d became my wits. The power of concentration deserted me.
Finally, as we were running in, I found that I had forgotten the French
for 'moths.' I'd looked it out the night before: I'd been murmuring it
all day long: and now, at the critical moment, it had deserted me. I
clasped my head in my hands and thought like a madman. Nothing doing.
I thought all round it, of course. I thought of candles and camphor
and dusk. My vocabulary became gigantic, but it did not include the
French equivalent for 'moths.' In desperation I approached my
_vis-a-vis_ and, in broken accents, implored him to tell me 'the French
for the little creatures which you find in your clothes.'...

"I like the French. If I'd asked an Englishman, he'd have pulled the
communication-cord, but this fellow never so much as stared. He just
released a little spurt of good-will and then started in, as if his
future happiness depended on putting me straight. 'But I was meaning
the fleas. Oh, indubitably. Animals most gross. Only last November
he himself....' It took quite a lot of persuasion to get him off
fleas. Then he offered me lice. I managed to make him understand that
the attack was delivered when the clothes were unoccupied. Instantly
he suggested rats. With an effort I explained that the things I meant
were winged. As the train came to a standstill, he handed me
'_chauvesouris_.' Bats! I ask you....

"I stepped on to the platform as if I was descending into my tomb. How
I got to the baggage-room, I'm hanged if I know; but I remember
standing there, shivering and wiping the sweat off my face. Truck by
truck the registered baggage appeared....

"I heard my case coming for about a quarter of a mile.

"The architecture of the baggage-room at the _Gare du Nord_ may be
crude, but its acoustic properties are superb. The noise which
accompanied the arrival of the cortege was simply ear-splitting. I was
in the very act of wondering whether, if I decided to retire, my legs
would carry me, when, with a crash, my uniform-case was slammed on to
the counter three paces away....

"A cloud of pepper arose from it, and in an instant all was confusion.
Passengers and porters in the vicinity dropped everything and made a
rush for the doors. A Customs official, who was plumbing the depths of
a basket-trunk, turned innocently enough to see the case smoking at his
elbow, dropped his cigar into some blouses, let out the screech of a
maniac and thr