A corresponding current of activity poured along each
vein. The old familiar impetus swayed me.
I welcomed it gladly and went upstairs, got out paper and a pen, and
the remembrance of my own life slipped away from me. All that night
I wrote, and the next day, and the fresh manuscript was fairly
started. For a whole fortnight I wrote almost incessantly. I
snatched a little food in the cafe, hardly knowing what I ate.
The nights passed feverishly without sleep, while the brain
revolved, excitedly, scenes written or to be written. Towards the
end of the fortnight the impulses to work steadily declined. I
forced myself to write at intervals; but, as usual, the forced work
was worthless, and I destroyed it when it was done. No, it was no
use. I could merely shrug my shoulders and smoke and wait.
The hot, blank days of August drifted by, and as I saw the
boulevards empty themselves day by day, and Paris grow hotter and
duller each afternoon, I felt the solitary existence weigh heavier
and heavier upon me. The loss of the dog seemed to have made a
larger gap in my existence than I should have believed; his unused
collars still lay upon my mantelpiece, his plate and saucer still
stood in the corner by the hearth, and sometimes when I was climbing
the dark stairs at night to my empty room I felt as if I would have
given years of my life to have had the dog leap up into my arms in
welcome.
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