don't know what has become of him. You see, I had ninety pounds left out
of the thousand when I left Oxford. So I just dived."

"But you have come up again now. You will resume your friends at the
point where you dived."

"Not yet. I am going away in a week's time."

"For long?"

"Eight months."

"And far?"

"Very."

"I am sorry," said Stella.

It had been the intention of Hillyard to use his first months of real
freedom in a great wandering amongst wide spaces. The journey had been
long since planned, even details of camp outfit and equipment and the
calibre of rifles considered.

"I have been at my preparations for years," he said. "I lived in a
cubbyhole in Westminster, writing and writing and writing, but when I
thought of this journey to be, certain to be, the walls would dissolve,
and I would walk in magical places under the sun."

"Now the New Year reviving old desires,
The thoughtful soul to solitude retires"