While they were still laughing, Françoise said seriously: “I would like to tell the story of my life, and do you know why? Because I keep discovering more and more how much I have in common with other people of my age, especially women. To tell the truth, all my experience has been very impersonal, yet there has always been something very personal about it. When I think back, my personal experiences always seem to have been brought about by the political events of the time. The day the North Vietnamese took Dien Bien Phu, my stepfather got drunk and raped me. The man who later became my husband took advantage of a headline about an OAS bombing to speak to me on the bus. After the Algerian War we had to move because our apartment was owned by a dispossessed Algerian colonist, who needed it for himself. When France walked out of NATO, I lost my job as secretary on an American Air Force base. In May 1968 my husband went off with another woman … Perhaps it’s because I’m a woman that so much of my experience has been determined by outside events. Almost all my experiences have been sad; as a matter of fact, you can hardly call them experiences. But they’ve changed me. If at the age of forty I get cancer or they take me to an insane asylum, I’ll know why.” “What about your more cheerful experiences?” the writer asked. “Do you account for them in the same way? Your possibly beginning to love me, for instance?” “Thanks to the unions,” said Françoise, “I have a steady part-time job. As a result, the work doesn’t disgust me as much as it might, and I’m not so worried about being thrown out of work. That gives me more time for the better feelings.” The writer wrote something in his notebook. “I just remembered,” he said, “that every time the waiter at the restaurant today opened a bottle of wine he held the cork up to his nose but didn’t really smell it.” “Yes,” said Françoise, “but did you notice how worn down his heels were? I think the reason you’ve lost interest in people is that you’re always looking for obscure details and you’ve run out of them. There’s nothing left for you to discover but the inexhaustible riches of everyday life, and you turn up your nose at that.” “I have not run out of obscure details,” said the writer, who ate with his left hand and wrote so vigorously with his right that the table moved. “In the last few minutes,” he said, “my curiosity has revived — right now I’m curious about somebody.” Françoise pinched his fat cheek and he suddenly stuck his finger in her ear. “About whom?” asked Keuschnig, who, feeling secure, had almost humbly let them talk the whole time, while looking at the wart in Françoise’s shaved armpit. “About you, my dear Gregor,” said the writer, without looking up from his notebook. His ball-point broke; without a moment’s delay he took out another and went on writing. This time no one laughed but Stefanie.