# Quote — John Fante, Ask The Dust

> When I saw a policeman strolling toward me I walked away. It was a hot night. Sand from the Mojave had blown across the city. Tiny brown grains of sand clung to my fingertips whenever I touched anything, and when I got back to my room I found the mechanism of my new typewriter glutted with sand. It was in my ears and in my hair. When I took off my clothes it fell like powder to the floor. It was even between the sheets of my bed. Lying in the darkness, the red light from the St. Paul Hotel flashing on and off across my bed was bluish now, a ghastly color jumping into the room and out again.

- Author: [John Fante](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-fante.md)
- Book: [Ask The Dust](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-fante/ask-the-dust.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Fante#Ask_the_Dust_(1939)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-fante/ask-the-dust/when-i-saw

## More from this book

> The trouble with trouble was that trouble was looking for Coldwater Gatling. They don't like Texas Rangers down in Arizona, consequently Coldwater Gatling figured shoot first and find out who you killed afterwards. That's how they did it in the Lone Star State where men were men and the women didn't mind cooking for hard-riding straight-shooting people like Coldwater Gatling, the toughest man in leather they had down there.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-fante/ask-the-dust/the-trouble-with.md)

> We drove into the Los Angeles Black Belt, Central Avenue, night clubs, abandoned apartment houses, broken-down business houses, the forlorn street of poverty for the Negro and swank for the whites.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-fante/ask-the-dust/we-drove-into.md)

> I turned around and saw the crease on the bed where Camilla had been seated, the sensuous contour where her thighs and hips had sunk beneath the softness of the blue chenille bedspread. then I forgot Sammy, and wild with longing I threw myself upon my knees before the spot and kissed it reverently.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-fante/ask-the-dust/i-turned-around.md)