Falk
Falk
Book Excerpt
ys little frocks and pinafores could be seen
drying in the mizzen rigging of his ship, or a tiny
row of socks fluttering on the signal halyards; but
once a fortnight the family washing was exhibited
in force. It covered the poop entirely. The after-
noon breeze would incite to a weird and flabby activ-
ity all that crowded mass of clothing, with its vague
suggestions of drowned, mutilated and flattened hu-
manity. Trunks without heads waved at you arms
without hands; legs without feet kicked fantasti-
cally with collapsible flourishes; and there were long
white garments that, taking the wind fairly
through their neck openings edged with lace, be-
came for a moment violently distended as by the
passage of obese and invisible bodies. On these days
you could make out that ship at a great distance
by the multi-coloured grotesque riot going on abaft
her mizzen mast.
She had her berth just ahead of me, and her name was Diana,--Diana not of Ephesus but of Bremen. This was proclaimed in white letters a foot l
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