Page 20 (1/1)

'Kissy, I believe that is a fib The truth of the ht arouse dishonourable thoughts in my impious Western mind That is a most unworthy suspicion However, I accept the delicacy of your respect of oing We'll beat the awabi record today What should we aiood A hundred would be wonderful But above all, you must roell and not let me drown And you must be kind to David'

'Who's David?' asked Bond, suddenly jealous at the thought that he would not be having this girl to himself

'Wait and see' She went back indoors and brought out the balsa wood tub and a great coil of fine quarter-inch rope She handed the rope to Bond and hoisted the tub on her hip, leading the way along a se The path descended slowly to a s-boat, covered with dried reeds to protect it froh up on the flat black pebbles Bond stripped off the reeds and laid them aside and hauled the simple, locally-made craft down to the sea It was constructed of so, totally transparent water He loaded in the rope and the wooden tub Kissy had gone to the other side of the little bay and had undone a string fro it in slowly and at the sa whistle To Bond's astonish black corh the shallows and waddled up the beach to Kissy's feet, craning its neck up and down and hissing, apparently in anger But Kissy bent down and stroked the creature on its plumed head and down the outstretched neck, at the saaily She ca line, and the cormorant followed clumsily It paid no attention to Bond, but jumped untidily over the side of the boat and scrambled on to the small thwart in the bohere it squattedbill down and through its breast feathers and occasionally opening its wings to the full extent of their five-foot span and flapping theh all its length, it settled down and gazed out to sea with its neck coiled backwards as if to strike and its turquoise eyes questing the horizon imperiously

Kissy climbed into the boat and settled herself with her knees hunched decorously between Bond's outstretched legs, and Bond slid the heavy, narrow-bladed oars into their wooden rowlocks and began rowing at a powerful, even pace, more or less, under Kissy's direction, due north

He had noticed that Kissy's line to the cor, perhaps two inches in diameter, round the base of the bird's neck This would be one of the fa cormorants of Japan Bond asked her about it

Kissy said, 'I found his and I cleaned hi has had to be rew up Now, you see, he can s ss to the surface in his beak He hands theets a piece of a big one as a reward He swims a lot by my side and keeps me company It can be very lonely down there, particularly when the sea is dark You will have to hold the end of the line and look after hiry He has not been out for three days becauseout with friends So it is lucky for him that you came to the island'

'So this is David?'

'Yes I nalishman as it happens He was called David Niven He is a famous actor and producer You have heard of hi hiiven an to pour down Bond's face and chest into his bathing pants Kissy undid the kerchief round her hair and leant forward arid ently Bond smiled into her almond eyes and had his first close-up of her snub nose and petalled mouth She wore no make-up and did not need to, for she had that rosy-tinted skin on a golden background - the colours of a golden peach - that is quite common in Japan Her hair, released frohts It was heavily waved, but with a soft fringe that ended an inch or so above the straight, fine eyebrows that showed no signs of having been plucked Her teeth were even and showed no irl, so that she avoided the toothiness that is a weak point in the Japanese face Her arer and less irls and, the day before, Bond had seen that her breasts and buttocks were firm and proud and that her stoure, equal to that of any of the star chorus girls he had seen in the cabarets of Tokyo But her hands and feet were rough and scarred ork, and her fingernails and toenails, although they were cut very short, were broken Bond found this rather endearing Airl' or'sea- with the creatures of the ocean with obvious indifference, and her skin, which ht have suffered froolden sheen of health and vitality But it was the charm and directness of her eyes and smile as well as her complete naturalness - for instance, when she mopped at Bond's face and chest - that endeared her so utterly to Bond At thather out towards the horizon during the day and co back with her to the sed the whimsy aside Only another two days to the full et back to reality, to the dark, dirty life he had chosen for himself He put the prospect out of his mind Today and the next day would be stolen days, days with only Kissy and the boat and the bird and the sea He must just see to it that they were happy days and lucky ones for her and her harvest of seashells

Kissy said, 'Not ht, to where the rest of the Ama fleet was spread out over the ocean 'With us, it is first coet out as far as a shoal most of us know of, and we shall have it to ourselves There the seaweed is thick on the rocks and that is what the awabi feed on It is deep, about forty feet, but I can stay down for alh to pick up two, three awabi if I can find the about with the hands a the seaweed, for you rarely see the shells You only feel theular pick 'After a while I shall have to rest Then perhaps you would like to go down Yes? They tell ht a pair of les These bulbs at the sides,' she showed hilasses and the eyes You will perhaps not be able to stay down long to begin with But you will learn quickly How long will you be staying on Kuro?'

'Only two or three days, I'm afraid'

'Oh, but that is sad What will David and I do for a boatet better'

'That is so I must take him to a cure place at one of the volcanoes on theone of the men on Kuro That is not easy The choice is not wide and, because I have a little money froht want toreasons That would be sad, and how is one to know?'

'Perhaps you will go back into films?'

Her expression beca to ht that because I am a Japanese I am some sort of an animal and that my body is for everyone Nobody treated et rid of the ods will solve my problems,' she smiled, 'like they have today' She scanned the sea ahead 'Another hundred yards' She got up and balancing perfectly despite the swell, tied the end of the long rope round her waist and adjusted the goggles above her forehead 'Now re, pull e your back e get hoh practice with ratefully Behind hi neck and hissing impatiently Kissy tied a short line to the wooden tub and put it over the side She followed, slipping decorously into the water and clasping her white dress between her knees so that it did not flower out around her At once David dived and disappeared without a ripple The line, tied to Bond's thwart, began paying out fast He picked up the coil of Kissy's rope and stood up, his joints cracking Kissy pulled down her goggles and put her head underwater In a moment she came up She smiled 'Yes, it looks fine down there' She rested in the water and began h pursed lips - to fill her lungs to the uttermost, Bond assumed Then, with a brief wave of the hand, she put down her head and arched her hips so that Bond had a brief sight of the black string cleaving her behind under the thin one, straight down, her feet twinkling behind her in a fast crawl to help the pull of the weights

Bond paid out fast, keeping an anxious eye on his watch David appeared below hi a half-pound silvery fish crosswise in his beak Da fish frolance, the cor tub and disappeared like a black bullet

Fifty seconds! Bond started nervously when the tug came He pulled in fast The white wraith appeared far below in the crystal water, and, as she caainst her sides to streamline her body She broke surface beside the boat and held out two fat awabi to show him and then dropped theain her breath and Bond gazed down at the wonderful breasts, taut beneath their thin covering She s whistle, and then caain

An hour went by Bond got used to the routine and had time to watch the nearest of the fleet of other boats They covered perhaps a mile of sea, and, from across the silent water, there came the recurrent eerie whistle-a soft, sea-bird sound - of the diving girls The nearest boat rocked in the sloell perhaps a hundred yards away, and Bond watched the young liolden body, shiny as a seal, and heard the excited chattering of their voices He hoped he would not disgrace hiarettes! Not a good mixture to train on!

The pile of aas slowly growing in the tub and, a fish Occasionally Bond bent down and retrieved one from David Once he dropped a slippery fish and the bird had to dive for it again This tihtier look of scorn from the turquoise eyes

Then Kissy came up, her stint done, and climbed, not so decorously this tiles and sat panting quietly in the stern Finally she looked up and laughed happily 'That is twenty-one Very good Now take hts and pick and see for yourself what it is like down there But I will pull you up anyway in thirty seconds Give ane,will be over'