Suddenly Blade heard a faint hooting, like the sound of a distant owl.

Dragged out of her thoughts, she was suddenly aware again of the dark forest around them, of the restless sighing of the wind in the treetops, of a distant owl's haunting cry.

Hoot-hoot, went the distant owl.

The hooting of a distant owl was all the sound that troubled the dead stillness.

He could hear sounds all around him: night creatures, a distant owl, mostly the sounds of wind and foliage, from which vision distracts us.

But never an answering call, save for a distant owl.

Mary breathed deeply of its coolness, meanwhile listening to a distant owl.

There was a silence, broken only by the screech of a distant owl.

Herons rustled mysteriously in their skyline roosts and a distant owl made personal enquiries.

There was no sound of any kind, beyond the hotel or within it; not a creaking floorboard or a prowling cat or a distant owl.