Death in Venice

by Thomas Mann

figure, and, when he summoned his gaze back from unbounded space and focused his eyes again, it was the beautiful boy who, coming from the left, was walking by in front of him on the sand. Barefoot, ready for wading, his slender legs bare to above the knees, he was walking slowly but with a step as light and proud as if he were thoroughly accustomed to go about without footgear, and he looked around toward the cabanas in the right-angled row. But scarcely had he noticed the Russian family, which was living its own life there in grateful harmony, when a storm-cloud of angry contempt covered his face. His forehead darkened, his mouth was raised up, an embittered twist of his lips to one side creased his cheek, and his eyebrows were so heavily wrinkled that his eyes seemed sunken beneath their pressure and, looking out from under, maliciously and blackly, spoke the language of hatred. He looked at the ground, looked behind him once more menacingly, then jerked his shoulder in a violent expression of disparagement and aversion and left his enemies behind him.