And I knew he would have completed it and then walked off into the emptinessof Farside, to die quickly in the darkness, having done his penance. “ Then he paused, andsaid shyly, “ Come on, why don’ t you and I sit and chew the fat over a nice cup of tea?” Billy shook his head with bemusement, smiling despite himself. Handy recognized the tone of the snicker. Aside from Rudy, who went out to get food, and the weekly trips to the unemployment line, noone left The Hill.
“Do I remember? Iremember the night Dick Barthelmess did the tango on the bar with that swimmer, the girl from theOlympics . it was part of the dream, from the things the bumRichard had said, that the women had said. What I had packed off to live in that place of darkwhere you can go but not return. And I realized: the frenzy at the check-in counters, the surly shoving, the being herded together.
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