‘Lucky for them they don’t know,’ he said, shaming her with a smile.
She tried to cover her annoyance by asking if they were anywhere near the top of the hills.
He knew no more than she did. Certainly by the time that they had rested and moved on again the fog had thickened. The stone walls and the clumps of hawthorn and furze with which the fields were scattered looked misty, wild, gigantic.
‘Time we quickened up a bit,’ he said.
‘How can you be sure it’s the right road?’
‘Because there bain’t no other, missus,’ he replied. ‘Up you come, my pretty!’ And he hoisted Gladys into his arms again.
They could no longer guess at the time of day. Mary supposed that it was now getting on for six o’clock, but the sky that drooped upon them was of a uniform, milky whiteness, and they could not guess the level of the sun. The air, indeed, grew colder, but that was a relief in itself after the oppression of the valleys.
They walked on, maybe for another hour. Mary’s arms ached with the burden of Morgan, who told her from time to time that his legs hurt him or that he wanted to go to bye-bye, and vexed her to the point of anger with his cry of, ‘Are we nearly there?’ She herself was utterly fagged and hungry. Her anxiety for Gladys had made it impossible for her even to think of food in the earlier part of the day. Now her stomach ached with emptiness, and the cold, moist air that she drew into her labouring lungs did nothing to quench the drought in her throat. Morgan suddenly began to whine for a drink of water. The sweets had made him thirsty.
‘They don’t lay on the water up here, my son,’ said Abner cheerfully.
‘But I want some,’ Morgan insisted. ‘Or tea,’ he added, as a slight concession.