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foraging, finding eazle first to clean my teeth and then, by following a young wing-tail, two fistfuls of ground-plums, as rich and nutritious as good cheese. Food never tasted so good and I didn’t regret at all that I had no brew to wash them down. A few minutes later I came across a wild whisker-tree and I picked about two dozen of the spidery fruit, even though I wasn’t hungry at all by then. I found a clearing in the bushes and laid out my shawl on top of the crisp grass. Then I spread out the whisker-fruit to begin drying. They would make a useful reserve if fresh food became scarce.
    As the light reddened in the west and began to depart, the birds and insects became suddenly frantic, as though they too had been drowsing in the sun and now had to make up for a wasted day. I wrapped my fruit in my shawl and quietly followed a pair of tracker-birds who were fetching orange bramberries for their raucous children. It’s always a difficult decision, whether or not to bother with bramberries. Their leaves are covered with a kind of hair which has barbs on the end. If you catch your clothes on them it can take half an hour to disentangle yourself, and they can, if you are very unfortunate, even grab your bare skin. And after all that trouble, they’re not that nice; not as nice as puffberries or yellowpips.
    I rolled up my sleeves and gathered a few mouthfuls. The way things were, I decided that I couldn’t really afford to waste any opportunity to eat even if I wasn’t hungry. By the time I had finished it was nearly dark, so I went back the way I had come and began to descend from the forest towards the drowning-pool.
    I was so sure that they would be there, the same beguilers that I had seen the last time. I followed the route that they had led me on before and settled myself on the northern lip of the high bank, far from the byre where the men and oxen were already shut away from the coming night. Feeling slightly foolish, even though there was no one around to see me, I followed mad Dabbo’s instructions and tied one end of the gut coil to a young flossy oak tree and the other end to my ankle. The heat showed no sign of diminishing even though it was dark, so I sat on the cotton shawl instead of wrapping it round me. Cross-legged, hugging my knees in anticipation, I waited.
    Behind me, at the edge of the forest, a nightangel was singing. It went through an extraordinary repertoire of sounds, from plaintive sobbing to sparkling chickering to melodic passages that stunned me with their simple beauty. I sank deep into its changing moods and came to the realisation that if I was that bird, or the mate that it was wooing, I would truly understand what love was. Not like the chuffie-coloured love that bore the name among the people of my village, but the real thing; so much more mysterious and profound. I didn’t know if it was possible for humans to experience it. It seemed doubtful, somehow, especially for someone as isolated and detached as I was.
    In the end I nodded off, still sitting there with my cheek resting on my scrunched-up knees, still listening to the nightangel. When I woke it was cold and I felt as stiff as old Hemmy. It took me ten minutes to unfold my legs and get the circulation going in them again, but after that I felt better and quite enjoyed the freshness of the pre-dawn air.
    I was surprised and pleased to find that I had no fear of the darkness. On the contrary, I delighted in it as though it was something that I had been unjustly denied throughout the whole of my life. The moon was only just past full, of course, and I knew that there would be much darker nights to come, but I felt, nonetheless, as I kept my watch that I had passed some kind of test.
    There were still no beguilers, though, and the morning came without bringing them to me. I remembered the night that they had danced before my eyes and wished that I had taken the opportunity then to try and catch one. Could I have done it? And if