It took a while for things in the house to accustom themselves, for the furniture to settle into the rooms, the walls to feel at ease with fresh, bright colour, and the floors to accept the tread of unfamiliar and demanding feet. Long before — in ancient history — it had been home to another family whose children had grown and gone. An elderly couple had lingered until they went. The house had been empty for a year, a year of absence, but not of silence. The house was never quite silent. And if there were still moments there was, though faintly, the sound of the sea.

The wind whished through the trees of the wood with a sound like surf on the shore. It was a curious effect that forbade investigation.

The sea was a sound permeating everywhere, even well inland. The wind whished through the trees of the wood with a sound like surf on the shore. It was a curious effect that forbade investigation. The girls would never dare go into that wood, not even on sunlit days when the world was calm. It was the sort of place a witch might go. Had they not seen Mrs. Seymour walk in that direction? Surely they had seen her. They knew where she was going, but they dared not think why.

They were too young to use the word “primeval,” but they would have understood its meaning. The wood on the high cliff was filled with dense vegetation that looked age-old, for this was one of the last wild places. At one time there was only vast forest and marsh. What was not sea was wilderness. That was how world had been. At one time there was no farmland, though the soil was arable. There were no houses, though there were people who spoke and thought and imagined. They fought, sometimes taming, wild creatures. They feared dragons, and they dreamed of mermaids. Their lives were like our fears and wishes. Perhaps they dreamed of a peaceful, prosperous future?