of the paddock, and an affectionate scrubbed woolly white dog belonging to the farm. After a while the lane branched off into a main road. They seemed to be in Alcapancingo itself, a sort of straggling suburb. The watchtower, nearer, taller, bloomed above a wood, through which they just made out the high prison walls. On the other side, to their left, Geoffrey's house came in sight, almost a bird's-eye view, the bungalow crouching, very tiny, before the trees, the long garden below descending steeply, parallel with which on different levels obliquely climbing the hill, all the other gardens of the contiguous residences, each with its cobalt oblong of swimming-pool, also descended steeply towards the barranca, the land sweeping away at the top of the Calle Nicaragua back up to the pre-eminence of Cortez Palace. Could that white dot down there be Geoffrey himself? Possibly to avoid coming to a place where, by the entrance to the public garden, they must be almost directly opposite the house, they trotted into another lane that inclined to their right. Hugh was pleased to see that Yvonne rode cowboy-fashion, jammed to the saddle, and not, as Juan Cerillo put it, "as in gardens." The prison was now behind them and he imagined themselves jogging into enormous focus for the inquisitive binoculars up there on the watchtower; "Guapa," one policeman would say. "Ah, muy hermosa," another might call, delighted with Yvonne and smacking his lips. The world was always within the binoculars of the police. Meantime the foals, which perhaps were not fully aware that a road was a means of getting somewhere and not, like a field, something to roll on or eat, kept straying into the undergrowth on either hand. Then the mares whinnied after them anxiously and they scrambled back again. Presently the mares grew tired of whinnying, so in a way he had learned Hugh whistled instead. He had pledged himself to guard the foals but actually the dog was guarding all of them. Evidently trained to detect snakes, he would run ahead then double back to make sure all were safe before loping on once more. Hugh watched him a moment. It was certainly hard to reconcile this dog with the pariahs one saw in town, those dreadful creatures that seemed to shadow his brother everywhere.
"You do sound astonishingly like a horse," Yvonne said suddenly. "Wherever did you learn that?"
"Wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wheeee-u," Hugh whistled again. "In Texas." Why had he said Texas? He had learned the trick in Spain, from Juan Cerillo. Hugh took off his jacket and laid it across the horse's withers in front of the saddle. Turning round as the foals came obediently plunging out of the bushes he added:
"It's the wheee-u that does it. The dying fall of the whinny." They passed the goat, two fierce cornucopias over a hedge. There could be no mistaking it. Laughing they tried to decide if it had turned off the Calle Nicaragua at the other lane or at its juncture with the Alcapancingo road. The goat was cropping at the edge of a field and lifted towards them, now, a Machiavellian eye, but did not move farther, watching them. I may have missed that time. I am still on the warpath however. The new lane, peaceful, quite shady, deep-rutted, and despite the dry spell full of pools, beautifully reflecting the sky, wandered on between clumps of trees and broken hedges screening indeterminate fields, and now it was as though they were a company, a caravan, carrying, for their greater security, a little world of love with them as they rode along. Earlier it had promised to be too hot: but just enough sun warmed them, a soft breeze caressed their faces, the countryside on either hand smiled upon them with deceptive innocence, a drowsy hum rose up from the morning, the mares nodded, there were the foals, here was the dog, and it is all a bloody lie, he thought: we have fallen inevitably into it, it is as if, upon this one day in the year, the dead come to life, or so one was reliably informed on the bus, this day of visions and miracles, by some contrariety we have been allowed for one hour