:24:04
Later he strangled himself with it.
:24:08
Well, I sure turned
into an interesting driveway.
:24:11
You did, sir. Goodnight, sir.
:24:20
I pegged him as slightly cuckoo, too.
:24:24
A stroke maybe.
:24:26
The whole place seemed stricken
with a creeping paralysis,
:24:32
out of beat with the rest of the world,
crumbling apart in slow motion.
:24:38
There was a tennis court,
or rather the ghost of a tennis court,
:24:43
with faded markings
and a sagging net.
:24:50
And, of course, she had a pool.
Who didn't then?
:24:55
Mabel Normand and John Gilbert
swam in it 10,000 midnights ago.
:25:00
And Vilma Banky
and Rod La Rocque.
:25:04
It was empty now. Or was it?
:25:14
There was something else going on:
The last rites for that hairy old chimp,
:25:21
performed
with the utmost seriousness,
:25:24
as if she were laying to rest
an only child.
:25:29
Was her life really as empty as that?
:25:41
It was all very queer,
but queerer things were yet to come.
:25:54
That night I had a mixed-up dream.
In it there was an organ grinder.