I became aware of a low, vibrant, wailing murmur coming out of the sunlit void to the south’ard. It was like the cry I had heard before and had had such an effect upon poor Tim.
Yankee Dan’s daughter evidently heard it, for she straightened up and listened, gazing steadily to windward. As the cry rose and fell, dying away as the breeze increased, it thrilled me through and through.
“What’s the matter?” asked Henry, who had come up and noticed my intense look.
“Don’t you hear it?” I asked.
“S’pose Hi do; it’s nothin’. Have ye cooled off?”
It was the first time he had spoken directly to me since the affair with the hounds, and I took it for an overture of friendship.
“If you squeeze my hand, I’ll brain you,” I said, and held it out. He took it, smiling.
“What made ye bolt, anyways?” he asked. “Hi could git ye anywheres on that island. Hi had to pay fer that dog ye killed, too.”
He seated himself beside me, as it was nearly eight bells, and we talked a few minutes, he describing the amusement caused by the two hounds loosed into the room of Thunderbo’s dance-hall.
“’Twas a fine sight, Heywood, to see that bloodhound grab the conch by the heel. If Hi hadn’t stopped there to laugh it out, Hi wud ha’ bust wide open. There he was hanging out the window, with Jones a-pullin’ one way an’ the dog the other, while the Doctor whanged him over the buttocks as they stretched ’im over the sill.”