"Pooh! nothing here to be so secret about," cried Walter, but Dick, nodding his head wisely said, "Let's look a little further. What's in that closet?" They ran to it, opened the door, and started back in sudden momentary affright. "'Taint alive," said Dick, the bolder of the two, quickly recovering himself; "horrid thing! I reckon I know what 'tis," and he whispered a few words in his companion's ear. Walter gave a nod of acquiescence of the opinion. "Here's another 'most finished," pursued Dick, dragging out and examining a bundle he found lying on the closet floor. (The one which had so startled them hung on the wall.) "We'll have some fun out of 'em one of these times when it's ready, eh, Wal?" "Yes, but let's put 'em back, and hurry off now, for fear somebody should come and catch us. I'm afraid those folks in the drawing-room may go, and our mothers come up to their work again." "So they might, to be sure," said Dick, rolling up the bundle and bestowing it in its former resting place. "We must be on the watch, Wal, or we'll miss our chance; they'll be sending them out o' this about as soon as they're finished." "Yes. Who do you think they're for?" (The boys scorned the rules of English grammar, and refused to be fettered by them. Was not theirs a land of free speech--for the aristocratic class to which they undoubtedly belonged?) "Cal and Art, of course." "Don't you believe it, Art cares for nothing but his books and Silverheels. Wasn't that a jolly birthday present, Dick? I wish Travilla and Cousin Elsie would remember ours the same way." "Reckon I do. There, everything's just as we found it. Now let's skedaddle." Chapter Eighth. "A horrid spectre rises to my sight, Close by my side, and plain, and palpable In all good seeming and close circumstance As man meets man." --JOANNA BAILLIE. It was a sultry summer night, silent and still, not a leaf stirring, hardly so much as the chirp of an insect to be heard. The moon looked down from a cloudless sky upon green lawns and meadows, fields and forests clothed in richest verdure; gardens, where bloomed lovely flowers in the greatest variety and profusion, filling the air in their immediate vicinity with an almost overpowering sweetness; a river flowing silently to the sea; cabins where the laborer rested from his toil, and lordlier dwellings where, perchance, the rich man tossed restlessly on his more luxurious couch. Mr. and Mrs. Travilla had spent the earlier part of the evening at the Oaks, and after their return, tempted by the beauty of the night, had sat conversing together in the veranda long after their usual hour for retiring. Now they were both sleeping soundly. Perhaps the only creature awake about the house or on the plantation, was Bungy the great watch dog, who, released from the chain that bound him during the day, was going his rounds keeping guard over his master's property.