"
"And Mrs. Jones's three children died there."
"Well, and didn't Mrs. Gardner lose her two and that brother of hers? and
I never heard their place was haunted; and didn't two die out of the
Trueman house? and ever so many more all over town? It was a dreadful
sickly summer."
"And Sarah Jane McClean was taken sick there with fever."
"Well, they had dirt enough to account for anything. Doctor Brown told me
himself that they had a great heap of potatoes sprouted in the cellar, and
there ain't anything so bad as that."
The last vestige of a ghost was demolished: Miss Faithful had nothing more
to say.
"It's nigh twenty-five years since the old doctor went off," said Miss
Sophonisba. "It ain't very probable he's alive now; and if he is, he won't
be very apt to come back: and if he is dead, he certainly won't. If he
did, I'd like to ask him why he never paid father that fifty dollars. I
saw Peter Phelps to-day, and he says he'll fix the place all up for us if
we'll have it, but of course I wouldn't say anything about it till I'd
spoken to you."
"Just as you please, Sophonisba," said Miss Faithful.
"He says he'll give us a bit of ground down on the flat for a garden, and
let his man dig it up for us. I went up and looked at the house. It ain't
so much out of repair as you'd think.
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