He was amazed at his
lack of feeling, a little disturbed: perhaps there was something
fatally wrong, lacking, about him, and he was embarked on the first
violent stage of physical and mental degradation. It couldn't be
helped, he told himself, once more down stairs, in the hall. Beyond,
the stool lay where Fanny had kicked it; and he bent over to pick up
the copper paper cutter from the floor. Putting it on the table, he
reflected that Fanny would, in all probability, destroy it. His
handkerchief, stiff, black with dried blood, was in the crystal ash
holder with a mahogany stand; and that, as unnecessarily unpleasant, he
hid in a pocket.
The electric globe in the floor lamp was yellow; it was nearly burned
out and would have to be replaced. This had been his special corner,
the most comfortable in the pen. But the pig, he remembered, had been
slaughtered last week; and he wondered if the parallel he had
established would hold true to the end. In the main aspect, he
concluded, yes. But the pig had died without experiencing what was,
undoubtedly, both the fundamental duty and recompense of living. The
pig, happily or unhappily, had remained in ignorance of Cytherea and
the delights of love; but, perhaps, if only for the moment, he had
better call that passion; it was a word of clearer, more exact,
definition.
He left the house walking, carrying his bag up the hill into Eastlake:
a train left for the city at eleven-fifty-eight.
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