Two squires stood guard over them, as if at my command (true, no such order had even occurred to me), and I went back to the courtyard. When the gate had once again shut behind me, I hesitated in my response as to whether I would actually go find a wagon or not. That is, I really had gone there for a wagon, already knowing beyond any doubt, however, that I would find neither a wagon, nor the squires, nor the crowd. And, in fact, the courtyard was empty; all that remained were the campfires, smoldering away somehow, as if they ran on the coming dawn. And face-to-face with a prediction so magnificently affirmed, I was forced to search my conscience, knowing that I would have to answer the question of whether I had somehow deliberately deluded myself into going for the wagon, knowing it would not be there. — The courtyard was deserted, but again there was the ineradicable sense of human-ness, nearby and all-embracing, just as when we were driving into Saint-Cloud. I turned back toward the watery landscape, accepting as quite natural that there was no aquatic landscape, nor Fuld, nor Giggles, nor soldiers in armor; in short, that I was walking through a so-called living dream, a quite truthful reality, and thus, as they say, a zone of truth, where there is nothing with which to deceive oneself, that what this is here is an entrance to the Métro, which I, descending the staircase, in fact also quickly recognized by its red lights.
So I was descending the staircase, and I was feeling so embarrassed about the answer as to whether I was still shuffling along the zone of truth, or else had already popped out of it, that I decided to establish what was what, come what may. I paid for my ticket with money that would require the cashier to give me change. I determined not to pick it up. If the cashier alerts me to it, that will be proof that I’m awake; if she doesn’t call after me, I’ll know that I’m dreaming. I conducted the experiment, even if I was aware that it was actually a sham: I knew in advance that the cashier could not not call for me, for such is the custom. And she actually did. And because I made like I hadn’t heard, she went so far as to send an assistant after me. An inspiration passed through me, that the constant confirmation of my prediction simply means there’s no point looking for safety. For where there is only an inch of room for doubt — perhaps in the associative hint of a slight dry spot in an aquatic landscape — certainty is merely a word. . and who knows. — The train arrived, I got on, the train moved on.
He boarded at La Trinité. My first sense was vexation at not having foreseen it. But was this really my only cause for regret? How was I to regret not having foreseen something — that is to say, his boarding at La Trinité—that had so convincing an air of originality? His boarding did not arouse memories of some event in the past. If I foresaw it — despite the fact that things that are being prepared will be a faithful analogy of what has occurred in some “back then”—I foresaw it in no way through some concrete experience, but rather only the way we sort of foresee the da capo in a minuet.