V. by Thomas Pynchon Page A

stood watching him. The square was empty except for Mohammed Ali and the horse.
    (How many times had they stood this way: dwarfed horizontal and vertical by any plaza or late-afternoon? Could an argument from design be predicated on that instant only, then the two must have been displaceable, like minor chess pieces, anywhere across Europe's board. Both of a color though one hanging back diagonal in deference to his partner, both scanning any embassy's parquetry for signs of some dimly sensed opposition - lover, meal-ticket, object of political assassination - any statue's face for a reassurance of self-agency and perhaps, unhappily, self-humanity; might they be trying not to remember that each square in Europe, however you cut it, remains inanimate after all?)
    They turned about formally and parted in opposite directions, Fat back toward the Hotel Khedival, Tweed into rue de Ras-et-Tin and the Turkish quarter.
    Bonne chance, Aieul thought. Whatever it is tonight, bonne chance. Because I will see neither of you again, that's the least I can wish. He fell asleep at last against the wall, made drowsy by the rain, to dream of one Maryam and tonight, and the Arab quarter ....
    Low places in the square filled, the usual random sets of criss-crossing concentric circles moved across them. Near eight o'clock, the rain slackened off.
     
    II
    Yusef the factotum, temporarily on loan from Hotel Khedival, dashed through the failing rain, across the street to the Austrian Consulate; darting in by the servants' entrance.
    "Late!" shouted Meknes, leader of the kitchen force. "And so, spawn of a homosexual camel: the punch table for you."
    Not a bad assignment, Yusef thought as he put on the white jacket and combed his mustaches. From the punch table on the mezzanine one could see the whole show: down the decolletages of the prettier women (Italian breasts were the finest - ah!), over all that resplendent muster of stars, ribbons and exotic Orders.
    Soon, from his vantage, Yusef could allow the first sneer of many this evening to ripple across a knowledgeable mouth. Let them make holiday while they could. Soon enough the fine clothes would be rags and the elegant woodwork crusted with blood. Yusef was an anarchist.
    Anarchist and no one's fool. He kept abreast of current events, always on lookout for any news favorable to even minor chaos. Tonight the political situation was hopeful: Sirdar Kitchener, England's newest colonial hero, recently victorious at Khartoum, was just now some 400 miles further down the White Nile, foraging about in the jungle; a General Marchand was also rumored in the vicinity. Britain wanted no part of France in the Nile Valley. M. Delcasse, Foreign Minister of a newly-formed French cabinet, would as soon go to war as not if there were any trouble when the two detachments met. As meet, everyone realized by now, they would. Russia would support France, while England had a temporary rapprochement with Germany - meaning Italy and Austria as well.
    Bung ho, the English said. Up goes the balloon. Yusef, believing that an anarchist or devotee of annihilation must have some childhood memory to be nostalgic about by way of balance, loved balloons. Most nights at dreams' verge he could revolve like the moon about any gaily-dyed pig's intestine, distended with his own warm breath.
    But from the corner of his eye now: miracle. How, if one believed in nothing, could one account . . .
    A balloon-girl. A balloon-girl. Hardly seeming to touch the waxed mirror beneath. Holding her empty cup out to Yusef. Mesikum bilkher, good evening; are there any other cavities you wish filled, my English lady. Perhaps he would spare children like this. Would he? If it should come to a morning, any morning when all the muezzins were silent, the pigeons gone to bide among the catacombs, could he rise robeless in Nothing's dawn and do what he must? By conscience, must?
    "Oh," she smiled: "Oh thank you. Leltak leben." May thy night be white as