mitted. "I ate a whole one up
here at a feast once, and I've never been able to stand the sight of one
since."

"This old room could tell some great tales if it could speak, couldn't
it?" Patty Paine said, looking about. "It's a barren hole, but I adore
it. I've had some great times here. Remember the night we thought we
heard some one coming and we got into the trunks? That was the time
Angela fell down-stairs and had hysterics. It was initiation night, too,
wasn't it? My, but wasn't Miss North furious! I thought she'd freeze
into an icicle. It took her weeks to thaw out."

"Had you a suspicion that she _had_ thawed out?" Ruth inquired.

"Oh, she isn't so bad, Ruth," Patty defended. "I've got a right soft
spot in my heart for Miss North--"

"Girls! what was that noise?" Angela Dare interrupted in a whisper. "I'm
sure I heard some one walking."

A hush fell over the room. The girls strained their ears.

"Oh, Angela! You're always hearing things. Your imagination is worse
than your conscience. They're both ingrowing," Ruth declared. "I don't
think you heard a blessed thing!"

"Yes, she did, Ruth," Blue Bonnet insisted. "I heard it, too."

"You did?"

"Yes--shh--there! You heard it then, didn't you?"

All admitted that they did hear some sort of a sound and sat with bated
breath.

"It's a rat or a mouse! Oh, see--there it goes--look, behind that big
brown trunk!"

The appearance of Fraulein accompanied by Miss North could scarcely have
caused greater confusion. The girls scattered in every direction. Wee
Watts made an attempt to climb the wall in her anxiety to escape,
turning over an old chair that fell with dreadful clatter.

"Wee Watts," Annabel said sternly, "stop acting so silly. Get down off
that old box instantly. It's going to break with you. We'll every one be
caught here in another minute. Exercise some sense!"

But Wee, her limbs shaking with fright, clung helplessly to the rough
beams in the old attic wall, beseeching the girls to let her alone.

"I'll faint if it comes near me--I know I shall," she wailed, her teeth
chattering. "Oh--oh--there it goes again--oh, oh, don't scare it this
way--don't--don't, Annabel! Please--please--"

Blue Bonnet climbed up beside Wee and put her hand over her mouth.

"Hush!" she said. "Do you want to get us all in trouble? I thought you
had such courage--met big things so well--"

"Oh, I do, Blue Bonnet--I really do--but this is a little thing--such a
horr