"I can see no one but Nicholas," cried Richard.
"Nor I," added Alizon, who shared in the young man's alarm.
"Are you sure you behold that figure?" said Richard, drawing Mistress Nutter aside, and breathing the words in her ear. "If so, it is a phantom—or he is in the power of the fiend. He was rash enough to invite that wicked votaress, Isole de Heton, condemned, it is said, to penal fires for her earthly enormities, to dance with him, and she has come."
"Ha!" exclaimed Mistress Nutter.
"She will whirl him round till he expires," cried Richard; "I must free him at all hazards."
"Stay," said Mistress Nutter; "it is I who have been deceived. Now I look again, I see that Nicholas is alone."
"But the nun's dress—the wondrous beauty—the flashing eyes!" cried Richard. "You described Isole exactly."
"It was mere fancy," said Mistress Nutter. "I had just been looking at her portrait, and it dwelt on my mind, and created the image."
"The portrait is gone," cried Richard, pointing to the empty wall.
Mistress Nutter looked confounded.