Through the silence of the room crept a queer, faint murmur like the breath of an æolian harp or the sighing of the wind through far-off pines. There was no attempt at harmonious arrangement and concordance; it was rather a vague, erratic and intangible dissonance, a weird jumble of soft discords that alternately pleased and pained. Gradually it increased in volume, as the wind rises to the approach of a storm, culminating finally in a thunderous crash of double bass. Then out of the contrastive silence of the succeeding lull came unmistakably the mournful howl of a wolf, wonderfully rendered by a few soft tremulous touches of those strong yet sensitive fingers.
Another rolling crash, a diminishing rumble, and then the rich, deep voice of the singer:
"Child of the Wind and Sun, I glide
Like a tongue of flame o'er the mountain's side.
Wherever falleth my blighting tread
Lie the whitening bones of the silent Dead.
For trail of wrath
Is my red-wet path
From the Sea's low rim to the glaciers high,
Ai y-u-u—yu—yu-u-u-u!
I live the better that others die.
Ai yu-u-u-u-u-u!
"Oh! sweet is the scent in the evening gale,
Of the dun deer wending adown the trail
Where I lie, grim ambushed, with bated breath,
A gray lance couched in the hand of Death!
At that maddening tang
White-bared each fang,
Dripping anon with ambrosia red;
Ai y-u-u—yu—yu-u-u-u!
Haste, sweetheart, to the feast outspread!
Ai yu-u-u-u-u-u!
"But sweeter even than Life's rich wine,
As, hot from the kill—ah-h! draught divine!—
It trickles adown my ravished throat,
Is my gaunt mate's deep-toned, chesty note.
As o'er hill and plain
She calls amain
Till the welkin quivers with ecstasy:
Ai y-u-u—yu—yu-u-u-u!
'Oh come, Beloved, to Love and me!'
Ai yu-u-u-u-u-u!
"Manlings spawned in the cities' slime.
Weaklings, withered before your prime.
What ken ye of the joys there be
Of Life and of Love and of Liberty!
Better hill and dell
As free Ishmael
Than the shackles of pomp and pageantry:
Ai yu-u-u—yu—yu-u-u-u!
Come out, oh! faint hearts, and howl with me!
Ai yu-u-u-u-u-u!"
In the storm of applause that rewarded his unique performance he rose and went over to the fireplace.
"If you are still disposed to the purchase of the Vaughan holdings I will accept your offer," he said to Brevoort. "But I must be free to come and go at will. I am one of the wolves, you know!"
Brevoort nodded a brisk acquiescence. "That is perfectly satisfactory to me. We will arrange the details."
McVey was genuinely pleased and said so; Carter rather grudgingly extended his congratulations; he would rather Douglass were the manager of his own estate. His grievance was still fresh and rankling.