For his
own fate he felt no immediate anxiety; three pounds goes but
little way in the world when there is nothing behind it, but
to a man who has counted his exchequer in pennies it seems a
good starting-point. Fortune had done him a whimsically
kind turn when last he trod these lanes as a hopeless
adventurer, and there might yet be a chance of his finding
some work and making a fresh start; as he got further from
the farm his spirits rose higher. There was a sense of
relief in regaining once more his lost identity and ceasing
to be the uneasy ghost of another. He scarcely bothered to
speculate about the implacable enemy who had dropped from
nowhere into his life; since that life was now behind him
one unreal item the more made little difference. For the
first time for many months he began to hum a careless
light-hearted refrain. Then there stepped out from the
shadow of an overhanging oak tree a man with a gun. There
was no need to wonder who he might be; the moonlight falling
on his white set face revealed a glare of human hate such as
Stoner in the ups and downs of his wanderings had never seen
before.
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