Then gradually their nerves quieted down, and even Grace, more aroused than any of the others, began to feel drowsy.  One by one they again sought their cots, and finally a series of deep breathings told of much-needed sleep.

It must have been long after midnight when Betty was suddenly aroused by a queer noise.  She had slept heavily, and at first she was not fully aware of her surroundings, nor what had awakened her.  Then she became conscious of a curious heavy breathing, as of some animal.  She sat up in alarm, her heart pounding furiously.  Her throat went dry.

“Girls—­ girls!” she gasped, hoarsely.  “Aunt Kate!”

The latter was the first to reply.  Quickly reaching out to the lantern near her, she turned up the wick.  Following the sudden illumination in the tent there was a cracking in the underbrush near it.

“Oh!” screamed Grace, sitting up.  “What is it?”

“I’m going to look!” said Mollie, resolutely.

“Don’t!  Don’t!” pleaded Amy, but Mollie was already at the flap of the tent, which she quickly loosed.  Then she screamed.

“Look!  It’s white!  It’s white!”

Betty, forcing herself to action, stood beside her chum.  She was just in time to see some-thing big and white run down toward the lake.  There was a clash and jingling as of chains, and a splashing of water.  Then the white thing disappeared, and the girls stood staring at one another, trembling violently.

CHAPTER XX

 The storm

Grace “draped” herself over the nearest cot.  Amy followed her example, with the added distinction that she covered her head with the blankets.  Betty and Mollie stood clinging to each other.

“Though I don’t think they were any braver than we,” declared Grace afterward.  “They simply couldn’t fall down, for Betty wanted to go one way and Grace the other.  So they just naturally held each other up.”

“I couldn’t stand,” declared Amy.  “My, knees shook so.”

Aunt Kate was the first to speak after the apparition had passed away, seeming to lose itself in the lake.

“Girls, have you any idea what it was?” she asked.

“The—­ the—­” began Amy.  “Oh, I can’t say it!” she wailed from beneath the covers.

“Don’t be silly!” commanded Betty, sharply.  “If you mean—­ ghost—­ say so,” but she herself hesitated over the word.

“If that was the ghost it was the queerest one I ever saw!” declared Mollie, with resolution.  “I don’t just mean that, either,” she hastened to add, “for I never saw a ghost before.  But in all the stories I ever read ghosts were tall and thin, of the willowy type——­ "

“Like Grace,” put in Betty, with rather a wan smile.

“Don’t you dare compare me to a ghost!” commanded the Gibson girl,” with energy that brought the blood to her pale cheeks.  She ventured to peer out from under the tent flap now.  “Is it—­ is it gone?” she faltered.