PARTISAN REVIEW
Toilet requisites and necessaries, said Mercier.
Superfluous luxury, said Camier.
A few pairs of socks, said Mercier, and one of drawers.
God, said Camier.
Some eatables, said Mercier.
Rotten ripe for the muckheap, said Camier.
On condition we retrieve them, said Mercier.
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Let us board the first express southward bound! cried Camier. He
added, more soberly, And so not be tempted to get out at the nearest
stop.
And why south, said Mercier, rather than north, or east, or west?
I prefer south, said Camier.
Is that sufficient ground? said Mercier.
It's the nearest terminus, said Camier.
True, said Mercier.
He went out into the street and looked up at the sky, a grey pall,
look where he would.
The sky is uniformly leaden, he said, resuming his place under the
arch, we'll drown like rats without the umbrella.
Camier criticized this simile.
Like rats, said Mercier.
Even if we had the umbrella, said Camier, we cou ld not use it, for
it is broken.
What fresh extravagance is this? said Mercier.
We broke it yesterday, said Camier. Your idea.
Mercier took his head between his hands. Little by little the scene
came back to him. Proudly he drew himself up, to his full height.
Come, he said, regrets are vain.
We' ll wear the raincoat turn and turn about, said Camier.
We' ll be in the train, said Mercier, speeding south.
Through the streaming panes, said Camier, we try to number the
cows, shivering pitiably in the scant shelter of the hedges. Rooks take
wing, all dripping and bedraggled. But gradually the day lifts and we
arrive in the brilliant sun light of a glorious winter's afternoon. It
seems like Monaco.
I don 't seem to have eaten for forty-eight hours, said Mercier. And
yet I am not hungry.
One must eat, said Camier. He went on to compare the stomach
with the bladder.
Apropos, said Mercier, how is your cyst?
