Translation:The High Mountains/28

Lambros obeyed like a good student. But when he raised his head from his paper and looked around, he jumped up as if stung by wasps.

The goats had run away! No sooner had they understood that the shepherd had his mind elsewhere than they had scattered themselves all over the high cliffs.

Only very few had stayed down. Most of them had climbed up high to the big rock; others had disappeared in the crevasses, others had climbed up onto the stones.

Five or six, the wildest, Lambros saw perched right up high on the summit.

At sunset, as the light was fading, you saw their black silhouettes against the sky, just like black ink on paper. From up high they looked tranquilly down at Lambros, as if to say:

“What on earth are you doing learning to read?” Then the shepherd began to run like demon, whistling and throwing stones.