And now in the tumultous beatin's of my heart I owned up that I would
ruther a hundred times it would be a burglar.

Anything seemed to me better than to be alone at night with a ghost.

But anon, as I quaked and trembled under that sheet, the voice spoke
agin--

"Samantha, are you awake?" And I sprung up in bed agin, and sez I--

"Josiah Allen, where are you? Oh, save me, Josiah! save me!"

The white figger turned. "Save you from what, Samantha? Is there a mouse
under the bed, or is it a spider, or what?"

"Who be you?" sez I, almost incoherently. "Be you a ghost? Oh, Josiah,
Josiah!" And I sunk back onto the pillow and busted into tears. The
relief wuz too great.

But anon Wonder seized the place that Fear had held in my frame, and
dried up the tear-drops, and I sprung up agin and sez--

"What be you a-doin', Josiah Allen, rigged up as you be in the middle of
the night, with the lights all a-burnin'?"

For every gas jet in the room was a-blazin' high.

Sez he, "I am posin' for a statute, Samantha."