Maggie rather liked the High Street; it
reminded her of the High Street in Polchester, although there was no
hill. Out of the High Street and on to the Esplanade. You should
never see an Esplanade out of the season, Katherine had once said to
Maggie. That dictum seemed certainly true this time. There could be
no doubt that this Esplanade was not looking its best under the
blustering March wind. Here a deserted bandstand, there a railway
station, here a dead haunt for pierrots, there a closed and barred
cinema house, here a row of stranded bathing-machines, there a
shuttered tea-house--and not a living soul in sight. In front of
them was a long long stretch of sand, behind them to right and left
the huddled tenements of the town, in front of them, beyond the
sand, the grey sea--and again not a living soul in sight. The
railway line wound its way at their side, losing itself in the hills
and woods of the horizon.
"There are not many people about, are there?" said Maggie. Nor could
she wonder. The East wind cut along the desolate stretches of
silence, and yet how strange a wind! It seemed to have no effect at
all upon the sea, which rolled in sluggishly with snake-like motion,
throwing up on the dim colourless beach a thin fringe of foam,
baring its teeth at the world in impotent discontent.
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