Lithway did seem changed; but I have such an involuntary trick of comparing my rediscovered friends with the human beings I have most recently been seeing that I did not take the change too seriously. He was perfectly unlike the Yucatan Indians; but, on reflection, why shouldn’t he be, I asked myself. Probably he had always been just like that. I couldn’t prove that he hadn’t. Yet I did think there was something back of his listlessness other than mere prolonged grief for his wife. Occasionally, I confess, I thought about the ghost in this connection. One morning I was leaving my sitting-room to go down to Lithway’s library. The door of the room faced the staircase to the third story, and as I came out I could always see, directly opposite and above me, a line of white banisters that ran along the narrow third-story hall. Mechanically, this time, I looked up and saw--I need not say, to my surprise--a burly negro leaning over the rail looking down at me. The servants were all white, and the man had, besides, a very definite look of not belonging there. He didn’t, in any way, fit into his background. I ran up the stairs to investigate. When I got just beneath him, he bent over towards me with a malicious gesture. All I saw, for an instant, was a naked brown arm holding up a curious jagged knife. The edge caught the little light there was in the dim hall as he struck at me. I hit back, but he had gone before I reached him--simply ceased to be. There was no Cheshire-cat vanishing process. I was staring again into the dim hall, over the white banisters. There were no rooms on that side of the hall, and consequently no doors. A light broke in on me. I went down-stairs to Lithway. “I’ve seen your ghost,” I said bluntly. What seemed to be a great relief relaxed his features. “You have! And isn’t she extraordinary?” “She?” “You say you’ve seen her,” he went on hurriedly. “Her? _Him_, man--black as Tartarus. And he cut me over the head.” “There?” Lithway drew his finger down the place. “Yes. How did you know? I don’t feel it now.” “Look at yourself.” He handed me a mirror. The slash was indicated clearly by a white line, but there was no abrasion. “That is very interesting,” I managed to say; but I really did not half like it. Lithway looked at me incredulously. “She has never had a weapon before,” he murmured. “She? This was a man.” “Oh, no!” he contradicted. “That’s impossible.” “He was a hairy brute and full-bearded besides,” I calmly insisted. Lithway jumped up. “My God! there’s some one in the house.” He caught up a revolver. “Let us go and look. He’ll have made off with the silver.” “Look here, Lithway,” I protested. “I tell you this man wasn’t real. He vanished into thin air--like any other ghost.” “But the ghost is a woman.” He was as stupid as a child about it.