The truck won’t get there till later on. But we have to go on a bit, only spatially, that is. For it is still pretty early, and not much activity trickling through the streets, not that there ever is in Happy Valley, except for the show or the races or polling day. So now there is very little doing, and we are looking down from above, and we are not particularly impressed by any beauty of design. Because somebody once built a house, I think it was probably old Quong, and someone else come along and built another, some little way off, just far enough to show that there was no love lost in the act. And it went on like that, just building here and there, without co-operation. There never was co-operation in Happy Valley, not even in the matter of living, or you might even say less in the matter of living. In Happy Valley the people existed in spite of each other. To go one step farther, the country existed also in spite of the town. It was not aware of it. There was no connecting link. Just as Oliver Halliday noticed when he got back from Europe, the country slept, inwardly intent on some secret war of passion or trying to separate the threads of old passions spent.
