240
THE WIT OF PORPORTUK
El-Soo made no sound. She sat and looked at her shattered ankles, on which she would never walk again.
"My legs are strong, El-Soo," Akoon said. "But never will they bear me away from you."
El-Soo looked at him, and for the first time in all the time he had known her, Akoon saw tears in her eyes.
"Your eyes are like deer's eyes, El-Soo," he said.
"Is it just?" Porportuk asked, and grinned from the edge of the smoke as he prepared to depart.
"It is just," the old men said. And they sat on in the silence.