Manana

Manana

TOMORROW NEVER COMES--Robert L. Duffus--Houghton Mifflin ($2.50) In one of those pleasant South American republics where blood is hot and daggers sharp, Latin temperament turns law clerk into general, army-sergeant into dictator, dictator into corpse. Rafael, the law April 29, 1929 clerk, happened to be "nephew" to the canon of the cathedral. That was powerfully to his advantage; but his friendship for Sergeant Domingo, ancient soldier-philosopher, was to more immediate purpose. For Rafael had had the misfortune to fall in love with Vitoria of the mellifluous eyes, Vitoria whom General Hernandez had marked for his own. With the general Rafael drove, laudably, a bargain: give him and Vitoria one night undisturbed and on the morrow he, Rafael, would surrender himself for slaughter. Rafael and Vitoria had their night. Before dawn the revolution broke. Hernandez was shot. Sergeant-Dictator appointed Rafael general in his place. The wise old soldier had been predicting revolution: "To be governed at all is bad enough, but to be governed by the same man for one, two, three, years--that is more than any one ought to be asked to endure. Always the same face, always the same proclamations, always the same way of stealing money. It is like having only one woman." An effervescent story, eminently readable, Tomorrow Never Comes is running-fire satire on politics and love, Nordic inhibitions, Latin excesses.