“I’ll tell you all I know about it,” said he,—­“an’ if you understand it then, you’re wiser ’n I am.  After they carried her home, she had a long spell o’ sickness,—­come near dyin’, they said; but they brought her through, at last, an’ she got about ag’in, lookin’ ten year older.  I kep’ out of her sight, though.  I lived awhile at Old Jones’s, till I could find a good farm to rent, or a cheap un to buy.  I wanted to git out o’ the neighborhood:  I was oneasy all the time, bein’ so near Rachel.  Her mother was wuss, an’ her father failin’-like, too.  Mother seen ’em often:  she was as good a neighbor to ’em as she dared be.  Well, I got sort o’ tired, an’ went out to Michigan an’ bought a likely farm.  Old Jones giv’ me a start.  I took Mary Ann out, an’ we got along well enough, a matter o’ two year.  We heerd from home now an’ then.  Rachel’s father an’ mother both died, about the time we had our first boy,—­him that you seen,—­an’ she went off to Toledo, we heerd, an’ hired out to do sewin’.  She was always a mighty good hand at it, an’ could cut out as nice as a born manty-maker.  She’d had another fit after the funerals, an’ was older-lookin’ an’ more serious than ever, they said.

“Well, Jimmy was six months old, or so, when we begun to be woke up every night by his cryin’.  Nothin’ seemed to be the matter with him:  he was only frightened-like, an’ couldn’t be quieted.  I heerd noises sometimes,—­nothin’ like what come afterwards,—­but sort o’ crackin’ an’ snappin’, sich as you hear in new furnitur’, an’ it seemed like somebody was in the room; but I couldn’t find nothin’.  It got wuss and wuss:  Mary Ann was sure the house was haunted, an’ I had to let her go home for a whole winter.  When she was away, it went on the same as ever,—­not every night,—­sometimes not more ’n onst a week,—­but so loud as to wake me up, reg’lar.  I sent word to Mary Ann to come on, an’ I’d sell out an’ go to Illinois.  Good perairah land was cheap then, an’ I’d ruther go furder off, for the sake o’ quiet.

“So we pulled up stakes an’ come out here:  but it weren’t long afore the noise follered us, wuss ‘n ever, an’ we found out at last what it was.  One night I woke up, with my hair stan’in’ on end, an’ heerd Rachel Emmons’s voice, jist as you heerd it last night.  Mary Ann heerd it too, an’ it’s little peace she’s giv’ me sence that time.  An’ so it’s been goin’ on an’ on, these eight or nine year.”

“But,” I asked, “are you sure she is alive?  Have you seen her since?  Have you asked her to be merciful and not disturb you?”

“Yes,” said he, with a bitterness of tone which seemed quite to obliterate the softer memories of his love, “I’ve seen her, an’ I’ve begged her on my knees to let me alone; but it’s no use.  When it got to be so bad I couldn’t stan’ it, I sent her a letter, but I never got no answer.  Next year, when our second boy died, frightened and worried to death, I believe, though he was scrawny enough when