The spring sunlight faded. The skies grew luminous. The hills went far away and lay down, as Laura had once said as a child; describing in eight easy words the whole look and atmosphere of an evening of settled weather when tomorrow is going to be a wonderful day.
‘We ought to be getting back,’ Zoë said.
As he picked up their fishing things from the bank he thought that there had been more magic in this one afternoon on the Turlie than in all the much advertised Islands of the West.
‘You love your work, don’t you?’ she said as they walked up the hill to Clune. ‘Laura told me that you could have retired years ago if you had wanted to.’
‘Yes,’ he said, a little surprised. ‘I suppose that I could have retired. My mother’s sister left me a legacy. She married a man who did well in Australia and she had no children.’
‘What would you do if you retired?’
‘I don’t know. I have never even considered it.’
9
But that night, going to sleep, he did consider it. Not as a prospect, but with speculation. What would it be like to retire? To retire while he was still young enough to begin something else? If he began something else what would it be? A sheep-farm like Tommy’s? That would be a good life. But could he make a success of an entirely country existence? He doubted it. And if not, then what else could he do?
He played with this nice new toy until he fell asleep and he took it to the river with him next morning. One of the really charming facets of the game was the thought of Bryce’s face when he read his resignation. Bryce would not merely be short of staff for a week or two; he would find himself deprived for good and all of his most valued subordinate. It was a delicious thought.