Between the banjo's murmuring chords, as he neared the Gentry clearing, once more a melody began to stray, like smoke which smoulders fitfully and must presently burst into flame.—Thrum-dum, thrum-dum, and then the tune's low call. It was a gypsy music, that lured with vistas of unknown road, the glint of water, and the sparkle of the hunter's fire; a wildly sweet note that asked, "How many miles?"—and again, out of colorless 61 drumming, "How many years? . . . how many miles?" . . . a song shadow-like in its come-and-go, rising at intervals to the cry of a passion no mortality has power to tame, and then, ere the ear had fairly caught its message, falling again into dim harmonies as of rain blown through the dark;—a question, and the wordless, haunting refrain for all answer. Just above his breath Lance voiced the words:
"How many years, how many miles,
Far from the door where my darling smiles?
How many miles, how many years.
Divide our hearts by pain and fears?"
The melody sank and trailed, drowned in a cadence of minors that sobbed like the rush of storm. Out of this, wild, as the wind's pleading, it rose again;
"It may be far, it may be near,
The water's wide and the forest drear,
But somewhere awaiting, surely I
Shall find my true love by and bye."