On the Beach Read Online Free Page B

down for one night,” the American said. “I’ll have to stick around here tomorrow, but I could use a swim on Saturday. It’s a long time since I had a swim. How would it be if I came down to Falmouth on the train Saturday morning? I’ll have to be back here on Sunday.”
    “I’ll meet you at the station.” They discussed trains for a little. Then Peter asked, “Can you ride a push bike?” The other nodded. “I’ll bring another bike down with me to the station. We live about two miles out.”
    Commander Towers said, “That’ll be fine.” The red Oldsmobile was fading to a dream. It was only fifteen months since he had driven it to the airport, but now he could hardly remember what the fascia panel looked like or on which side the seat adjustment lever lay. It must be still in the garage of his Connecticut home, untouched perhaps, with all the other things that he had schooled himself not to think about. One had to live in the new world and do one’s best, forgetting about the old; now it was push bikes at the railway station in Australia.
    Peter left to catch the ferry truck back to the Navy Department; he picked up his letter of appointment and his wheels, and took the tram to the station. He got back to Falmouth at about six o’clock, hung the wheels awkwardly on the handlebars of his bicycle, took off his jacket, and trudged the pedals heavily up the hill to his home. He got there half an hour later, sweating profusely in the heat of the evening, to find Mary cool in a summer frock in the refreshing murmur of a sprinkler on the lawn.
    She came to meet him. “Oh Peter, you’re so hot!” she said. “I see you got the wheels.”
    He nodded. “Sorry I couldn’t get down to the beach.”
    “I guessed you’d been held up. We came home about half past five. What happened about the appointment?”
    “It’s a long story,” he said. He parked the bicycle and the wheels on the verandah. “I’d like to have a shower first, and tell you then.”
    “Good or bad?” she asked.
    “Good,” he replied. “Seagoing until April. Nothing after that.”
    “Oh Peter,” she cried, “that’s just perfect! Go on and have your shower and tell me about it when you’re cool. I’ll bring out the deck chairs and there’s a bottle of beer in the frig.”
    A quarter of an hour later, cool in an open necked shirt and light drill trousers, sitting in the shade with the cold beer, he told her all about it. In the end he asked, “Have you ever met Commander Towers?”
    She shook her head. “Jane Freeman met them all at the party in
Sydney
. She said he was rather nice. What’s he going to be like to serve under?”
    “All right, I think,” he replied. “He’s very competent. It’s going to be a bit strange at first, in an American ship.But I liked them all, I must say.” He laughed. “I put up a blue right away by ordering a pink gin.” He told her.
    She nodded. “That’s what Jane said. They drink on shore but not in a ship. I don’t believe they drink in uniform at all. They had some kind of a fruit cocktail, rather dismal. Everybody else was drinking like a fish.”
    “I asked him down for the week-end,” he told her. “He’s coming down on Saturday morning.”
    She stared at him in consternation. “Not Commander Towers?”
    He nodded. “I felt I had to ask him. He’ll be all right.”
    “Oh … Peter, he won’t be. They’re never all right. It’s much too painful for them, coming into people’s homes.”
    He tried to reassure her. “He’s different. He’s a good bit older, for one thing. Honestly, he’ll be quite all right.”
    “That’s what you thought about that R.A.F. squadron leader,” she retorted. “You know—I forget his name. The one who cried.”
    He did not care to be reminded of that evening. “I know it’s difficult for them,” he said. “Coming into someone’s home, with the baby and everything. But honestly, this chap won’t be like that.”
    She resigned