‘Well, I don’t know what Obury saw, or Mansell, either,’ said Bill. ‘But, whatever they saw, it wasn’t me. I went back through the stable-courtyard and up the village street. It was a darned sight easier way to take on such a pitch-black night. The last lap, up to our place from the village, was quite bad enough. I certainly didn’t propose to walk back through Groaning Spinney. I didn’t want to bash my brains out against an immemorial elm.’

‘They’re mostly beeches,’ said Obury.

‘Anyhow, I thought the ghost only appeared by moonlight,’ put in Deborah.

‘Ah, you’d probably only see it by moonlight,’ said Miss Hughes. ‘But that wouldn’t necessarily prove that it wasn’t there at other times. You’ve heard about ghosts which are only footsteps, but nothing seen? Well, in my opinion, such a ghost can be seen by animals, particularly by dogs, who are well-known to be susceptible to supernormal presences.’

‘Talking of dogs,’ said Mrs Bradley, ‘it did seem as though the gamekeeper’s dog, Worry, disliked that gate the other day.’

The story of Worry was received respectfully by everybody except Mansell, who continued to suggest that as there were no such things as ghosts, even a dog would not be able to see them, and Bill Fullalove who, rather surprisingly, said that dogs were fools and cowards. Tiny Fullalove challenged this, and stated that a good dog was better than a good man any day. The argument was not entirely good-natured, although both cousins conducted it smilingly. Mrs Bradley turned the conversation with great adroitness on to the subject of the Roman antiquities found in the neighbourhood, and the subject of ghosts was shelved in favour of a discussion of the finds at Chedworth.

Ghosts cropped up again, however, on Boxing Day morning. Snow fell on Christmas night, and in the morning the sun shone brilliantly on pine branches laden with soft crystals, and upon hills of purple-shadowed silver. Obury proposed to take a walk, and invited others to join him. Jonathan intended to remain at home in order to prepare the vegetables for Boxing Day lunch; Deborah was not anxious to walk over snow, which she disliked; Mrs Bradley was to help with the cooking again – her one chance in the year, she explained, to practise the fascinating art, so Obury, Mansell and Miss Hughes took a long cast upwards into the hills, proposing to bear left at the top of the rise and to return across the snow-covered fields which bordered the manor house wood.

They returned to find that two more guests had arrived; these were the village choirmaster, a delicate-looking young man with effeminate hands and a cruel mouth, and a certain Mr Baird, a retired stockbroker, a widower, who lived with his man-servant next door to the doctor in a modern and delightful little house just past the mill.