I sat in the sun and watched the bathers on the beach. They looked very small. After a while I stood up, gripped with my toes on the edge of the raft as it tipped with my weight, and dove cleanly and deeply, to come up through the lightening water, blew the salt water out of my head, and swam slowly and steadily in to shore.
After I was dressed and had paid for the bath-cabin, I walked back to the hotel. The bicycle-racers had left several copies of L’Auto around, and I gathered them up in the reading-room and took them out and sat in an easy chair in the sun to read about and catch up on French sporting life. While I was sitting there the concierge came out with a blue envelope in his hand.
“A telegram for you, sir.”
I poked my finger along under the fold that was fastened down, spread it open, and read it. It had been forwarded from Paris:
Could you come Hotel Montana Madrid am rather in trouble Brett.
I tipped the concierge and read the message again. A postman was coming along the sidewalk. He turned in the hotel. He had a big moustache and looked very military. He came out of the hotel again. The concierge was just behind him.
“Here’s another telegram for you, sir.”
“Thank you,” I said.
I opened it. It was forwarded from Pamplona.
Could you come Hotel Montana Madrid am rather in trouble Brett.
The concierge stood there waiting for another tip, probably.