Once outside I began to tremble like a _peuplier_ in _l'automne_....
"_L'automne humide et monotone._"
--"_Allez en bas, pour la soupe_" the Wooden Hand said not unkindly. I
looked about me. "There will be no more men before the commission until
to-morrow," the Wooden Hand said. "Go get your dinner in the kitchen."
I descended.
Afrique was all curiosity--what did they say? what did I say?--as he
placed before me a huge, a perfectly huge, an inexcusably huge plate of
something more than lukewarm grease.... B. and I ate at a very little
table in _la cuisine_, excitedly comparing notes as we swallowed the
red-hot stuff.... "_Du pain; prenez, mes amis_," Afrique said. "_Mangez
comme vous voulez_" the Cook quoth benignantly, with a glance at us over
his placid shoulder.... Eat we most surely did. We could have eaten the
French Government.
The morning of the following day we went on promenade once more. It was
neither pleasant nor unpleasant to promenade in the _cour_ while somebody
else was suffering in the Room of Sorrow. It was, in fact, rather
thrilling.
The afternoon of this day we were all up in The Enormous Room when _la
commission_ suddenly entered with Apollyon strutting and lisping behind
it, explaining, and poo-poohing, and graciously waving his thick wicked
arms.
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