They set off, Glenys remarking that she hoped he would keep the way they had spent the night to himself, but presently she had other things to think about, for the snow was more than a foot deep and hid all sorts of obstacles for the unwary. One moment her boot sank into soft snow and the next she was banging her toes on a hidden rock. But they kept their eyes fixed on the weathercock, and sooner than she would have believed possible they saw the sunken lane which they knew led directly to the farm.

‘It’s just occurred to me to wonder whether there were search parties out looking for us last night,’ Sam said suddenly. ‘Mrs Buttermilk will have expected you and the children to arrive on her doorstep and my in-laws must have assumed that I would leave you at your lodgings and then return to the farm. Goodness, I hope to God they didn’t alert the police, or the neighbours, otherwise we shall be unpopular.’

‘And there will be talk,’ Glenys said resignedly. ‘Oh dear, and talk is what I most want to avoid. Not that it will really matter, come to think, because I’ll be on my way as soon as the snow clears.’

Sam was beginning to answer when she checked him, a hand on his arm. ‘Listen!’ she commanded. ‘It’s the children!’ And sure enough, rounding the next bend and tearing towards them, well muffled up in coats and scarves, came Jimmy and Mo.

‘Where have you been?’ Mo shrieked as she panted up to them. ‘I went into your room, Dad, as soon as I woked up this morning and you weren’t there. But I didn’t cry, and I went back up to our room and shook Jimmy and he said you’d have stayed with Mrs Buttermilk, else you’d have got lost, ’cos there were a great blizzard, you know, and Nain said you don’t know the country well enough to walk around when it’s under snow. She said only a idiot would have come home in them conditions.’

‘Very true, my bright little button,’ her father said, winking at Glenys. ‘But we’re starving hungry, ’cos we got lost in the Wild Wood on our way back, so we’ve had no breakfast. You know the book Miss Glenys has been reading to you?’

‘Yes, I remember it,’ Mo said. ‘It snows in the Wild Wood . . .’

Jimmy, who had stopped to examine a deserted bird’s nest in a thicket, came galloping up and interrupted his sister. ‘I ‘spect Mrs Buttermilk gave you both breakfast,’ he said, ‘but our Nain says you’ll be hungry all over again after your long walk, so she told us to run ahead of you and she’ll start cooking at once.’

‘Well, you won’t arrive at the farm much before we do, because your nain was right, and we’re hungry as hunters,’ Sam said. ‘We’ve also got pretty wet, and as soon as we reach the farm we shall want to borrow a couple of dressing gowns and dry our clothes out before the kitchen fire, so you two run ahead and tell Nain we’re not far behind you.’