Chapter Forty-Four
When the two doctors returned to the room where they had left The Mole with an orderly, he was sitting at the table, writing. His eyes were closed, his left arm lay in a wide arc around the grey notebook. His jaw was slack, his right hand moved the pencil with unrivalled speed.
Ferrand looked at The Mole and addressed the male nurse. “Stay with him as long as he writes and when he stops, tell me.” He went to the door and waved Denis out of the room. In his office, he sat behind his desk. Denis noticed the wrinkles around the older man’s eyes, how the lines in his forehead had deepened.
“I will tell you one more thing, Michel. Before the war, I was as happy as a man can be because I accepted the limitations of human life. The ancient philosophers had taught me that mod
