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His Lordship stopped in his walk, and, his tone barely covering his anger now, he said, "I don't see why you're holding this case up as an example if you I intend to give the child your name."

Clive had stopped a few feet ahead of his father, and standing sideways to him with the nonchalant, disinterested air that seemed part of him now, and which annoyed his father, he said, "I was merely stating a case in point. That courts don't always do what is expected of them; so, as you suggested, I think it would be wise to have this matter settled once and for all."

"Yes, yes, I agree with you." His Lordship was walking on again, his voice calmer now, but his Adam's apple, moving rapidly up and down, showed his inner agitation, and his irritation came to the fore again when his son, seemingly bent on continuing the conversation along what he considered, under the circumstances, very tactless lines, said, "Has she ever tried to see the child?"

"No, of course not."

"How is her money paid to her?"

"What!"

"I said how is the money paid to her?"

"I told you this weeks ago. At the beginning of the month."

"What I mean is, does she come and collect it?"

Now His Lordship merely paused in his walk while he looked at his son, then asked stiffly, "What is all this? Why this sudden interest in this girl?"

"She is the mother of the child, isn't she?"

"There is no one disputing that, and least of all me." His Lordship's anger was now evident, but it seemed to make no impression on his son.

"You didn't say how she got her money."

"Cunningham takes it to the habitation." His words were cold and stiff.

"The habitation?" Now Clive was looking at his father.

"She lives on the fells in a makeshift house. That is her own fault; she has enough money to rent a decent place. "

"On the tells, the open fells? Why do you think she continues to live there?"

"How should I know? These people are like rats, they cling to their homes."

There was a pause. There was no sound between them, no sound from the child even, for he had stopped and was examining a dead, blackening rowan frond that covered his two small hands. No bird sound broke the silence in these seconds, no wind in the branches of the trees; it was dive's voice that cut it, saying with strange bitterness, "For a rat she did rather well in my opinion." Then, moving quickly forward, he gathered up the boy in his arms and held him above his head; and for the first time he really looked at him. And the boy, surprised by the playful e ness of his papa, did not respond for a moment, not until his papa put him down on the ground and, taking his hand, ran him forward towards the end of the park to where the grass drive led into the forbidden distance; and, standing close to the tangle of undergrowth, lifted him up in his arms again and, pointing into the distance, said, "I think that's a rabbit."

"Where, Papa?" The child leaned forward and peered along the path.

"Oh, he's gone. Rabbits are very quick little fellows."

He held the child in the same position until His Lordship came almost to his shoulder, saying, "Don't encourage him to go along there. He could easily slip into the wood; it's heavily trapped."

He put the child down now and, patting his bottom, sent him forward at a run and laughing gleefuly. And then he said, apparently in some surprise, "But I was through there last week. I never came across a trap."

"There weren't any last week. But we found a place where they were getting in; there must have been a number of them. It could have been the scum from Rosier's village or one of the gangs that sell to the markets. Anyway, they certainly thinned the birds out; even came as far as the pens and helped themselves.... And not a dog barked; they're elusive as vapor. "

"I understood it was illegal now to set spring traps."

"Illegal or not they're staying. I have placed a notice on the south wall to the effect that it is dangerous to enter the woods. I have not stated that there are traps set; they're clever enough to deduce why the notice is there."

Clive gave a huh of a laugh now as he said, "They won't need much evidence to prove that there are traps if they show they've one leg missing, or blinded."

"What can one do? You tell me. They're scourging the country like vermin, no man's property is safe from them. Do you know that Bellingham had a keeper tied up, gagged, then thrown face downwards in the lake to drpwn. And he would have but one of the other keepers had been watching from the undergrowth and managed to get him out in time.

Travel may have widened your sympathies, Clive, but I would like to wager that, when you inherit, your forbearance on such matters will be wanting. "

"Very likely, very likely." Clive was nodding his head thoughtfully now. Then he went on, "Touching on the matter of inheritance reminds me that I've also been rather negligent about visiting Compton and getting my matters settled. You said, didn't you, that I would have around four thousand a year from the trust?"

"Yes, about that. Perhaps a little more; the investments abroad have been very favorable of late."

"Quite enough to set up a small establishment?"

"Yes, if you go careful. Were you thinking of doing this?"

"Yes and no. My mind is rather unsettled at the moment."

"You have given up the idea then of returning to the sea?"

"Not entirely. Captain Spellman is anxious that I sail with him again;

but there's plenty of time tor me to consider that because the ship is doing a coastal run, and in the spring, when the sea's open, he'll be trading to Bergen, so I understand. Anyway, he'll be near enough at hand should I change my mind. "

"What if he should have taken on a permanent first mate in the meantime?"

"Ohi" dive's tone was airy, "He'll arrange matters." He paused before ending, "You know, you made a deep impression on the Captain, Father."

His Lordship's face took on a slight tinge of pink and when the child came running back towards them now and flung himself against his father's legs and hugged his thigh he hoped with a deep intensity that his son would, in the end, decide to return to the sea, and for more reasons than one.

It was early November. For eight days now they had seen no sun; the fog shrouded the grounds in a white mist in which the trees floated and men's heads appeared in the distance as if disembodied.

In almost every room in the house a fire was blazing. The whole place was warm, even the great hall and the stone passages, and the atmosphere was light, almost gay. The servants bustled and looked happy in their bustling; all day long there were men and women carrying big skips of wood and buckets of coal, or big copper cans of hot water for baths. The master, Miss Isabelle, and the child bathed every day; only Master Clive had no use for daily hot baths. Up till a fortnight before he had taken his bath in the river. In the opinion of the indoor servants Master Clive was a funny one; they would even have dared to say not quite a gentleman any longer, for he didn't have a valet, and he had the plebeian way of thanking servants for doing him a small service. This latter might go down with some, but servants of long standing knew that these weren't gentlemen's ways.

