...
The stillness pressed upon the house. Every sound--the distant rattling of
some cab, the faint murmur of trams--was stifled, extinguished. The orchard
seemed to press in upon the house, darker and darker grew the forest about
it--The stars were shut out, the moon... the world was dead.
Then into this sealed and hidden silence, a voice crying from an upper
room, suddenly fell--a woman in the abandonment of utter pain, pain beyond
all control, was screaming. Somewhere, above that dark forest that pressed
in upon the house, a bird of prey hovered. It hung for a moment; it
descended--its talons were fixed upon her flesh... then again it ascended.
Shriek after shriek, bursting the silence, chasing the shadows, flooding
the secrecy with horrible light, beat like blows upon the walls of the
house--rose, fell, rose again. Peter was standing, his back against the
wall, his hands spread out, his face grey.
"My God, my God... Oh! my God!"
The sweat poured from his forehead. Once more there was silence but now it
was ominous, awful....
The little silver clock ticked--Peter's body stood stretched against the
wall--he faced the door.
Hours, hours passed. He did not move. The screaming had, many years ago,
ceased. The doctor--a cheerful man with blue eyes and a little bristling
moustache--came in.
"A fine boy, Mr.
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