Balbal

She watched him walk laboriously up the steep path, his heavy black shoes picking a slow careful route toward the Point Lobos Motor Inn.

Outside, the mist coming in from the sea moved on a brisk following wind, consuming cars and buildings in a blanket of invisibility as it rolled toward the headland.

Try to butter sb up.

It had in it a hint of anger.

She opened her eyes and squirmed around in the long grass, to look back at the cliff path.

Two squabbling gulls called out in anger, hunting each other in and out of crevices in the lower reaches of the cliffs—then, silent, rose like ghosts, their slow powerful wingbeats carrying them high above Marie and the nuns.

I walk out on him. 我离开他。

Marie saw that, despite his easy running style, his face and neck were slathered in sweat.

Sister Anna panted short-windedly, as though she ran a race.

The question hung in the air.

It would call and call and I would strain to hear until, suddenly, it would fade from sight.

The old nun came forward, holding out her arms as to embrace her and as she touched her, holding her lightly, the tension left Marie’s body.

There was a creaking noise as the door opened, then a dull slam as it shut.

She would be vouchsafed a second vision.

She would go with the old and holy nun, would show the old nun those rocks, those twisted cypresses, the great shelf of cliff jutting out into the ocean, its surface newly seared by a cruciform scar.

Sunlight goldened the room, casting long shadows.

I am afraid it might make it too much of a delegation.
Mother Paul fiddled with the truck’s gears as though dismissing him.

The truck was very noisy, its tailboards rattling, its engine coughing as it went off down the coastal road.

He picked up the tennis hat and put it on, positioning it to hide his wound.

His cheek bruise was less noticeable, his color was normal, the skin rosy, his eyes bright and alert.

Mother Paul looked at the girl’s troubled face,...