He did not like going into his room, dreading that window, but once in
bed he slept almost immediately and did not waken till morning. Thus
strengthened with rest he embarked on Thursday, and wasted it, entire.
He knew that today, tomorrow or Saturday morning he must make the
crucial decision. He knew that it would be more difficult to face
tomorrow than today--yet he flung the day away aimlessly, dodging his
thoughts by not putting them into words.
This is exactly how he felt: He, himself, was a frightened specter
running through the caverns of his own mind, pursued by a suffocating
something that he pretended was not pursuing him!
In the morning he took this feeling with him on a walk down the _Boul'
Mich'_ to the book stalls on the _quais_ where he poked amongst
worthless old books until he was so bored it seemed his veins were full
of gray dust and his belly full of nothing.
He had luncheon in the Thin Cat, which stands where one cobbled street
meets another. Horse-drawn trucks, motor trucks, hand-carts, passenger
buses like mastodons, taxis, struggled by in a gasoline haze and each
with engine, wheel, horn or voice seemed to be trying to make the most
possible noise.
Inside the waiters slammed doors, plates, bottles, chairs, and shouted
orders. Patrons banged dishes with knives and forks and screamed in
passionate conversation. A thousand sounds made one ear-splitting
blare of racket. Luncheon in the _Chat Maigre_ would be plainly heard
in London were there no intervening noises. But luncheon in the _Chat
Maigre_ cost three francs twenty-five centimes--or about fourteen and
four-sixteenths cents, American, as Flecker figured it at the day's
exchange. He chose a table in a corner not far from the entrance.
As he was finishing his meal the witch sat down opposite him. For a
minute Flecker did not dare to look at her, but in the first glance he
had seen she wore a black jacket and the same black hat. When he heard
her speak to the waiter he looked up quickly.
She was not the witch. She was the old woman in gray. Her hooked nose
stuck out above her wrinkled mouth. She leered and screamed at him.
"_Comment?_" Flecker's teeth chattered.
She screamed even louder, asking for the menu. With a trembling hand he
passed it.
"_Merci!_" She opened her jaws in that terrible smile, and ogled him
from the wrinkled corners of her eyes.
"Listen!" She leaned across the table. Flecker jerked back his head as
if she were a snake. Seeing this she could not speak.
"Listen!" she repeated, recovering her grin. "Dear boy, darling boy!
Wish for happiness!"
Flecker wanted only to get away from her.
He scraped back his chair and stumbled away. The waiter took his three
francs, twenty-five, at the entrance. Spike looked over his shoulder
at the old woman. She smiled and waved her napkin. Spike fled into the
street.
As in a nightmare when one is the only reality in a world of shadows,
a focused figure against a fade-out background, Flecker ran from the
café. He did not know the impact of his running feet against the
pavement; the traffic flowed by him in silence; the tall, leaning
houses of gray plaster were no more substantial than curling smoke.
His harsh fear held him in its clutch as he ran. He did not know where
he was running. His long legs whisked him under the heads of running
horses, scraped him against the headlights of motors, sitting back on
their screaming brakes, got him out of reach of an agitated _gendarme_
who was too fat to run far.