Without further ado he hopped up and walked off bowleggedly, without a glance back. I was left alone in the morning light with nothing except for the necklace, which hung solidly on my chest. And a sore arm. So it had happened, I hadn’t dreamed it. I had been blessed.

When I had collected my wits I hiked downstream and back to camp. By the time I got there the necklace was deep in one of my down jacket’s padded pockets, and I had a story all worked out.

Phil was already there, chattering to the entire group. “There you are!” he shouted. “Where the hell were you? I was beginning to think they had gotten you!”

“I was looking for you,” I said, finding it very easy to feign irritation. “Who’s this they?”

“The yeti, you fool! You saw him too, don’t deny it! And I followed him and saw him again, up the river there.”

I shrugged and looked at him dubiously. “I didn’t see anything.”

“You weren’t in the right place! You should have been with me.” He turned to the others. “We’ll shift the camp up there for a few days, very quietly. It’s an unprecedented opportunity!”

Valerie was nodding, Armaat was nodding, even Sarah looked convinced. The botanists looked happy to have some excitement.

I objected that moving that many people upvalley would be difficult, and disruptive to whatever life was up there. And I suggested that what Phil had seen was a bear. But Phil wasn’t having it. “What I saw had a big occipital crest, and walked upright. It was a yeti.”

So despite my protests, plans were made to move the camp to the high valley and commence an intensive search for the yeti. I didn’t know what to do. More protests from me would only make it look suspiciously like I had seen what Phil had seen. I have never been very clever at thinking up subterfuges to balk the plans of others; that’s why I left the university in the first place.