‘Am I bothering you, Hugh?’ she asked after her song was done. ‘Would you prefer me to keep quiet?’

She must have sensed me shaking my head, since she could not have seen, and I had no words. She began to sing again:

Hush and baloo, baby,

Hush and baloo,

A’ the lave’s in their beds,

I’m hushing you.

Shortly I slept, to waken at dawn and creep out of the hammock. I was half-dressed when Terry sat up and said in a shrill frightened voice:

‘Hugh! Where are you, Hugh?’

‘Here,’ I answered, going over to her.

She put her arms round my neck and clung to me.

‘I must have been dreaming,’ she whispered, ‘I thought —I had a dreadful dream; Hugh—stay with me!’

‘I’m here, I’m beside you,’ I said. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of, Terry.’

‘It’s to-day we’re going,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ I answered.

‘Is it time to go?’ she asked.

‘Not till night,’ I replied. ‘I’m going out for a stag. We must have a full larder waiting for us when we come home.’

‘I’m going with you,’ she cried.

‘But Terry—’ I expostulated.

‘Light the lamp,’ she bade me; ‘light the lamp till I see to put on my clothes. Take me with you to-day, Hugh.’

‘You’ll be tired to death,’ I persisted. ‘We’ve a long journey before us at the end of the day. There’s a lot to do, getting ready—’

‘I must go,’ she said.

We were well out on the hill before daylight arrived. As we came to an eminence from which the valley of the Truim could be glimpsed as a dark narrow expanse between the hills a distant rumbling caught my attention.

‘There are trains still,’ I told Terry. ‘Don’t you hear it? Coming down from the summit of Drumochter Pass. Perhaps we’ll catch sight of it.’

We sat down to wait.

‘It’s going at a hell of a pace,’ I said. ‘There didn’t use to be an express at this hour.’ As I spoke a glare of light swept into the valley and went hurtling northwards with a roar and a flare of fire-illumined steam. In a moment it was out of sight behind the Binion hill, and the noise receded towards Newtonmore, and our straining ears heard it no more. It was so calm we could hear a cock crowing in Dalwhinnie. So there were cocks betraying the dawn in our forsaken world. But scarcely had it crowed than we heard another train surmount Drumochter and accelerate downhill, to flame before us, and in its turn vanish.