Chapter 42 Section Eleven

The last scene is in the porch.Hagen couldn't find the cane he had come with (it had actually fallen behind a pipe in the bathroom). "I may have left my purse where I was sitting," said Mrs. Thayer, pushing her brooding husband as gently as possible toward the living room. Pnin and Clements, like two well-fed door gods, were standing on both sides of the living room door, exchanging the last few words. walk into.In the middle of the room, Professor Thomas and Miss Bliss—he with his hands behind his back, standing on his heels now and then, and her, with a tray in her hand—stand discussing Cuba, which, as far as Betty knew, she My fiancé had a cousin who lived there for a long time.Thayer stumbled from one chair to another, and found a white handbag out of nowhere, because his mind was busy formulating the words he was going to write in his diary that night:

We sat and drank there, each with his own past locked in his heart; and the alarm clock of fate was set for the unknown future - at this moment, a wrist was finally raised, and the eyes of the spouses met... Meanwhile Pnin asked Joan Clements and Margaret Thayer if they would come upstairs and see how he had furnished the room.The idea piqued their interest.So he led the way.His so-called studio now looks very comfortable, with its scrawled floor covered with a more or less Pakistani rug originally bought for his school office and recently Without a word he withdrew from under the startled Faternfors.A plaid blanket that Pnin had covered when he left Europe and crossed the Atlantic in 1940, and some cushions of a particular style adorned the immovable bed.Several pink bookshelves, on which he found that there had been generations of children's books—beginning with Horatio Algier Jr.'s "Tom the Shoeshine, or the Road to Success" in 1889, through a series of Ernest Thompson Seton's Rolf in the Woods in 1911, through to the 1928 edition of the ten-volume Condon Illustrated Encyclopedia with small blurred photographs— Now he had taken them all down and replaced them with three hundred and sixty-five books which he had borrowed from the Wendale College library.

"Think about these books are all stamped by me." Mrs. Thayer sighed and rolled her eyes, pretending to be surprised. "There are also some chapters stamped by Mrs. Miller." said Pnin, who is meticulous about historical facts. The most impressive thing about the bedroom is a large folding screen, which blocks the bed with four tents and protects it from the unavoidable wind. The view: Fifty feet away, a black stone wall rises suddenly, with a dark starry sky above the black grass and trees on the top.Laurence wandered alone on the back lawn, passing through the reflection of a window into the gloom.

"You're really having a good time after all," Joan said. "You know what I'm going to tell you," replied Pnin, triumphantly, in a low voice. "Tomorrow morning, under the curtain of the god rice (secret), I will meet a gentleman who is going to help me buy this house!" They come downstairs.Roy mishanded Betty's small handbag to his wife.Heilmann found his cane.Marguerite's small handbag was found.Lawrence reappears. "Good-bye, good-bye, Professor Wen!" cried Pnin, his face red and round in the porch light. (In the foyer, Betty and Margaret were still admiring Dr. Hagen's knobbly cane, recently received from Germany, with a donkey's head carved on the top. One of the donkey's ears would still be Shaking. This cane originally belonged to Hagen's grandfather who was born in Bavaria, a country pastor. According to a note left by the pastor, the mechanism of the other ear was broken in 1914 Hagen said he took the cane for some Alsatian dog on Green Ping Street. American dogs aren't used to people on the street. He's always preferred walking to driving himself. That ear can't be repaired. Well, at least in Wendale there is nothing to be done.)

"I don't understand now why he called me that," T.V. Thomas, an anthropology professor, told the Clements as they walked together through the melancholy darkness toward four cars parked under the elms across the road. The car goes. "Our friend," replied Clements, "has his own way of naming things. His mouth is infinitely varied, adding to the joy of life. His mispronunciation is as wonderful as a myth. He even It's a slip of the tongue, too, and it's abstruse. He calls his wife John." "But I still feel a little awkward," Thomas said. "He probably mistook you for someone else," Clements said. "As far as I know, you could really be the other guy."

Dr. Hagen caught up before they could cross the road.Thomas, still looking puzzled, said his goodbyes and left. "Well, bye," said Hagen. This is a beautiful autumn night, the earth is like velvet, and the sky is like steel. Joan asked: "You really don't want to take our car, let us take you there?" "It's only a ten-minute walk. It's such a wonderful night that one really wants to take a stroll." The three stood there, gazing at the stars for a while. "These are all worlds," Hagen said. "Otherwise," Clements said, yawning, "it might be a horrible mess. I suspect the universe was originally a fluorescent corpse, and we were in it."

From the lighted porch came Pnin's hearty laugh, having just finished telling the Thayers and Betty Bliss that he once retrieved someone else's netting bag, too. "Come on, my fluorescent corpse, let's go," Joan said. "It's good to see you tonight, Hellman. Give Imjad my regards. It's a good party tonight. I've never seen Timofey so happy." "Yes, thank you," Hagen replied absently. "You didn't see the look on his face," said Joan. "He told me he was going to talk to a real estate agent tomorrow about buying this dream house."

"Did he say it? Are you sure he said it?" asked Hagen sharply. "Quite sure," said Joan. "And if there's anyone who needs a house most, it's Timurphy, of course." "Well, good night," said Hagen. "Glad you're here. Good night." He waited until they got into the car, hesitated, and walked back toward the lighted porch, where Pnin was shaking hands with the Thayers and Betty a second or third time as if on a stage. ("I will never," Joan said, turning the steering wheel back, "never let my kid go abroad with that old gay woman." "Be careful," said Lawrence, " He's probably drunk, but his ears are sharp.")

"I can never forgive you," Betty said to her cheery master, "for not letting me scrub the dick for you." "I'll wash him," said Hagen, tapping the steps with his cane as he came up. "Children, let's go." After one final handshake, the Thayers and Betty departed.