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The Country of the Blind and Other Stories - The Truth about Pyecraft · The H. G. Wells Library

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  Speaker 1: Section twenty eight of the Country of the Blind and
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  Speaker 1: Other Stories by H. G. Wells. This LibriVox recording is
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  Speaker 1: in the public domain. Read by Peter Yearsley, The Truth
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  Speaker 1: about Pyecraft. He sits not a dozen yards away. If
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  Speaker 1: I glance over my shoulder, I can see him, and
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  Speaker 1: if I catch his ire, and usually I catch his ire,
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  Speaker 1: it meets me with an expression. It is mainly an
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  Speaker 1: imploring look, and yet with suspicion in it. Confound his suspicion.
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  Speaker 1: If I wanted to tell on him, I should have
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  Speaker 1: told long ago I don't tell, and I don't tell.
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  Speaker 1: And he ought to feel at his ease, as if
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  Speaker 1: anything so gross and fat as he could feel at ease?
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  Speaker 1: Who would believe me? If I did tell Poor old Piecraft,
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  Speaker 1: great uneasy jelly of substance, the fattest club man in London.
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  Speaker 1: He sits at one of the little club tables in
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  Speaker 1: the huge bay by the fire stuff. What is he stuffing?
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  Speaker 1: I glanced judiciously and capt him biting at a round
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  Speaker 1: of hot buttered tea cake, with his eyes on me.
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  Speaker 1: Confound him with his eyes on me. That settles it,
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  Speaker 1: pi Craft. Since you will be abject, Since you will
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  Speaker 1: behave as though I was not a man of honor.
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  Speaker 1: Here write, under your embedded eyes, I write the thing down,
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  Speaker 1: a plain truth about pie Craft. The man I helped,
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  Speaker 1: the man I shielded, and who has requited me by
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  Speaker 1: making my club unendurable, absolutely unendurable, with his liquid appeal,
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  Speaker 1: with the perpetual don't tell of his looks. And besides,
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  Speaker 1: why does he keep on eternally eating? Well, here goes
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  Speaker 1: for the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
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  Speaker 1: truth pie Craft. I made the acquaintance of Piecraft in
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  Speaker 1: this very smoking I was a young, nervous new member,
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  Speaker 1: and he saw it. I was sitting all alone, wishing
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  Speaker 1: I knew more of the members. And suddenly he came
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  Speaker 1: a great rolling front of chins and abdomina towards me,
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  Speaker 1: and grunted and sat down in a chair close by me,
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  Speaker 1: and wheezed for a space and scraped for a space
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  Speaker 1: with a match, and lit a cigar and then addressed me.
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  Speaker 1: I forget what he said, something about the matches not
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  Speaker 1: lighting properly. And afterwards, as he talked, he kept stopping
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  Speaker 1: the waiters one by one as they went by and
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  Speaker 1: telling them about the matches. In that thin fluty voice
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  Speaker 1: he has. But anyhow it was in some such way
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  Speaker 1: we began our talking. He talked about various things and
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: came round to games, and thence to my figure and complexion.
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  Speaker 1: You ought to be a good cricketer, he said. I
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  Speaker 1: suppose I am slender, slender to what some people would
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  Speaker 1: call lean, and I suppose I am rather dark. Still,
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  Speaker 1: I'm not ashamed of having a Hindu great grandmother, but
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  Speaker 1: for all that, I don't want casual strangers to see
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  Speaker 1: through me at a glance to her. So that I
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  Speaker 1: was set against Pyecraft from the beginning. But he only
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  Speaker 1: talked about me in order to get to himself, I expect,
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  Speaker 1: He said, you take no more exercise than I do,
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  Speaker 1: and probably you eat no less like all excessively obest people.
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  Speaker 1: He fancied, he ate nothing yet, and he smiled an
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  Speaker 1: oblique smile. We differ, And then he began to talk
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  Speaker 1: about his fatness and his fatness, all he did for
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  Speaker 1: his fatness, and all he was going to do for
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  Speaker 1: his fatness, what people had advised him to do for
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  Speaker 1: his fatness, and what he had heard of people doing
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  Speaker 1: for fatness similar to his a priori. He said, one
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  Speaker 1: would think a question of nutrition could be answered by
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  Speaker 1: dietary and a question of assimilation by drugs. It was stifling,
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  Speaker 1: It was dumpling talk. It made me feel swelled to
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  Speaker 1: hear him. One stands that sort of thing once in
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  Speaker 1: a way at a club. But a time came when
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  Speaker 1: I fancied I was standing too much. He took to
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  Speaker 1: me altogether too conspicuously. I could never go into the
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  Speaker 1: smoking room, but he would come wallowing towards me, And
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  Speaker 1: sometimes he came and gormandized round and about me while
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  Speaker 1: I had my lunch. He seemed at times almost to
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  Speaker 1: be clinging to me. He was a bore, but not
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  Speaker 1: so fearful a bore as to be limited to me.
