get myself. . . . Why—I feel as though . . . oh—I'd like to be that piece of silk in there—that strip of braid—that red or that blue ribbon, which the girls in the dry goods stores, after they've measured it with their tape-measure . . . did you ever notice what they do? . . . They make an "8" of it around the thumb and finger of their left hand before they wrap it up. . . . (4 pause.) And I watch the man or the woman, when they come out of the shop with the bundle either hanging to one of their fingers, or held under one of their arms. And I watch them till they are out of sight . . . imagining—uh-h! . . . all that I imagine! . . . You couldn't guess half of it! (A pause—Then gloomily, reflectively, as though speaking to himself.) But it does me good—some good at least.
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316
MAN WITH THE FLOWER IN HIS MOUTH
THE CUSTOMER: Good? That's interesting. What good does it do you?
MAN WITH THE FLOWER: Oh—it helps to attach me—in my imagination, I mean—attach me to life—much as a vine clings to the bars of an iron gate. (A pause.) Oh . . . I never let it rest a moment—my imagination! I cling with it, persistently, to life—to the lives of other people! Not of people I know. No—no. I couldn't—with people I know. That disgusts me, somehow. Sort of sick to your stomach, eh?—No, I cling to the life of other people—of strangers, with whom my imagination can wander freely—But not capriciously, you understand—oh, no! . . . On the contrary—taking careful account of the least things I notice in them! And you have no idea how it works! I get right in on the inside track with some of them. . . . I can see this man's house, for instance. I live in it. I come to feel quite at home there—down to the point of noticing—say, you know, every house has a certain faint odour peculiar to it? There's one in your house—there's one in mine. But in our houses, of course, we don't notice it—because it's the very breath of our lives—understand! Oh—I can see that you agree!
THE CUSTOMER: Yes. Because—well—you must have a good time—just imagining all those things!
MAN WITH THE FLOWER (wearily, after some reflection): A good time? I?
THE CUSTOMER: Yes. . . . I suppose—
