bed in the back of the car.' Bruce looked at her quickly. 'With you?' he
asked.
'Yes.'
'You do not mind that everyone should know?'
'I am not ashamed of us.' There was a fierceness in her tone.
'I know, but-' 'You said once that nothing between you and I could ever
be dirty.'
'No, of course it couldn't be dirty. I just thought-'
'Well then, I love you and from now on we have only one bed between us.'
She spoke with finality.
Yesterday she was a virgin, he thought with amazement, and now -
well, now it's no holds barred. Once she is roused a woman is more
reckless of consequences than any man.
They are such wholesale creatures. But she's right, of course.
She's my woman and she belongs in my bed. The hell with the rest of the
world and what it thinks!
'Make the bed, wench.' He smiled at her tenderly.
Two hours after dark the drum started again. They lay together, holding
close, and listened to it. It held no terror now, for they were warm and
secure in the afterglow of passion. It was like lying and listening to
the impotent fury of a rainstorm on the roof at night.
They went out to the bridge at sunrise, the shelter moving across the
open ground like the carapace of a multi-legged metallic turtle.
The men chartered and joked loudly inside, still elated by the novelty
of it.
'All right, everybody. That's enough talking,' Bruce shouted them down.
'There's work to do now.' And they began.
Within an hour the sun had turned the metal box into an oven.
They stripped to the waist and the sweat dripped from them as they
worked. They worked in a frenzy, gripped by a new urgency, oblivious of
everything but the roughsawed timber that drove white splinters into
their skin at the touch. They worked in the confined heat, amidst the
racket of hammers and in the piney smell of sawdust. The labour fell
into its own pattern with only an occasional grunted order from Bruce or
Ruffy to direct it.
By midday the four main trusses that would span the gap in the bridge
had been made up. Bruce tested their rigidity by propping one at both
ends and standing all his men on the middle of it. It gave an inch under
their combined weight.
'What do you think, boss?' Ruffy asked without conviction.
'Four of them might just do it. We'll put in king-posts
underneath,' Bruce answered.
'Man, I don't know. That tanker weighs plenty.'
'It's no flyweight,' Bruce agreed. 'But we'll have to take the chance.
We'll bring the Ford across first, then the trucks and the tanker last.'
Ruffy nodded and wiped his face on his forearm, the muscles below his
armpits knotted as he moved and there was no flabbiness in the powerful
bulge of his belly above his belt.
Thew!' He blew his lips out. 'I got the feeling for a beer now.
This thirst is really stalking me.'
