sleeping there again.

"Is it becoming a cavalier," said Mette, "to be afraid of a shadow? I am
but a woman, and yet I dare undertake the adventure."

"I will stake my Sorrel," answered the Junker, "that you will not try
it."

"I will wager my Dun against it," cried Mette.

It was believed that she was in jest; but as she obstinately insisted on
adhering to the wager, both her lover and father strove to dissuade her
from so hazardous an enterprise. She was inflexible. The Junker now
considered it his duty to make a full confession. The old man shook his
head; Froeken Mette laughed, and maintained he had dreamed, and, in order
to convince him that he had, she felt herself the more bound to fulfil
her engagement. The father, whose paternal pride was flattered by the
courage of his daughter, now gave his consent; and all that Junker Kai
could obtain was, that a bell-rope should be brought close to the bed,
and that her waiting-maid should lie in the same chamber. Mette, on the
other hand, stipulated, that all persons in the house should continue in
their beds, that it might not afterwards be said they had frightened
away the spectre; and that no one should have a light after eleven
o'clock. Her father and the Junker would take up their quarters for the
night in the so-called gilded chamber, which was separated from the
tower-chamber only by a long passage. In this room hung the bell with
which, in case of need, the young lady was to sound an alarm. The
mother, no less heroic than the daughter, readily gave her consent to
the adventure, the execution of which was fixed for the following night.

IV.-THE ELOPEMENT.

Throughout this momentous night, which was to fix the future lot of the
Isabel, or Dun, and the Sorrel, neither family nor domestics enjoyed
much sleep: all lay in anxious expectation of the extraordinary things
that were likely to come to pass. Mewing of cats, screeching of owls,
barking of dogs, drove the dustman[14] away every time he came sneaking
in. The stable-boys heard the horses pant, snort, and kick; to the
bailiff it seemed as if sacks were being dragged about the granary; the
dairy-maid declared it was precisely like the noise of churning; and the
housekeeper heard, plainly enough, a sort of rummaging in the pantry.
Nor did sleep find its way into the gilded chamber. The lord of the
manor and the Junker lay silent, from time to time casting a look at the
little silver bell that hung between the