The Old Man at the Bridge by Ernest

:Hemingway

An old man with steel rimmed spectacles and very dusty

clothes sat by the side of the road . There was a
pontoon bridge across the river and carts, trucks, and
men, women and children were crossing it. The muledrawn carts staggered up the steep bank from the
bridge with soldiers helping push against the spokes of
the wheels. The trucks ground up and away heading out
of it all and the peasants plodded along in the ankle
deep dust. But the old man sat there without moving.
.He was too tired to go any farther
It was my business to cross the bridge, explore the
bridgehead beyond and find out to what point the
enemy had advanced. I did this and returned over the
bridge. There were not so many carts now and very few
.people on foot, but the old man was still there
.Where do you come from? I asked him
.From San Carlos, he said, and smiled
That was his native town and so it gave him pleasure to
.mention it and he smiled
I was taking care of animals, he explained. Oh, I
.said, not quite understanding
Yes, he said, I stayed, you see, taking care of
animals. I was the last one to leave the town of San
.Carlos
He did not look like a shepherd nor a herdsman and I
looked at his black dusty clothes and his gray dusty face

and his steel rimmed spectacles and said, What

?animals were they
Various animals, he said, and shook his head. I had
.to leave them
I was watching the bridge and the African looking
country of the Ebro Delta and wondering how long now
it would be before we would see the enemy, and
listening all the while for the first noises that would
signal that ever mysterious event called contact, and
.the old man still sat there
.What animals were they? I asked
There were three animals altogether, he explained.
There were two goats and a cat and then there were
.four pairs of pigeons
.And you had to leave them? I asked
Yes. Because of the artillery. The captain told me to go
.because of the artillery
And you have no family? I asked, watching the far end
of the bridge where a few last carts were hurrying down
.the slope of the bank
No, he said, only the animals I stated. The cat, of
course, will be all right. A cat can look out for itself, but
.I cannot think what will become of the others
.What politics have you? I asked
I am without politics, he said. I am seventy-six years
old. I have come twelve kilometers now and I think now I
can go no further. This is not a good place to stop, I
said. If you can make it, there are trucks up the road
.where it forks for Tortosa

I will wait a while, he said, and then I will go. Where

?do the trucks go
.Towards Barcelona, I told him
I know no one in that direction, he said, but thank
.you very much. Thank you again very much
He looked at me very blankly and tiredly, then said,
having to share his worry with some one, The cat will
be all right, I am sure. There is no need to be unquiet
about the cat. But the others. Now what do you think
?about the others
Why theyll probably come through it all right. You
?think so
Why not, I said, watching the far bank where now
.there were no carts
But what will they do under the artillery when I was
?told to leave because of the artillery
.Did you leave the dove cage unlocked? I asked. Yes
.Then theyll fly
Yes, certainly theyll fly. But the others. Its better not
.to think about the others, he said
If you are rested I would go, I urged. Get up and try
.to walk now
Thank you, he said and got to his feet, swayed from
.side to side and then sat down backwards in the dust
I was taking care of animals, he said dully, but no
.longer to me. I was only taking care of animals

There was nothing to do about him. It was Easter

Sunday and the Fascists were advancing toward the
Ebro. It was a gray overcast day with a low ceiling so
their planes were not up. That and the fact that cats
know how to look after themselves was all the good luck
.that old man would ever have

THE TELL-TALE HEART

by Edgar Allan Poe

1843
TRUE! --nervous --very, very dreadfully nervous I had
been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The
disease had sharpened my senses --not destroyed --not
dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I
heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard
many things in hell. How, then, am I mad? Hearken! and
observe how healthily --how calmly I can tell you the
.whole story

It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my

brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night.
Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved
the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never
given me insult. For his gold I had no desire. I think it
was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture
--a pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell
upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees --very
gradually --I made up my mind to take the life of the old
.man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever

Now this is the point. You fancy me mad. Madmen know

nothing. But you should have seen me. You should have
seen how wisely I proceeded --with what caution --with
what foresight --with what dissimulation I went to work!
I was never kinder to the old man than during the whole
week before I killed him. And every night, about
midnight, I turned the latch of his door and opened it
--oh so gently! And then, when I had made an opening
sufficient for my head, I put in a dark lantern, all closed,
closed, that no light shone out, and then I thrust in my
head. Oh, you would have laughed to see how cunningly
I thrust it in! I moved it slowly --very, very slowly, so
that I might not disturb the old man's sleep. It took me
an hour to place my whole head within the opening so
far that I could see him as he lay upon his bed. Ha!
would a madman have been so wise as this, And then,
when my head was well in the room, I undid the lantern
cautiously-oh, so cautiously --cautiously (for the hinges
creaked) --I undid it just so much that a single thin ray
fell upon the vulture eye. And this I did for seven long
nights --every night just at midnight --but I found the
eye always closed; and so it was impossible to do the
work; for it was not the old man who vexed me, but his
Evil Eye. And every morning, when the day broke, I went
boldly into the chamber, and spoke courageously to him,
calling him by name in a hearty tone, and inquiring how
he has passed the night. So you see he would have been
a very profound old man, indeed, to suspect that every
night, just at twelve, I looked in upon him while he
.slept

