pawn on a chess-board, she had crossed three dykes and was at the
shepherd's gate.

He was working at the farther side of the garden and did not see her
till she called him. She had been to his cottage only once before, when
he complained of the roof leaking, but Socknersh would not have shown
surprise if he had seen Old Goodman of the marsh tales standing at his
door. Joanna had stern, if somewhat arbitrary, notions of propriety, and
now not only did she refuse to come inside the gate, but she made him
come and stand outside it, among the seed-grasses which were like the
ghost of hay.

It struck her that she had timed her visit a little too late. Already
the brightness had gone from the sunset, leaving a dull red ball hanging
lustreless between the clouds. There was no wind, but the air seemed to
be moving slowly up from the sea, heavy with mist and salt and the scent
of haws and blackberries, of dew-soaked grass and fleeces.... Socknersh
stood before her with his blue shirt open at the neck. From him came a
smell of earth and sweat ... his clothes smelt of sheep....

She opened her mouth to tell him that she was highly displeased with the
way he had managed her flock since the shearing, but instead she only
said:

"Look!"

Over the eastern rim of the Marsh the moon had risen, a red, lightless
disk, while the sun, red and lightless too, hung in the west above Rye
Hill. The sun and the moon looked at each other across the marsh, and
midway between them, in the spell of their flushed, haunted glow, stood