His shoeless hooves gripped the round, slippery stones covering the river-bed which was almost dry. Using his hands, the man cautiously pushed back the thorny branches which obstructed his view of the plain. Day was breaking. Far away, where the land rose, first in a gentle slope, for he remembered it being similar to the pass he had descended far north, before suddenly being broken up by a balsatic mountain ridge rising up in a vertical wall, stood some houses which from a distance looked quite small and low, and lights that resembled stars. Along the mountain ridge which cut out the entire horizon from that side, there was a luminous line as if someone had passed a light brushstroke over the peaks and, because still wet, the paint had gradually spread over the slope. The sun would appear from that direction. One false move as he pushed back the branches and the man grazed his hand: he muttered something to himself and put his finger to his lips to suck the blood. The horse retreated, stamping his hooves and swishing his tail over the tall grasses that absorbed the remaining moisture on the river-bank sheltered by overhanging branches forming a screen at that black hour.