Upon the eighth night I was more than usually cautious

in opening the door. A watch's minute hand moves more
quickly than did mine. Never before that night had I felt
the extent of my own powers --of my sagacity. I could
scarcely contain my feelings of triumph. To think that

there I was, opening the door, little by little, and he not

even to dream of my secret deeds or thoughts. I fairly
chuckled at the idea; and perhaps he heard me; for he
moved on the bed suddenly, as if startled. Now you may
think that I drew back --but no. His room was as black as
pitch with the thick darkness, (for the shutters were
close fastened, through fear of robbers,) and so I knew
that he could not see the opening of the door, and I kept
.pushing it on steadily, steadily

I had my head in, and was about to open the lantern,

when my thumb slipped upon the tin fastening, and the
?"old man sprang up in bed, crying out --"Who's there

I kept quite still and said nothing. For a whole hour I did
not move a muscle, and in the meantime I did not hear
him lie down. He was still sitting up in the bed listening;
--just as I have done, night after night, hearkening to
.the death watches in the wall

The Guest
by Albert Camus. Translated by Justin O'Brien
The schoolmaster was watching the two men climb
toward him. One was on horseback, the other on foot.
They had not yet tackled the abrupt rise leading to the
schoolhouse built on the hillside. They were toiling
onward, making slow progress in the snow, among the
stones, on the vast expanse oft he high, deserted
plateau. From time to time the horse stumbled. Without
hearing anything yet, he could see the breath issuing
from the horses nostrils. One of the men, at least, knew

the region. They were following the trail although it had

disappeared days ago under a layer of dirty white snow.
The schoolmaster calculated that it would take them
half an hour to get onto the hill. It was cold; he went
.back into the school to get a sweater
He crossed the empty, frigid classroom. On the
blackboard the four rivers of France, 1 drawn with four
different colored chalks, had been flowing toward their
estuaries for the past three days. Snow had suddenly
fallen in mid-October after eight months of drought
without the transition of rain, and the twenty pupils,
more or less, who lived in the villages scattered over
the plateau had stopped coming. With fair weather they
would return. Daru now heated only the single room
that was lodging, adjoining the classroom and giving
also onto the plateau to the east. Like the class cows,
his window looked to the south too. On that side the
school was a few kilometers from the point where the
plateau began to slope toward the south. In clear
weather could be seen the purple mass of the mountain
.range where the gap opened onto the desert

Somewhat warmed, Daru returned to the window

from which he had first seen the two men. They were no
longer visible. Hence they must have tackled the rise.
The sky was not so dark, for the snow had stopped
falling during the night. The morning had opened with a
dirty light which had scarcely become brighter as the
ceiling of clouds lifted. At two in the after- noon it
seemed as if the day were merely beginning. But still
this was better than those three days when the thick
snow was falling amidst unbroken darkness with little
gusts of wind that rattled the double door of the classroom. Then Daru had spent long hours in his room,
leaving it only to go to the shed and feed the chickens
or get some coal. Fortunately the delivery truck from

Tadjid, the nearest village to the north, had brought his

supplies two days before the blizzard. It would return in
.forty-eight hours

Besides, he had enough to resist a siege, for the

little room was cluttered with bags of wheat that the
administration left as a stock to distribute to those of
his pupils whose families had suffered from the drought.
Actually they had all been victims because they were all
poor. Every day Daru would distribute a ration to the
children. They had missed it, he knew, during these bad
days. Possibly one of the fathers would come this
afternoon and he could supply them with grain. It was
just a matter of carrying them over to the next harvest.
Now shiploads of wheat were arriving from France and
the worst was over. But it would be hard to forget that
poverty, that army of ragged ghosts wandering in the
sunlight, the plateaus burned to a cinder month after
month, the earth shriveled up little by little, literally
scorched, every stone bursting into dust under one's
foot. The sheep had died then by thousands and even a
few men, here and there, sometimes without anyone's
.knowing