Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1903-11-26


my doubts as to naturalization. In
short. he promised to show me q spirit
returned to~earth. And he added rath-
er naysteriously, The character of this
manifestation is such that even you
will not charge fraud / had been
working pretty hard, and the tempta-
ton was great to have few days in
the country Strange to say, the hope
Of seeing my friends ghost repealed
rather than attracted me. was salts
fed that there was trickery Of some
kind and felt reasonably certain that /
should discover the truth. was equal
" sure that my friend was honest, and
/ was loath to be party to his dis
comfture when / should have shown
up his ghost in its true colors.
II reached the station about noon
on Thanksgiving day. MY friend met
me and took great delight In showing
me over his new home. The family,
of course, were cordial. as ! had long
been on closely intimate terms with
them-in fact, called his wife and
two girls by their names. The wife,
Margaret, was one of those hero wor-
shippers, her husband being the hero.
She saw everything as he saw it and,
of course. was as firmly fixed in spir-
itualistic theories as he. The eldest
daughter, Stephanie, was college bred,
a Vassar graduate, and not only be-
lieved in spiritualism, but could prove
it, or thought she could, mathematical
", logically, psychologically and phil
osophically. She was the pride of her
father and his mainstay in an argu-
ment. The other girl, Fanny, was my
favorite, and if she believed in ghosts
/ am sure it was only because of her
environment. She had no fixed ideas Of
her own. Then there was the youngest
child, Charlie. the Satan of the family,
a boy of fifteen. This young rascal
openly avowed a firm belief in ghosts
within earshot of his parents; but,
while vouching for the accuracy Of his
fathers many tales Of visiting spec
ters, not infrequently Charlie would
slyly wink one eye at me. Here may
as well say frankly that I associated
my friends latest ghost with Charlie
/ expected that, should discover the
secret strings which moved the specter,
l would likewise find that Charlie
was pulling them. In this connection
was destined to meet my first mysti-
fication.
ITO my SURPRISE my friend said
nothing about the ghostly visitation
from the moment of my arrival up to
the time when was shown to my
room TO make my toilet for dinner.
attributed this to his innate courtesy
and natural diffidence. He evidently
hesitated to bore me too soon with his
theories, or, as had often called it,
his fad. While 1 was washing there
was light rap on my door. and Char
lie walked in
Say, DOCTOR said he, getting at his
topic without delay, suppose dads
told you about our spook, and you've
come up to see her, haven't youg
Yes | replied. But i did not
know it was female. Have you seen
her yourselfg | thought / might as
well pump the youngster at once.
Have / seen her?' said he. Wen,
l guess yes. Say, doctor, can trust
you, can't ~
Why, certainly said /. 1t seemed
that my discoveries were to be all too
easy. But was mistaken.
Well continued Charlie, you must
know then that l never took any stock
in dads ghosts-th is, not In any Of
the others. OF course I've seen a lot OF
them, and then. again, there's been a lot
more that dad said he saw. but didn't
see, though I've agreed with him. be-
cause well. just to make him happy
A boy must do that, eh, doctorY
You sly young rascal! thought l,
but / merely answered With nod, and
he went on:
You see, ali the other ghosts and
ghostesses were just common every
day sort Of spooks, things with sheets
round them. and they most generally
came in the dark, when there was lit /
tie chance TO tell much about their
looks. They might have been the me-
diums, you know, at least some of
them. But it's different with this ghost
we've got now. She's beauty. and
there doesn't seem any chance for a
humbug about it.
Why notY / asked. wondering
whether the humbuggery were not go
ing on at the very moment.
Wen. in the first place, it's such Il
little bit of ghost. She must have
died when she was not more than sew
en- or eight years old, should think
Anyway, she's only SO high. indicating
with his hand held above the floor
You would hardly expect a medium to
make up for little one like that. now.
would you? It's easier to believe in the
ghost notion
- "A grown person could hardly make
up for SO small ghost. must admit.
said |. But how do you know it is not
4 child who does this trickY
:" What child. doctor? | know all the
Fo1in psfprs that live around here end