The return trip had presented more difficulty. On the twenty-second a trickle of peasants had mixed with the dependants. At first he’d thought it was farmers and hamlet women come to sell their produce and wares but the people had had nothing with them, had not stopped, had not set up shop. By the twenty-third it seemed clear that only the old and very young were coming to the highway. “Has someone talked to these people?” he’d asked his escort. “Of course,” the liaison had answered, indignant. Immediately he’d known he’d blown an opportunity, had placed the man on the defensive. The next day the highway had been clogged not only by the column but with hundreds of pushcarts, with thousands upon thousands of children and thousands more of enfeebled elders shuffling along north or south, or
