Michael smiled, for self-pity was never far away. It had rolled in again, straight off the moors – the mist came down and left you staring through the bus window at the reflection that followed you round the world: your own, foolish face mouthing the words, ‘So what?’ And as he met his own eyes again, he didn’t want the journey to end. The world was getting so much more dangerous, and the black rocks were getting spiky and dramatic, rearing up in the dusk – there was a soft booming sound, too, and he realised it was the wind. You hardly heard it on the train, but out here the driver had to sail her bus hard into a gale that tugged and heaved.

He heard the ticking of the indicator, and she pulled into a layby.

Nobody was waiting to board, but the two teenagers were getting off – and they also knew the driver, and said goodnight to her. The light was all but gone, and Michael craned his head round as the bus set off again – and they weren’t in a village. He hadn’t noticed so much as a house, and yet that was the destination for the two teenagers. They were farmer’s children, perhaps, used to a bracing walk in the dark – they’d been doing it for years, and could have done it blindfold, over the cattle-grid into the farmyard, the sheepdogs barking in joyful welcome and the warm yellow lamp in the kitchen blazing like a beacon.

Bread in the oven, and a broth warming on the hob. A newborn lamb in the farmer’s arms – an extraordinarily late birth, admittedly. He’d be trying to feed it milk from a bottle, and the youngest boy – a child of seven, perhaps, in his pyjamas – would be sitting close, knowing he now had a special pet which would follow him everywhere.

‘You two!’ said the farmer’s wife, in a broad Northern accent. ‘You must be right frozen. Sit down, there’s tea in’t pot.’

‘Saw a stranger on’t bus, Ma,’ said the girl.

The accents were getting broader.

‘A stranger, eh? A stranger on’t bus?’

‘He weren’t a walker, because he had nowt wi’ him. Just a little bag, really.’

‘Was he wearing boots?’

‘No, Ma. Shoes. He was all on his own as well, starin’ out at nothin’.’

On they went, and he was breathing quickly again.