Get Going, Guys

Rain drips from dark clouds. The oyster picnic is over.

We must push on, says Gaius. Back to Saint Malo.

In the rain! says Belle. Can't it wait until morning?

Early train, says Gaius. Right, Arthur?

Right, says Arthur. Except I haven't...

Booked it, says Belle. So we're seat hopping?

Allow me, says Sartre. I have a special free train pass. It allows me to make group bookings.

How did you get that? asks François-René.

I was given it, says Sartre.

Who by? asks François-René. (He suspects the French government).

The French government, says Sartre. For services to French literature. I see you look jealous.

Not at all, says François-René.

Of course he's not jealous.

The Scarabée has stopped cursing.

If I was a beetroot, what? says the Scarabée. I don't know. What's the answer?

Cannot but BEETLE, says Terence. Ha ha!

No, says Baldy. That's not right. Cannot but BEETROOT.

Cannot but BE A BEETROOT, says Terence, remembering.

How does that work? asks the Scarabée.

He has much to learn about Terence.

Let's get going, guys, says Sweezus.

I don't have a bike, says Arthur.

It's true, he doesn't. He walked to Cancale with François-René, and borrowed Belle's bike for the last few kilometres, when Saint Roley went missing.

However...

If free train tickets can be fortuitously produced by the French government, a bicycle can be fortuitously borrowed from....

Jeanne Jugan.

Here she comes now, on her rattly, webby old bicycle, black clothes flapping, to return Sartre's hat.

She is only too happy to lend Arthur her bicycle.

But Sartre does not like the look of his hat.

It was not in that condition when it left my possession, says Sartre.

It was when I got it, says Jeanne Jugan.

Sartre has often thought about the indifference of objects, and how they are resistant to whatever significance human consciousness might perceive in them.

He makes an effort to think it again.