Page:Beyond Fantasy Fiction Volume 1 Issue 1 (1953-07).djvu/120

 few dying gasoline-flames — that was all.

Hofmanstahal said, “At least we shall be well fed. Did you have any close friends aboard?”

“No.” Craig sat down, pushed wet hair back from his forehead, let his hands fall to his lap. “And you?”

“Me? No one. I have outlived all my friends. I content myself with being a man of the crowd. A select group of bon vivants for drinking and conversation it is enough."

ITTING with a seat between them, as if each somehow wanted to be alone, the men exchanged backgrounds. By his own account, Hofmanstahal was an adventurer. No locality could hold him for long, and he seldom revisited a place he already knew. He had been secretary to a former Resident in Malaya, and concerned himself with gems in Borneo, with teak in China; a few of his paintings had been displayed in the Galerie des Arts in Paris. He had been en route to Damascus to examine some old manuscripts which he believed might contain references to one of his ancestors.

“Although I was born in Brashov,” he said, “family records indicate that we had our beginnings elsewhere. You may think it snobbish, this delving into my background, but it is a hobby which has absorbed me for many years. I am not looking for glory; only for facts.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” Craig said. “I envy you your colorful past.”

“Is yours so dull, then?”

“Not dull the colors just aren’t so nice. I grew up in the Atlanta slums. Things were pretty rough when I was a kid—”

“You weren’t big enough to be tough.”

Craig nodded, wondering why he didn’t resent this second reference to his small size. He decided that it was because he liked the big man. Hofmanstahal wasn’t insolent, just candid and direct.

“I read a lot,” Craig went on. “My interest in astronomy led me into navigation while I was in the Navy. After I was mustered out I stayed at sea rather than go back to what I’d left.”

They continued to converse in low, earnest voices for the remainder of the afternoon. Always above them the white gulls circled.

“Beautiful, aren’t they?” asked Craig.

Hofmanstahal looked up. His pale eyes narrowed. “Scavengers! See the wicked eyes, the cruel beaks! Pah!”

Craig shrugged. “Let’s eat. And hadn’t you better do something for that cut under your eye?”

Hofmanstahal shook his massive head. “You eat, if you wish. I am not hungry.” He touched his tongue 118