The Crystal World Read Free Page A

_leproserie_."
    After apologizing for their mistake, the customs men glanced at each other and then cleared Dr. Sanders, chalking up his suitcases without bothering to open them. A few moments later he walked down the gangway. On the jetty the native soldiers lounged around the staff car. The rear seat remained vacant, presumably for the missing physicist from Libreville University.
    As he handed his suitcases to a porter with _Hotel d'Europe_ stenciled across his peaked cap, Dr. Sanders noticed that a far more thorough inspection was being made of the baggage of those leaving Port Matarre. A group of thirty to forty steerage passengers was herded together at the far end of the jetty, and the police and customs men were searching them one by one. Most of the natives carried bedrolls with them, and the police were unwinding these and squeezing the padding.
    By contrast with this activity, the town was nearly deserted. The arcades on either side of the main street were empty, and the windows of the Hotel d'Europe hung listlessly in the dark air, the narrow shutters like coffin lids. Here, in the center of the town, the faded white facades made the somber light of the jungle seem even more pervasive. Looking back at the river as it turned like an immense snake into the forest, Dr. Sanders felt that it had sucked away all but a bare residue of life.
    As he followed the porter up the steps into the hotel, he saw the black-robed figure of Father Balthus farther down the arcade. The priest was walking swiftly, his small traveling bag held in one hand. He turned between two columns, then crossed the road and disappeared among the shadows in the arcade facing the hotel. At intervals Sanders saw him again, his dark figure lit by the sunlight, the white columns of the arcade framing him like the shutter of a defective stroboscopic device. Then, for no apparent reason, he crossed the Street again, the skirt of his black robe whipping the dust around his heels. His high face passed Sanders without turning, like the pale, half-remembered profile of someone glimpsed in a nightmare.
    Sanders pointed after him. "Where's he off to?" he asked the porter: "The priest-he was on the steamer with me."
    "To the seminary. The Jesuits are still there."
    "Still? -what do you mean?"
    Sanders moved toward the swinging doors, but at that moment a dark-haired young Frenchwoman stepped out. As her face was reflected in the moving panes, Sanders had a sudden glimpse of Suzanne Clair. Although the young woman was in her early twenties, at least ten years younger than Suzanne, she had the same wide hips and sauntering stride, the same observant gray eyes. As she passed Sanders, she murmured, "Pardon..." Then, returning his stare with a faint smile, she set off in the direction of an army lorry that was reversing down a side road. Sanders watched her go. Her trim white suit and metropolitan chic seemed out of place in the dingy light of Port Matarre.
    "What's going on here?" Sanders said. "Have they found a new diamond field?"
    The explanation seemed to make sense of the censorship and the customs search, but something about the porter's studied shrug made him doubt it. Besides, the references in Suzanne's letter to diamonds and sapphires would have been construed by the censor as an open invitation to join in the harvest.
    The clerk at the reception desk was equally evasive. To Sanders's annoyance, the clerk insisted on showing him the weekly tariff, despite his assurances that he would be setting off for Mont Royal the following day.
    "Doctor, you understand there is no boat, the service has been suspended. It will be cheaper for you if I charge you by the weekly tariff. But as you wish."
    "All right." Dr. Sanders signed the register. As a precaution he gave as his address the university at Libreville. He had lectured several times at the medical school, and mail would be forwarded from there to Fort Isabelle. The deception might be useful at a later