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  Speaker 1: And from the first there was something in his manner,
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  Speaker 1: almost as though he knew, almost as though he penetrated
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  Speaker 1: to the fact that I might, that there was a remote,
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  Speaker 1: exceptional chance in me that no one else presented. I'd
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  Speaker 1: give anything to get it down. He would say anything,
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  Speaker 1: and peer at me over his vast cheeks and pant,
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  Speaker 1: poor old pyecraft. He has just gonged, no doubt, to
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  Speaker 1: order another buttered tea cache. He came to the actual
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  Speaker 1: thing one day. Our farmer copier. He said, our western
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  Speaker 1: farmer copier is anything but the last word of medical
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  Speaker 1: science in the East, I've been told. He stopped and
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  Speaker 1: stared at me. It was like being at an aquarium.
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  Speaker 1: I was quite suddenly angry with him. Look here, I said,
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  Speaker 1: who told you about my great grandmother's recipes? Well, he fenced.
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  Speaker 1: Every time we've met for a week, I said, and
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  Speaker 1: we've met pretty often, you've given me a broad hint
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  Speaker 1: or so about that little secret of mine. Well, he said,
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: now the cat's out of the bag. I'll admit, yes,
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  Speaker 1: it is so. I had it from Pattison indirectly, he said,
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  Speaker 1: which I believe was lying. Yes, Pattison, I said, took
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  Speaker 1: that stuff at his own risk. He pursed his mouth
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  Speaker 1: and bowed. My great grandmother's recipes, I said, are queer
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  Speaker 1: things to handle. My father was near making me promise.
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  Speaker 1: He didn't no, but he warned me he himself used
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  Speaker 1: one once. Ah, But do you think suppose suppose that
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  Speaker 1: did happen to be one? The things are curious documents,
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  Speaker 1: I said, even the smell of em. No. But after
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: going so far, Pyecraft was resolved, I should go farther.
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  Speaker 1: I was always a little afraid if I tried his
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  Speaker 1: patience too much, he would fall on me suddenly and
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  Speaker 1: smother me. I own I was weak, but I was
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  Speaker 1: also annoyed with Pyecraft. I had got to that state
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  Speaker 1: of feeling for him that disposed me to say, well,
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  Speaker 1: take the risk. The little affair of Patterson to which
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: I have alluded was a different matter altogether. What it
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  Speaker 1: was doesn't concern us now. But I knew anyhow that
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  Speaker 1: the particular recipe I used then was safe. The rest
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  Speaker 1: I didn't know so much about, and on the whole
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  Speaker 1: I was inclined to doubt their safety pretty completely. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: even if Pyecraft got poisoned, I must confess the poisoning
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  Speaker 1: of Piecraft struck me as an immense undertaking. That evening,
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  Speaker 1: I took that queer odd scented sandalwood box out of
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  Speaker 1: my safe and turned the rustling skins over. The gentleman
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  Speaker 1: who wrote the recipes for my great grandmother evidently had
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  Speaker 1: a weakness for skins of a miscellaneous origin, and his
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: handwriting was cramped to the last degree. Some of the
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  Speaker 1: things are quite unreadable to me, though my family, with
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  Speaker 1: its Indian Civil service associations, has kept up a knowledge
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  Speaker 1: of Hindustani from generation to generation, and none are absolutely
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  Speaker 1: plain sailing. But I found the one that I knew
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  Speaker 1: was there soon enough, and sat on the floor by
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  Speaker 1: my safe for some time looking at it. Look here,
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  Speaker 1: said I to Piecraft next day, and snatched the slip
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  Speaker 1: away from his eager grasp. So far as I can
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  Speaker 1: make it out, this is a recipe for loss of weight, ah,
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  Speaker 1: said Pyecraft. I'm not absolutely sure, but I think it's that.
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  Speaker 1: And if you take my advice, you'll leave it alone,
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  Speaker 1: because you know I blacken my blood in your interest, Pyecraft.
