said. «You’re going to blow me to a good lunch. It’s the last square meal you’re going to have over here — maybe for a long while.» I steered him to a cosy little restaurant and ordered a good spread. I ordered the best wine on the menu, regardless of price or taste. I had all his money in my pocket — oodles of it, it seemed to me. Certainly never before had I had so much in my fist at one time. It was a treat to break a thousand franc note. I held it up to the light first to look at the beautiful watermark. Beautiful money! One of the few things the French make on a grand scale. Artistically done, too, as if they cherished a deep affection even for the symbol.
The meal over, we went to a café. I ordered Chartreuse with the coffee. Why not? And I broke another bill — a five-hundred franc note this time. It was a clean, new, crisp bill. A pleasure to handle such money. The waiter handed me back a lot of dirty old bills that had been patched up with strips of gummed paper; I had a stack of five and ten franc notes and a bagful of chicken feed. Chinese money, with holes in it. I didn’t know in which pocket to stuff the money any more. My trousers were bursting with coins and bills. It made me slightly uncomfortable also, hauling all that dough out in public. I was afraid we might be taken for a couple of crooks.
When we got to the American Express there wasn’t a devil of a lot of time left. The British, in their usual fumbling farting way, had kept us on pins and needles. Here everybody was sliding around on castors. They were so speedy that everything had to be done twice. After all the checks were signed and clipped in a neat little holder, it was discovered that he had signed in the wrong place. Nothing to do but start all over again. I stood over him, with one eye on the clock, and watched every stroke of the pen. It hurt to hand over the dough. Not all of it, thank God — but a good part of it. I had roughly about 2,500 francs in my pocket. Roughly, I say. I wasn’t counting by francs any more. A hundred, or two hundred, more or less — it didn’t mean a goddamned thing to me. As for him, he was going through the whole transaction in a daze. He didn’t know how much money he had. All he knew was that he had to keep something aside for Ginette. He wasn’t certain yet how much — we were going to figure that out on the way to the station.
In the excitement we had forgotten to change all the money. We were already in the cab, however, and there wasn’t any time to be lost. The thing was to find out how we stood. We emptied our pockets quickly and began to whack it up. Some of it was lying on the floor, some of it was on the seat. It was bewildering. There was French, American and English money. And all that chicken feed besides. I felt like picking up the coins and chucking them out of the window — just to simplify matters. Finally we sifted it all out; he held on to the English and American money, and I held on to the French money.
We had to decide quickly now what to do about Ginette — how much to give her, what to tell her, etc. He was trying to fix up a yarn for me to hand her — didn’t want her to break her heart and so forth. I had to cut him short.
«Never mind what to tell her,» I said. «Leave that to me. How much are you going to give her, that’s the thing? Why give her anything?»
That was like setting a bomb under his ass. He burst into tears. Such tears! It was worse than before. I thought he was going to collapse on my hands. Without stopping to think, I said: «All right, let’s give her all this French money. That ought to last her for a while.»
«How much is it?» he asked feebly.
«I don’t know — about 2,000 francs or so. More than she deserves anyway.»
«Christ! Don’t say that!» he begged. «After all, it’s a rotten break I’m giving her. Her folks’ll never take her back now. No, give it to her. Give her the whole damned business… I don’t care what it is.»
He pulled a handkerchief out to wipe the tears away. «I can’t help it,» he said. «It’s too much for me.» I said nothing. Suddenly he sprawled himself out full length — I thought he was taking a fit or something — and he said: «Jesus, I think I ought to go back. I ought to go back and face the music. If anything should happen to her I’d never forgive myself.»
That was a rude jolt for me. «Christ!» I shouted, «you can’t do that! Not now. It’s too late. You’re going to take the train and I’m going to tend to her myself. I’ll go see her just as soon as I leave you. Why, you poor boob, if she ever thought you had tried to run away from her she’d murder you, don’t you realize that? You can’t go back any more. It’s settled.»
Anyway, what could go wrong? I asked myself. Kill herself?
Tant mieux.
When we rolled up to the station we had still about twelve minutes to kill. I didn’t dare to say good-bye to him yet. At the last minute, rattled as he was, I could see him jumping off the train and scooting back to her. Anything might swerve him. A straw. So I dragged him across the street to a bar and I said: «Now you’re going to have a Pernod — your last Pernod and I’m going to pay for it… with your dough.»
Something about this remark made him look at me uneasily. He took a big gulp of the Pernod and then, turning to me like an injured dog, he said: «I know I oughtn’t to trust you with all that money, but… but… Oh, well, do what you think best. I don’t want her to kill herself, that’s all.»
«Kill herself?» I said. «Not her! You must think a hell of a lot of yourself if you can believe a thing like that. As for the money, though I hate to give it to her, I promise you I’ll go straight to the post office and telegraph it to her. I wouldn’t trust myself with it a minute longer than is necessary.» As I said this I spied a bunch of post cards in a revolving rack. I grabbed one off — a picture of the Eiffel Tower it was — and made him write a few words. «Tell her you’re sailing now. Tell her you love her and that you’ll send for her as soon as you arrive… I’ll send it by pneumatique when I go to the post office. And tonight I’ll see her. Everything’ll be Jake, you’ll see.»
With that we walked across the street to the station. Only two minutes to go. I felt it was safe now. At the gate I gave him a slap on the back and pointed to the train. I didn’t shake hands with him — he would have slobbered all over me. I just said: «Hurry! She’s going in a minute.» And with that I turned on my heel and marched off. I didn’t even look round to see if he was boarding the train. I was afraid to.

I hadn’t thought, all the while I was bundling him off, what I’d do once I was free of him. I had promised a lot of things — but that was only to keep him quiet. As for facing Ginette, I had about as little courage for it as he had. I was getting panicky myself: Everything had happened so quickly that it was impossible to grasp the nature of the situation in full. I walked away from the station in a kind of delicious stupor — with the post card in my hand. I stood against a lamppost and read it over. It sounded preposterous. I read it again, to make sure that I wasn’t dreaming, and then I tore it up and threw it in the gutter.
I looked around uneasily, half expecting to see Ginette coming after me with a tomahawk. Nobody was following me. I started walking leisurely toward the Place Lafayette. It was a beautiful day, as I had observed earlier. Light, puffy clouds above, sailing with the wind. The awnings flapping. Paris had never looked so good to me; I almost felt sorry that I had shipped the poor bugger off. At the Place Lafayette I sat down facing the church and stared at the clock tower; it’s not such a wonderful piece of architecture, but that blue in the dial face always fascinated me. It was bluer than ever today. I couldn’t take my eyes off it.
Unless he were crazy enough to write her a letter, explaining everything, Ginette need never know what had happened. And even if she did learn that he had left her 2,500 francs or so she couldn’t prove it. I could always say that he imagined it. A guy who was crazy enough to walk off without even a hat was