White cigar shaped object, very fast, no plausible explanation

I was home from college for the weekend or Thanksgiving at the time and getting out of my car on the driver's side as my girlfriend was getting out on the passenger's side.
I had just started taking astronomy in college and got into the habit of looking up at the night sky for constellations.  It was a clear night, with a bright moon, but there were a couple of puffy clouds that were illuminated by the moon.  As I first looked up, I saw an object that I thought was a meteor or falling star.  Then after looking closely, I saw it was a bright white cigar shaped object sort of falling at an angle like the hands of a clock from 1 to 2.  Suddenly it silently moved at an impossible rate of speed across a large arc of sky to end up behind a cloud.  It made no sound, and looked just very white with no other distinguishing features.  My girlfriend saw it too after I said "look at that !".  The funny thing was, I got the feeling that it sensed it was seen and fled like an animal.  I never saw it again.