"Oh, Lord, yes!" Pete agreed. "Often. I hate it. But that will go, too.
Here they come."
The bathers had turned; they were swimming up the beach. They passed
Julia, who joined the procession, and turned toward the land. Stretched
in a long line, they rode in on a big wave. Billy and Pete leaped
forward. Assisted by the men, the girls tottered up the sand, gathered
into a little group, talking among themselves. Their wet draperies clung
to them in long, sweeping lines; but they dried with amazing quickness.
The sun grew hotter and hotter. Their transient flash of animation died
down; their conversation gradually stopped.
Chiquita settled herself flat on the sand, the sunlight pouring like a
silver liquid into the blue-black masses of her hair, her narrow brows,
her thick eyelashes. Presently she fell asleep. Clara leaned against a
low ledge of rock and spread her coppery mane across its surface. It
dried almost immediately; she divided it into plaits and coils and wove
it into an elaborate structure. Her fingers seemed to strike sparks from
it; it coruscated. Julia lay on her side, eyes downcast, tracing with
one finger curious tangled patterns in the sand. Her hair blew out and
covered her body as with a silken, honey-colored fabric; the lines of
her figure were lost in its abundance. Peachy sat drooped over, her hand
supporting her chin and her knees supporting her elbows, her eyes fixed
on the horizon-line. Her hair dried, too, but she did not touch it. It
flowed down her back and spread into a pool of gold on the sand. She
might have been a mermaid cast up by that sea on which she gazed with
such a tragic wistfulness - and forever cut off from it.
A little distance from the rest, Honey sat with Lulu. She was shaking
the brown masses of her hair vigorously and Honey was helping her. He
was evidently trying to teach her something because, over and over
again, his lips moved to form two words, and over and over again, her
red lips parted, mimicking them. Gradually, Lulu lost all interest in
her hair. She let it drop. It floated like a furry mantle over her
shoulders. Into her little brown, pointed face came a look of
overpowering seriousness, of tremendous concentration. Occasionally
Honey would stop to listen to her; but invariably her recital sent him
into peals of laughter. Lulu did not laugh; she grew more and more
serious, more and more concentrated.
The other men talked among themselves. Occasionally they addressed a
remark to their captives. The flying-girls replied in hesitating
flutters of speech, a little breathy yes or no whenever those
monosyllables would serve, an occasional broken phrase. Superficially
they seemed calm, placid even. But if one of the men moved suddenly, an
uncontrollable panic overspread their faces.