Bambi answered in a whisper, “I think ...”
“Tell me what you think, then!” the elder ordered him.
Bambi blushed and quaked and said, “There’s someone else who is above all of us, ... above us and above Him.”
“The time has come, then, when I can go,” the elder said.
He turned round and the two of them wandered on for a little while.
At a tall ash tree the elder stopped. “Don’t come with me any more, Bambi,” he began, in a calm voice, “my time is up. Now I need to find a place for the end ...”
Bambi was about to say something.
“No,” the elder stopped him. “No ... at the time I am now approaching each of us is alone. Fare well, my son ... I have loved you very much.”
The summer’s day started being hot as soon as the sun had risen, no wind, no chill of twilight. The sun seemed to be in more of a hurry that day. It rose quickly into the sky and broke out its dazzling flames like a dreadful blaze.
The dew on the meadow and on the bushes quickly evaporated; the earth became very dry and crumbly. In the woods it became quiet before its usual time. Only the woodpecker could be heard laughing here and there, and only the pigeons cooed in tireless, fervent tenderness.