spook we was both raisin' so much noise I
didn't savvy what he said fer some time. Then I found he was cussin' me
out.

"'Come here, you forsaken ---- ----,' he howls. 'Quit yellin'! I say _quit
yellin'_! Don't yer see who this is? Come here an' help me.'

"'You think I'm goin' ter tech that Ming spook?' I shrieks.

"'You miser'ble loony,' he yells back, 'can't yer see it ain't no Ming?
It's Ranch!'

"Well, so it was. It was Ranch skeered stiff an' hollerin' fer dear life
at bein' jumped on an' waked up in the middle of a graveyard that-a-way.
Pore ol' feller had had Daggett on his mind, an' went sleepwalkin' an'
huntin' wrapped in his blanket.

"'An',' says Buck ter me, 'if youse hadn't been in such a dope dream
with skeer, you'd 'a' sensed what he was a-yellin'. He was callin'
"Oh-oo-oo, oh-oo-oo, here Daggett! Here, boy!" an' then he'd whistle an'
call again: "Here, Daggett! Here, Daggett!" That's how I knew it was
Ranch; an', besides, he told me onct that he sleepwalked when he got
worried. But you, you white livered--' an' then he cussed me out some
more.

"'Smarty,' I says, 'if yer knew so blame well it was Ranch, why did yer
give him the flyin' tackle like yer done an' git him all woiked up like
this?'

"'Well,' says Buck sort o' sheepy, 'I was some woiked up meself, an'
time he come along I give him the spook's tackle without thinkin'; I was
too skeered ter think. Hush, Ranch. Hush, old boy. It's jus' me'n Bill.
Nobody shan't hoit yer.'

"We comforted pore ol' Ranch an' fixed him up, an' then when he felt
better told him about things--all but how Daggett was et--an' I wrapped
his