cture of this calm and capable figure in
the midst of the feverish, over-lighted, over-heated room. In that
moment the nervous pucker between her eyes ironed out ever so little,
and something resembling a wan smile crept into her face. And what she
said was:

"I wouldn't have believed it."

"Believed what?" inquired Martha Foote, pleasantly.

"That there was anybody left in the world who could look like that in a
white shirtwaist at 6:30 A.M. Is that all your own hair?"

"Strictly."

"Some people have all the luck," sighed Geisha McCoy, and dropped
listlessly back on her pillows. Martha Foote came forward into the room.
At that instant the woman in the bed sat up again, tense, every nerve
strained in an attitude of listening. The mulatto girl had come swiftly
to the foot of the bed and was clutching the footboard, her knuckles
showing white.

"Listen!" A hissing whisper from the haggard woman in the bed. "What's
that?"

"Wha' dat!" breathed the coloured girl, all her elegance gone, her
every look and motion a hundred-year throwback to her voodoo-haunted
ancestors.

The three women remained rigid, listening. From the wall somewhere
behind the bed came a low, weird monotonous sound, half wail, half
croaking moan, like a banshee with a cold. A clanking, then, as of
chains. A s-s-swish. Then three dull raps, seemingly from within the
very wall itself.

The coloured girl was trembling. Her lips were moving, soundlessly. But
Geisha McCoy's emotion was made of different stuff.

"Now look here," she said, desperately, "I don't mind a sleepless night.
I'm used to 'em. But usually I can drop off at five, for a little while.
And that's been going on--well, I don't know how long. It's driving me
crazy. Blanche, you fool, stop that hand wringing! I tell you there's no
such thing as ghosts. Now you"--she turned to Martha Foote again--"you
tell me, for God's sake, what _is_ that!"

And into Martha Foote's face there came such a look of mingled
compassion and mirth as to bring a quick flame of fury into Geisha
McCoy's eyes.

"Look here, you may think it's funny but--"

"I don't. I don't. Wait a minute." Martha Foote turned and was gone. An
instant later the weird sounds ceased. The two women in the room looked
toward the door, expectantly. And through it came Martha Foote, smiling.
She turned and beckoned to some one without. "Come on," she said. "Come
on." She put out a hand, encouragingly, and brought forward the
s