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  Speaker 1: My ancestors on that side were so far as I
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  Speaker 1: can gather a jolly queer lot, see, let me try it,
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  Speaker 1: said Pyecraft. I leant back in my chair. My imagination
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  Speaker 1: made one mighty effort and fell flat within me. What
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  Speaker 1: in Heaven's name, by Craft, I asked, do you think
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  Speaker 1: you'll look like when you get thin? He was impervious
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  Speaker 1: to reason. I made him promise never to say a
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  Speaker 1: word to me about his disgusting fatness again. Whatever happened never,
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  Speaker 1: And then I handed him that little piece of skin.
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  Speaker 1: It's nasty stuff, I said, no matter, he said, and
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  Speaker 1: took it He goggled at it, but he said he
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  Speaker 1: had just discovered that it wasn't English. To the best
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  Speaker 1: of my ability, I said, I will do you a translation.
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  Speaker 1: I did my best. After that, we didn't speak for
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  Speaker 1: a fortnight. Whenever he approached me, I frowned and motioned
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  Speaker 1: him away, and he respected our compact. But at the
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  Speaker 1: end of the fortnight he was as fat as ever,
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  Speaker 1: and then he got a word in I must speak.
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  Speaker 1: He said, it isn't fair. There's something wrong. It's done
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  Speaker 1: me no good. You're not doing your great grandmother justice.
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  Speaker 1: Where's the recipe? He produced it gingerly from his pocket book.
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  Speaker 1: I ran my eye over the items. Was the egg addled?
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  Speaker 1: I asked, No, ought it to have been that? I said,
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  Speaker 1: goes without saying. In all my poor dear great grandmother's recipes,
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  Speaker 1: when condition or quality is not specified, you must get
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  Speaker 1: the worst. She was drastic or nothing. And there's one
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  Speaker 1: or two possible alternatives to some of these other things.
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  Speaker 1: You got fresh rattlesnake venom. I got a rattlesnake from
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  Speaker 1: jam Racks. It cost it cost. That's your affair. Anyhow,
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  Speaker 1: this last item, I know a man who yes, um, well,
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  Speaker 1: I'll write the alternatives down so far as I know
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  Speaker 1: the language. The spelling of this recipe is particularly atrocious.
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  Speaker 1: By the by dog here probably means pariah dog. For
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  Speaker 1: a month after that, I saw Pyecraft constantly at the club,
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  Speaker 1: and as fat and anxious as ever. He kept our treaty,
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  Speaker 1: but at times he broke the spirit of it by
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  Speaker 1: shaking his head despondently. Then one day in the cloak room,
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  Speaker 1: he said, your great grandmother, not a word against her,
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  Speaker 1: I said, and he held his peace. I could have
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  Speaker 1: fancied he had desisted. And I saw him one day
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  Speaker 1: talking to three new members about his fatness, as though
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  Speaker 1: he was in search of other recipes. And then quite unexpectedly,
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  Speaker 1: his telegram came. Mister Formelyn bawled a page boy under
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  Speaker 1: my nose, and I took the telegram and opened it
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  Speaker 1: at once. For Heaven's sake, come Pyecraft, hum said I.
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  Speaker 1: And to tell the truth, I was so pleased at
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  Speaker 1: the rehabilitation of my great grandmother's reputation. This evidently promised
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  Speaker 1: that I made a most excellent lunch. I got Pyecraft's
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  Speaker 1: address from the hall. Porter Piecraft inhabited the upper half
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  Speaker 1: of a house in Bloomsbury, and I went there so
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  Speaker 1: soon as I had done my coffee and trappistine. I
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  Speaker 1: did not wait to finish my cigar, mister Pyecraft, said
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  Speaker 1: I at the front door. They believed he was ill.
