IV 

 A RUNAWAY DAY 



It is a wise man who knows when to run away. 

 To quote rightly the words of a great poet, whose 

 name has escaped me: — 



He who works and runs away 

 May live to work another day. 



So it was that, like Christian of old, I suddenly 

 decided to escape for my life from my city. 



There were many reasons. It was a holiday. 

 Then the sun rose on one of the most perfect days 

 that ever dawned since the calendar was invented. 

 Furthermore, there was the thought of a little 

 cabin hidden in the heart of the pine barrens. So I 

 ran away through snow-covered meadows and silent 

 woods and past farmhouses that were old when this 

 republic was first born, until my law offices and the 

 city and the noise and the dust and the smoke were 

 all behind the horizon. 



An hour later I was following a little path that 

 zigzagged back and forth through thickets of scrub 

 oak and stiff rows of pitch pines. Above the trees 

 was the rush of wings. The upper air was filled with 

 the victorious sound of going that heartened David 

 from the tops of the mulberry trees in that dread 

 valley of Rephaim. Perhaps it was the wind ; but why 



