“I ever choose the woodland,
For here the wild birds are,
And I’m a sister to them,
Though my home it is a star.”
Thus I sang as I danced down the glade, waving my hands above my head in a kind of unholy glee at the weird music that I made. I halted opposite these tremblers, and set up a ridiculous scream of mockery. Then I looked upon them with great eyes of wonder, and then again began to dance and sing:
“A blackbird is my brother,
I see him in that tree,
A skylark is my lover,
But I prefer a bee.”
While I was in the middle of this arrant nonsense, my good friend Flickers, who was paler than a ghost, hung on to his pistol with tenacity, for that piece of iron held all the little courage that he had. I could see the perspiration shining on his face, as he muttered in a voice that trembled like the ague: