His noggin end was a tower of screeching bats, as of some haunted West Country moor; his stomach was a failing metropolis; his vision was blurred and flickering. He stumbled and groaned and bounced from the walls. He found his boots if only by the touch and wept his way into them. He staggered to the pisspot and aimed for it out of some remnant delicacy. He relieved himself fully to the roar of oceanic applause. He stood gormlessly then with drained apparatus to hand and tasted the sourness of his life—a melancholic, slave to the infinite sadness, he wondered if he might get through the day
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