Eugene answered with growing passion. “There is a place where all things happen! But not here, Ben!”
My gods, with bird-cries in the sun, hang in the sky.
“Not here, Ben! It is not right!” Eugene said again.
The manifold gods of Babylon. Then, for a moment, Eugene stared at the dark figure on the rail, muttering in protest and disbelief: “Ghost! Ghost!”
“Fool,” said Ben again, “I tell you I am not a ghost.”
“Then, what are you?” said Eugene with strong excitement. “You are dead, Ben.”
In a moment, more quietly, he added: “Or do men die?”
“How should I know,” said Ben.
“They say papa is dying. Did you know that, Ben?” Eugene asked.
“Yes,” said Ben.
“They have bought his shop. They are going to tear it down and put up a skyscraper here.”
“Yes,” said Ben, “I know it.”
We shall not come again. We never shall come back again.
“Everything is going. Everything changes and passes away. To-morrow I shall be gone and this—” he stopped.
“This—what?” said Ben.
“This will be gone or—O God! Did all this happen?” cried Eugene.
“How should I know, fool?” cried Ben angrily.
“What happens, Ben? What really happens?” said Eugene. “Can you remember some of the same things that I do? I have forgotten the old faces. Where are they, Ben? What were their names? I forget the names of people I knew for years. I get their faces mixed. I get their heads stuck on other people’s bodies. I think one man has said what another said. And I forget—forget. There is something I have lost and have forgotten. I can’t remember, Ben.”
“What do you want to remember?” said Ben.
A stone, a leaf, an unfound door. And the forgotten faces.
“I have forgotten names. I have forgotten faces. And I remember little things,” said Eugene. “I remember the fly I swallowed on the peach, and the little boys on tricycles at Saint Louis,
