“Are you here for the Dartmoor Trail?” asked the man, returning the pen.

Harold said that he wasn’t. He was travelling to a friend by foot, with a very specific purpose. He shuffled his postcards into a neat pile.

“Of course my wife and I are walkers. We come here every year. Even when she broke her leg we came back. That’s how much we love it.”

Harold replied that he and his wife also used to take the same holiday each year at a holiday camp in Eastbourne. There had been entertainment every evening, and competitions among the residents. “One year my son won the Daily Mail Twist prize,” he said.

The man nodded impatiently as if he were hurrying Harold along. “Of course it’s what you wear on your feet that counts. What kind of boots do you have?”

“Yachting shoes.” Harold smiled, but the hiking man didn’t.

“You should wear Scarpa. Scarpa is what the pros wear. We swear by Scarpa.”

His wife looked up. “You swear by Scarpa,” she said. Her eyes were round, as if she had contact lenses that maybe hurt. For a confusing moment Harold was caught in the memory of a game David used to play, where he timed how long he could stare without blinking. His eyes would be streaming but he wouldn’t close them. It was not the sort of competition they would run at the holiday camp in Eastbourne. This one had been painful to watch.

The hiking man said, “What kind of socks do you wear?”

Harold glanced at his feet. “Normal ones,” he was about to say, but the man didn’t wait for an answer.

“You need specialist socks,” he said. “Anything else and you can forget it.” He broke off. “What socks do we wear?” Harold had no idea. It was only when the man’s wife supplied the answer that he realized the hiking man was addressing her and not himself.

“Thorlo,” she said.

“Gore-Tex jacket?”

Harold opened his mouth and closed it.

“Walking is what makes our marriage. Which route are you doing?”

Harold explained that he was making it up as he went along, but that he was, in essence, heading north. He mentioned Exeter, Bath, and possibly Stroud. “I’m sticking to the roads because I have driven all my adult life. It’s what I know.”

The hiking man continued talking. It occurred to Harold that he was one of those people who didn’t require other people in order to have a conversation. His wife studied her hands. “Of course the Cotswold Trail is overrated. Give me Dartmoor any day.”

“Personally I liked the Cotswolds,” said his wife. “I know it’s more flat but it’s romantic.” She twiddled her wedding ring so hard it looked as if she might unscrew her finger.