He did not say anything and listened to the weight of the surf falling on the hard wet sand in the night.
The next morning there was still heavy surf and the rain came in gusts. They could not see the Spanish coast and when it cleared between the driven squalls of rain and they could see across the angry sea in the bay there were heavy clouds that came down to the base of the mountains. Catherine had gone out in a raincoat after breakfast and had left him to work in the room. It had gone so simply and easily that he thought it was probably worthless. Be careful, he said to himself, it is all very well for you to write simply and the simpler the better. But do not start to think so damned simply. Know how complicated it is and then state it simply. Do you suppose the Grau du Roi time was all simple because you could write a little of it simply?
He went on writing in pencil in the cheap, lined, school notebook that was called a cahier and already numbered one in roman numeral. He stopped finally and put the notebook in a suitcase with a cardboard box of pencils and the cone-shaped sharpener, leaving the five pencils he had dulled to point up for the next day, and took his raincoat from the hanger in the closet and walked down the stairs to the lobby of the hotel. He looked into the hotel bar which was gloomy and pleasant in the rain and already had some customers and left his key at the desk. The assistant concierge reached into the mailbox as he hung up the key and said, “Madame left this for Monsieur.”
He opened the note which said, David, didn’t want to disturb you am at the cafe love Catherine. He put on the old trench coat, found a boina in the pocket and walked out of the hotel into the rain.
She was at a corner table in the small cafe and before her was a clouded yellow-tinged drink and a plate with one small dark red freshwater crayfish and the debris of others. She was very far ahead of him. “Where have you been, stranger?”
“Just down the road a piece.” He noticed that her face was rain-washed and he concentrated on what rain did to heavily tanned skin. She looked very nice too in spite of it and he was happy to see her this way.
‘Did you get going?” the girl asked.
“Good enough.”
“You worked then. That’s fine.”
The waiter had been serving three Spaniards who were sitting at a table next to the door. He came over now holding a glass and an ordinary Pernod bottle and a small narrow-lipped pitcher of water. There were lumps of ice in the water. “Pour Monsieur aussi?” he asked.
“Yes,” the young man said. “Please.”
The waiter poured their high glasses half full of the off-yellow liquid and started to pour the water slowly into the girl’s glass. But the young man said, “I’ll do it,” and the waiter took the bottle away. He seemed relieved to be taking it away and the young man poured the water in a very thin stream and the girl watched the absinthe cloud opalescently. It felt warm as her fingers held the glass and then as it lost the yellow cast and
began to look milky it cooled sharply and the young man let the water fall in a drop at a time.
“‘Why does it have to go in so slowly?” the girl asked.
“It breaks up and goes to pieces if the water pours in too fast,” he explained. “Then it’s flat and worthless. There ought to be a glass on top with ice and just a little hole for the water to drip. But everybody would know what it was then.”
“I had to drink up fast before because two G.N. ‘s were in, the girl said.
“Whatyoumacallits nationals. In khaki with bicycles and black leather pistol holsters. I had to engulp the evidence.”
“Engulp?”
“Sorry. Once I engulped it I can’t say it.”
“You want to be careful about absinthe.”