And then we all played at it; and we all won. All except the
curate, that is. He had a very bad quarter of an hour. I never
knew a man have such hard luck at cards. He lost every time.

We had some more punch after that; and Uncle made such a funny
mistake in brewing it: he left out the whisky. Oh, we did laugh
at him, and we made him put in double quantity afterwards, as a
forfeit.

Oh, we did have such fun that evening!

And then, somehow or other, we must have got on to ghosts; because
the next recollection I have is that we were telling ghost stories
to each other.



TEDDY BIFFLES' STORY



Teddy Biffles told the first story, I will let him repeat it here
in his own words.

(Do not ask me how it is that I recollect his own exact words--
whether I took them down in shorthand at the time, or whether he
had the story written out, and handed me the MS. afterwards for
publication in this book, because I should not tell you if you did.
It is a trade secret.)