"Well, I got the big end of the wish-bone," said Rose, "and I was just going to wish that I'd find the ghost when, all of a sudden, I heard it!"

"Now see here, you two!" exclaimed Daddy Bunker, speaking to Russ and Rose, while Laddie and Vi, with Mun Bun and Margy, were still at their game. "You mustn't be talking about such things as ghosts. There isn't any such thing, and you may scare the younger children."

"How did you hear about a ghost at Great Hedge?" asked Grandpa Ford curiously.

Russ and Rose looked at each other. The time had come to tell of their listening under the window, and they felt a little ashamed of it. But they had been taught to tell the truth, no matter how much it hurt, and they must do it now.

"How did you know about a ghost?" asked Mother Bunker.

"We--we heard you and Grandpa Ford talking about it--the time he came to our house," confessed Russ. He felt that he, being the oldest, must speak first.

"We listened under the window," added Rose. She wanted to do her share of the telling.

"That was very wrong to do," said her mother. "But, of course, I know you didn't mean to do wrong. Still, as it happened, no great harm was done, but you should have told me about it at the time. It was not right to be so mysterious about it, nor to have it as a secret. You two children are too small to have secrets away from Father and Mother, unless they are little ones, like birthday surprises and the like. Now, don't listen under windows again."

"We won't," promised Russ and Rose, who then told the whole story.

"But is there a ghost?" asked Russ, as the strange noise sounded again.

"No, of course not," said Daddy Bunker. "But, since you have heard part of the story, you may as well hear all of it."

Seeing that the four smaller children were busy at their play, and would not listen to what he said, Daddy Bunker drew Russ and Rose up on his lap and began:

"You remember when Grandpa Ford came to see us, he said he wanted to take us back with him, and, if we could, have us help him find out something queer about Great Hedge, which he had bought from Mr. Ripley.

The 'something queer' was that, every now and then, noises, such as you heard just now, sound through the house. Grandpa Ford and Grandma Ford couldn't find out where they came from, and neither Mr. Ripley nor his daughter knew what made them.

"Of course," went on Daddy Bunker, "some people, when they hear a strange sound or see a strange sight, think it is a ghost. But there is no such thing."

"We thought it was a ghost made Mun Bun's hair stick out and be pulled,"

confessed Rose, "but it was only the spinning wheel."

"Now, to go on with my story. As the queer noises kept up, Grandpa Ford came to get me, to see if I could help him. I am in the real estate business, you know--I buy and sell houses--and he thought I might know something about the queer noise in his house. I have bought and sold houses that people said were haunted--that is, which were supposed to have ghosts in," laughed Daddy Bunker. "But I never saw nor heard of any spirits."

"Did you find out what made this noise?" asked Russ.

"No, we haven't yet, but we take a look every time we hear it," said his father. "That is what we are going to do now. So, after this, don't be afraid when you hear it. It is something in the house that makes it--not a ghost or anything like that. We'll find it sooner or later, Grandpa Ford and I."

"May we help?" asked Russ.

"Please, Daddy?" cried Rose.

"Well, yes, I guess so, if you want to," answered his father slowly. "If you hear the noise, and it sounds anywhere near you, look around and see if you can find out what makes it. Don't cry 'ghost!' and scare the others."

"We won't," promised Rose. "And maybe we'll be lucky and find it."

"I hope you will," put in Grandma Ford.

"It sounded like a cow mooing," remarked Russ.

"Yes, it did," agreed Grandpa Ford. "At first I thought it was a cow that had got into the cellar. But I couldn't find one. Then I thought it was boys playing a trick on us, but I heard the noise in the middle of the night, when no boys would be out. I don't know what makes it, but I'd like to find the ghost, as I call it, though I'm not going to after this. That isn't a good name. We'll just call it 'Mr. Noise.'"

"And we'll help you find 'Mr. Noise'!" laughed Russ.

Laddie came from where he was playing with a new riddle, and, while they were laughing over it, the groaning noise sounded again.

"Listen, all of you, and see if you can tell where it is," said Grandpa Ford.

Russ and Rose listened. So did Laddie and Violet; but Mun Bun and Margy kept on playing with their dolls.

"It's a tree rubbing against the house outside," said Russ.

"I thought so at first," said Grandpa Ford, "but there are now no trees that rub. I cut off the branches of those that did."

Each one thought it was in a different room, but a search showed nothing out of the way. They were all very much puzzled.

"It's worse than one of Laddie's queer riddles," said Daddy Bunker, when he and Grandpa Ford came back from having searched in several of the rooms.

They listened for a while longer, but the noise was not heard again, and then it was time to go to bed. The wind sprang up again and the clouds seemed to promise more snow. And, surely enough, in the morning, the white flakes were falling thick and fast.

"They'll cover up our snow man," said Laddie to Russ.

"Never mind. I know how we can have more fun," said the older boy.

"How?"

"I'll make some snowshoes for us, and we can walk without sinking down in the snow."

"How can you do that?"

"Oh, I'll show you. I started to make 'em before, but I forgot about it.

Now I will."

And, when breakfast was over, and the four older children had been warmly wrapped and allowed to go out to play in the storm, Russ led Laddie to the barn.

"We'll make the snowshoes there," he said. "I have everything all ready."

Laddie saw a pile of barrel staves--the long, thin pieces of wood of which barrels are made, where his brother had stacked them. Russ also had some pieces of rope, a hammer and some nails, and some long poles.

"What are they for?" asked Laddie, pointing to the poles.

"That's to take hold of and help yourself along. It's awful hard to walk on snowshoes--real ones, I mean. And, maybe, it'll be harder to walk on the barrel kind I'm going to make."

Then Russ began making the snowshoes.

CHAPTER XVIII