The train leaves in three-quarters of an hour.
I count my money to pass the time.
Twelve hundred francs a month isn't enormous. But if I hold myself back a little it should be
enough. A room for 300 francs, 15 francs a day for food: that leaves 450 francs for petty cash,
laundry, and movies. I won't need underwear or clothes for a long while. Both my suits are clean, even
though they shine at the elbows a little: they'll last me three or four years if I take care of them.
Good God! Is it I who is going to lead this mushroom existence? What will I do all day long? I'll
take walks. I'll sit on a folding chair in the Tuileries—or rather on a bench, out of economy. I'll read in
the libraries. And then what? A movie once a week. And then what? Can I smoke a Voltigeur on
Sunday? Shall I play croquet with the retired old men in the Luxembourg? Thirty years old! I pity
myself. There are times when I wonder if it wouldn't be better to spend all my 300,000 francs in one
year—and after that . . . But what good would that do me? New clothes? Women? Travel? I've had all
that and now it's over, I don't feel like it any more: for what I'd get out of it! A year from now I'd find
myself as empty as I am today, without even a memory, and a coward facing death.
Thirty years! And 14,400 francs in the bank. Coupons to cash every month. Yet I'm not an old
man! Let them give me something to do, no matter what ... I'd better think about something else,
because I'm playing a comedy now. I know very well that I don't want to do anything: to do something
is to create existence—and there's quite enough existence as it is.