his shoulders, he could feel it dry in the sun and see the white patches that the salts of his body made in the drying. He could feel and see himself standing there and knew there was nothing to do except go on.
At half past ten he had crossed the lakes and was well beyond them. By then he had reached the river and the great grove of fig trees where they would make their camp. The bark of the trunks was green and yellow and the branches were heavy. Baboons had been eating the wild figs and there were baboon droppings and broken figs on the ground. The smell was foul.
But the half past ten was on the watch on his wrist as he looked at it in the room where he sat at a table feeling the breeze from the sea now and the real time was evening and he was sitting against the yellow gray base of a tree with a glass of whiskey and water in his hand and the rolled figs swept away watching the porters butchering out the Kongoni he had shot in the first grassy swale they passed before they came to the river.
I’ll leave them with meat, he thought and so it is a happy camp tonight no matter what comes after. So he put his pencils and the notebooks away and locked the suitcase and went out the door and walked on the stones, dry and warm now, to the hotel patio.
The girl was sitting at one of the tables reading a book. She wore a striped fisherman’s shirt and tennis skirt and espadrilles and when she saw him she looked up and David thought she was going to blush but she seemed to check it and said, “Good morning, David. Did you work well?”
“Yes, beauty,” he said.
She stood up then and kissed him good morning and said, “I’m very happy then. Catherine went in to Cannes. She said to tell you I was to take you swimming.”
“Didn’t she want you to go in town with her?”
“No. She wanted me to stay. She said you got up terribly early to work and maybe you’d be lonely when you finished. Can I order some breakfast? You shouldn’t always not eat breakfast.”
The girl went into the kitchen and she came out with oeufs plat avec jambon and English mustard and Sovora.
“Was it difficult today?” she asked him.
“No,” he said. “It’s always difficult but it’s easy too. It went very well.”
“I wish I could help.”
“Nobody can help,” he said.
“But I can help in other things can’t I?”
He started to say there are no other things but he did not say it and instead he said, “You have and you do.”
He wiped the last of the egg and mustard up from the shallow dish with a small piece of bread and then drank some tea. “How did you sleep?” he asked.
“Very well,” the girl said. “I hope that’s not disloyal.”
“No. That’s intelligent.”
“Can we stop being so polite?” the girl asked. “Everything was so simple and fine until now.”
“Yes, let’s stop. Let’s stop even the ‘I can’t David nonsense,” he said.
“All right,” she said and stood up. “If you want to go swim ming I’ll be in my room.
He stood up. “Please don’t go,” he said. “I’ve stopped being a shit.”
“Don’t stop for me,” she said. “Oh David how could we ever get in a thing like this? Poor David. What women do to you. She was stroking his head and smiling at him. “I’ll get the swimming things if you want to swim.
“Good,” he said. “I’ll go get my espadrilles.”
They lay on the sand where David had spread the beach robes and the towels in the shade of a red rock and the girl said, “You go in and swim and then I will.”
He lifted very slowly and gently up out and away from her and then waded out from the beach and dove under where the water was cold and swam deep. When he came up he swam out against the chop of the breeze and then swam in to where the girl was waiting for him standing up to her waist in the water her black head sleek and wet, her light brown body dripping. He held her tight and the waves washed against them.