Atdtda32: I know everything, or maybe nothing, 911-914

[Paul Nightingale]

The "threatened counterrevolution" with which the section opens reminds us
of the opening to the chapter as the narrative continues to up-date Kit's
story. Above the section break, Kit has been located at the Deux Continents;
here, competing "factions", each insisting on its own version of the future,
"sooner or later" arrive at--are drawn irresistibly to--the hotel. At the
end of 62.2 Kit feels "his life ha[s] found its equilibrium at last", as
though he 'belongs' at the hotel; here, "tending bar" might be considered a
kind of opting (or dropping) out. In anticipation of the "ancient reflex"
that gets him into trouble on 912 we might observe that the Deux Continents
operates "on a less exalted level" (911); and then recall that Kit has been
here before, on the Stupendica, "preferring [fourth class] over his palatial
accommodations a couple-three decks up and forward of the stacks" (511).

Local interest groups are then juxtaposed to the international arms market.
On 557, following Kit's post-Stupendica stop-over in Ostend, Victor Mulciber
introduces himself as "the one they send for when Basil Zaharoff is busy
with a new redhead and can't be bothered". Here, Kit recalls Victor's
appearance, whereas Victor recalls Kit's occupation: "more as an engineer
than as a mathematician", ie as someone who can be used profitably by
others. This is not to say that mathematics cannot be used profitably, of
course; Victor suggests the necessary application of abstract knowledge, a
means to an end perhaps similar to Clive's earlier take on revenge (and we
might recall that, back on 739, Kit suggests that Vibe be left to "the
forces of History"; Reef sneers at "Harvard talk"). Furthermore, that Kit
should take advantage of a "seller's market" invokes contingency,
emphasising that markets can and probably will change.

Victor introduces aviation and Kit recalls the "pretty theoretical" work he
did at Gottingen; "ordinarily" he would have been content to forget about
Victor's offer, if not for the collision on 912. Here, Kit's involvement has
seemingly been determined by "some ancient reflex to do with the odds"; as
an agent he has opted for intervention, just as he did (or will do: "Next
thing he knew ..." etc) when seeing Dally confronted by Imi/Erno on 909.
Bottom of 912 ("Not sure who was after them or, in Kit's case, why ..." etc)
the action continues from the escape from the train, bottom of 910, with Kit
and Dally fearing pursuit by Imi/Erno and "fleeing into the heart of the
city". A couple of pages later, following the digression that gives Kit's
back-story, "they ha[ve] found their way past the city limits ... and into a
paprika field" (912), the latter offering them solitude precisely because of
the scene's timing, "in the silence before the clamoring weeks of harvest"
(913). Recalling "the promise she'd more or less inveigled him into making"
(735, 745-747) brings them to sex, and more sex, and then back to Szeged.
There is restless movement here, stasis (perhaps the "matter of stillness"
that had governed Kit's life in the Deux Continents) only restored,
temporarily, on 914 when the section ends with the "telepathic waiter" who
knows more than he should: he features as a chorus, perhaps, or a reader of
the fiction that is Kit and Dally (cf the chef de brigade on 910).