ith a book, put aside the volume and came running.

"Look, look! Now it's moving," her brother continued with growing
suspense. "It's the arm of a black coat; wait, soon the whole shutter
will be opened."

At this moment a black object lifted itself and soared up to the tower.

"It was only a bird, a large black-bird," said the disappointed Mea.
"You have called me at least twenty times already; every time you think
that the shutters will open, and they never do. You can call as often as
you please from now on, I shall certainly not come again."

"I know they will open some day," the boy asserted firmly, "only we can't
tell just when; but it might be any time. If only stiff old Trius would
answer the questions we ask him! He knows everything that is going on up
there. But the old crosspatch never says a word when one comes near him
to talk; all he does is to come along with his big stick. He naturally
doesn't want anybody to know what is happening up there, but everybody in
school knows that a ghost wanders about and sighs through the pine
trees."

"Mother has said more than once that nothing is going on there at all.
She doesn't want you to talk about the ghost with the school-children,
and she has asked you not to try to find out what they know about it.
You know, too, that mother wants you to call the castle watchman Mr.
Trius and not just Trius."

"Oh, yes, I'll call him Mr. Trius, but I'll make up such a song about
him that everybody will know who it is about," Kurt said threateningly.

"How can he help it when there is no ghost in Wildenstein about which he
could tell you tales," Mea remarked.

"Oh, he has enough to tell," Kurt eagerly continued. "Many wonderful
things must have happened in a castle that is a thousand years old. He
knows them all and could tell us, but his only answer to every question
is a beating. You know, Mea, that I do not believe in ghosts or spirits.
But it is so exciting to imagine that an old, old Baron of Wallerstaetten
might wander around the battlements in his armor. I love to imagine him
standing under the old pine trees with wild eyes and threatening
gestures. I love to think of fighting him, or telling him that I am not
afraid."

"Oh, yes, I am sure you would run away if the armoured knight with his
wild eyes should come nearer," said Mea. "It is never hard to be brave
when one is as far away from danger as you are now."

"Oho! so you think I would be afraid of a ghost,"