He would not own that life had beaten him, or that death
had beaten him. Going straight to bed, he slept at once, abandoning
himself to the sleep.
So the weeks went on. Always alone, his soul oscillated, first on the
side of death, then on the side of life, doggedly. The real agony
was that he had nowhere to go, nothing to do, nothing to say, and WAS
nothing himself. Sometimes he ran down the streets as if he were mad:
sometimes he was mad; things weren't there, things were there. It made
him pant. Sometimes he stood before the bar of the public-house where he
called for a drink. Everything suddenly stood back away from him. He
saw the face of the barmaid, the gobbling drinkers, his own glass on the
slopped, mahogany board, in the distance. There was something between
him and them. He could not get into touch. He did not want them; he did
not want his drink. Turning abruptly, he went out. On the threshold he
stood and looked at the lighted street. But he was not of it or in it.
Something separated him.
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