"All by myself," said Hortense.

Aunt Esmerelda shook her head and muttered, but rising, found a candle
and lighted it.

"Ef yo' say yo' prayahs, mebbe nothin'll git yo'," she said ominously.

It was black as a hat in the basement, and little shivers ran up and
down Hortense's spine, but she ran quickly to the storeroom and filled
her plate with apples from the big barrel.

Starting back she heard a noise and stopped, her heart pounding and
little pin pricks crinkling her scalp; then she hurried to the stairs,
almost running. But she did not run up the stairs, for she didn't wish
to have Aunt Esmerelda think her afraid.

She was a glad little girl, nevertheless, when she was safe again in
the light kitchen.

"Yo' didn' see nothin'?" demanded Aunt Esmerelda.

"I didn't see anything," said Hortense. "I heard something, but it was
probably only a rat." She spoke bravely, quite like Grandfather.

"'Twan't no rat," muttered Aunt Esmerelda gloomily, shaking her head.
"It's a ha'nt or a ghos'. Dey's ha'nts and ghos's all 'roun dis place."

Hortense began to feel quite brave after she had arrived safely in the
cheerful dining room. Grandfather looked at her, shrewdly smiling.

"Did you see or hear anything?" he asked.

"I heard--a noise," replied Hortense.

"And were you afraid?" he asked again.

Hortense looked into his bright, kind eyes.

"A little," she confessed.

Grandfather took her on his knee.

"It isn't being afraid that matters," he said. "It's doing what you set
out to do whether afraid or not That's what it is to be brave."

"Really?" Hortense asked.

"Yes, really," assured Grandfather. "It is not brave to be without
fear, but to overcome it. Now we'll go into the library, and I'll tell
you the promised story and give you something--but what it is, I'll not
reveal until later."

Grandmother returned to her chair and her knitting, with the white owl
and the cat for company, and Grandfather and Hortense found a
comfortable seat in Grandfather's big chair. There was a cheerful fire
on the hearth, and Grandfather's study lamp cast a bright light upon
his desk--but the bronze Buddha remained in a shadow, and the rows of
books along the walls were scarcely visible.

"When I was a young lad in Scotland," said Grandfather when Hortense
was seated on his knee with her head upon his shoulder, "I had a close
friend of my own age whose name was Dugald--Dugald Stewart. We grew up
together, and when we be