They spread the blankets against the roots of a great tree, over a bed of heathery scrub, very soft and springy; they had no axe or any means of chopping wood, but there was a thick carpet of dead stuff under the trees.  Noticing dead branches hanging by thin strips of bark Marcella made a lasso with the swag straps and pulled them down.  As far as warmth went, there was no need for fire at all as soon as the meal was cooked:  but out there in the vast purple-blackness of the night with pin-points of starlight in the illimitable loneliness the rose and gold of the spurting flames was comforting and comradely.  They piled the dead wood upon it before they lay down; as one resinous branch after another caught fire the trees danced round in giant shadows, as though they were doing a death-dance for their limbs on the funeral pyre.  The silence was a complete blank except when a flapping of wings beat the air where some bird changed its night perch, or a parrot squawked hoarsely for a moment, causing a fluttering of smaller wings that soon settled to silence again.

Louis rolled over; like Marcella he had been lying on his back, staring through the trees at the stars.  His hand sought hers and held it, quivering a little.

“You know, it’s going to be a hell of a fight, Marcella,” he said.

“Oh my dear, do you think so?” she asked, surprised that he was confirming her opinion.

“Yes.  In the city, you see, I only have to fight myself.  I know, there, that I can always get the stuff—­even if I’ve no money I can beg or pinch it—­All I’ve to fight there is the accessibility of it.  Here I’ve to fight the inaccessibility....”

“I don’t quite understand that, Louis.”

“I don’t suppose you do.  You see, dearie, out here it’s quite on the cards that I shall go completely off my rocker.”  He spoke quietly, rather wistfully and sadly.

“Louis!” she cried, sitting up and looking down at him.

“I know I can’t get whisky, you see.  It’s probably a hundred miles away.  And I’ve no money.  You must keep it all.  This craving comes on and simply eats me up, dear.  It’s like a cancer, gnawing through bone and flesh and muscle.  In the city when the gnawing gets too awful there’s always an anesthetic in the nearest pub.  In a way, to conquer it in the city is more noble.  I said ‘noble’ in inverted commas, dear.  I don’t think it is particularly noble.  But it’s going to be the devil of a fight.”

She did not know what to say or think.  It seemed, at any rate, better that he should be removed from whisky, however hard it was going to be for him.

“I’ve thought a lot about it,” he went on, speaking more impersonally than she had thought he could.  “It’s going to be so awful for you.  I’ll be a fiend to you, I expect, when the hunger comes on.  I suppose this is one of the advantages of an inebriates’ home.  They’d shove me in a straight jacket or give me drugs when I got like that.  Out here, you see, there’s only you.  I can’t control myself.  I may hurt you.”