The Desert Islander | Page 3

of the room. "Are you not eating too?"
"I'm not in the habit of eating a meat meal at ten o'clock at night."
"Is 'not being in the habit' a reason for not doing it now?"
"To me it is."
"Oh--oh--oh--I wish I were like you," said Constantine vehemently. "It is so tiring being me--having no guide. I do like you."
"Help yourself to spinach," said Mr. White crossly.
"Now shall I tell you my Zigzag idea?"
"If you can eat as well as talk."
Constantine was exceedingly hungry; he bent low over his plate, though he sat sideways to the table, facing Mr. White, ready to launch a frontal attack of talk. His mouth was too full for a moment to allow him to begin to speak, but quick, agonized glances out of his black eyes implored his host to be silent till his lips should be ready. "You know," he said, swallowing hurriedly, "I always think of a zigzag as going downwards. I draw it in the air, so ... a straight honest line, then--see--a diagonal subtle line cuts the air away from under it--so ... Do you see what I mean? I will call the zig a to, and the zag a from. Now---"
"Why is one of your legs fatter than the other?" asked Mr. White.
"It is bandaged. Now, I think of this zigzag as a diagram of human minds. Always human minds are zigs or zags--a to or a from--the brave zig is straight, so ... the cleverer, crueller zag cuts away below. So are men's---"
"But why is it bandaged?"
"It was kicked by a horse. Well, so are men's understandings. Here I draw the simple, faithful understanding--and here--zag--the easy, clever understanding that sees through the simple faith. Now below that--see--zig once more--the wise, the serene, and now a zag contradicts once more; this is the cynic who knows all answers to serenity. Then below, once more---"
"May I see your leg?" asked Mr. White. "I was in an ambulance unit during the war."
"Oh, what is this talk of legs?" cried Constantine. "Legs are all the same; they belong to millions. All legs are made of blood and bone and muscle--all vulgar things. Your ambulance cuts off legs, mends legs, fits bones together, corks up blood. It treats men like bundles of bones and blood. This is so dull. Bodies are so dull. Minds are the only onliness in men."
"Yes," said Mr. White. "But minds have to have legs to walk about on. Let me see your leg."
"Very well, then, let us talk of legs. We have at least legs in common, you and I."
"Hadn't you got more sense than to put such a dirty rag round an open wound?"
"It is not dirty; it is simply of a grey colour. I washed it in a rice field." Constantine spoke in a muffled voice from somewhere near his knee-cap, for he was now bent double, wholeheartedly interested in his leg. "I washed the wound too, and three boils which are behind my knee. This blackness is not dirt; it is a blackness belonging to the injury."
Mr. White said nothing, but he rose to his feet as though he had heard a call. Constantine, leaving his puttee in limp coils about his foot like a dead snake, went on eating. He began to talk again about the zigzag while he stuffed food into his mouth, but he stopped talking soon, for Mr. White was walking up and down the long room and not pretending to listen. Constantine, watching his host restively pacing the far end of the room, imagined that he himself perhaps smelled disagreeable, for this was a constant fear of his--that his body should play his rare personality this horrid trick. "What is the matter?" he asked anxiously, with a shamed look. "Why are you so far?"
Mr. White's lazy, mild manner was quite changed. His voice seemed to burst out of seething irritation. "It's a dam nuisance just now. It couldn't happen at a worse time. I've a great deal of work to do--and this fighting all over the province makes a journey so dam---"
"What is so dam?" asked Constantine, his bewilderment affecting his English.
"I'll tell you what," said Mr. White, standing in front of Constantine with his feet wide apart and speaking in an angry voice. "You're going to bed now in my attic, and to-morrow at daylight you're going to be waked up and driven down in my car, by me (damn it!) to Lao-chow, to the hospital--a two days' drive--three hundred miles-over the worst roads you ever saw."
Constantine's heart gave a sickening lurch. "Why to hospital? You think my leg is dangerous?"
"If I know anything of legs," said Mr. White rather brutally, "the doctor won't let you keep that one an hour longer than he has to."
Constantine's mouth began instantly to tremble so