ook a step forward, when instantly it
vanished, vanished like a candle blown out. I stepped back again; but it
was some time before I could find the exact spot and position from
which it was visible. At last, there it was, the weird reddish light,
flickering away as before. Then I screwed up my courage, and made for
the rock; but the ground was so uneven that it was impossible to steer
straight; and though I walked along the whole base of the cliff, I could
see nothing. Then I made tracks for home; and I can tell you, boys,
that, until you remarked it, I never knew it was raining, the whole way
along. But hollo! what's the matter with Tom?"

What indeed? Tom was now sitting with his legs over the side of the
bunk, and his whole face betraying excitement so intense as to be almost
painful. "The fiend would have two eyes. How many lights did you see,
Dick? Speak out!"

"Only one."

"Hurrah!" cried Tom, "that's better." Whereupon he kicked the blankets
into the middle of the room, and began pacing up and down with long
feverish strides. Suddenly he stopped opposite Dick, and laid his hand
upon his shoulder. "I say, Dick, could we get to Sasassa Valley before
sunrise?"

"Scarcely," said Dick.

"Well, look here; we are old friends, Dick Wharton, you and I. Now don't
you tell any other man what you have told us, for a week. You'll promise
that, won't you?"

I could see by the look on Dick's face as he acquiesced that he
considered poor Tom to be mad; and indeed I was myself completely
mystified by his conduct. I had, however, seen so many proofs of my
friend's good sense and quickness of apprehension that I thought it
quite possible that Wharton's story had had a meaning in his eyes which
I was too obtuse to take in.

All night Tom Donahue was greatly excited, and when Wharton left
he begged him to remember his promise, and also elicited from him a
description of the exact spot at which he had seen the apparition, as
well as the hour at which it appeared. After his departure, which must
have been about four in the morning, I turned into my bunk and watched
Tom sitting by the fire splicing two sticks together, until I fell
asleep. I suppose I must have slept about two hours; but when I awoke
Tom was still sitting working away in almost the same position. He had
fixed the one stick across the top of the other so as to form a rough T,
and was now busy in fitting a smaller stick into the angle between
them, by manipulat