Aunt Martha had just about decided to untie a fit of hysterics,when Clara J. reached for the kerosene bucket and threw oil on thetroubled waters.

"Let's drop all this nonsense about burglars and ghosts and go tobreakfast," she suggested. "I don't believe there ever was a ghostwithin sixty miles of this house, and to save my soul I couldn't beafraid of a burglar whose specialty consisted of falling in thecellar and swearing till help came!"

After breakfast I was dragged away to the brook to fish for lambchops or whatever kind of an animal it was that Uncle Peter andTacks decided would bite. Aunt Martha posted off to the city onurgent business, the nature of which she carefully concealed fromeverybody.