‘Good evening to you, sir.’

‘I wonder if you would be good enough to direct me to the nearest inn. I seem to have missed my way.’

‘That’ll be the Nettleby Arms, sir, in the village. You’re walking away from it. If you’ll walk with me a little way I can point you in the right direction.’

‘That would be very kind.’

The stranger turned and set off the way he had come, hardly waiting to suit his pace to Tom’s. He was a tall man with a pleasant, deep, schoolmasterly voice.

‘I see you have a bad leg. Tell me if I go too fast. I have been tramping all day and have got in the way of a good speed. Were you in South Africa perhaps, in the Army?’

Tom’s halting pace was due to his attempt to conceal the bulge of the rabbit in his pocket by keeping one leg straight. ‘No, sir, no, it was a mantrap did it. Cruel things, they can be.’

‘Good God! Don’t they know they’re illegal?’

‘It was some time ago,’ said Tom hastily. ‘Not this present gamekeeper, it was the one before, a vicious man.’

‘I should say so!’

‘I bear no grudge. He was doing his duty as he saw it, that’s what I say.’

‘His duty to trap a fellow human in a diabolical contraption that might cripple him for life! And all to ensure that there should be enough poor beasts for someone else to murder. Is there much shooting then on the estate?’

‘Indeed there is. This is Sir Randolph Nettleby’s place. Some of the best shooting in the country. The King himself has shot here, though not so often as his late Majesty.’

‘Good God. How ghastly.’

‘Taking the food from the poor man’s pot indeed as God has provided,’ said Tom, changing his tone to suit what seemed to be his audience’s view.

‘Murder.’

‘You might say so in a sense.’ Tom was mystified now and spoke tentatively.

‘Must we kill our brothers and sisters in order to eat?’ said the other.

‘I should hope not indeed,’ said Tom stoutly but in total bewilderment.

‘Until we can recognize the universal kinship of all living creatures we shall remain in outer darkness. In outer darkness.’

‘Ah.’

‘The birds are our sisters, the beasts our brothers.’

‘In a manner of speaking, you could say.’

‘All we need for our daily sustenance are the fruits of field and orchard.’

‘They do say the Lord will provide.’

‘It is quite unnecessary to eat flesh. I have walked a good twenty miles today and I could go on for another ten. No flesh has passed my lips for five years.’

‘Is that so then?’

‘Will they be out tomorrow about their purposes of massacre?’

‘I couldn’t say, sir. It’s nothing to me, the pastimes of the rich class. I couldn’t say if they’ll be shooting tomorrow. This is where I’ll be going, sir, to my poor residence. If you go straight on to the crossroads there you’re in the village then. The Nettleby Arms is a hundred yards or so to your left.’