After lunch we work on clearing the last of the rubble, digging out the foundation stones. I stand up to stretch. A couple of crows fly up and land in the tree at the side of the gate. I can’t tell what kind it is from here because the bark is covered with moss. The whole thing half dead, young branches warped and split by the weather. It has a haunted look about it. If it wasn’t on private land I could use it to practise remedial pruning. I imagine the feel of the knife, blade flipping out, finding the right nick, the best angle, waiting to see if the tree still leaks sap at the cut. Imagine telling Mum I’m switching from trees to stones. Or maybe it’s no worse in her eyes. Still a big waste of academic talent. She can’t believe I’ll ever make any money. I could do neither or both. Just something that means I can stand in a place like this. Something that makes me feel this ache at the end of the day, that means I can lie down in bed and sleep without dreaming.

Somewhere near here is the wall where we stopped and looked up at the old man sleeping. And the village where she grew up. The place she said she’d take me but never did, the stream where she went quiet and looked like she might have seen a ghost.

The others scrape out the soil to make a clean even trench, a solid base to build on. Keith askes me to carry the excess and use it to fill the damp ruts all over the grass, left there by tractor tyres. It’s good to get away from the noise of the group. Sunday school songs on repeat in my head. The wise man built his house upon the rock and the rain came tumbling down.

On the OS map the fells are just collections of orange contour lines. It’s hard to imagine the curves of them softened by trees, the bleached grass, the heather, the way they loom over you in twilight or when a storm is heading in. The summit cairns no more than piles of rubble. The weekend hang gliders with their bright colours pulled and pushed by the wind.