MS-WU-MSS008-3-50-2

[4722] friends call a trench-coat, and I could smell the rubber, though trench-
-coats are not rubberized as a rule. [4723] So I avoided as far as possible
having recourse to proper shelters, made of boughs, preferring the shelter
of my faithful umbrella, or of a tree, or of a hedge, or of a bush, or
of a ruin.

[4724] The thought of taking to the road, to try and get a lift, never
crossed my mind.

[4725] The thought of turning for help to the villages, to the peasants,
would have displeased me, if it had occurred to me.

[4726] I reached home with my fifteen shillings intact. [4727] No, I spent two.
[4728] This is how.

[4729] I had to suffer other molestations than this, other offences, but
I shall not record them. [4730] Let us be content with paradigms. [4731] I may have
to suffer others [per] in the future. This is not certain. But they will
never be known. This is certain.

[4732] It was evening. [4733] I was waiting quietly, under my umbrella, for the
weather to clear, when I was brutally accosted from behind. [4734] I had heard
nothing. [4735] I had been in a place where I was all alone. [4736] A hand turned me
about. [4737] It was a big ruddy farmer. [4738] He was wearing an oilskin, a bowler
hat and wellingtons. [4739] His chubby cheeks were streaming, the water was
dripping from his bushy moustache. [4740] But why describe him. [4741] We glared at
each other with hatred.

[4742] Perhaps he was the same who had so politely
offered to drive us home in his car. [4743] I think not. [4744] And yet his face was
familiar. [4745] Not only his face. [4746] He held a lantern in his hand. [4747] It was not
lit. [4748] But he might light it at any moment. [4749] In the other he held a spade.
[4750] To bury me with if necessary. [4751] He seized me by the jacket, by the lapel.
[4752] He had not yet begun to shake me exactly, he would shake me in his own
good time, not before.[4753] He merely cursed me. [4754] I wondered what I could have