"I think, master, the damps will soon ding down the old house: look at
the wall; the paper hangs for all the world like the clerk's wig--ha,
ha! If we should burn the house down we'd rid it o' the ghosts. Would
they stand fire, think you, or be off to cooler quarters?"
"Hush, Gilbert; thou art wicked enough to bring a whole legion about us,
if any of them are within hearing. I always seemed to treat these
stories with contempt, but I never could satisfy myself about the noises
that old Gidlow and his wife heard. Thou knowest he was driven out of
the house by them. People wondered that I did not come and live here,
instead of letting it run to ruin. It's pretty generally thought that I
fear neither man nor devil; but--oh! here it is; here is the will. I
care nothing for the rest, provided this be cancelled."
"Ay, master, they said the ghost never left off scratching as long as
anybody was in the room. Which room was it, I wonder?--I never thought
on't to inquire; but--- I don't like this a bit. It runs in my head it
is the very place; and behind that wall, too, where it took up its
quarters like as it might be just a-back of the paper there.
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