I felt suddenly that "this sort of thing" would kill me. The definition
of the cause was vague, but the thought itself was no mere morbid
artificiality of sentiment but a genuine conviction. "That sort of
thing" was what I would have to die from. It wouldn't be from the
innumerable doubts. Any sort of certitude would be also deadly. It
wouldn't be from a stab--a kiss would kill me as surely. It would not be
from a frown or from any particular word or any particular act--but from
having to bear them all, together and in succession--from having to live
with "that sort of thing." About the time I finished with my neck-tie I
had done with life too. I absolutely did not care because I couldn't
tell whether, mentally and physically, from the roots of my hair to the
soles of my feet--whether I was more weary or unhappy.

And now my toilet was finished, my occupation was gone. An immense
distress descended upon me. It has been observed that the routine of
daily life, that arbitrary system of trifles, is a great moral support.
But my toilet was finished, I had nothing more to do of those things
consecrated by usage and which leave you no option. The exercise of any
kind of volition by a man whose consciousness is reduced to the sensation
that he is being killed by "that sort of thing" cannot be anything but
mere trifling with death, an insincere pose before himself. I wasn't
capable of it. It was then that I discovered that being killed by "that
sort of thing," I mean the absolute conviction of it, was, so to speak,
nothing in itself. The horrible part was the waiting. That was the
cruelty, the tragedy, the bitterness of it. "Why the devil don't I drop
dead now?" I asked myself peevishly, taking a clean handkerchief out of
the drawer and stuffing it in my pocket.

This was absolutely the last thing, the last ceremony of an imperative
rite. I was abandoned to myself now and it was terrible. Generally I
used to go out, walk down to the port, take a look at the craft I loved
with a sentiment that was extremely complex, being mixed up with the
image of a woman; perhaps go on board, not because there was anything for
me to do there but just for nothing, for happiness, simply as a man will
sit contented in the companionship of the beloved object. For lunch I
had the choice of two places, one Bohemian, the other select, even
aristocratic, where I had still my reserved table in the _petit salon_,
up the white stair