Translation:The High Mountains/53
The children come down quickly. They hurry up as they're going to be caught in the dark.
That's it, they've left the Moor's rock.
They have crossed the valleys, have arrived at the path where they had seen Phanis's footprints and they are advancing at speed towards the fir tree.
From there they'll cut across again, they'll reach the cabins rapidly and they will bring Phanis back and that's what everyone is waiting for.
—How they must be waiting! said Matthias.
—We're late, really late.
—We're late, but what have we seen!
—Did you see how magnificent the sun was!
—When it touched the water, it quivered.
—Look at the clouds! D'you see them?
As the evening was falling, the clouds in the sky were all red; they still took on the colour of the vanished sun, but slowly they too darkened.
—Look boys what the Moor's rock looks like from afar. You'd say a man! said Matthias.
They turned round to look at the Moor's rock which blackened in the dusk. At the summit one could really make out a head, a forehead, a big nose, a mouth and two thick lips.
From close up these stones evoked nothing. From far away however they formed a face, like the Moor's face. That's why the old people believed that a Moor lived up there!
It's not the only rock like that. Many stones from far away look like human faces; an old woman can take them for ghosts; a child can even be afraid of them.
A child, but not a man like Andreas, Phanis, Matthias, Kaloyannis, Costakis.
Not those who dared to go up there to see.
And now they laugh at old Charmaine's remarks! Where are the Moor's fires? Where is he, the Moor? From far away they look at the rock and call out to it:
—Hey, Moor!
—Put your hat on then, Uncle Moor!
—So go and smoke your pipe, Grandpa Moory!
—Good night, Grandpa Moooooory!