"Then you shall, Master," said old Cicely, rather excitedly. "'Twas at Dagworth in Suffolk, in the house of one Master Osborne, where she served as chambermaid. He had been a while in the house, had the ghost, and nobody couldn't get to see him--no, not the parson, though he used to reason with him on doctrine and godliness. They oft heard him a-calling for meat and drink, with the voice of a child of one year, which meat being put in a certain place was no more seen. He said his name was Malke. And after a while, one day she spoke to him and begged him for a sight of him, promising not to touch him. Whereupon he appeared to her as a young child in a white coat, and told her that he was a mortal child, stole by the good-folk,[2] and that he was born at Lanaham, and wore a hat that made him invisible, and so, quoth he, doth many another. He spoke English after the manner of the country, and had many roguish and laughter-stirring sayings, that at last they grew not to fear him."[3] "How long did he stay there?" "Now you are asking me more than I know, Master. But don't you never go to say again that there's no such things as ghosteses, when my grandmother's aunt's mother-in-law seen him with her own two eyes!" "And Mr. Osborne kept no dogs, or cats, I suppose?" "Master Harry, you don't believe it! Well, to be sure, I never did! You'll be saying next thing that there's no such things as the good-folk, when I've seen their dancing-rings on the grass many a hundred times! I'm sore afeared, Master Harry, that it haven't done you no good a-going for a soldier--I am." And Harry found that all his arguments produced no further effect than the conviction of old Cicely that he had been in bad company. From the information thus gained, however, he formed these conclusions:--First, His mother knew nothing about the secret chamber. Secondly, Cicely was equally ignorant. Thirdly, It was situated, as he had surmised--above the scullery or behind it--probably both--and below his sister Isabella's bedroom. Fourthly, It had been inhabited as recently as the preceding week. All the more reason, he thought, for stopping up the means of ingress; and all the more for not revealing to old Cicely that her ghost was in all probability a Popish priest. On the evening of the spring day upon which Harry thus barred the refugee out of his hiding-place, Celia was strolling through the park alone. She fed the fawns and the swans on the ornamental water, and wandered on with no definite object, until she reached the boundary of her father's grounds. She sat down on the grass near a large laurel, and became lost in thought. There happened at this place to be a small gap in the hedge near her, through which her position was plainly observable from the road. She started as she heard a sudden appeal made to her: "Young Madam, pray you a penny, for the love of God!"