Then all was silence.
A quarter of an hour later Hans once more lifted his instrument.... He stopped, startled.
Immediately to the north, silhouetted against the bright sky in the opening of the valley, an elk bull stood on a mountain ridge. Hans could see the sky between its legs and also two ears and enormous, shovel-shaped antlers.
The elk did not move, and stood out like a statue against the sky above the valley.
Gaupa cocked his gun. “Rauten,” he whispered, and it sounded like a sob. He had seen the mutilated ear. At that moment the bull stepped down from the ridge, straight towards them, and darkness hid him from their view.
Then they heard “Örrke—örrk,” a kind of nasal grunt, approaching nearer and nearer. A dry twig cracked, and in the clearing a pine stump shimmered with a greyish gleam. The roar from Ré River seemed far distant, as if withdrawn, but suddenly it sounded close again, the forest gave a sigh, and Gaupa saw a lichen tuft move slightly just above Hans’s head.
Then the noise of the elk ceased as if suddenly cut off. There was not a sound. The minutes crawled past. There was still silence.
Gaupa turned.
“Weathered!” he whispered.
But Rauten trotted northwards along the edge of the long Ré marshes hour after hour. He had heard the luring call of a cow, went to meet her, and found man. What a strange thing to happen!... And Rauten ran on. It is bad to be where man is.