Part 20 (1/2)

”Honestly?”

”Yes, honestly.”

”I knew a woman in Chicago,” said Miss Landbury, ”and she said the night before her mother died she lay down on the cot to rest, and a white shadow came and hovered over the bed, and she saw in it, like a dream, all the details of her mother's death just as it happened the very next day. She swore it was true.”

”Don't talk any more about white shadows,” said Carol. ”They make me nervous.”

”Wouldn't it be ghastly to wake up alone in a little wind-blown canvas tent in the dead of night, and find it shut off from the world by a white shadow, and hear a low voice whisper, 'Come,' and feel yourself drawn slowly into the shadow by invisible clammy fingers--”

”Don't,” cried Miss Landbury.

”That's not nice,” said Carol.

”Don't scare the girls, Barrows. Carol will sleep under the bed to-night.”

”I am with the girls myself,” said Gooding. ”There isn't any sense getting yourself all worked up talking about spirits and ghosts and things that never happened in the world.”

”Oh, they didn't, didn't they? Just the same, when you reach out for a cough-drop and get hold of a bunch of clinging fingers that aren't yours, and are not connected with anybody that belongs there,--well, I for one don't take any chances with ghosts.”

A sudden brisk tap on the door drew a startled movement from the men and a frightened cry from the girls. The door opened and the head nurse stood before them.

”Ten-fifteen,” she said curtly. ”Please go to your cottages at once.

Mr. Duke, why don't you send your company home at ten o'clock?”

”Bad manners. Ministers need hospitality more than religion nowadays, they tell us.”

”Oh, Miss David,” cried Miss Tucker, ”won't you go out to my tent with me? I feel so nervous to-night.”

”What is the matter?” asked the nurse suspiciously, looking from one to another of the flushed faces and noting the restless hands and the fearful eyes.

”Nothing, nothing at all, but my head aches and I feel lonesome.”

The nurse contracted her lips curiously. ”Of course I will go,” she said.

”Let me come too,” said Miss Landbury, rising with alacrity. ”I have a headache myself.”

Huddled together in an anxious group they set forth, and the nurse, like a good shepherd, led her little flock to shelter. But as she walked back to her room, her brows were knitted curiously.

”What in the world were the silly things talking about?” she wondered.

”David Duke,” Carol was informing her husband, as she stood over him, in negligee ready to ”hop in,” ”I shall let the light burn all night, or I shall sleep in the cot with you. I won't run any risk of white shadows sitting on me in the dark.”

”Why, Carol--”

”Take your pick, my boy,” she interrupted briskly. ”The light burns, or I sleep with you.”

”This cot is hardly big enough for one,” he argued. ”And neither of us can sleep with that bright light burning.”

”David,” she wailed, ”I have looked under the bed three times already, but I know something will get me between the electric switch and the bed.”

David laughed at her, but said obligingly, ”Well, jump in and cover up your head with a pillow, and get yourself settled, and I will turn off the lights myself.”