Partly to aid in concealing his increasing paleness, and partly with a view to render it a medium for the conveyance of subdued sound, the hand of the latter was raised to his face in such a manner that the motion of his lips could not be distinguished from behind.

“We are betrayed,” he scarcely breathed.  “If you can command yourself, turn and look at the window; but for God’s sake arm yourself with resolution, or look not at all:  first draw the hood over your head, and without any appearance of design.  Our only chance of safety lies in this,—­that the Canadian may still be true, and that our disguise may not be penetrated.”

In despite of his native courage,—­and this had often been put to honourable proof,—­he, thus mysteriously addressed, felt his heart to throb violently.  There was something so appalled in the countenance of his friend—­something so alarming in the very caution he had recommended—­that a vague dread of the horrible reality rushed at once to his mind, and for a moment his own cheek became ashy pale, and his breathing painfully oppressed.  It was the natural weakness of the physical man, over which the moral faculties had, for an instant, lost their directing power.  Speedily recovering himself, the young man prepared to encounter the alarming object which had already so greatly intimidated his friend.  Carefully drawing the blanket hood over his head, he rose from his seat, and, with the energetic movement of one who has formed some desperate determination, turned his back to the fire-place, and threw his eyes rapidly and eagerly upon the window.  They fell only on the rude patchwork of which it was principally composed.  The female had quitted the room.

“You must have been deceived,” he whispered, keeping his eye still bent upon the window, and with so imperceptible a movement of the lips that sound alone could have betrayed he was speaking,—­“I see nothing to justify your alarm.  Look again.”

The younger officer once more directed his glance towards the window, and with a shuddering of the whole person, as he recollected what had met his eye when he last looked upon it.  “It is no longer there, indeed,” he returned in the same scarcely audible tone.  “Yet I could not be mistaken; it was between those two corner squares of wood in the lower sash.”

“Perhaps it was merely a reflection produced by the lamp on the centre pane,” rejoined his friend, still keeping his eye riveted on the suspicious point.

“Impossible! but I will examine the window from the spot on which I stood when I first beheld it.”

Again he quitted his seat, and carelessly crossed the room.  As he returned he threw his glance upon the pane, when, to his infinite horror and surprise, the same frightful vision presented itself.

“God of Heaven!” he exclaimed aloud, and unable longer to check the ebullition of his feelings,—­“what means this?—­Is my brain turned? and am I the sport of my own delusive fancy?—­Do you not see it now?”