`` That was a terrible thing to do '', I said to Oso.

`` But that was war '', I said.

Still, I was disgusted with myself for agreeing with Montero's methods.

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.

Now under me I could see him for what he really was, a boy dressed up in streaks of paint.

Such was my state of mind that I did not question the possibility of this ; ;

under the circumstances I was only too willing to confess all.

I was nearly thirty at the time.

It was dark and, I sensed, very large ; ;

Sometimes I was aware of people moving about in the darkness.

This impressed me, until I realized how limited was his sphere of influence.

I felt certain he was really a spineless little man.

Once, pressing him, I learned that his job was only part-time, in the afternoons when nothing went on in the hall.

In the mornings, I was informed, fluorescent tubes, similar to the one above the counter, illuminated the entire hall.

I was shown, instead, a batch of white tickets of the sort handed out, he told me, every morning.

Now, here was something of obvious importance to me, yet when I reached for the tickets he snatched them away from my hand.

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.

I felt certain it was self-appointed.

I decided to see no more of the clerk until the processing of my papers was completed.

I was constantly searching for clues around the neighborhood of the hall.

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.

When one of the men in the hall behind us spat on the floor and scraped his boot over the gob of spittle I noticed how the clerk winced.

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.

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

No one was behind it, but in the rear wall of the office I noticed, for the first time, a door which had been left partially open.

Don't like to bother no one unless we have to, which I figger we do, in your case.

But there's one thing I never seen or heard of, one thing I just don't think there is, and that's a sportin' way o' killin' a man ''!!

Adios '', I said, exhausting my Spanish vocabulary on my host and exchanging one of a scarcely-tapped store of smiles with my host's daughters.

I seized the rack and made a western-style flying-mount just in time, one of my knees mercifully landing on my duffel bag -- and merely wrecking my camera, I was to discover later -- my other knee landing on the slivery truck floor boards and -- but this is no medical report.

Seeming much relieved, she smiled one of those worth-waiting-for smiles, and I smiled all the way into the bedroom.

I worked for my Uncle ( an Uncle by marriage so you will not think this has a mild undercurrent of incest ) who ran one of those antique shops in New Orleans' Vieux Carre, the old French Quarter.

I dismissed these feelings as wishful thinking but I could not get it out of my head that we had a strong physical attraction for one another and we both feared to dwell on it because of our relationship.

I don't even remember who wrote it but it was one of those 15th or 16th century poets.

I felt that he looked at me coldly and appraisingly and seemed to be uncertain what his attitude towards me should be, but he did not say one word which might indicate that he had been told of advances to his wife.

Of course, males play a role there, but believe me when I say you wouldn't enjoy yourself one bit on Eromonga.

I clapped the big man with the bleached hair on his shoulder and said heartily, hoping it would make an impression on the women: `` This one is the maku Frayne.

He stopped, embarrassed, and Morgan said, `` I understand that, but I don't savvy why you'd go off and leave your jobs in the first place ''.

At first I thought he had missed.

Gracias '', I hollered, my first long swallow filling me with confidence and immediately doubling the size of my Spanish vocabulary.

I ducked just as the first strand broke somewhere down the line and came whipping over the sideboards.

And that is the way I first saw her when my Uncle brought her into his antique store.

At first, I thought he was out of his head, talking wildly like this.

Hell, I gave him the first decent job he ever had, six, seven -- how many years ago was it, Rob ''??

`` Bastards '', he would say, `` all I did was put a beat to that Vivaldi stuff, and the first chair clobbered me ''!!

When I mentioned that for my first long voyage I did not even have the money for the return fare, but had trusted to luck that I would earn a sufficient amount, the young people looked at me doubtingly.

His first inaugural address speaks of `` my country whose voice I can never hear but with veneration and love ''.

But first I want to quote him on the relationship that he found between religion and politics in this country and what happened to it.

and, `` I do think that families are the most beautiful things in all the world '', burst out Jo some five hundred pages later in that popular story of the March family, which had first appeared when Henrietta was eight ; ;

When I take over Taliesin, the first thing I'll do is fire you ''.

If `` Jack the Courtier '' is really to be taken as Swift, the following remark is obviously Steele's comment on Swift's change of parties and its effect on their friendship: `` I assure you, dear Jack, when I first found out such an Allay in you, as makes you of so malleable a Constitution, that you may be worked into any Form an Artificer pleases, I foresaw I should not enjoy your Favour much longer ''.

I had had difficulties from the very first day.

As a groundwork for the proposal I give some attention to the first task enumerated above, the clarification of goal.

For this reason, then I want to describe, first, two examples of the puritanical attacks: Stephen Gosson's The School Of Abuse, 1579, and his later Playes Confuted, published in 1582.

The first time I went there he asked me to bring him water from Flagler's well -- water that reminded him of his first days in the mountains -- and before I came the next time I filled a five-gallon jug for him and brought it to the hospital.