Fiction | May 07, 2016

Scrambling under the bar in search of his upper left molar, dislodged and sprung with this latest punch, his nosebleed now mingling with the beer-slops, Arnaud has a vision: a bronze statue of Athena flies in above the audience, an enormous silver-breasted goddess with slat-framed wings, guided in her holy trajectory over the stage by the remote-control brain of the new computer at the Comédie Française.

This is what he’s been waiting for before departing. So much for all the paralytic nights at the drawing board, the months of false starts and hesitations. This new idea is so perfect he could even take the night train to Paris and present it to the board of directors over morning coffee. If only he could lay his hands on this tooth, whacked out by one of these muscular seasonal workers and hidden somewhere under Meynier the barman’s feet.

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