‘Nothing. Nothing at all. The rings and blisters formed and broke. The mud has a kind of lustre at night. I then followed the path right over to the big hill above the Springs. I went almost to the house but there was nobody. I came back here and saw you walking towards me.’

Whether by accident or design, Mr Falls switched on his torch and its strong beam shone full in Dikon’s eyes. He moved his head but the light followed him. He said thickly: ‘I’m going up there. To look.’

‘I think you had better not do that,’ said Mr Falls.

‘Why?’

‘It should be left undisturbed. We can do nothing.’

‘But you’ve already disturbed it.’

‘Not more than I could help. Very little. Believe me, we can do nothing here.’

‘It’s all a mistake,’ said Dikon violently. ‘It means nothing. The path may have fallen in a week ago.’

‘You forget that we came that way to the concert. It has fallen in since then.’

‘Since you know all the answers,’ said Dikon unevenly, ‘perhaps you’ll tell me what we do next. No, I’m sorry. I expect you’re right. Actually, what do we do next?’

‘Establish the identity of the man in the overcoat, don’t you think?’

‘You mean—find the members of the party. To see…Yes, you’re quite right. For God’s sake let’s go back.’

‘By all means let us go back,’ said Mr Falls. ‘But you know there was only one member of the party who wore an overcoat, and that was Mr Questing.’

II

They had agreed to tell Mrs Claire and Barbara that they had met nobody on the reserve and leave it at that. The short drive home was made ghastly by Mrs Claire’s speculations on the origin of the scream. She was full of comfortable explanations which, Dikon felt, she herself did not altogether believe. The Maori people, she said, were so excitable. Always playing foolish pranks. ‘I expect,’ she ended on a note that was almost tranquil, ‘they just thought they’d give us a good fright.’

Barbara, on the other hand, was completely silent. ‘It was in another age,’ Dikon thought, ‘that I kissed her.’ But he did not believe that it was because of the kiss that she was silent. ‘She knows something has happened,’ he thought. It was a relief to hear Mrs Claire say that after such a late night they’d just pop straight off to bed.

When they had returned to the Springs, Dikon let his passengers out and drove the car round to the garage. He saw Mrs Claire and Barbara walk along the verandah towards their rooms. He parked the car and returned to find Mr Falls waiting for him on the verandah.