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By Root 14204 0

still holding the bottle like a baby, and Warden seeing her feet with their painted nails in the now-darker-than-half dark behind the buildings felt a hot flash go over him, must be the change of life, he thought, you having one of those like use to blister poor sister, as they walked through the damp salt air past the backs of the shop buildings with their leanto arcade to shade daytime swimmers, past the Tavern’s outdoor terrace that was not quite crowded now and the wooden bandstand where the beachboys sat under it and played their ukes for atmosphere in the daytime, past the several private homes interspersed with fruitjuice stands, down the long dark deserted beach, to the Moana’s three sided patio (this was no patio, this was a lanai) open on the water with its enormous tree (a ban—yan, wasn’t it?), where Karen put her shoes back on and he felt it again.

“This is it, Sgt Martin,” Karen laughed.

“Thats fine, Mrs Martin.”

“I asked for, and got, a corner room on the ocean side. More expensive, but worth it, and we can afford it cant we, Sgt Martin?”

“We can afford anything, Mrs Martin.”

“Wait till you see it, its big and airy and lovely and we’ll have them serve our breakfast in the room tomorrow. Really and truly a fine place, Sgt Martin.”

“Fine place for a honeymoon, Mrs Martin?” he said unashamedly.

“Yes,” she said, leaning her head back in that way she had and looking at him from under her eyelids, “for a honeymoon, Sgt Martin.”

There was nobody around the patio and he kissed her then, standing out on the beach still, the bad of a while ago all gone now, finding it now just as he had thought so long about it being, before they went up to the nice room, the fine room, that was on the second floor and that they walked up to and then down the long corridor that was like every other hotel corridor whether cheap or expensive, clear down to the end, to the last door on the left.

She turned on the lights and then turned around to him smiling and said, “See? They even closed the Venetian blinds for Sgt & Mrs H L Martin. They must know us.” and Warden saw the familiar face of Capt Holmes’s wife that he had seen so often at a distance on the Post before he knew her and he was strangely moved at the strangeness of it all, seeing the loveliness of the big, woman’s breasts straining against the summer print, the long legs with their long thighs and the hips that looked thin under the dress but were not thin or even slim but very full without the dress, and he flipped the knob-button-lock and took three steps and had her as she was slipping her arm up out of the tiny sleeve of the dress she had unbuttoned down the back exposing the slip strap on the deep-tanned shoulder, and he did not give a damn for any of it, Stark or Champ Wilson or O’Hayer or any of them or what they said and he did not believe a goddam word of it and he knew it was not true and he didnt give a goddam if it was true it was different now the hell with all of it and all of them because it had never been like this and it would never again be like this and he knew it and he knew he must be wise and deep and brave and great enough to save this to dig it out of the morass of lies and half lies and false truths and hang onto it now that he finally had it and why had he had it when he knew so few ever had it that he was almost ashamed for having so much of it now as he opened his eyes again and saw that it was all still there still really and truly there and looked down at the shining eyes that actually truly seemed to make two great vertical lines of light as if he were looking at one single star through unfocused field glasses such as he had never seen before and he was both proud and humble and he laughed, looking back now at the easy-for-any-Boy-Scout-to-stalk trail of clothes from the doorway to the bed.

“You laugh beautifully, my darling,” Karen murmured sleepily, “and you make love beautifully too. When you love me I feel as if I were a goddess being worshipped, a White Goddess to the savages and you the savages, carefully restrained in worship but