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Roy Glashan's Library
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Idler, September 1900, with "From the Crow's Point of View"
SKAUR, the black wolf, whined uneasily in his sleep, stirred a little, and awoke. His cave was in black darkness, for night had nearly fallen, and it was growing near to hunting time. He was the lonely wolf, the terror of the peasants, the foe of the hunters for many leagues round, the lamb-stealer, the daring one, the outcast of the grey back. and in fact people said, the Evil One himself.
But it did not disturb Skaur, this abuse, whether he knew it or no.
He trotted leisurely out from the overhung darkness of the pine belt and stood, peering over the snowy waste.
"Aghaghr," he snarled, "nothing living for miles." He cocked his eye up at a belated crow that dawdled towards the pine belt.
"Is anything stirring, friend?" he asked.
"Naught," croaked the bird, "save only that the Baron has sent three most marvellous big and shaggy wolf hounds home to-day. I saw them arrive at the castle . Ivan has taken two for his fold. They could kill any loafer of a wolf I've ever seen with one snap, and I heard of a hunt, yes, a wolf hunt, my friend, that will shortly take place."
He chuckled wickedly and flopped into a tree close by.
Skaur threw up his lean black head and snarled uneasily.
"Rumph, that is very big talk indeed. These big dogs, can they run—very fast I mean, as fast as I can, for instance?" he asked.
The crow looked down with malicious eyes, and answered doubtfully:
"Ye-es, but you of course are not afraid of them, you are so cunning, and—and—all that."
There was a touch of sarcasm underrunning the words, that Skaur noticed, and he felt very uncomfortable.
"And this hunt, the wolf hunt, when is it to be?"
"I do not know, but I think to-morrow, when the Baron's wife returns to the castle. She is coming to-night, along yonder track."
"Did you hear my name—Skaur the Lonely Wolf—spoken?" he queried anxiously.
The bird fluttered further up the branch before he replied:
"No, I don't remember so, but they spoke much amongst themselves—the hunters—of the black wolf, and swore oaths that they would not rest, now they had those beautiful wolf hounds, until the black wolf was dead—torn to rags."
Skaur kicked up the snow with his hind legs, and howled miserably.
"What is the matter?" asked the crow innocently—too innocently, in fact. "Are you the black wolf they meant?"
"Ah, yah—yes," barked Skaur.
"Well, I'm sorry I spoke," said the crow ambiguously, and put his head under his wing, laughing to himself.
"Well, I'm sorry I spoke," said the crow.
The wolf galloped silently away, always under the shadow of the pines, until he came to where a sleigh-track cut through the trees. There he paused, snuffing curiously at the fresh snow which had fallen whilst he slept. Then he turned, facing the slight breeze with his nose in the air.
"Nothing, nothing," he yelped impatiently. He paused and soliloquised, whining. "There is the small fold under the castle, one might snatch a lamb there by creeping silently through the hole in the corner—a fat lamb—aghar-r, they have the fresh dogs, I forgot. The cattle are driven in. There may be a loosed goat down in the village, or a stray child, or"—he paused—"the Baroness comes home to-night, the crow said. I have a mind to wait."
A fine, dry snow powdered down, and the cold bit his limbs.
He bayed at the pale moon and galloped out on the plain, moving round in widening circles. Suddenly he stopped dead, still and rigid as an ebony model listening. Far. far away on the lower plain the grey pack were hunting, racing on a hot scent, and the breeze bore the sound of their howlings to him. He was their outcast and dare not join them—all because he was born black.
The howling came nearer and Skaur glided swiftly back to the sheltering trees.
A frightened doe tore sobbing into the wood, sending great puffs of white breath out into the frosty air from distended nostrils, and there presently appeared over the ridge a dozen little moving black spots that grew rapidly, churning up the snow. These were the grey wolves. Skaur crouched lower.
They threw themselves with savage howls into the pines, and Skaur crept silently after them. The wolves emerged on the other side and vanished into the powdering drift. Presently their noises ceased: they had pulled down the quarry. The lonely black wolf skulked back, envious. He was decided now; the pack had frightened all the game for leagues, so he would wait for the baroness
He scratched out a snug hole in the pine needles and lay therein, grumbling in his throat, with stiff raised shoulder-bristles.
Staring up at the moon with unblinking, yellow eyes, and black lip drawn up from the bared white fangs: "Aghar-aur-r," he snarled, "three big hounds, shaggy, that can run a wolf down and kill him with one snap—aghar-r."
The wind soughed gently through the tree-tops, and there came no other sound for two hours.
Occasionally the wolf would whine impatiently: "The Baron hunts me, therefore I hunt his Baroness—and I am hungry."
The watching eyes never closed, the pricked, listening ears never relaxed, and the black. pointed nose was always raised.
A keene coldness came gradually, the snow powder whirled as it fell, the wind droned anxiously on through the tree-tops in the same gently rising and falling cadences, the black shadows on the snow cast by the pines swayed as they had swayed for the last two hours, and the lonely wolf was crouched as ever.
Another hour passed and the moon hung higher overhead. Still the thin snow-powder eddied, the wind moaned, the black shadows on the snow swung gravely back and to, and the lonely wolf skulked—whining now.
A swollen cloud crawled up into the vast blue-black heavens, heralding a heavier fall, and silently blotting out a few stars that had quivered and blinked in their desolateness.
Then, far away, a sleigh-bell jangled, and Skaur, the pack-exile, rose silently, leaping into the air a few times in case of cramped muscles. He stood by a pine at the edge of the snow-covered track, judging his leap.
The sleigh bells jangled nearer.
"They say there are wolves abroad this winter, husband," said the Baroness in the sleigh, "and I am nervous. Hold your revolver ready until we are through the pine belt"
The Baron smiled a little, but obeyed, for he idolised his young wife.
The sleigh bells jangled opposite Skaur, the horses snorted with inherited race-fear and the black wolf leaped straight as an arrow at the fur-clad bundle in the sleigh.
But he had not allowed for the horses' sudden swerve, and therefore he only just landed on the side of the sleigh, where he hung for a moment—a hideous white-fanged, flame-eyed, red-tongued, panting, snarling, grisly head from out of the darkness. There was a revolver crack, a streak of white flame, and Skaur collapsed and crumpled up in the snow, with the top of his narrow head blown away.
There was a revolver crack.
"But I did not tell him that the Baron, who, by the way, is a very good shot, was returning with the Baroness," remarked a crow, the morning after, to a friend. They were sitting on the stiff, gaunt body of a black wolf they had just dug out of the snow a few yards beyond the pine belt. "I must have forgotten to, I suppose," be concluded.
The two crows laughed raucously, nudged each other, and hunted for tit-bits.
Moral:—Put not your trust in crows.
—Bertram Atkey
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
Go to Home Page
This work is out of copyright in countries with a copyright
period of 70 years or less, after the year of the author's death.
If it is under copyright in your country of residence,
do not download or redistribute this file.
Original content added by RGL (e.g., introductions, notes,
RGL covers) is proprietary and protected by copyright.