And the year would tell.
To the right from the dank water of a quarry pool abandoned long since to catfish and willows, a milk-white mist was rising eerily into the moonlight.

Brian saw it but he saw it indistinctly.

He was thinking of the boy's sister, her sweet face tragic with imploring.

It lay in the mist and yet not in the mist, and it was binding him to obligation.
He had written a promise.

That promise he must keep.