The droop of their shoulders, the heaviness of their steps, the silence in which they went, trumpeted misery. Anything, however, was better than the dull sightless stares with which the news that their work was over had been received. Every, who was no coward, had been prepared for suspicion, defiance, violence. Instead, his service of the warrant had been accepted without a word. He had no shred of authority, but not the slightest attempt had been made to call his bluff. It had been, in fact, a painful walk-over. The seven labourers seemed to expect a death-blow. When it fell, they met it with the apathy of despair. Every felt as though he were sentencing a bunch of forest ponies to the pits, and the dumb hopelessness of their demeanour plucked at his young heart-strings.... For two or three minutes after the little group had passed out of sight the young man stood motionless. Presently his eyes wandered from the trail up a rude bank, all starred with primroses, through the dim breathless magic of a pinewood on to a peering screen of new-born leaves, pale-faced and trembling. After a moment's rest, they turned southward to where the lean brown road went paving a deep corridor, straight, silent, its black walls towering. Distance and gloom lent these a grim symmetry, suggestive of duress; above, a grey ribbon of sky issued a stony comfort, such as prisoners use.... With a shiver, Every turned away his head. To the north the ground fell sharply, and the cut of the road vouchsafed a glimpse of what it led to--woods, woods, woods, swelling, rising, tumbling, bolstering one another up, shouldering one another aside, some with their limbs still bare, others laced with the pale pinafore of spring, all of them dense and orderless, composite regiments of timber, where squire and skip-jack stood back to back, and the whelps of both thrust and quarrelled for a place in the bulging ranks. Every became suddenly conscious of a silence more tense and death-like than he had ever dreamed of.... Then a wind breathed--miles away ... to the north. He could hear the breath coming, a mere whimper among the tree-tops. The whimper became a whine.... Reaching the pinewood, the note slid into a moan, that rose slowly to a thin wail as the breath fled up the corridor with the towering walls. The wail fell to a sigh.... With straining ears, the man waited for this to fade.... "Mopping up?" said a quiet voice. Every started violently and turned right about. Ten paces distant, within the shadow of the beechwood, was a big upstanding grey, with ears pricked, vigilant. Square in the saddle sat a girl, in a habit of dark blue cloth. So dim was the light that Every could not distinguish her features, but he marked how the eyes burned out of a pale face and noted the glint of copper beneath the hard felt hat. "Mopping up?" she repeated quietly, but this time there was a silkiness in the tone that put the man on his guard.