Monygham heard it pass over his head--in
Linda Viola's voice), dominated even after death the dark gulf
containing his conquests of treasure and love--all that had come down
crashing about my ears.
I felt I could never pick up the pieces--and in that very moment I was
saying, "Won't you sit down?"
The sea is strong medicine. Behold what the quarter-deck training even
in a merchant ship will do! This episode should give you a new view of
the English and Scots seamen (a much-caricatured folk) who had the last
say in the formation of my character. One is nothing if not modest,
but in this disaster I think I have done some honour to their simple
teaching. "Won't you sit down?" Very fair; very fair, indeed. She sat
down. Her amused glance strayed all over the room.
There were pages of MS. on the table and under the table, a batch of
typed copy on a chair, single leaves had fluttered away into distant
corners; there were there living pages, pages scored and wounded, dead
pages that would be burned at the end of the day--the litter of a cruel
battle-field, of a long, long, and desperate fray. Long! I suppose
I went to bed sometimes, and got up the same number of times.
Pages:
135
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