The wind
was here and the cloud - soo-hoo! drawing out longer and more plaintive in
the thin mouthpiece of the chink. The cloud had no more rain in it, but
it shut out the sun; and all that afternoon and all that night the low
plaint of the wind continued in sorrowful hopelessness, and little sounds
ran about the floors and round the rooms.
Still soo-hoo all the next day and sunlessness, turning the mind, through
work and conversation, to pensive notes. At even the edge of the cloud
lifted over the forest hill westwards, and a yellow glow, the great
beacon fire of the sun, burned out, a conflagration at the verge of the
world. In the night, awaking gently as one who is whispered to - listen!
Ah! all the orchestra is at work - the keyhole, the chink, and the
chimney; whoo-hooing in the keyhole, whistling shrill whew-w-w! in the
chink, moaning long and deep in the chimney. Over in the field the row of
pines was sighing; the wind lingered and clung to the close foliage, and
each needle of the million million leaflets drew its tongue across the
organ blast. A countless multitude of sighs made one continued distant
undertone to the wild roar of the gable close at hand. Something seemed
to be running with innumerable centipede feet over the mouth of the
chimney, for the long deep moan, as I listened, resolved itself into a
quick succession of touches, just as you might play with your
finger-tips, fifty times a second tattooing on the hollow table. In the
midst of the clangour the hearing settled down to the sighing of the
pines, which drew the mind towards it, and soothed the senses to sleep.
Towards dawn, awake again - another change: the battering-ram at work now
against the walls. Swinging back, the solid thickness of the wind came
forward - crush! as the iron-shod ram's head hanging from its chains
rushed to the tower. Crush! It sucked back again as if there had been a
vacuum - a moment's silence, and crush! Blow after blow - the floor heaved;
the walls were ready to come together - alternate sucking back and heavy
billowy advance. Crush! crush! Blow after blow, heave and batter and
hoist, as if it would tear the house up by the roots. Forty miles that
battering-ram wind had travelled without so much as a bough to check it
till it struck the house on the hill. Thud! thud! as if it were iron and
not air. I looked from the window, and the bright morning star was
shining - the sky was full of the wind and the star. As light came, the
thud, thud sunk away, and nothing remained but the whoo-hoo-hoo of the
keyhole and the moan of the chimney. These did not leave us; for four
days and nights the whoo-hoo-hoo-whoo never ceased a moment.
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