Scene 22

As the boat stopped at a trio of boulders, which jutted out of the sea like three frozen Graces, a man stepped up to Maille standing at the railing and bowed politely. He had noticed the gentleman before: he was the spokesman of a small group of friends who had been constantly conversing animatedly with one another. The man courteously asked Maille if he could translate the guide's words for him. Maille nodded and smiled back with suitable courtesy.

The man pointed to the Grace-rock: «The guide said that these are the director with his first wife to the left and his second wife to the right». Maille laughed as nicely as he could. The translator of the joke shook like an omnibus on a bad country road.
«I am called Mr Lee», the omnibus introduced himself when he had recovered from his pothole-shudders. He was there on holiday with his wife and a couple of friends from Gwangju, and his aunt owned a small house in the village. Maille did not need to formulate the question burning on his lips. As he introduced himself, Mr Lee provided him with all the answers he needed – with even more than was good for him.
«From Santa Lemusa! What a coincidence! What travel-friendly folk!» Lee remarked exuberantly, while beckoning his friends, who instantly surrounded the secret agent as though he were holding out a magician's duster or a novel gadget to embellish vegetables. Just a couple of weeks earlier he had encountered another person from Santa Lemusa, volunteered Lee happily, a young woman, on a flight to New York.
«Very sweet, a beauty – almost as lovely as my wife», beamed Lee, pushing a woman towards Maille. The lady smiled coyly and extended her hand to Maille – in the manner that someone hands over a glove that he has found on the floor. «Yours?»

The happily married kimchi tiger pulled out a stack of calling cards and rustled through it – with a continuing Christmas glow on his face. Then he found what he needed: «Tatjana is her name, Tatjana Koslow. A beautiful girl decidedly – she's a doctor or something. She will visit us one day. But now you are here. What a coincidence. We must celebrate that! Do you know Korean Sashimi?»

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