My gaze grew fat with pleasure as it
fed on her nakedness....
She stepped down to the water's edge, dabbling her outstretched toes in
the flow.
Ankle-deep, she stood and stooped. She scooped up water and dashed it
over her breasts. She rose erect a moment and gazed idly about.
Then, binding her hair in a careful knot, she went in with a plunge and
I saw that she could swim well.
My heart shook and thundered so that its pulse pervaded all my body with
its violence. I held in curb a mad, almost irresistible impulse to rush
in after her, crying out that I was a poet ... that this was the true
romance ... that we must throw aside the conventions ... that no one
would ever know.
Then I thought of my skinniness and ugliness in comparison with her
slight but perfect beauty. And I knew that it would repel her. And I
held still in utter shame, not being good-looking enough to join her in
the river.
I lay prone, almost fainting, dizzy, not having the strength to creep
away, as I now considered I must do.
I saw her return and watched her as she slowly resumed her clothes,
piece by leisurely piece. She folded her camp stool, packed her small
easel in a case and started off toward town.
Shouldn't I now intercept her, explain who I was, and offer to escort
her along the tracks back to town? For it was surely dangerous for her
to come so far into the night, alone.
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