Gunslinger

VIII

She ceased her narrative, and when he made no immediate comment, she thought at first that the story had put him to sleep. She had begun to drowse herself when he asked: “That’s all?”

“Yes. That’s all. It’s very late.”

“Um.” He was rolling another cigarette.

“Don’t go getting your tobacco dandruff in my bed,” she told him, more sharply than she had intended.

“No.”

Silence again. The tip of his cigarette winked off and

on.

“You’ll be leaving in the morning,” she said dully.

“I should. I think he’s left a trap for me here.”

“Don’t go,” she said.

“We’ll see.”

He turned on his side away from her, but she was comforted. He would stay. She drowsed.

On the edge of sleep she thought again about the way Nort had addressed him, in that strange talk. She had not seen him express emotion before or since. Even his lovemaking had been a silent thing, and only at the last had his breathing roughened and then stopped for a minute. He was like something out of a fairytale or a myth, the last of his breed in a world that was writing the last page of its book. It didn’t matter. He would stay for a while. Tomorrow was time enough to think, or the day after that. She slept.