entered the park and the Manor in the same way that I had done. Yet, when
we tried to open the step, we failed, and had finally to smash it. This
must have warned the haunters; for when we descended to a secret room
which we found at the end of a long and narrow passage in the thickness
of the walls, we found no one.

"The police were horribly disgusted, as you can imagine; but for my
part, I did not care either way. I had 'laid the ghost,' as you might
say, and that was what I set out to do. I was not particularly afraid of
being laughed at by the others; for they had all been thoroughly 'taken
in'; and in the end, I had scored, without their help.

"We searched right through the secret ways, and found that there was an
exit, at the end of a long tunnel, which opened in the side of a well,
out in the grounds. The ceiling of the hall was hollow, and reached by a
little secret stairway inside of the big staircase. The 'blood-drip' was
merely colored water, dropped through the minute crevices of the
ornamented ceiling. How the candles and the fire were put out, I do not
know; for the haunters certainly did not act quite up to tradition, which
held that the lights were put out by the 'blood-drip.' Perhaps it was too
difficult to direct the fluid, without positively squirting it, which
might have given the whole thing away. The candles and the fire may
possibly have been extinguished by the agency of carbonic acid gas; but
how suspended, I have no idea.

"The secret hiding paces were, of course, ancient. There was also, did I
tell you? a bell which they had rigged up to ring, when anyone entered
the gates at the end of the drive. If I had not climbed the wall, I
should have found nothing for my pains; for the bell would have warned
them had I gone in through the gateway."