Sometimes the thick growth of young hemlocks and cedars would conceal her from view, then John stopped, and putting his hand to his mouth would shout, “Halloo! Halloo!”
Kasya heard it; she stopped with a smile, and pretending that she did not see him, answered in a high, silvery voice:
“John!”
The echo answers:
“John! John!”
Meanwhile Burek had espied a squirrel up a tree, and, standing before it looking upward, barked. The squirrel sitting on a branch covered herself with her tail in a mocking manner, lifted her forepaws to her mouth and rubbed her nose, seemed to play with her forefingers, make grimaces, and laugh at the anger of Burek. Kasya, seeing it, laughed with a resounding, silvery tone, and so did John, and so the woods were filled with the sound of human voices, echoes, laughter and sunny joy.
Sometimes there was a deep silence, and then the woods seemed to speak; the breeze struck the fronds of the ferns, which emitted a sharp sound; the trunks of the pines swayed and creaked, and there was silence again.
Then could be heard the measured strokes of the woodpecker. It seemed as if some one kept knock—knocking at a door, and you could even expect that some mysterious voice would ask:
“Who is there?”
Again, the wood thrush was whistling with a sweet voice; the golden-crowned hammer plumed his feathers. In the thicket the pheasants clucked and the bright green humming birds flitted between the leaves; sometimes on the top of the pine tree a crow, hiding itself from the heat of the sun, lazily flapped its wings.