The Bachelors by Henri de Montherlant

do I know? You're the one who's got the papers, if there are any.'
    There was a long pause. One might have assumed that M. de Coantré was carefully weighing the pros and cons. In fact he was thinking of nothing — literally nothing. His eyelids were beginning to droop, as though what he really wanted to do was to drop off to sleep.
    'Look here,' said Lebeau, 'we're all wasting our time.' (Complacently he flicked the ash from his cigarette.) 'If M. de Coantré values his peace of mind above everything else, he had better pay up. Otherwise, we should probably have to ask him to see Defraisse . . .'
    The cruel politeness of 'We're all wasting our time' made M. de Coantré writhe. Could there possibly be a more courteous way of saying, 'You're wasting my time?'
    'All right, let's pay him, and get it over with,' he said.
    'Very well,' said the chief clerk heartily. 'But don't say I forced your hand. I'm still quite prepared to see Defraisse and argue with him, provided you help me, of course . . .'
    'No, no,' said M. de Coantré. 'Sell as many of the shares as you need to, and let's hear no more about it.'
    They chatted a bit longer and then, 'having said all there was to be said,' M. de Coantré got up to go. It was only then that he realized that Lebeau had left the room — without saying goodbye to him.
    Scarcely had M. de Coantré gone before Bourdillon was running after him with a half-mocking, half-pitying smile and handing him his bundle of papers, which he had forgotten. Every time he left the lawyer's office he forgot something.
    Once outside, he began to walk aimlessly. He felt so disgruntled that he stopped at the first tobacconist's to buy a packet of cigarettes. Six months before, when he realized his new financial position, he had given up smoking to save money. But now his will-power was crumbling. On the most favourable assumption, if no more creditors turned up, he would have two thousand francs left! 'But after all,' he thought, 'there's still time to tell him to contest it. I'll have a look through my papers. In any case, even if I have to pay, there's always Uncle Octave.' He noticed that involuntarily — as a horse whose rider has fallen asleep automatically takes the accustomed route — his steps had led him to the boulevard Haussmann. He went upstairs without taking the lift, for he was afraid of such machines (similarly, without either of them having mentioned it, M. Élie never took the lift).
    M. Octave was out. Léon pretended to look for a visiting card in his wallet (for twenty years he had had none) and exclaimed 'I've just given the last one away!' having forgotten, as Papon, who eyed him in silence, had not, that he had already been through this little act twice before in Uncle Octave's hall. Then, on a slip of paper which he afterwards put in an envelope, he wrote 'My dear uncle, a new creditor has turned up at Lebeau's: five thousand francs. Once this is paid (and a thousand francs saved elsewhere), I shall have two thousand left. No comment. I shall, if I may, call on you tomorrow at five. Your affectionate Léon.' When he saw himself signing 'Léon' on a note to M. Octave, he had the impression that he was on a footing of great intimacy with his uncle, and that his uncle wished him well. He put 'your affectionate' because it was a formula used by the Duc d,Orléans.
    He did not get back to the boulevard Arago until eight o'clock, having a genius for taking three or four hours, so fantastic were the means of transport he adopted, on a journey which a messenger boy (not by nature in a hurry) would have done in one. M. Élie had started dinner without him. He went straight upstairs to change, partly to spare his 'best' clothes but also because he always felt slightly uncomfortable in them. And when he saw these clothes laid out on the bed, he remembered all the trouble he had had earlier in the day, brushing them, finding a clean shirt, cleaning his boots, shaving, etc., and the pill he had