Argosy, September 1955 — page 36: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

34 H. E. BATES bed, and from the way she had run her fingers through her thick black hair. “You look tired,”’ she said to him at last. ‘“‘ It’s time you got mto that good clean bed.” In the morning he woke to an air that had in it the breath of ashes. It sprang at his already catarrhal throat with windy choking heat. He grasped then the reason for his lethargy of the previous day, his soporific irritations as he met the boat that he had not expected. The leste was blowing, the wind from the north-east that burnt with pure incineration off the mainland sand. This had not prevented Miss Vane from getting up at five o’clock and watching the night-boats, like slowly extinguishing fireflies, bringing in their fish across the bay. ‘* They looked wonderful,” she said. ‘‘ Haven’t you ever seen them come in? ”’ ee No.”’ “ T talked to some of them—the men, I mean. There were two brothers from Santo Carlo—”’ ‘“You should be very careful how you talk to ghise people,” he said. At breakfast, which they had together in the already shuttered little dining-room, in a queer kind of morning twilight through which even her large and exceptionally blue eyes looked almost white in their diffusion, he warned her about the intolerable burning wind. | “It will probably last for two days,” he said. ‘‘ Perhaps three. I’m afraid you'll find it very exhausting.” In a white dress of low cut, with a transparent organdie insertion a” bu i 7 he " =e : + across the breast, she looked remarkably cool and she said, ‘‘ Isn’t ai it a good chance to get up into the hills? Couldn’t you take a day fe off and come with me? ”’ ae He rested easily on the firm ground of his local knowledge. | Ei ““'That’s the curious thing about the leste,” he said. “ It’s even hotter in the hills. You’d hardly believe it, but the coast is going to be the cooler place.”’ 1k ay **T might go myself,” she said. 5 “Oh no,”’ he said, “‘ don’t think of doing that.” 4 “Why not?” <t ‘“* Oh, in the first place—well, it’s hardly the thing. You see, ¥ you can drive only so far. After that it’s a question of mule-track. eg You need several days—”’ a ‘‘ | have plenty of days,’ she said. a “Yes, but not while the Jeste is on,” he said. ‘‘ Really not. : It can be absolutely ghastly up there when the /este is on.” % *“ How would you know?” she said. ‘“‘ You’ve never been.” a His coffee, which should have been cool after so much conversa- a tion, sprang down his already anguished throat like acid. He felt 5 physically unable to speak for some moments, and at last she said, a ‘IT think you look awfully tired. Don’t you ever want to get a5 St away from here? ” ‘ * Not particularly. I suppose eventually—”’ ~ Aw comicbooksconin