All The Wind

Silence grows between Dominic Flandry and a woman who has entered his room on Altai. As she stands watching him for nearly a minute:

"It grew so still in the room that he heard the wind on the lake."

-Poul Anderson, "A Message in Secret" IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, February 2010), pp. 341-397 AT IV, p. 354. 

To any new readers: The sound of the wind is a constant background noise or Greek chorus in Poul Anderson's works, to such an extent that we now notice any reference to the wind even when it might not be significant. In this case, the audibility of the wind outside underlines and emphasizes the silence and tension between the two characters. That this silence is full of menace is made clear by the immediately following sentence:

"Shadows were thick in the corners, and the dragons and warriors on the tapestries appeared to stir." (ibid.)

Continuing to read through "A Message in Secret," we come across:

"Wind lulled in long grasses, the whispering ran for kilometers..."

-ibid., VI, p. 362.

Flandry and his new woman acquaintance are now on the run, pursued by the Altaian authorities. However, at this precise moment, they are hidden, concealed by long grass, and able to rest. Therefore, the wind lulls and whispers rather than roaring or threatening.

Above them, the sky is:

"...an infinite vault full of wind and deep blue chill..." (ibid.)

Again, no immediate threat but nevertheless the natural environment from which they must soon find shelter - and hostile airboats search in that sky.

The wind blows unabated but we must take a break.