He dashed for the next hut, but it was the same as ever (the maize and nothing else), just as if all human life were receding before him, as if Somebody had determined that from now on he was to be left alone—altogether alone. As he stood there the rain reached the clearing; it came out of the forest like thick white smoke and moved on. It was as if an enemy were laying a gas-cloud across a whole territory, carefully, to see that nobody escaped.
