... I can't tell you how lovely it seemed. I simply
drank it in.... I remembered when I was a child, one night near La
Samaritaine. There were fireworks on the river. That child seemed to
be someone else, who made me laugh, and yet I was sorry for him; and
then I thought that it was a good thing to be alive, and grow up, and
have something, somebody, no matter who to love ... even that rocket;
and then the pain came on, and I began to howl, and didn't know any
more till I found myself in the ambulance. There wasn't much fun in
living then; it felt as if a dog was gnawing my bones ... might as
well have stayed at the bottom of the hole ... but even then how fine
it seemed to live the way I used to, just live on every day without
pain ... think of that! and we never notice it,--without any pain at
all ... none!... it seemed like a dream, and when it did let up for a
second, just to taste the air on your tongue, and feel light all over
your body--God Almighty! to think that it was like that all the time
before, and I thought nothing of it.... What fools we are to wait till
we lose a thing before we understand it! And when we do want it, and
ask pardon because we did not appreciate it before, all we hear is:
'Too late!'"
"It is never too late," said Clerambault.
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