wished to say either of these words), the white horse laughed a nasty
hollow laugh, sprang upwards from the ground, and was soaring through
the air toward the dying sunset, right away from home and dinner.

Neville clung on tightly, for he was so high above the earth that to
fall off would mean the end of him. And far beneath him he saw the
green fields and the white road, which now seemed like a mere thread.

"That's not fair! Whoa back! Whoa back!" he shouted to the white
horse; but the white horse made no reply. Indeed, he seemed suddenly
not so much like a white horse as like a white cloud shaped like a
horse, and Neville saw that he no longer sat upon the horse's silky
coat, but upon something soft and downy like a white fleece, and it
was slightly damp. Then he knew that he was riding upon a cloud; and,
as it was quite absurd to go on talking to a cloud, he ceased to cry
out. He just sat tight and wondered what would happen next.

He was high over a farm-house now: one that he used to see from the
bald hill. He knew it by the tall pine-trees that grew round it; and
down in the farm-yard he saw a man with a bucket going out to feed the
calves. Neville called loudly to him, but the man did not even look
up. Now he was far beyond that farm-house and above an orchard, where
he saw the fruit-trees standing in straight rows; and a few seconds
later the mountain range was beneath him, and Neville knew that the
cloud that looked like a horse was making straight for the golden
gateway, which was now glowing dully in a grey sky. He was riding into
the sunset.

Swiftly as the wind that drove it, the Cloud Horse drifted over the
mountain range. There was a sudden glow of golden light all about him,