Read Online Right of Thirst by Frank Huyler - Free Book Online

get started.”
    We were quiet for a while after that, and then she yawned.
    â€œIf I cannot go to the village, then I will go to my tent,” she said. “I am sleepy.”
    With that, she stood up from the table and stretched. She was small, thin, and lithe, with a hint of sexuality all the same—curves, subtle but undeniable. I noticed this from the beginning, and it reassured me to feel it—to glance at her, sometimes, in that way, as if I were taking sips of water.
    She wore her blond hair short, tapered at the neck. She had pale perfect skin, and blue eyes that leapt out against the fleece vest she wore most of the time. Her gestures were precise and delicate. She stood up straight. Her teeth were small and neat, and only a tracery of lines at the corners of her eyes suggested that she was older than she first appeared. She was working on her Ph.D., and by no means a girl, though she looked like one. In the beginning she was quiet, and when I met her I suspected her of both earnestness and dogmatism. It took me a while to see her playfulness, her humor and irreverence; at first, she was distinguished mostly by the attention that even modestly attractive young women receive when they are alone in a world of men.
    Rai was gone for several hours. I sat in the dining tent alone, listening to the wind, restless, trying to read. Elise was in her tent when he returned. He stamped in out of the cold, blew on his hands, poured himself a cup of tea, and promptly lit a cigarette.
    â€œAlways they are difficult,” he said, shaking his head. “Always. But they will come tomorrow.”
    I thanked him.

CHAPTER NINE
    Early the next morning the men appeared. Eight or nine of them. They were bearded, dressed in a strange mixture of cheap Western clothes—worn and blackened tennis shoes, T-shirts—and traditional local cloaks. They wore tight woolen caps, which they touched in deference to Captain Rai. They hardly spoke. They were filthy. They did not resemble Rai, who was from the lowlands. Their skin was paler, with a distinct Asian cast to their features. Some of them had light eyes. They smelled strongly of smoke and a little bit like animals. As individuals they were young, but as a group they looked a thousand years old.
    Rai looked at them and sighed. “I need some soldiers,” he said, and led them out from the shadows of the camp into the sun on the field, where the tents lay waiting, mildewed and cracked and unfolded for years.
    It was cold, especially in the shade, and the wind was picking up and flowing down off the peaks. Everyone’s breath was visible. Elise and I retreated to the dining tent for another cup of tea. There was nowhere else to go, and nothing to do but sit there, reading and talking, standing up every so often to stretch. We left the door open, pulled our chairs close to the heater, and watched them.
    â€œWe should help,” I said. “Don’t you think?”
    â€œI don’t know,” she said.
    They seemed to be learning quickly; after only a few minutes of instruction the first tent was being staked into the ground, and Rai was simply standing and pointing. Every so often he’d stamp his feet and walk in a little circle to keep warm. The villagers, though, seemed utterly untouched by the cold, pounding in the metal pegs with stones in their bare hands.
    After a few minutes, when the second tent was up and Rai had run his gloved hands across the ropes again to make sure they were tight, it was apparent that he’d had enough. He turned and walked toward us, in his green army jacket, the sun reflecting off his mirrored sunglasses, until he crossed into the shadows again. He stamped into the dining tent, and made straight for the kerosene heater, which was already up and hissing.
    â€œIt is very cold,” he said. “And time for breakfast.”
    â€œIt doesn’t seem to bother them,” I replied.
    â€œThey are like