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  Speaker 1: He hadn't been out for two days. He expects me,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: said I. As they sent me up, I rang the
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  Speaker 1: bell at the lattice door upon the landing. He shouldn't
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  Speaker 1: have tried it, anyhow, I said to myself. A man
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  Speaker 1: who eats, it's like a pig ought to look like
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  Speaker 1: a pig. An obviously worthy woman with an anxious face
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  Speaker 1: and a carelessly placed cap came and surveyed me through
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  Speaker 1: the lattice. I gave my name, and she let me
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  Speaker 1: in in a dubious fashion, well, said I. As we
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  Speaker 1: stood together inside Pyecraft's piece of the landing, he said
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  Speaker 1: you was to come in if you came, she said,
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  Speaker 1: and regarded me, begging no motion to show me anywhere,
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  Speaker 1: And then confidentially, he's locked in, sir, locked in, locked
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  Speaker 1: himself in yesterday morning, and hasn't let anyone in since, sir,
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: and ever and again, swearing, oh my, I stared at
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  Speaker 1: the door. She indicated by her glances in there. I said, yes, sir,
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  Speaker 1: what's up? She shook her head sadly. He keeps on
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  Speaker 1: calling for vittle, sir, evy vittles he wants. I get
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  Speaker 1: him what I can Porky's ad suet. Put in sausages,
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  Speaker 1: new bread, everything like that. Left outside, if you please,
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  Speaker 1: and me go. His eating says something awful. There came
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: a piping ball from inside the door. That fore, Molynn,
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  Speaker 1: that you pie Craft. I shouted and went and banged
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  Speaker 1: the door. Tell her to go away. I did. Then
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  Speaker 1: I could hear a curious pattering upon the door, almost
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  Speaker 1: like some one feeling for the handle in the dark,
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  Speaker 1: and Piecraft's familiar grunts. It's all right, I said, she's gone.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: But for a long time the door didn't open. I
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  Speaker 1: heard the key turn. Then Pyecraft's voice said, come in.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: I turned the handle and opened the door. Naturally, I
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: expected to see Piecraft. Well you know, he wasn't there.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: I never had such a shock in my life. There
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: was his sitting room in a state of untidy disorder,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: plates and dishes among the books and writing things, and
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  Speaker 1: several chairs overturned. But pie Craft, it's all right, old man.
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  Speaker 1: Shut the door, he said, And then I discovered him there.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: He was right up close to the cornice in the
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: corner by the door, as though some one had glued
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: him to the ceiling. His face was anxious and angry.
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: He panted and gesticulated. Shut the door, he said, if
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: that woman gets hold of it. I shut the door
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  Speaker 1: and went and stood away from him and stared. If
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: anything gives way and you tumble down, I said, you'll
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: break your neck. Bi cruft, I wish I could, He wheezed,
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  Speaker 1: a man of your agent. Wait getting up to kiddish gymnastics,
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: don't he said, and looked agonized. I'll tell you, he said,
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: and gesticulated how the deuce said, I are you holding
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: on up there? And then abruptly I realized that he
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: was not holding on at all, that he was floating
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: up there, just as a gas filled bladder might have
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: floated in the same position. He began a struggle to
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: thrust himself away from the ceiling and to clamber down
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: the wall. To me, it's that prescription, he panted. As
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  Speaker 1: he did so, your great scran He took hold of
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: a framed engraving rather carelessly as he spoke, and it
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: gave way, and he flew back up to the ceiling again,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: while the picture smashed onto the sofa. Bumpy went against
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: the ceiling, and I knew then why he was all
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: over white on the more salient curves and angles of
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: his person. He tried again, more carefully, coming down by
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: way of the mantle. It was really a most extraordinary spectacle,
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: that great fat, apoplectic looking man upside down and trying
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: to get from the ceiling to the floor. That prescription,
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: he said, too successful. How loss of weight almost complete?
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: And then, of course I understood by jove, Pyecraft said
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: I what you wanted was a cure for fatness, but
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: you always called it weight. You would call it weight somehow.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: I was extremely delighted. I quite liked Piecraft for the time.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Let me help you, I said, and took his hand
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: and pulled him down. He kicked about, trying to get
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: foothold somewhere. It was very like holding a flag a
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: windy day. That's table, he said, pointing, is solid mahogany
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: and very heavy. If you can put me under that
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: I did, and there he wallowed about like a captive balloon,
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: while I stood on his hearth rug and talked to him.
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: I lit a cigar, Tell me, I said, what happened?
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: I took it? He said, how did it taste? Oh? Beastly?
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: I should fancy they all did. Whether one regards the ingredients,
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: or the probable compound or the possible results. Almost all
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: my great grandmother's remedies appear to me, at least to
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: be extraordinarily uninviting. For my own part, I took a
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: little sip first, yes, and as I felt lighter and
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: better after an hour, I decided to take the draft,
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: My dear pike Craft. I held my nose, he explained,
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: and then I kept on getting lighter and lighter and helpless,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: you know. He gave way suddenly to a bus passion.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: What the goodness am I to do? He said? There's
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: one thing pretty evident. I said that you mustn't do.
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: If you go out of doors, you'll go up and up.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: I waved an arm upward. They'd have to send Santas
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: Dumont after you to bring you down again. I suppose
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: it will wear off. I shook my head. I don't
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: think you can count on that, I said, And then
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: there was another burst of passion, and he kicked out
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: at adjacent chairs and banged the floor. He behaved just
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: as I should have expected a great, fat, self indulgent
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: man to behave under trying circumstances, that is to say,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: very badly. He spoke of me and of my great
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: grandmother with an utter want of discretion. I never asked
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: you to take the stuff, I said, and generously, disregarding
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: the insults he was putting upon me, I sat down
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: in his arm chair and began to talk to him
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: in a sober, friendly fashion. I pointed out to him
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: that this was a trouble he had brought upon himself,
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: and that it had almost an air of poetical justice.
