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The world well lost for love—was that Dryden or Pope?
I stopped by Titus Chevron, panting. Across the street, the beatnik proprietor of the Jolly White
Elephant was smoking his pipe and watching me. The Ocher Card Man stood at the mouth of the alley
behind the Kennebec Fruit. It was apparently as far as he could go in that direction.
He held out his hands to me, which was bad. Then he fell on his knees and clasped his hands in
front of him, which was ever so much worse. “Please don’t do this! You must know the cost!”
I knew it and still hurried on. A telephone booth stood at the intersection just beyond St. Joseph’s
Church. I shut myself inside it, consulted the phone book, and dropped a dime.
When the cab came, the driver was smoking Luckies and his radio was tuned to WJAB.
History repeats itself.