A man seated near the middle of the table rose to his feet and inclined his upper body, extending his hands to either side. He was tall, slender except for the stomach that tugged at his light-colored shirt that he wore loose and unsashed over.

He got in a scrape with the school bully.

There's a very useful page for LJers at http://www.livejournal.com/birthdays.bml - but it only works for those friends who have entered their birthdays.

Beyond these gardens (called “de la Isla”), so princelily laid out, is a vast expanse of forest, thickly planted with trees of various foliage: labyrinthine avenues and tortuous alleys ending in, here and there, a clairière, where rustic tables and seats, and vine-spread canopies, indicate the scenes of royal pic-nics au frais.