He would have given anything if only it had stayed, fought it out then. But it belonged to a state too far away for that—defensive, at times aggressive, but forever running, hiding, slinking: a thrower from among thick boughs behind tree-trunks—and in a moment it was out of the window, bundling over the sill, so clumsy and yet so amazingly quick.
He could hear the swing of a bough as it caught it. There was a loud rustle of leaves, and a stone hurtled in through the window; but that was all.
Hector tidied the room, tossed the scattered garments into the bottom of the wardrobe, and re-made the bed in his awkward boy-fashion, moving mechanically, as if in a dream; his hands busied over his petty tasks, his mind engrossed with something so tremendous that he seemed to be two separate people, of which the one, the greater, revolved slowly and certainly in an unalterable orbit, quite apart from his old everyday life, from that Hector Fane whom he had always known, thought of, spoken of as “myself.”
He went to his own room, put on his collar and coat—for he had lain down upon his bed without undressing, every nerve on edge—laced up his boots with meticulous care. He was no longer frightened or hurried; he knew exactly what he was going to do, and that alone hung him—moving slowly, surely—as upon a pivot.
The moonlight was so clear that there was no need for a candle, flooding the stairway, the study with its shabby book-shelves.
Easy enough to take the old shot-gun from the nails over the mantelshelf; only last holiday—years and years ago, while he was still a child—he had been allowed to use it for wild-duck shooting—and run his hand along the back of the writing-table drawer in search of those three or four cartridges which he had seen there a couple of days earlier.
The cartridges in his pocket swung against his hip as he mounted his bicycle and rode away—guiding himself with one hand, the gun lying heavily along his left arm; it was like someone nudging, reminding.
The scene was entirely familiar; but what was so strange in himself lent it an air of something new and uncanny. The winding road had a swing, drawing him with it; the mingled mist and moonlight were sentient, watchful, holding their breath.
Once or twice he seemed to catch sight of a low, stooping figure amid the rough grass and rush-tufted hollows to the left of him; but he could not be sure until he reached the very shore, left his bicycle in the old place.
Then a stone grazed his shoulder, and there was a blurred scurry of brown, from hummock to hummock, low as a hare to the ground.