midnight
At the moment that the leader 's head appeared through the opening , a gray and ghostly figure rose with its weird , shrill cry of rage that startled the two comrades safely hidden in the hay . The effect upon the intruders can be easily guessed . These superstitious Mexicans had known vaguely of a woman haunting this castle by the sea . Sometimes they had seen a gray , creeping figure at the end of the hall or heard a piercing cry ring out at midnight , and now this creature was about to spring upon them and curse them to the bottomless pit . There was a cry of fright , and in leaping back , the man near the top of the ladder knocked over the one below , and he in turn the next , so that it was like when a ball hits the King Pin and the others are sent sprawling . The searching party fled in panic and dismay out of the barn , and nothing could have persuaded them to have set foot in those haunted walls again , no , not even the threats of the redoubtable Captain William Broome himself . What the outcome would have been had the captain been on hand , it is difficult to say , for it was commonly supposed that he was in fear of nothing .