ERNEST HEMINGWAY - Premium Edition. Ernest Hemingway

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      “Bill,” Edna looked at me. “Please don’t go in again, Bill. They’re so stupid.”

      “That’s it,” said Mike. “They’re stupid. I knew that was what it was.”

      “They can’t say things like that about Mike,” Bill said.

      “Do you know them?” I asked Mike.

      “No. I never saw them. They say they know me.”

      “I won’t stand it,” Bill said.

      “Come on. Let’s go over to the Suizo,” I said.

      “They’re a bunch of Edna’s friends from Biarritz,” Bill said.

      “They’re simply stupid,” Edna said.

      “One of them’s Charley Blackman, from Chicago,” Bill said.

      “I was never in Chicago,” Mike said.

      Edna started to laugh and could not stop.

      “Take me away from here,” she said, “you bankrupts.”

      “What kind of a row was it?” I asked Edna. We were walking across the square to the Suizo. Bill was gone.

      “I don’t know what happened, but some one had the police called to keep Mike out of the back room. There were some people that had known Mike at Cannes. What’s the matter with Mike?”

      “Probably he owes them money” I said. “That’s what people usually get bitter about.”

      In front of the ticket-booths out in the square there were two lines of people waiting. They were sitting on chairs or crouched on the ground with blankets and newspapers around them. They were waiting for the wickets to open in the morning to buy tickets for the bull-fight. The night was clearing and the moon was out. Some of the people in the line were sleeping.

      At the Café Suizo we had just sat down and ordered Fundador when Robert Cohn came up.

      “Where’s Brett?” he asked.

      “I don’t know.”

      “She was with you.”

      “She must have gone to bed.”

      “She’s not.”

      “I don’t know where she is.”

      His face was sallow under the light. He was standing up.

      “Tell me where she is.”

      “Sit down,” I said. “I don’t know where she is.”

      “The hell you don’t!”

      “You can shut your face.”

      “Tell me where Brett is.”

      “I’ll not tell you a damn thing.”

      “You know where she is.”

      “If I did I wouldn’t tell you.”

      “Oh, go to hell, Cohn,” Mike called from the table. “Brett’s gone off with the bull-fighter chap. They’re on their honeymoon.”

      “You shut up.”

      “Oh, go to hell!” Mike said languidly.

      “Is that where she is?” Cohn turned to me.

      “Go to hell!”

      “She was with you. Is that where she is?”

      “Go to hell!”

      “I’ll make you tell me”—he stepped forward—“you damned pimp.”

      I swung at him and he ducked. I saw his face duck sideways in the light. He hit me and I sat down on the pavement. As I started to get on my feet he hit me twice. I went down backward under a table. I tried to get up and felt I did not have any legs. I felt I must get on my feet and try and hit him. Mike helped me up. Some one poured a carafe of water on my head. Mike had an arm around me, and I found I was sitting on a chair. Mike was pulling at my ears.

      “I say, you were cold,” Mike said.

      “Where the hell were you?”

      “Oh, I was around.”

      “You didn’t want to mix in it?”

      “He knocked Mike down, too,” Edna said.

      “He didn’t knock me out,” Mike said. “I just lay there.”

      “Does this happen every night at your fiestas?” Edna asked. “Wasn’t that Mr. Cohn?”

      “I’m all right,” I said. “My head’s a little wobbly.”

      There were several waiters and a crowd of people standing around.

      “Vaya!” said Mike. “Get away. Go on.”

      The waiters moved the people away.

      “It was quite a thing to watch,” Edna said. “He must be a boxer.”

      “He is.”

      “I wish Bill had been here,” Edna said. “I’d like to have seen Bill knocked down, too. I’ve always wanted to see Bill knocked down. He’s so big.”

      “I was hoping he would knock down a waiter,” Mike said, “and get arrested. I’d like to see Mr. Robert Cohn in jail.”

      “No,” I said.

      “Oh, no,” said Edna. “You don’t mean that.”

      “I do, though,” Mike said. “I’m not one of these chaps likes being knocked about. I never play games, even.”

      Mike took a drink.

      “I never liked to hunt, you know. There was always the danger of having a horse fall on you. How do you feel, Jake?”

      “All right.”

      “You’re nice,” Edna said to Mike. “Are you really a bankrupt?”

      “I’m a tremendous bankrupt,” Mike said. “I owe money to everybody. Don’t you owe any money?”

      “Tons.”

      “I owe everybody money,” Mike said. “I borrowed a hundred pesetas from Montoya to-night.”

      “The hell you did,” I said.

      “I’ll pay it back,” Mike said. “I always pay everything back.”

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