He occupied one of the bunks with McBride, and long after everyone else had gone to sleep, he lay watching the flames leaping in the fireplace, and their reflection glowing and dancing on the walls and roof. Every now and again, as the fire died a little, his glance swept shadowy corners nervously and he shivered at some particularly creepy detail of the stories he had been told about the place.
But even his wrought up imagination could find nothing very fearful in this peaceful picture, and at length he dozed off.
He woke with a start to find the room in darkness. The fire had died down to a dull red glow which illuminated only a foot or two of the stone hearth. Everything else was swathed in shadows—everything, that is, save—
Barber gasped suddenly and sat up tingling, his gaze fixed fearfully on the farther wall of the cabin. For a long moment he stared, wide-eyed, horrified, at the motionless, shapeless figure which stood out, vaguely white against the glass of the window. Then suddenly it moved with a slow, creepy motion along the wall, and with a gurgle of fright, Furn clutched his bedfellow.
“Micky!” he gasped thickly. “Micky—wake up!”
McBride rolled over. “Huh?” he grunted sleepily. “W’as matter?”
“The ghost!” shrilled Barber. “Morford’s ghost!”
The words penetrated to more ears than one. Startled into complete wakefulness, McBride bounced over and leaned out of the bunk. At the same instant Red Garrity sat up abruptly from a heap of blankets on the floor, and Cavanaugh poked his head over the edge of the upper bunk.
“What’s the matter?” they both cried at once.
“The ghost!” wailed Barber. “There beside the window. I can see it—”