Page 217 - tender-is-the-night

of the lake through the alleys of the shore hotels. He was
conscious of the groups of English, emergent after four years
and walking with detective-story suspicion in their eyes, as
though they were about to be assaulted in this questionable
country by German trained-bands. There were building and
awakening everywhere on this mound of débris formed by
a mountain torrent. At Berne and at Lausanne on the way
south, Dick had been eagerly asked if there would be Ameri-
cans this year. ‘By August, if not in June?’
He wore leather shorts, an army shirt, mountain shoes.
In his knapsack were a cotton suit and a change of under-
wear. At the Glion funicular he checked his bicycle and took
a small beer on the terrace of the station buffet, meanwhile
watching the little bug crawl down the eighty-degree slope of
the hill. His ear was full of dried blood from La Tour de Pelz,
where he had sprinted under the impression that he was a
spoiled athlete. He asked for alcohol and cleared up the ex-
terior while the funicular slid down port. He saw his bicycle
embarked, slung his knapsack into the lower compartment
of the car, and followed it in.
Mountain-climbing cars are built on a slant similar to the
angle of a hat-brim of a man who doesn’t want to be rec-
ognized. As water gushed from the chamber under the car,
Dick was impressed with the ingenuity of the whole idea—a
complimentary car was now taking on mountain water at
the top and would pull the lightened car up by gravity, as
soon as the brakes were released. It must have been a great
inspiration. In the seat across, a couple of British were dis-
cussing the cable itself.

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