Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Paul Cezanne Card Players

Paul Cezanne Card PlayersLaurie Maitland fireWilliam Bouguereau Innocence
understand I am unhappy about my family, and very anxious to find them again, so I think I must move on, much as I would like to stay."
The priest pushed out his lips, in the thicket of his beard, and frowned; but then he shrugged and said, "Well, you shall go if you must. But before you leave, you must drink your vodka. Stand with me now! Take it, and down all in one, like this!"
He threw back the glass, swallowing it all at once, and then hauled his massive body up and stood very close to Will. In his fat, dirty fingers the glass he held out seemed tiny; but it was brimming with the clear spirit, and Will could smell the heady tang of the drink and the stale sweat and the food stains on the man's cassock, and he felt sick before he began.
"Drink, Will Ivanovitch!" began to intone a prayer or a psalm. Vapors of tobacco and alcohol and sweat came powerfully from him, and he was close enough for his thick beard, wagging up and down, to brush Will's face. Will held his breath.
The priest's hands moved behind Will's shoulders, and then Semyon Borisovitch was hugging him tightly and kissing his cheeks, right, left, right again. Will felt Balthamos dig tiny claws into his shoulder, and kept still. His head was swimming, his stomach lurching, but he didn't the priest cried, with a threatening heartiness.Will lifted the glass and unhesitatingly swallowed the fiery, oily liquid in one gulp. Now he would have to fight hard to avoid being sick.There was one more ordeal to come. Semyon Borisovitch leaned forward from his great height, and took Will by both shoulders."My boy," he said, and then closed his eyes and

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