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.I didn't feel like anything any more, watching her white dress swift in the twilight, carrying her somewhere or she carrying it somewhere: anyway, it was going too, moving when she moved and because she moved, losing her when she would be lost because it moved when she moved and went with her to the instant of loss.I remember how, when I learned about Thaw and White and Evelyn Nesbitt, how I cried.I cried because Evelyn, who was a word, was beautiful and lost or I would never have heard of her.Because she had to be lost for me to find her and I had to find her to lose her.And when I learned that she was old enough to have a grown daughter or son or something, I cried, because I had lost myself then and I could never again be hurt by loss.So I watched the white dress, thinking, She'll be as near me in a second as she'll ever be and then she'll go on away in her white dress forevermore, in the twilight forevermore.Then I felt Don watching her too and then we watched the soldier spring down from the bike.They came together and stopped and for a while they stood there in the street, among the people, facing one another but not touching.Maybe they were not even talking, and it didn't matter how long; it didn't matter about time.Then Don was nudging me."The other table," he said.The five young men had all turned; their heads were together, now and then a hand, an arm, secret, gesticulant, their faces all one way.They leaned back, without turning their faces, and the waiter stood, tray on hip, a squat, sardonic figure older than Grandfather Lust himself looking also.At last they turned and went on up the street together in the direction from which he had come, he leading the bicycle.Just before they passed from sight they stopped and faced one another again among the people, the heads, without touching at all.Then they went on."Let's have some wine," Don said.The waiter set the brandies on the table, his apron like a momentary board on the wind."You have military in town," Don said."That's right," the waiter said."One.""Well, one is enough," Don said.The waiter looked up the street.But they were gone now, with her white dress shaping her stride, her girl-white, not for us."Too many, some say." He looked much more like a monk than the priest did, with his long thin nose and his bald head.He looked like a devastated hawk."You're stopping at the priest's, eh?""You have no hotel," Don said.The waiter made change from his waistcoat, ringing the coins deliberately upon the table."What for? Who would stop here, without he walked? Nobody walks except you English.""We're Americans.""Well." He raised his shoulders faintly."That's your affair." He was not looking at us exactly; not at Don, that is."Did you try Cavalcanti's?""A wineshop at the edge of town? The soldier's aunt, isn't it? Yes.But she said."The waiter was watching him now."She didn't send you to the priest?""No.""Ah," the waiter said.His apron streamed suddenly.He fought it down and scoured the top of the table with it."Americans, eh?""Yes," Don said."Why wouldn't she tell us where to go?"The waiter scoured the table."That Cavalcanti.She's not of this parish.""Not?""Not since three years.The padrone belongs to that one beyond the mountain." He named a village which we had passed in the forenoon."I see," Don said."They aren't natives.""Oh, they were born here.Until three years ago they belonged to this parish.""But three years ago they changed.""They changed." He found another spot on the table.He removed it with the apron.Then he examined the apron."There are changes and changes; some further than others.""The padrona changed further than across the mountain, did she?""The padrona belongs to no parish at all." He looked at us."Like me.""Like you?""Did you try to talk to her about the church?" He watched Don."Stop there tomorrow and mention the church to her.""And that happened three years ago," Don said."That was a year of changes for them.""You said it.The nephew to the army, the padrone across the mountain, the padrona.All in one week, too.Stop there tomorrow and ask her.""What do they think here about all these changes?""What changes?""These recent changes.""How recent?" He looked at Don."There's no law against changes.""No.Not when they're done like the law says.Sometimes the law has a look, just to see if they were changed right.Isn't that so?"The waiter had assumed an attitude of sloven negligence, save his eyes, his long face.It was too big for him, his face was."How did you know he was a policeman?""Policeman?""You said soldier; I knew you meant policeman and just didn't speak the language good.But you'll pick it up with practice." He looked at Don."So you made him too, did you? Came in here this afternoon; said he was a shoe-drummer.But I made him.""Here already," Don said."I wonder why he didn't stop the.before they.""How do you know he's a policeman?" I said.The waiter looked at me."I don't care whether he is or not, buddy.Which had you rather do? think a man is a cop and find he's not, or think he's not a cop, and find he is?""You're right," Don said."So that's what they say here.""They say plenty.Always have and always will [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]