exception of Old Louis, occasionally Mullins too, I had no companionship. Brodie, who by the way received no money from the insurance companies, but equally, escaped a worse disaster, I never saw again. The post on the Times, meanwhile, seemed far away, highly problematical too. My comforts were Bronx Park, occasionally open-air music, Louis, and my own dreams, speculations and, chief of all, the Bhagavad Gita.... Hours I spent in the free libraries. Never, before or since, did I read so many books in so short a time. This free reading, of course, never stopped for a moment all the years I lived in New York, but during these six weeks it reached a maximum.
From the 'vantage ground of easier days I have often looked back and wondered why I made no real effort to better myself, to get out of the hated city, to go west, for a railway pass was always more or less within my power, and other fellows, similarly in difficulties, were always changing occupations and localities. It was due, I think, to a kind of resignation, though rather a fierce resignation, a kind of obstinate spirit of acceptance in me. "Take it all, whatever comes," said this spirit. "Dodge, shirk, avoid nothing. You have deserved it. Exhaust it then. Suck the orange dry." And, as if life were not severe and difficult enough, as it was, I would even practise certain austerities I invented on my own account. Already I felt myself immeasurably old; life seemed nearly ended; external events, anyhow, did not really matter....
A rolling-stone sees life, of course, but collects little, if any, fruit; though I made no determined efforts to escape my conditions at this time, a new adventure ever had attractions for me. Having once tasted the essence of a particular experience, I found myself weary of it and longing for a new one. This vagabondage in the blood has strengthened with the years. A fixed job means prison, a new one sends my spirits up. Routine is hell. To take a room, a flat, a job by the year, means insupportable
detestation of any of them soon afterwards. It