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: He had eaten too much. This he disputed, and for
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: a time we argued the point he became noisy and violent.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: So I desisted from this aspect of his lesson, and
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: then said, I, you committed the sin of euphuism. You
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: called it not fat, which is just and inglorious. But
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: wait you He interrupted to say that he recognized all that.
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: What was he to do? I suggested he should adapt
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: himself to his new conditions. So we came to the
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: really sensible part of the business. I suggested that it
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: would not be difficult for him to learn to walk
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: about on the ceiling with his hands. I can't sleep,
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: he said, But that was no great difficulty. It was
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: quite possible, I pointed out, to make a shake up
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: under a wire mattress, fasten the under things on with tapes,
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: and have a blanket sheet and cover it to button
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: at the side. He would have to confide in his housekeeper,
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: I said, and after some squabbling he agreed to that. Afterwards,
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: it was quite delightful to see the beautifully matter of
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: fact way with which the good lady took all these
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: amazing inversions. He could have a library ladder in his room,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: and all his meals could be laid on the top
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: of his bookcase. We also hit on an ingenious device
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: by which he could get to the floor whenever he wanted,
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: which was simply to put the British Encyclopedia tenth edition
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: on the top of his open shelves. He just pulled
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: out a couple of volumes and held on and down
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: he came. And we agreed that there must be iron
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: staples along the skirting, so that he could cling to
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: those whenever he wanted to get about the room on
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: the lower level. As we got on with the thing,
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: I found myself almost keenly interested. It was I who
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: called in the housekeeper and broke matters to her, and
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: it was I chiefly who fixed up the inverted bed.
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: In fact, I spent two whole days at his flat.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: I have a handy, interfering sort of man with a screwdriver,
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: and I made all sorts of ingenious adaptations for him.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: Ran a wire to bring his bells within reach, turned
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: all his electric lights up instead of down, and so on.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: The whole affair was extremely curious and interesting to me,
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: and it was delightful to think of Piecraft like some
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: great fat blow fly, crawling about on his ceiling and
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: clambering around the lintel of his doors from one room
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: to another, and never, never, never coming to the club anymore.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: Then you know, my fatal ingenuity got the better of me.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: I was sitting by his fire, drinking his whisky, and
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: he was up in his favorite corner by the cornice,
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: tacking a turkey carpet to the ceiling. When the idea
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: struck me. By jove, Piecraft, I said, all this is
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: totally unnecessary. And before I could calculate the complete consequences
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: of my notion, I blurted it out lead underclothing, said I,
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: and the mischief was done. Piecraft received the thing, almost
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: in tears. To be right ways up again, he said.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: I gave him the whole secret before I saw where
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: it would take me. Buy sheet lead, I said, Stamp
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: it into disks, sew em all over your underclothes until
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: you have enough. Have lead sold boots, carry a bag
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: of solid lead, and the thing is done. Instead of
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: being a prisoner here, you may go abroad again, Piecraft,
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: you may travel A still happier idea came to me.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: You need never fear a shipwreck. All you need do
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: is just slip off some or all of your clothes,
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: take the necessary amount of luggage in your hand, and
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: float up in the air. In his emotion, he dropped
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: the tack hammer within an ace of my head. By jove,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: he said, I shall be able to come back to
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: the club again. The thing pulled me up short. By jove,
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: I said, faintly, yes, of course you will. He did.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: He does. There. He sits behind me now, stuffing as
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: I live, a third go of buttered tea cake, And
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: no one in the whole world knows except his housekeeper,
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: and me that he weighs practically nothing, that he is
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: a mere boring mass of assimulatory matter, mere clouds in clothing.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: Niente nephas the most inconsiderable of men. There he sits
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: watching until I have done this writing. Then if he can,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: he will waylay me. He will come blowing up to me.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: He will tell me over again all about it, how
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: it feels, how it doesn't feel, how he sometimes hope
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: it is passing off a little. And always somewhere in
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: that fat, abundant discourse he will say, the secret's keeping, Eh,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: if anyone knew it, I should be so ashamed. Makes
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: a fellow look such a fool, you know, crawling about
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: on a ceiling and all that. And now to elude Pyecraft,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: occupying as he does, an admirable strategic position between me
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: and the door. End of Section twenty eight