We lay in our protecting mow, and the warmth of our bodies drew out of it faint odors of salt hay. We did not talk. There are times when one seems to exist in poise, with eternity on all sides. One's thoughts do not move, they float.
"Well?" said Jonathan at last.
I could hear the hay rustle as he straightened up.
"Don't interrupt," I answered.
But my spirit had come down to earth, and after the first jolt I realized that, as usual, Jonathan was right.
We plunged out again into the buffeting wind and the starlit darkness, and I followed blindly as Jonathan led across the marshes, around pools, over ditches, until we began to see the friendly twinkle of house lights on the edge of the village. On through the lanes to the highroad, stumbling now and then on its stiffened ruts and ridges. As houses thickened the gale grew noisy, singing in telephone wires, whistling around barn corners, slamming blinds and doors, and rushing in the tree-tops.
"O for that haymow!" I gasped.
"The open fire will be better." Jonathan flung back comfort across the wind.
Ten minutes later we had made harbor in the little house by the shore. The candles were lighted, the fire set ablaze, and as we sat before it cooking chops and toast I said, "No, Jonathan, the open fire isn't any better than the haymow."
"But different?" he suggested.