Introduction
Romance novel set in South Africa.
Millin, Sarah Gertrude Liebson, 1889-1968.

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Page 165

They were down at Muizenberg, leading the same old seaside life - the hotel, the inflated charges the dressing, the surfing, the seaside walks, the meetings at the pavilion, the introductions, the talking and laughing - a life of determined enjoyment punctuated by food and drink.

Ruth was in her element, her round young face sun-flushed under her panama; her splendid, even teeth habitually a visible part of her smiling mouth; her becoming skirts blowing about her white-clad legs, walking with a gay little twirl of

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sheer happiness with other happy young girls or with one or other or several of an admiring multitude of young men.
She was an expert surfer, and twice daily for an hour at a time she would rush, stretched flat on her surf-board, to the shore riding the eager waves.
Right on to the sands they would bring her, her lithe, slender figure and flashing white legs and brightly-bound head and wet, laughing face.
And she would turn over after a moment and get up and run leaping back into the waves carving her surf-board under her arms.

Alma, after a shorter dip, would sit and watch her.
Sometimes a young admirer of Ruth's would join Alma.
"She surfs beautifully, doesn't she, Miss Grant?"

The life was unrestrained and natural.
Men and women entered the sea from different parts of the bathing pavilion but met in the water.
On the sands a mixed humanity stared at an equally mixed humanity as it disported itself in the ocean, mermaids of girls, fat, timid, old women, screaming children, daring swimmers in the distance.

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Millin, Sarah Gertrude: The Dark River  T. Seltzer, New York,1920. Hathi Trust https://hdl.handle.net/2027/nyp.33433074901822

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