"It--it's maybe an owl," returned Russ, trying to think of the most harmless creature that made a noise at night. "I never heard an owl howl like that," whispered his sister. "Aw, Rose! owls don't howl. It's wolves that howl--or coyotes such as we saw at Cowboy Jack's. Don't you remember the coyote caught in the trap that you thought was a dog?" Rose's mind would not be drawn from the thing in question. She said, quite as fearfully: "Maybe this is a wolf, Russ." "Of course not," declared the boy trying to speak bravely. "There aren't any wolves in this part of the country. I asked Frane, Junior." But there was evidently a savage creature here that Russ Bunker had known nothing about, for now it cried out again! Its long, quavering note echoed through the woods and made the boy and girl stand again and shiver. "I--I guess it isn't any animal after all," said Rose suddenly, and speaking with some relief. "That's a woman. Of course it is. But she must be lost, or something bad has happened to her. Oh, Russ!" she added, suddenly seizing her brother once more. "I know what it must be. And they are almost always ladies, so Phillis says." "What's that?" demanded Russ, puzzled. "It's a ha'nt! It's a lady ha'nt! I do believe it must be!" "Aw, Rose, what you talking about?" demanded her brother, yet secretly quite as much troubled by the strange, eerie sound as she was. "You know that haunts are only make-believe." "We-ell!" sighed Rose, "maybe that's only a make-believe sound we hear. But--but I don't like it. There!" For a third time the screech was repeated. It seemed nearer. Russ could not be confident that it was "make-believe." The strange sound seemed very real indeed. CHAPTER XXIII A FOUR-LEGGED GHOST "I don't like that noise a bit," whispered Rose, standing close to her brother. "It--it makes me all shivery." "But, if it is only just a woman calling----" "There must be something awful the matter with her, if she has to scream like that," declared Rose. As they did not hear the noise again for a little while, both of them plucked up courage, and they went on to the burned cabin. The sticks they had set up were still standing. Russ fastened each of the four pasteboard "letters" to a stick at the four corners of Mammy June's ruined house. There was light enough from the stars for the two children to see quite plainly what they were about. Rose, however, was looking all about them while Russ did the work of setting up the printed signs for Sneezer Meiggs to see if he came home unexpectedly. "What do you expect to see, Rose?" demanded her brother loftily. "I don't know. Philly says ha'nts are all in white." "I don't see anything very white around here," rejoined Russ. "But there are so many colored folks, perhaps some of the ha'nts might be black," suggested Rose. "Then we wouldn't see them very well in the shadows." "I don't believe----" began Russ.