The Deaves Affair

Evan Weir's pipe was foul he threw it down with an exclamation of disgust. Its foulness was symbolic everything was out of kilter. He looked at the picture he had been painting for a week rotten! It was a still life a broken jar and three books on a rag of Persian embroidery. Picking up his pen-knife he deliberately cut the canvas out of the stretcher and setting a match to a corner of it tossed it in the empty stove. He paced up and down the room wondering what the devil was the matter with him he couldn't work he couldn't read his friends bored him life was as flat as beer dregs.