We're hours before lunchtime. Two blocks down, El Morito's owner does the same, and the twins of La Tacita de Oro, and the owner of Jerusalem Falafel and of Petit Beurre and the Greeks from Happy Burger and the Hungarian Pastryshop, and Rahman from Bangladesh, all are out on this bright June morning sweeping their sidewalk as night-time clients leave home for work. The echo of a slap, the woman staggers dropping her hip-flask, he manages a kick and another till they pull him away. The scene clears. Late, late at night, when Broadway's been swept and the bars are closed, and dawn's any minute now, suddenly, a strumming of chords, a chorus in Latin on an island on Broadway, gentle male tenors, one or two guitars, heedless of time, drunk, vagrant, mirthless merry-making, people gather to hear Haitian and Dominican patch up ancient quarrels in song.
People sweat and are restless.
Much later, Izaak reverts to the Ninth. Dein ist, was du gesehnt, dein was du geliebt. Unspeakanese, you tipped him kindly. He teaches at Bard College.