me in Hadleigh Wood."

"Why should you think that?"

He had sat up stiffly, and while she clung whispering at his breast he
looked out over her head, glancing his eyes in all directions.
Straight in front of him across the glade, the great beeches were gray
and ghostly, and beyond them in the strip that concealed the ride it
seemed that the shadows had suddenly thickened and blackened.

"I'll tell you. But _you_ tell me something first. Does Mrs. Dale
think this place is haunted?"

He changed his attitude abruptly, put his hands on her shoulders and
held her away from him, so that he could see her face.

"What was it you asked me?"

"Does she fancy the wood is haunted?"

"No, why?"

"I believe she does."

"Rubbish. Why should she?"

"They used to say it was. Granny used to say so. She gave me some
dreadful whippings for coming here. Poor Granny was just like Mrs.
Dale about it--always saying it wasn't right for me to come here."

Dale had settled the girl on his knees so that she sat now without any
support from him. His hands had dropped to the rough surface of the
tree; and he spoke in his ordinary voice.

"Look here, Norah, never mind for a moment what your Granny said. Tell
me what it was that my wife said."

"When do you mean? Last time she was angry?"

"I mean, whatever she said--and whenever she said it--about ghosts or
hauntings."

"Oh, a long time ago. It was to Mrs. Goudie."

"I expect you misunderstood her. But I'd like to know what first put
such nonsense into your head--that Mrs. Dale thought the wood was
haunted. Can't you remember exactly what she did say?"

"She said something about the gentleman's being killed here, and she
wondered at the people coming a Sundays like they used to."

"Was that all?"

"No, she said something about it would serve them right for their
pains if they saw the gentleman's ghost."

Dale grunted. "That was just her joke. There are no such things as
ghosts."

"Aren't there?" Norah laughed softly and happily, and snuggled down
again with her face against his jacket. "_You_ aren't a ghost--though
you made me jump, yes, you did. But I wasn't afraid of you."

"Hush," he muttered. "Norah, don't go on--don't." His hands were still
on the tree, rigidly fixed there, and he sat bolt upright, staring
out over her head.

"Why not? You said I might tell my secrets. I wasn't afraid. I thought
'Oh, aren't I glad I done what Mrs. Dale told me not to--and come into