"Civil servant," Faber told him.

"What sort of work?"

"Finance. I'm just a cog in the machine."

"Treasury?"

"Mainly."

"Interesting work?" he persisted.

"Fairly." Faber summoned up the energy to invent a story. "I know a bit about how much a given piece of engineering ought to cost, and I spend most of my time making sure the taxpayer isn't being overcharged."

"Any particular sort of engineering?"

"Everything from paper clips to aircraft engines."

"Ah, well. We all contribute to the war effort in our own way."

It was, of course, an intentionally snide remark, and David would naturally have no idea why Faber did not resent it. "I'm too old to fight," Faber said mildly.

"Were you in the first lot?"

"Too young."

"A lucky escape."

"Doubtless."

The track ran quite close to the cliff edge, but David did not slow down.

It crossed Faber's mind that he might want to kill them both. He reached for a grab handle.

"Am I going too fast for you?" David asked.

"You seem to know the road."

"You look frightened."

Faber ignored that, and David slowed down a little, apparently satisfied that he had made some kind of point.

The island was fairly flat and bare, Faber observed. The ground rose and fell slightly, but as yet he had seen no hills. The vegetation was mostly grass, with some ferns and bushes but few trees: there was little protection from the weather. David Rose's sheep must be hardy, Faber thought.

"Are you married?" David asked suddenly.

"No."

"Wise man."

"Oh, I don't know."

"I'll wager you do well for yourself in London. Not to mention-"

Faber had never liked the nudging, contemptuous way some men talked about women. He interrupted sharply, "I should think you're extremely fortunate to have your wife."

"Oh?"

"Yes."

"Nothing like variety, though, eh?"

"I haven't had the opportunity to discover the merits of monogamy." Faber decided to say no more, anything he said was fuel to the fire. No question, David was becoming annoying.

"I must say, you don't look like a government accountant. Where's the rolled umbrella and the bowler hat?" Faber attempted a thin smile. "And you seem quite fit for a pen-pusher."

"I ride a bicycle."

"You must be quite tough, to have survived that wreck."

"Thank you."

"You don't look too old to be in the army either."

Faber turned to look at David. "What are you driving at?" he asked calmly.

"We're there," David said.

Faber looked out of the windscreen and saw a cottage very similar to Lucy's, with stone walls, a slate roof and small windows. It stood at the top of a hill, the only hill Faber had seen on the island, and not much of a hill at that. The house had a squat, resilient look about it. Climbing up to it, the jeep skirted a small stand of pine and fir trees. Faber wondered why the cottage had not been built in the shelter of the trees.

Beside the house was a hawthorn tree in bedraggled blossom. David stopped the car. Faber watched him unfold the wheelchair and ease himself out of the driving seat into the chair; he would have resented an offer of help.

They entered the house by a plank door with no lock. They were greeted in the hall by a black-and-white collie: a small broad-headed dog who wagged his tail but did not bark. The layout of the cottage was identical with that of Lucy's, but the atmosphere was different: this place was bare, cheerless and none too clean.

David led the way into the kitchen, where old Tom, the shepherd, sat by an old-fashioned wood-burning kitchen range, warming his hands. He stood up.

"This is Tom McAvity." David said.

"Pleased to meet you," Tom said formally.

Faber shook his hand. Tom was a short man, and broad, with a face like an old tan suitcase. He was wearing a cloth cap and smoking a very large briar pipe with a lid. His grip was firm and the skin of his hand felt like sandpaper. He had a very big nose. Faber had to concentrate hard to understand what he was saying; his Scots accent was very broad.

"I hope I'm not going to be in the way," Faber said. "I only came along for the ride."

David wheeled himself up to the table. "I don't suppose we'll do much this morning, Tom, just take a look around."

"Aye. We'll have some tay before we go, though."

Tom poured strong tea into three mugs and added a shot of whisky to each. The three men sat and sipped it in silence, David smoking a cigarette and Tom drawing gently at his huge pipe, and Faber felt certain that the other two spent a great deal of time together in this way, smoking and warming their hands and saying nothing.

When they had finished their tea Tom put the mugs in the shallow stone sink and they went out to the jeep. Faber sat in the back. David drove slowly this time, and the dog, which was called Bob, loped alongside, keeping pace without apparent effort. It was obvious that David knew the terrain very well as he steered confidently across the open grassland without once getting bogged down in swampy ground. The sheep looked very sorry for themselves. With their fleece sopping wet, they huddled in hollows, or close to bramble bushes, or on the leeward slopes, too dispirited to graze. Even the lambs were subdued, hiding beneath their mothers. Faber was watching the dog when it stopped, listened for a moment, and then raced off at a tangent.

Tom had been watching too. "Bob's found something," he said. The jeep followed the dog for a quarter of a mile. When they stopped Faber could hear the sea; they were close to the island's northern edge. The dog was standing at the brink of a small gully. When the men got out of the car they could hear what the dog had heard, the bleating of a sheep in distress, and they went to the edge of the gully and looked down. The animal lay on its side about twenty feet down, balanced precariously on the steeply sloping bank, one foreleg at an awkward angle. Tom went down to it, treading cautiously, and examined the leg. "Mutton tonight," he called.

David got the gun from the jeep and slid it down to him. Tom put the sheep out of its misery.

"Do you want to rope it up?" David called. "Aye-unless our visitor here wants to come and give me a hand."

"Surely," Faber said. He picked his way down to where Tom stood. They took a leg each and dragged the dead animal back up the slope. Faber's oilskin caught on a thorny bush and he almost fell before he tugged the material free with a loud ripping sound.

They threw the sheep into the jeep and drove on. Faber's shoulder felt very wet, and he realised he had torn away most of the back of the oilskin.

"I'm afraid I've ruined this slicker," he said.

"All in a good cause," Tom told him.

Soon they returned to Tom's cottage. Faber took off the oilskin and his wet donkey jacket, and Tom put the jacket over the stove to dry. Faber sat close to it.

Tom put the kettle on, then went upstairs for a new bottle of whisky. Faber and David warmed their wet hands.

The gunshot made both men jump. Faber ran into the hall and up the stairs. David followed, stopping his wheelchair at the foot of the staircase.

Faber found Tom in a small, bare room, leaning out of the window and shaking his fist at the sky. "Missed," Tom said.

"Missed what?"

"Eagle."

Downstairs, David laughed.

Tom put the shotgun down beside a cardboard box. He took a new bottle of whisky from the box and led the way downstairs.

David was already back in the kitchen, close to the heat. "She was the first animal we've lost this year," he said, his thoughts returning to the dead sheep. "Aye," Tom said.

"We'll fence the gully this summer."

"Aye."

Faber sensed a change in the atmosphere: it was not the same as it had been earlier. They sat, drinking and smoking as before, but David seemed restless. Twice Faber caught the man staring at him.