she scolded. “What is there for lunch? I’ll get you
something.”
He protested, but she insisted, and at last he gave in,
and sat down with her to eat the stew she heated over the
little oil-stove. Marc had sent up a number of tins, she
found, as well as eggs, cheese and bread. There was no
reason why Peter should not eat well.
After lunch they resumed work. They continued to work
for the rest of the afternoon, breaking only for a cup of
black coffee at two o’clock, and soon had the whole site
mapped out. Peter crawled around on his knees,
measuring the ground, and Kate carefully marked down
the measurements on his rough sketch map. Then they
noted down all the positions of pillars, fallen stones and
other objects, then measured the pillars, their heights,
breadths, capitals.
Kate’s shoulders and arms were aching. Her eyes kept
blurring and she was hot and weary. But Peter seemed
beyond such ordinary human weakness. Frowning,
absorbed, intent, he worked on as the sun grew warmer,
rose higher and higher, and then began to move down the
sky again.
She glanced at her watch and found, to her relief, that it
was half past three. She wanted to get back down the peak
before Jake arrived, so she said goodbye to Peter, who
answered briefly, hardly realising what she had said, she
suspected.
Kate was glad to see no sign of the car below. Taking a
deep breath, she began to lower herself, clinging to the
grassy outcrops of stone, her fingers clawing fiercely, feet