Still but a misty wraith, the awful thing leaned over the prostrate man and as the shawled head drew near, Professor Hardwick saw dimly the face of his visitor, and it was a skull! The fearsome sight of hollow eye-sockets and grinning, fleshless jaws, gave a sudden strength to the frightened man, and he uttered a faint terrorized scream. Slowly the spectre raised a long, white-draped arm, and Hardwick saw a small glass tumbler in front of his face. Only for an instant, and then the phantom faded away, and vanished into space. Again the Professor called out, and hurrying footsteps were heard in the hall. Mr. Tracy was away in Boston, and Rudolph Braye had gone to New York, so the only other man in the house was Landon, who came hastily to the Professor's door in his dressing-gown and slippers. "What is it," he asked, "did you call? Are you ill?" "The--the ghost----" the old man articulated with difficulty. "Nonsense!" said Landon, "you've been dreaming. Where's a ghost? I just came along the corridor, and I didn't see any." "Don't tell me I didn't see it," babbled the Professor. "I did, Wynne, as plain as I see you now." Landon had brought his own bedroom candle, and by its scant light he scanned the old man's face. "You're all scared up, Professor," he said, kindly. "Guess I'll give you a nightcap, and send you back to sleep again, it's only four or so." "I know it, Wynne, it was just four when that--that thing came. I wasn't asleep, I haven't been for an hour or more. Just at four o'clock,--the hall clock was striking,--I saw that awful thing come stalking in--and--and it had a death's head under that white shawl----" "Hold on, there, Professor, if that's so, there must be somebody who did the stalking! I'm going to make search." Landon called Thorpe, and together the two went over the whole house, searching in every nook and cranny that could possibly conceal an intruder. But none was found. Every door and window was securely fastened, and as Landon had often observed, not a mouse could get into Black Aspens, once it was locked up for the night. "Nothing doing, Professor," he reported cheerfully, after the search. "We lighted up the whole place, and we scoured for burglars or ghost-pretenders, but nothing human has entered this house to-night. Nor was your spook any of ourselves, for Milly has rounded up the girls, and I've made sure that the doors that shut off the servants' quarters have not been opened. Now, what have you to say?" "Only that I saw the thing," the Professor had pulled himself together, "and I'm not prepared to say whether I think it was a phantom or a person pretending to be one. You're sure about the servants?" "Absolutely, they couldn't get through." "What about Stebbins? Could he have been concealed in the house all night?" "No; and if he had, how could he have got out? All the doors and windows are locked on the inside, just as they've been all night. He couldn't lock them behind him."