Page:Letters from an Oregon Ranch.djvu/200

 there, listening to softly falling rain, night winds soughing through the forest, owls hooting in the orchard,—nature music as deliciously lulling to the senses as the “drowsy wine of poppies.”

But the midnight adventure can no longer be postponed.

During the night I woke suddenly without any apparent cause, but with the sure consciousness of something being wrong, soon verified by the strangest of sounds, as if tiny soft hands were very gently patting time for unseen dancers,—an awfully creepy sound in the dark. A little later came stealthy footsteps, nearer and nearer, seeming to approach the dais. Soon there was a rustling among some clothes hanging on the wall, quite near, as if they were being fumbled over. Flesh and blood could endure no more.

“Tom! Tom! There’s somebody in this room! Get a light, quick!”

“How foolish you are, Katharine! If you hear anything at all,—which I doubt,—it’s only the squirrels running over the roof.”

“Don’t stop now to talk! Do hurry with the light!”

Reluctantly and with great deliberation he arose, muttering something about “idiocy” and “spells,” and just as he struck a match, a horrible hairy creature bounded out of those clothes, leaped to the wall, and ran along a rafter to the comb of the roof.

“For heaven’s sake, what was it, Tom?”