The manuscript was put aside for thirty-five years until its present publication on the Web. The way back to Washington Square was strenuous, requiring some dodging and sidestepping. The world was stygian, people pushing cars and cars pushing back, plutonic hirelings hasting to show displeasure at their circumstances. Beneath the streets were locked a quarter of a million people breathing fetid air that they would readily exchange for the exhaust pipes above. In the skyscrapers thousands stood locked in stuck elevators.
Candles cost a half dollar now.
The rising curve of taxicab rates had bottomed out at two hundred percent of the normal, multiplied by five. Thomas peeked into the Istanbul at 30 th Street and, sure enough, Safra, the Belly Dancer, was readying her bumps and grinds. He backed away to let in several clients lately of Penn Station and stepped on a turd. The experience deglamourized the setting, and he wondered whether the Mayor-elect, John Lindsay, had any plans to deal with the growing menace of uncurbed dogs. Since little troubles drive out big ones, he had walked practically to Fourteenth Street and Fifth Avenue before concerning himself with how tragedy might have changed the countenances of higher animals.