As if strewing firecrackers the midget automobile blew windy explosions from the corroded tailpipe.It hurtled through a magical moonlit landscape. Sierra conifers stood like centurians powdered with lunar snow.
"Wow." Sotto voce.
"My humble island is impressive, no?"
*
They stopped by Ramon's farmhouse to change clothes. The islander tossed Kit cut-off jeans and a soccer jersey. And Water Buffalos, sandals from India.
"OK, Pard. Let's vamoose."
"OK, Cowboy. Let's vamoose."
On the way out Ramon explained that his family had been goatherds for many generations. His parents broke tradition, moving to Barcelona and becoming civil servants. As soon as he was old enough Ramon returned to the homestead.
"I don't keep goats." His grin was infectious.
*
Windows down, air pummeled them with the scent of brine and oranges.
Kit noted the lean hardness of Ramon's whipcord body and its unblemished dusky Mediterranean skin. A musky aphrodisiac armpit oil dilated Kit's sensitive nostrils. Ramon was pure Catalan. His blunt wedge of nose reminded Kit of ancient Phoenician art. Ramon's triceps poked out like a baby apple as he steered the car. Thighs showed like slabs of quarry stone.
Ramon broke silence. "Have you studied the Punic Wars?"
Carthage and Rome. Rome won in the end."
"You Americans. Always the bottom line."
"You're aiming to tell me something."
"The Iberian port of Cartagena is named for Carthaginians who settled there in the Fifth or Sixth Century. Scenes in ancient Ibiza were much like those Flaubert wrote for "Salambo."
"Favorite of mine. Love the erotic cruelty."
"You don't say?"
"Try this, Goat Boy. 'Now, Dido, with these relics burn thyself and make Aeneas famous throughout the world for perjury and slaughter of a queen.' Marlowe's twist on Virgil."
For a nanosecond Kit saw Ramon's ears grow elfin and panpipes cooed high in the sibilent hills.
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