I looked round the wild empty scene; it had its terrors, winter, and storm, sudden cliffs and green bogs, but they were not such as fretted the humanity we had fled from; no sign of man or man’s handiwork save a distant fence and burnt patches of heather on the moor was there to remind us of the man-made horror we had left behind us. Yet a mere month ago we were the fools of rumour, a prey to whispers, racked by fear and loathing. To-day the sun shone. We lived in the remote world which is not divided from men by miles alone; a greater distance than the rough hill barriers divided us from our kind; the callous earth, unchanged in war and pestilence, occupied time as if there were no men, and we lived there, in that strict country.

The wind abating to a breath lulled me. Even the brief unhappiness of the morning, which owed to the east wind, faded into the past, and I should soon have been asleep had not a movement on the hill-slope facing us taken my eye. I had reached a state of continual unconscious vigilance. Quite automatically, with my mind still turned backwards, I took my glass from its case and rubbed the lenses with my handkerchief and looked towards the facing hill. I saw a herd of deer, twenty or thirty stags with the new horn just visible, milling uneasily. They rushed now in one direction, now in the other. The wind though light was steady. It was impossible they could have seen me at the distance. I had not moved enough to attract their attention and I had taken care to blacken the brass of my telescope so that it should not shine in the sun and betray me. Once, long ago, I had been saved from a gamekeeper who tried to catch me poaching because I saw his telescope gleaming in the heather, and it taught me a lesson. Anxiety commenced to replace my beatific calm, until I heard Terry speak. She was standing at the door of the cave shaking out a deer-skin.

‘Isn’t it the loveliest lovely day!’ she cried.

‘Terry!’ I retorted, ‘what on earth are you doing, standing there? Don’t you know to be more careful? Lie down and keep quite still.’

It was amusing to see the sudden change that came on her face, and the haste with which she flung herself on the ground, not even waiting to make sure that the place she chose was dry or smooth. She lay for a few seconds in absolute silence. Then she raised her head with exaggerated caution to peer about her, dropping her head almost as soon as she lifted it.

‘Ostrich!’ I murmured.

‘Can I come up, Hugh?’ she whispered. At my nod she crawled and dragged herself to where I waited.