78
ALBERT
J.
GUERARD
-"Very well. I
will
seal
this
abominable sack. See that it re–
mains unopened when you reach the border at the other side. Other–
wise you will be our guest under disagreeable circumstances, and for
an indefinite period."
The sealing of the sacks-the affixing of large staples through
customs cards-was quickly done. Then the policeman waved us on.
He had given only a glance at my passport, a cursory and scornful
glance.
But Seguros was not so lucky at our own border.
Yes, our own border. For it is time to bring these random notes
to an end, which can give a fleeting impression of the continent we
fling our voice at. One cannot describe everything: the last of the
tramp trains we took, or the fires and the plasticages, or the fixed
stare of a man lying dead of starvation on the main street in Savona.
So, instead, home: the last miles on foot in the moon-drenched night,
since the bus had to leave us at the border. The two Forces Libres
guards passed me after a long inspection of my passport. One of the
few American ones they must have seen since my last passing here:
unrenewed, worn and the stitching precarious, every page crowded
with stampings and inked angry scrawls. Yet a bona fide passport,
after all, with the ten-year-old photograph of a face still unsensual,
unbrutalized and unlined, hopeful then, wearing the shaved haircut
of a college trip in "an interval between wars." Moreover, these guards
knew who I was. I did have my notoriety as manager of the hovering
visible ship, though more offensive to the daytime Legitimacy than
to the Forces Libres who ruled by night. The
Agracorinth
was an
unmoving obscene eyesore by day, but only riding lights after dark.
But Seguros was stopped. Stopped because his only document was
this
improvised one issued by the Legitimacy: that is, by the one authority
the Forces Libres could not recognize. He would have to cross the
border by day, when the police and customs authorities of the
Legitimacy would be in charge.
So I came home alone, and
it
was long after midnight when I
reached the villa. The man on guard at the bottom of the garden
was fast asleep, with his rifle across his knees. I was tempted to wrench
it from him or even wake him by firing it myself. Instead I crept
past him and up through the garden and the terraces. The trees
were ghostly and unstirring, as at the bottom of the sea.
f
