amparopvtv

@@@@@ They passed a bend in the island and saw Mount Anaka in the distance"Boy, did we climb that?" Wyman asked Some of them scrambled up the side, pointing out slopes of the mountain to each other, arguing whether they had climbed each particular ridgeThey had a startled pride in themselves"It's a big sonofabitch "We did okay to go as far as we did That was the main sentimentAlready they were thinking how they would tell it to their buddies in other platoons "We just got lost in the shuffleEverybody's gonna have a story to tell And that pleased them tooThe final sustaining ironies The song was still going on "Ha' past six I had her doin' tricks Lay me down, Roll me over, Do it again Croft stared at the mountainThe inviolate elephant brooding over the jungle and the paltry hills It was pure and remoteIn the late afternoon sunlight it was velvet green and rock blue and the brown of light earth, made of another material than the fetid jungle before it The old torment burned in him againA stream of wordless impulses beat in his throat and he had again the familiar and inexplicable tension the mountain always furnished him He had failed, and it hurt him vitallyHis frustration was loose againHe would never have another opportunity to climb itAnd yet he was wondering if he could have succeeded