Ripley Under Ground (Ripley, #2)

by Patricia Highsmith

The Underground was a part of the atmosphere of London life, and Tom also was an admirer of Underground graffiti.

What Tom admired about London graffiti-writers was their ability to scrawl things from moving escalators.

Underwear posters abounded on the escalator routes, nothing but girls in girdles and panties, and they were adorned by anatomical additions male and female, sometimes whole phrases: I LOVE BEING HERMAPHRODITE! How did they do it? By running in an opposite direction from the escalator’s while writing? WOGS OUT! was a favorite everywhere, varied by WOGS OUT NOW! Down on the train platform, Tom spotted a poster for the Zeffirelli Romeo and Juliet with Romeo naked on his back and Juliet crawling over him with a shocking proposal coming out of her mouth. Romeo’s reply in a balloon was “Okay, why don’t you?”

Tom worked for an hour or so in the garden, then read a bit in Les Armes Secrètes by Julio Cortazar.

Tom did not look back at the house, because he believed one person’s eye attracted the eye of another.

“The other night,” Tom said, “I tried to compose a limerick. “There once was a match by computer. A nought was wed to a neuter. Said the neuter to nought, ‘I’m not what I ought, But our offspring will be even mooter.’

“Pink adhesive tape,” Tom said, “is a sign of racial discrimination. Black Power in the States ought to get onto that—and stop it.”