De
Croix, arouse yourself, and help me to bring courage to this girl."

He drew back from his grip on the palisades, as if, by sheer power of
will, he forced his fascinated eyes from the cloud-bank, shivering like
a man with an ague fit.

"_Sacre_! did ever human eyes behold so foul a thing!" he cried, his
voice shaking, his hand shading his face. "'T will haunt me till the
hour I die."

"Bah! 'T will all be forgotten with return of daylight," I was quick
to reply; for had found relief in action, and could perceive already
that the clouds were becoming shapeless and drifting rapidly southward
in a great billowy mass. "Do not stand there moping like a day-blind
owl, but aid me to make Mademoiselle see the foolishness of her fears."

The sting of these words moved him more than a blow would have done;
but as he knelt beside her, I noted there was little of the old
reckless ring in his voice.

"'T is indeed true, Toinette,--'t was but a cloud, and has already
greatly changed in aspect. 'T will be no more than cause for laughter
when the sun gilds the plain, and will form a rare tale to tell to the
gallants at Montreal. Yet, Saint Guise! 't was grewsome enough, and my
knees quake still from the terror of the thing."

Mademoiselle was as brave and cool-headed a girl as ever I knew; but so
thoroughly had she been unnerved by this dreadful happening, that it
was only after the most persistent urging on our part that she
consented to be led below. There, at the foot of the ladder, I stepped
aside to permit De Croix to walk with her across the parade; but she
would not go without a word of parting.

"Do not think me weak and silly," she implored, her face, still white
from the terror, upturned to me in the moonlight. "It was so spectral
and ghastly that I gave way to sudden fear."

"You need no excuse," I hastened to assure her. "When the thing
frightened De Croix and me, and even set so old a soldier as Captain
Wells to raving, it was no wonder it unnerved a girl, however brave she
might prove in the presence of real danger. But you can sleep now,
convinced it was naught but a floating cloud."

She smiled at me over her shoulder, and I watched the pair with jealous
eyes until they disappeared. I noticed Captain Wells standing beside
me.

"You thought I raved up yonder," he said gravely; "to-morrow will prove
that my interpretation of the vision was correct."

"You believe it a prophecy of evil?"

"It