They're just sheep."
For the first time in so long that he could scarcely remember, Anthony
felt a touch of the old pleasant contempt for his friend. Richard
Caramel continued:
"My publishers, you know, have been advertising me as the Thackeray of
America--because of my New York novel."
"Yes," Anthony managed to muster, "I suppose there's a good deal in what
you say."
He knew that his contempt was unreasonable. He, knew that he would have
changed places with Dick unhesitatingly. He himself had tried his best
to write with his tongue in his cheek. Ah, well, then--can a man
disparage his life-work so readily? ...
--And that night while Richard Caramel was hard at toil, with great
hittings of the wrong keys and screwings up of his weary, unmatched
eyes, laboring over his trash far into those cheerless hours when the
fire dies down, and the head is swimming from the effect of prolonged
concentration--Anthony, abominably drunk, was sprawled across the back
seat of a taxi on his way to the flat on Claremont Avenue.
THE BEATING
As winter approached it seemed that a sort of madness seized upon
Anthony. He awoke in the morning so nervous that Gloria could feel him
trembling in the bed before he could muster enough vitality to stumble
into the pantry for a drink.
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