The silence of the night hanging everywhere seemed to call on her for proof that she had beheld a real earthly spectacle, and the dead thump of the hooves on the snow-floor in passing struck a chill through her as being phantom-like.

But she had seen a saddle on the horse, and the stirrups flying, and the horse looked affrighted.

The scene was too earthly in its suggestion of a tale of blood.

What if the horse were Robert's?
She tried to laugh at her womanly fearfulness, and had almost to suppress a scream in doing so.

There was no help for it but to believe her brandy as good and efficacious as her guests did, so she went downstairs and took a fortifying draught; after which her blood travelled faster, and the event galloped swiftly into the recesses of time, and she slept.
While the morning was still black, and the streets without a sign of life, she was aroused by a dream of some one knocking at her grave-stone.