Part 35 (1/2)

”We'll see about that!” said our grandmother. ”But come! all seems quiet now; we will go to bed, and investigate further to-morrow.”

”Yes, ole mist'ess, honey, I knows all is quiet jest now, but----”

”Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!--Ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho!” burst a peal of demoniac laughter, resounding through and through the room, and close into our ears.

”The Lord between us and Satan!” cried Ca.s.sy, dropping the candle, which immediately went out and left us in darkness.

While, peal on peal, sounded the demoniac laughter around us.

Ca.s.sy fell on her knees and began praying:

”St. Mary, pray for us! St. Martha pray for us! all ye hooly vargins and widders, pray for us lone women! St. Peter, pray for us! St. Powl pray for us! All hooly 'postles and 'vangellers, pray for us poor sinners!--Saint--Saint--Saint--oh! for de Lor's sake, Miss Ally, honey, tell me de name o' that hooly saint as met a ghose riding on Balaam's a.s.s and knows hows--how it feels!”

”It was Saul or Samuel, or the Witch of Endor, I forget which,” said Alice, whose knowledge of the Old Testament, never very precise, was frightened out of her.

”St. Saul, St. Samuel, St. Witchywinder, pray for us, as met a ghost yourself and knows how it feels.”

And still, while Ca.s.sy prayed her frantic prayers, and poor old Hector told his beads, and Alice trembled and clung to me, the demon laughter resounded around and around us. We were in such total darkness that I had not seen Mrs. Hawkins withdraw herself from the group, nor suspected her absence until we heard her firm, cheery voice outside near the dining-room door, saying:

”What can any one think of this? Come here, Hector! Come here, children!”

We all went--expecting some _denouement_.

Mrs. Hawkins telegraphed to us to be perfectly silent, and to step lightly. She turned the angle of the house and walked up the blind alley between the back of the house and the back of the kitchen; when she had got about midway of the walk, she stopped, and silently pointed to the rank weeds and bushes that grew closely under the wall of the house.

”There! what do you think of that?” she said, in a low voice.

We looked, and at first could see nothing; but, on a closer inspection, we perceived a very faint glimmer, a mere thread of red light, low down among the bushes.

We looked up at Mrs. Hawkins for explanation.

”After the candle fell and went out,” she said, ”I slipped out, with the intention of exploring again, and this time alone, and in darkness. I came up this blind alley, and, looking sharply, descried that glimmer of light. And now I am convinced that the revelers, human or ghostly, are below there, in that old, disused cellar that we were made to believe was nearly full of water, and required to be drained. Don't be agitated, children! take it coolly,” concluded Mrs. Hawkins, stooping down to put aside the weeds and bushes.

Just at this moment another detonating roll of the ball, and scattering fall of the pins, and peal of hollow laughter, resounded from below.

Urr-rr-rr-r-r-r-rattle bang-ang-ang! ”Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! Ho! ho! ho!

ho! A dead shot!”

”Too late, young gentlemen! Your fun is all over! Your game is up! You are discovered! Come forth!” said Mrs. Hawkins, who, down upon her knees, pulled away the bushes, turned up the old, broken and mouldy cellar door, and discovered the scene below.

A rudely fitted-up bowling alley, occupying the further end of the room, and some eight or ten youths, no longer engaged in rolling b.a.l.l.s, but, on the contrary, standing in various att.i.tudes of detected culpability.

”Come! come forth!” commanded Mrs. Hawkins.

And they came, climbing up the rotten and moldering steps, and the very first who put his impudent head up through the door into the open air was Will Rackaway!

”Oh! Will,” exclaimed Alice, reproachfully.