And you wanted no part of me when I had so much to give.

As I dug in behind one of the bales we were using as protection, I grudgingly found myself agreeing with Oso's logic, especially when I imagined what would have happened to Missy if Old Knife's large party of screeching warriors had overrun our company.

In the brief moment I had to talk to them before I took my post on the ring of defenses, I indicated I was sickened by the methods men employed to live and trade on the river.

Next to him was a young boy I was sure had sat near me at one of the trading sessions.

At first I thought he had missed.

I saw the clergyman kneel for a moment by the twitching body of the man he had shot, then run back to his position.

Later I would remember what this pompous little man had told me about the worth of a ticket.

One afternoon, upon receiving permission and the necessary instructions from the clerk, I had visited the toilet adjoining the hall.

For although I had crossed a corner of the hall on my way to the toilet I still could not tell for sure how far to the rear the darkness extended.

I could observe the two fans down at the end, but their size in themselves meant nothing to me as long as I had no measure of comparison.

I had for some time been hoping, in vain, for one of the dim figures to pass between the fan vents and myself.

It was, I felt, possible that they were men who, having received no tickets for that day, had remained in the hall, to sleep perhaps, in the corners farthest removed from the counter with its overhead light.

And I had hardly finished my business in the toilet on the aforementioned occasion when the lights in that place, like the hall lights controlled from the switch in the office, flicked off and on impatiently.

I had signed it off on the forms.

Although I had been inside it I had not yet seen it functioning.

I didn't ask for a Jeroboam of champagne ''.

I had difficulty swallowing and had champagne in my knees.

While being sprayed with champagne on the victory podium, he is reported to have asked, " Do I win Rookie Of The Year?

Tarrant, who drank champagne with the Ingrams in their dressing room, said he was convinced that Ingram was genuine when he signed the £ 1 million cheque, saying that " If I thought there was anything wrong, I certainly would not have signed it.

A similar concept, with aristocracy in place of capitalism, comes from the 19th-century philosopher Alexander Herzen, who in From the Other Shore ( 1855 ) wrote " It is they, none other, who are dying of cold and hunger ... while you and I in our rooms on the first floor are chatting about socialism ' over pastry and champagne.

The director recalled one such incident: " Steve and I had been discussing some point on which we disagreed, so he picked up this bottle of champagne and threw it at me.

I stayed in the best hotels, visited the best beaches and I had access to beautiful women, champagne and caviar.

A French champagne salesman, Gustave Laviarde, impressed by the story, decided to assume the vacant throne as Aquiles I.

Examples can be seen on the rare occasions when he enjoys luxury and money ; one episode where Peggy and Al receive free first-class plane tickets to New York City from Marcy shows them sipping champagne together and singing " I Got You, Babe ".

Returning from his second war-wound to the Western Front he records: " I have never liked travelling light and so, though the amount of kit I arrived with may, in fact have aroused a certain amount of astonishment, I was quickly forgiven by my commanding officer as well as by everyone else, when they found out that it included, among other things, a case of champagne.

" He also liked the idea of batting ahead of Bradman in the batting order: " Much better, I thought, to get in before him than to come later, like flat beer after champagne.

" I think we get champagne ( after winning )," says Trickle.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Gray Eyes rushing at me with a knife.

I was nearly thirty at the time.

I would turn away from my writing in the hope of getting a good look at them but I never quite succeeded.

They, and the two large fans which I could dimly see as daylight filtered through their vents, down at the far end of the hall, could be turned on by a master switch situated inside the office.

By counting the number of stalls and urinals I attempted to form a loose estimate of how many men the hall would hold at one time.

No sooner would I turn my head away from the counter before he would address me, at times quite sharply, in order to bring back my attention.

I felt strongly attached to the hall, however, and hardly a day passed when I did not go to look at it from a distance.

My future lay solely with the hall, yet what did I know about the hall at this point??

I was at once disappointed, although just what I had expected him to look like I could not have explained.

What sort of men I would come into contact with, at the hall??

This desire, I went on, growing voluble as my conviction was aroused, had mounted at such a rate recently that I now found its realization necessary not only to my physical but also to my spiritual wellbeing.

I would have foregone my romantic chances rather than leave a friend sweltering and dusty and -- Well, at least I wouldn't have shouted back a taunt.

I was again in motion and at a speed which belied the truck's similarity to Senor X's Ford turtle.

At once my ears were drowned by a flow of what I took to be Spanish, but -- the driver's white teeth flashing at me, the road wildly veering beyond his glistening hair, beyond his gesticulating bottle -- it could have been the purest Oxford English I was half hearing ; ;