kindest-'arted pal, why I've often heard you say--"

"H'sh!" ses Bill. "I didn't. I'll swear I didn't. I never thought of
such a thing."

"You turn over and go to sleep," ses his wife, "hiding your 'ead under
the clothes like a child that's afraid o' the dark! There's nothing
there, I tell you. Wot next will you see, I wonder? Last time it was a
pink rat."

"This is fifty million times worse than pink rats," ses Bill. "I on'y
wish it was a pink rat."

"I tell you there is nothing there," ses his wife. "Look!"

Bill put his 'ead up and looked, and then 'e gave a dreadful scream and
dived under the bed-clothes agin.

"Oh, well, 'ave it your own way, then," ses his wife. "If it pleases you
to think there is a ghost there, and to go on talking to it, do so, and
welcome."

She turned over and pretended to go to sleep agin, and arter a minute or
two Silas spoke agin in the same hollow voice.

"Bill!" he ses.

"Yes," ses Bill, with a groan of his own.

"She can't see me," ses Silas, "and she can't 'ear me; but I'm 'ere all