‘Can’t we dry-salt the meat and hang it from the rafters?’ Terry asked. ‘Or if the winter’s hard meat will keep in the snow.’

Our flour likewise was enough for seven or eight months. ‘We’ve been using a quarter of tea a week,’ Terry said. ‘We have no more than three pounds remaining. We’ll miss our tea when it’s done.’

‘Then we must drink water and spare the tea,’ I declared. ‘What about sugar?’

‘We haven’t used a great deal,’ she replied. ‘The condensed milk has eked it out, but the milk’s practically used up.’

‘It’s a luxury, anyway,’ I declared.

‘No doubt it is,’ she agreed, ‘but lots of things which are luxuries in themselves become necessities when they are all lacking. We can live without sugar and butter and vegetables, I don’t say we’ll starve while we have meat and flour, but I don’t believe we can keep healthy. Our jam’s a luxury—’

‘How much is left?’ I interrupted.

‘Three jars; we used it heavily for a while. You were supping it with a spoon, Hugh.’

‘I never did!’ I declared indignantly, and was forced to smile. ‘How did you find out?’ I asked.

‘You forgot to clean the spoon,’ she told me.

‘It was very wicked and thoughtless of me,’ I said. ‘But oh, Terry, I was so sick of meat! meat! meat! I thought I’d die for something sweet.’

‘I’m not blaming you,’ she continued, ‘but I was counting on the jam to keep us healthy through the winter.’

‘We can make more,’ I informed her gleefully.

‘Can we?’ she cried. ‘Is that true? Is there fruit hereabouts?’

‘Yes, cranberries,’ I said, ‘and probably crowberries and blaeberries too, and I saw the averans in full flower on the top of the Farrow; we’ll get them in the autumn if the frost doesn’t take them. There’ll be heaps of rowans and we could go down to the Spey where the rasps grow. You need a lot of sugar for rowans—’

‘If we have enough sugar to preserve them, the sourer they are the better for us,’ Terry declared. ‘That’s a great load off my mind.’

When we concluded the tale of our stores we knew that we had as much salt and flour as would suffice us until spring.

‘Then they’re likely to outlast us,’ I commented bitterly when Terry told me her conclusion.

‘The biscuits and the butter are nearly done,’ she went on.

We have ten dozen eggs preserved. The ham is mostly all eaten. Our vegetables are finished. The potatoes grew soft and Terry had to throw most of them away. ‘We’ve more of some things than we had to begin with,’ Terry said.

‘That’s a blessing,’ I said ironically.

‘Why are you angry with me, Hugh?’ she asked. ‘Why do you speak to me as you do?’