Gradually my eyes grew accustomed to the bright light. I could now see traces of the hand of man in the ruins: two broad roads paved with shining stones. To the left and right of them, narrow tortuous alleys. In the center the circular agora, or public meeting place, and next to it, with a totally democratic condescension, had been placed the king's palace with its double columns, large stone stairways and numerous outbuildings.

In the heart of the city the stones were most heavily trodden by the foot of man and that was where the inner shrine must have been: the Great Goddess was there, with her huge breasts, set wide apart, and her arms wreathed in snakes.

Everywhere were small shops, oil presses, forges, and the workshops of joiners and potters. A cleverly designed anthill, well-built in a sheltered position, and whence the ants had disappeared thousands of years ago. In one place a craftsman had been carving a jar out of veined stone but had not had the time to finish it; the chisel had fallen from his hand, to be discovered thousands of years later, lying next to the unfinished work of art.

The eternal, vain, stupid questions: why? what for? come to poison your heart. The unfinished jar, where the artist's happy and confident inspiration had suddenly been defeated, fills you with bitterness.

All at once a little shepherd, tanned by the sun and wearing a fringed handkerchief round his curly hair, stood up on a stone beside the crumbling palace and showed his black knees.

"You there, brother!" he shouted.

I wanted to be alone, and made believe I had not heard. But the little shepherd began to laugh mockingly.

"Ha! Playing deaf, eh? Any cigarettes? Give me one! In this empty hole I get so fed up with life."

He dragged out the last words and there was such misery in them that I felt sorry for him.

I had no cigarettes, so I offered him money. But the little shepherd was annoyed:

"To hell with money!" he shouted. "What would I do with it? I tell you I'm fed up with everything. I want a cigarette!"

"I haven't any," I said in despair. "I haven't any."

"No cigarettes?" He was beside himself and struck the ground with his crook. "No cigarettes! Well, what have you got in your pockets? They're bulging with something."

"A book, a handkerchief, paper, a pencil, a penknife," I answered, pulling out one by one the things in my pocket. "Would you like this penknife?"

"I've got one. I've got everything I want: bread, cheese, olives, my knife, leather for my boots and an awl, and water in my bottle, everything… except a cigarette! And it's as though I'd got nothing at all! And what might you be after in the ruins?"

"I'm studying antiquity."

"What good do you get out of that?"

"None."

"None. Nor do I. This is all dead, and we're alive. You'd do better to go, quick. God be with you!"

"I'm going," I said obediently.

I went back along the little track with some anxiety in my mind.

I turned for a moment and could see the little shepherd who was so tired of his solitude still standing on his stone. His curly hair, escaping from under his black handkerchief, was waving in the south wind. The light streamed over him from head to foot. I felt I was looking at a bronze statue of a youth. He had placed his crook across his shoulders and was whistling.

I took another track and went down towards the coast. Now and then, warm breezes laden with perfume reached me from nearby gardens. The earth had a rich smell, the sea was rippling with laughter, the sky was blue and gleaming like steel.

Winter shrivels up the mind and body of man, but then there comes the warmth which swells the breast. As I walked I suddenly heard loud trumpetings in the air. I raised my eyes and saw a marvellous spectacle which had always moved me deeply ever since my childhood: cranes deploying across the sky in battle order, returning from wintering in a warmer country, and, as legend has it, carrying swallows on their wings and in the deep hollows of their bony bodies.

The unfailing rhythm of the seasons, the ever-turning wheel of life, the four facets of the earth which are lit ín turn by the sun, the passing of life-all these filled me once more with a feeling of oppression. Once more there sounded within me, together with the cranes' cry, the terrible warning that there is only one life for all men, that there is no other, and that all that can be enjoyed must be enjoyed here. In eternity no other chance will be given to us.

A mind hearing this pitiless warning-a warning which, at the same time, is so compassionate-would decide to conquer its weakness and meanness, its laziness and vain hopes and cling with all its power to every second which flies away forever.

Great examples come to your mind and you see clearly that you are a lost soul, your life is being frittered away on petty pleasures and pains and trifling talk. "Shame! Shame!" you cry, and bite your lips.

The cranes had crossed the sky and disappeared to the north, but in my head they continued to fly from one temple to another, uttering their hollow cries.

I came to the sea. I was walking rapidly along the edge of the water. How disquieting it is to walk alone by the sea! Each wave, each bird in the sky calls to you and reminds you of your duty. When walking with company you laugh and talk, and cannot hear what the waves and birds are saying. It may be, of course, that they are saying nothing. They watch you passing in a cloud of chatter and they stop calling.

I stretched out on the pebbles and closed my eyes. "What is the soul, then?" I wondered. "And what is this secret connection between the soul, and sea, clouds and perfumes? The soul itself appears to be sea, cloud and perfume…"

I rose and started walking again, as if I had come to a decision. What decision? I did not know.

Suddenly I heard a voice behind me.

"Where are you going, sir, by the grace of God? To the convent?"

I turned round. A stocky, robust old man, with a handkerchief twisted round his white hair, was waving his hand and smiling at me. An old woman walked behind him, and behind her their daughter, a dark-skinned girl with fierce eyes, wearing a white scarf over her head.

"The convent?" asked the old man a second time.

And suddenly I realized that I had decided to go that way. For months I had wanted to go to the little convent built for the nuns near the sea, but I had never managed to make up my mind. My body had abruptly made the decision for me that afternoon.

"Yes," I answered. "I'm going to the convent to hear the chants to the Holy Virgin."

"May Her blessing be upon you."

He quickened his pace and caught me up.

"Are you what they call the Coal Company?"

"That's right."

"Well, may the Blessed Virgin send you good profits! You are doing a lot of good for the village, bringing a means of livelihood to many a poor father with a family to keep. May you be blessed!"

And a moment or two later the cunning old fellow, who must have known that we were not doing very well, added these words of consolation:

"And even if you get no profit out of it, my son, don't worry. You'll not be the loser. Your soul will go direct to paradise…"

"That's what I'm hoping, grandad."

"I never had any education, but one day at church I heard something Christ had said. It stuck in my head and I never forget it: 'Sell,' he said, 'everything you possess to obtain the Great Pearl.' And what is that Great Pearl? The salvation of your soul. You are well on the way to getting the Great Pearl, sir."

The Great Pearl! How many times it had gleamed in the darkness of my mind like a huge tear!

We began walking, the two men in front, the two women behind with clasped hands. From time to time we made a remark. Would the olive blossom last on the trees? Would it rain and swell the barley? We must both have been hungry because we constantly led the conversation round to food.