ottering feet
feeling their unknown way, and all the sweet curves and softnesses, the
innocent surprises and _naive_ desires, which made up for him the image
of "the baby." He would have said she was "prutty," implying much by the
word.

As he gazed at his precious charge, and watched the sunlight pattern
slowly but surely creeping towards the foot of the cradle, he had an odd
feeling that school would soon be over. A moment after he rubbed his
eyes and looked again. Was it true, or was he dreaming? Were those
shadowy whirls of smoke, dimming the sunshine, a vision of the past, or
did he actually see them before him, as of old, coiling about and around
the bars of light on the floor? It was certainly there, the shadow of
smoke, and came he could not tell whence; for in all the unpeopled
valley there were, of human beings, as far as he knew at that moment,
only himself and the baby. To his mind, so full of the past, it seemed
the herald of another danger.

He raised himself with difficulty from his stool, and moved his stiff
limbs to the threshold. As he did so, he noticed that the smoke was
within the room as well as without; it was festooning about the baby's
cradle, it was filling the place, there was scarcely air to breathe. His
first idea, as he smelt the soot, and saw the blacks showering on the
hearth, was that the chimney was on fire. He went straight to the baby
in its cradle, and, his limbs forgetting their stiffness, lifted her in
his arms to carry her to a place of safety; when that was done he would
take off the embers from the grate, and sprinkle salt on the hearth to
quench the fire.

Not till he reached the door did he notice a sound that filled the
valley. A strange, high-pitched note, like a hundred curry-fowl crying
at once--a wail, as of spirits in hell. Now from one direction, now from
another; now rising, now falling, the weird, unearthly shriek seemed
everywhere at once, increasing each moment in force and shrillness. As
the old man, holding the baby close to him, looked up and listened, fear
struck his lips with a sudden trembling. Opposite to him he saw a
strange sight. Halfway up the mountain, on the other side of the valley,
not a leaf on the trees was stirring: the lower slopes lay basking in
the sunshine, and the shadows of fleeting clouds only added to the
peaceful beauty of the scene; while the trees above were raging
bacchanals, whirling, swaying, tossing their long arms in futile agony