Now the mouse was behind the birch stick.

Then Rolf noticed that the stick if it were to fall would strike a drying line, one end of which was on the song-drum peg.

So he made a dash at the mouse and displaced the stick; the jerk it gave the line sent the song-drum with hollow bumping to the ground.

The boy stooped to replace it; as he did, Quonab grunted and Rolf turned to see his hand stretched for the drum.

Had Rolf officiously offered it, it would have been refused; now the Indian took it, tapped and warmed it at the fire, and sang a song of the Wabanaki.
It was softly done, and very low, but Rolf was close, for almost the first time in any long rendition, and he got an entirely new notion of the red music.