I confess my heart beat more rapidly than usual, as I paused an instant to peer through the shadowy gloom within.

It was a small, low room, with a litter of broken furniture strewing the earthen floor; but the log walls were quite bare.

The flicker of the still blazing Fort illuminated the interior sufficiently to enable me to make out these simple details, and to see that the place was without living occupant.
There was only one other apartment in the building, and I walked back until I came upon the door which separated the two, and flung it open.
As I did so I thought I saw a shadow, the dim flitting of a woman's form between me and the farther wall; but as I sprang hastily forward, grasping after the spectral vision, I touched nothing save the rough logs.

Twice I made the circuit of that restricted space, so confident was I of my own eye-witness; but I found nothing, and could only pause perplexed, staring about in wonder.
It occurred to me that my own overtaxed nerves were at fault, and that if I was to accomplish anything before daylight I must say nothing likely to alarm De Croix further.
"Come, Monsieur!" I said, as I came out and shook him into attention, "there is naught within more dangerous than shadows, or perchance a rat.

Nor have I any time longer to dally over such boyishness.