But Judith did not get over her panic till the next morning, and then several days passed without a re-appearance of the ghost or the illusion.
At length one evening when the moon was bright, Miss Conyers, instead of going down into her cabin, sat in the stern enjoying the beauty of the night; and presently feeling chilly, she told Judith to go to her stateroom and fetch a shawl.
The girl started to obey; but the next minute uttered a terrific shriek.
Miss Conyers sprang to her feet; and there, not three yards from her, stood Judith, struck, statue-still, with terror, gazing upon—what?
A figure just as she had described the apparition to be—thin as a skeleton, pale as a spectre; and if not as tall as the mainmast, certainly looking preternaturally tall from being so preternaturally lean; his head was bound up in a white cloth, his foot tied up in a rag, his arm in a sling, and himself leaning on a crutch;—the ghost of that Foretop Tom who had been drowned more than two years ago.
An icy chill of superstitious horror, that all her will and intellect could not prevent, shot through the veins of Britomarte Conyers.
But the next instant she had governed this feeling; and saying to herself, “I will find out what this means,” she walked straight up to the figure and laid her hand on its shoulder.
CHAPTER XL.
HOMEWARD.
“Who are you, man?” inquired Miss Conyers, looking in the face of the mysterious stranger.
“Me? Ou, I’m just naebody!” answered the apparition, rather sulkily.