His trousers were still slightly damp, but this didn’t bother him now. He was walking across the fallow fields, taking care to step only on the stubble left from the last harvest. The occasional partridge flew up as he passed, and he heard the sound of hares fleeing from the crunching sound made by his boots. Once he was out of the olive grove, his one plan was to keep going. He could recognise the Milky Way, the W of Cassiopeia and the Great Bear. From there, he could locate the Pole Star and that was where he was directing his feet. Although he had not as yet spent one whole day on the run, he knew that more than enough time had passed for fear already to be racing through the village streets towards his parents’ house, an invisible torrent that would carry all the women of the village along with it to form a pool around his mother, who would be lying limply on her bed, her face as wrinkled as an old potato. He imagined the turmoil in the house and in the village. People perched on the stone bench outside, hoping to catch a glimpse through the half-open door of what was going on inside.
