I kept my eye on Camilla. She waded to her knees, saw a breaker coming, and ran towards the shore. Then she came back. She shouted with delight. A breaker struck her and she squealed and disappeared. A moment later she reappeared, laughing and shouting. I yelled at her not to take such chances, but she staggered out to meet a white crest that rose up and tumbled her out of sight. I watched her roll like a hamper of bananas. She waded to the shore, her body glistening, her hands in her hair. I swam until I was tired, then I waded out of the water. My eyes stung from salt water. I lay on my back and panted. After a few minutes my strength returned and I sat up and felt like smoking a cigarette. Camilla was not in sight. I walked to the car, thinking she was there. But she wasn’t. I ran down to the edge of the water and searched the foamy confusion. I called her name.

Then I heard her scream. It came from far out, beyond the surge of breakers and into the fog bank over choppy water. It seemed a good hundred yards. She screamed again; ‘Help!’ I waded in, hit the first breakers with my shoulders, and started swimming. Then I lost the sound of her voice in the roar. ‘I’m coming!’ I yelled, and I yelled again and again, until I had to stop to save my strength. The big breakers were easy, I dived under them, but the small waves confused me, slapped my face and choked me. Finally I was in choppy water. The little waves leaped for my mouth. Her cries had stopped. I churned water with my hands, waiting for another cry. It did not come. I shouted. My voice was weak, like a voice under water.

Suddenly I was exhausted. The little waves leaped over me. I swallowed water, I was sinking. I prayed, I groaned and fought the water, and I knew I should not fight it. The sea was quiet out here. Far inland I heard the roar of the breakers. I called, waited, called again. No answer save the slush of my arms and the sound of the little choppy waves. Then something happened to my right leg, to the toes of the foot. They seemed lodged. When I kicked the pain shot to the thigh. I wanted to live. God, don’t take me now! I swam blindly towards the shore.

Then I felt myself in the big breakers once more, heard them booming louder. It seemed too late. I couldn’t swim, my arms were so tired, my right leg ached so much. To breathe was all that mattered. Under water the current rushed, rolling and dragging me. So this was the end of Camilla, and this was the end of Arturo Bandini — but even then I was writing it all down, seeing it across a page in a typewriter, writing it out and coasting along the sharp sand, so sure I would never come out alive. Then I was in water to my waist, limp and too far gone to do anything about it, floundering helplessly with my mind clear, composing the whole thing, worrying about excessive adjectives. The next breaker smashed me under once more, dragged me to water a foot deep, and I crawled on my hands and knees out of water a foot deep, wondering if I could perhaps make a poem out of it. I thought of Camilla out there and I sobbed and noticed my tears were saltier than the sea water. But I couldn’t lie there, I had to get help somewhere, and I got to my feet and staggered towards the car. I was so cold and my jaws chattered.