ture of Freda, overworked
and underpaid, homeless and driven from pillar to post. The image was
painful, but it pleased him so to suffer.

On Saturday there was to be shooting, the last of the season. People
were coming down for the week-end and, doubtless, neighbours would be
there. In the home coverts cock pheasants still trumpeted in peace,
but their time had come.

Martin had no gun of his own, but sometimes he used a spare weapon of
his uncle's. If he had been more efficient he would have liked the
actual shooting: he could see the point of it and appreciate the thrill
of waiting and achieving. But he had neither the long experience nor
the swift eye and he was glad when the gun was needed by someone else.
Freda would not see his lack of skill, for Robert had brought a friend
from town for whom the gun would be required.

Neither Margaret nor Freda went out in the morning, and Martin also
stayed in to work. The guns came back to lunch at half-past twelve, as
they had begun to shoot early, for that made a better division of the
short daylight. When they went out again Margaret accompanied Robert's
friend and Martin took Freda to watch the first drive. The air was
soft: otherwise Freda, being still convalescent, would not have been
allowed to stand about. But it was considered warm enough for her if
she wore a thick motoring coat of Margaret's. Here and there films of
mist hung thinly over fields, but in the woods it was clear: the wind
spoke gently in the trees or passed in silence down the rides and open
glades. Underfoot rustled the drifting, many-tinted leaves and the
flight of a startled song-bird made the still air reverberate. The
fragrance of distant pines was mingled with the scent of the leaf-mould
and sometimes the glint of the birch's silver broke the splendid
monotony of giant trunks.

The mystery of Ham and Eggs flashed across Martin's mind. The cult
must not exclude woods.

"Aren't these trees wonderful," he said simply.

"I think they're awful, in the proper sense of the word. They make me
excited and terrified and happy."

"Awful is the right word. Why did men spoil it?"

"We've managed to spoil most things."

"Will they begin shooting soon?" asked Freda after a pause.

"The beaters will be coming up soon."

"Why do people do it? It seems so unnecessary, so savage, somehow."

"So it is savage. That's just the point. It answers a need, I
suppose. You wait till you hea