On this morning of thick fog and air so chill that it penetrated even the thickest clothing and probed the skin, Clive left the warm comfort of the house and took a walk. No one had inquired as to where he was going. His father was closeted in the study with his bailiff and Isabelle was playing with the child.

Once outside the North Lodge he turned right along the road until he came to the oak tree, and there he stopped. She would not have been here for days. How intense must have been the hunger that brought her here in the first place, that made her create the hidey-hole and run the risk of discovery.

He walked on sharply now and mounted the fells at about the place where he had remembered her going up the bank. Away from the shelter of the wall and the sunken road the air caught at his breath and made his chest heave. He could see no farther than sixty feet ahead; and for the first time since leaving the house he asked himself a question: "If I do see her how will I bring the matter up?"

Long before he had gone into Newcastle the weeK before to sign the deed claiming that the child, christened as Richard Brodie, was his son and rightful heir and would henceforth take the name of Richard John Horatio Fischel, he had known what lay behind his change of attitude; but he also knew it would take time before he could present it to the girl in an acceptable fashion, time in which he must convince her that he was up to no trickery, that his one aim was to recompense her for the wrong he had done her.

Each night since he had surprised her in the hidey- hole he had gone over the incident second by second, It was much clearer in the dark, much more real; he felt her body close to his for the second time in his life. He saw the blood press to the surface of her face where his fingers squeezed her mouth. He saw the creamy film and the texture of her skin, and he smelled the smell of her, that woman's smell that her old shabby clothes could not smother. He had smelled it on the day he had taken her, and never had he smelled it since on any other woman.

Women all had particular smells, but there had been none like the odor that came from her; and there, as he had held her pressed tightly to him while their child laughed and called on the other side of the bramble fence, he had been more aware of the odor of her than he had been of the strangeness of the situation.

He knew that he could wander about up here tor hours, even go round in circles and never come across a living soul. After some time he took out his watch and peered at it and was surprised to see it was only a quarter to eleven, little more than an hour since he had left the house. He felt he had been away from the confines of the Hall for days.

When the fog lifted for a moment, and he saw in the distance the figure of a woman, he stopped. The woman had seen him, and she, too, had stopped. He couldn't make out in the swirling fog if it was the girl or not, but when the figure came hurrying towards him he knew it wouldn't be the girl. The woman stopped within twenty feet of him.

There was a look of surprise on her face; it was as if she had thought she would see someone else. He saw that she was a big, ugly woman but not poorly clad; and when she turned and almost ran back the way she had come, he remained standing, pmzled by her appearance and quick disappearance. It was evident she had not expected to see him.

After a moment he, too, turned and retraced his steps the way he had come; but fifteen minutes later, when he hadn't reached the road, he realized he had missed his way. Then ten minutes later still he came on the dwelling.

It seemed to rise out of the ground like an eruption. It was akin to something he imagined a man would build if wrecked on a desert island;

it looked like a number of poor cow sheds at different levels stuck against the outcrop of rock. He saw it was in three sections but that only the middle section had a window, and there were only two doors.

The larger door was open and revealed what looked like a wood shed, the other door was closed. He was staring at this door, wondering whether he should knock, when it opened and there she stood. But only for a second. At the sight of him she heaved in a deep breath, sprang back into the room, and banged the door shut. And then he heard a bar being dropped into its socket.

God Almighty! She was still all that afraid of him. Couldn't she believe that he meant her no harm, only good? If he could only get her to realize just how much good he meant her.

He knocked on the door sharply as he said, "Open the door, please. I must speak with you."

He heard a small voice which wasn't hers say something, and again there was silence. And again he said, "I have no intention of going away until I can speak with you, so you might as well open the door. I have something to say to you that is of great interest to you ... it, it concerns the child."

Two full minutes passed before the bar was lifted; then slowly the door was opened, and there she stood, one hand gripping the door and four children standing round her, their eyes wide, with fear in them. The sight brought his head down, and after a moment he asked quietly, "May I come in?" And now she pushed the children from her and opened the door further to allow him to walk into a room that wasn't a room, but the strangest place he had ever seen, and he had seen some strange places.

The wall of the outcrop jutted roughly into it; there were odd bits of old furniture here and there, and at the far end a tiny fireplace. She and the rest of them had lived here, according to his reckoning, for five years, and here his son had been born and nurtured by her until he was five months old. He looked at the children, all girls--they were grouped together now at the side of the fireplace--and turning his gaze to her, he said, "Do you think I might have a word with you in private?"

When she went and picked up a shawl from the top of a chest, he said,

"No, no, it is bitter out. Is there no place to send the children?"

And on this she made a motion with her head and the tallest girl, still with her eyes on him, sidled past him and to a door at the far end of the room, the others following her.

When they were alone he looked at her where she was standing by the far corner of the fire, her face averted from him, and he said, "Won't you sit down?" When she made a small movement with her head he said under his breath, "How can I convince you of what I said the other day, I mean you no harm?"

She still made no answer, but her shoulders moving up and down showed him the rapidity of her breathing, and the terror of him that was still in her; and so, throwing aside his formulated plan of slow approach, he said, "How would you like your child back?"

Her body was slow in turning, her lips were apart, her eyes wide, and the fear had gone from her as if it had never been, but the look that had replaced it lasted only a matter of seconds; and when her shoulders slumped downwards they seemed to drag with them a veil of blankness over her face, and she said dully, "You're just sayin' that.