The night wind blows.
The world lies silent.
London was torn down during the day. Port Said was destroyed. The nails were pulled out of San Francisco. Glasgow is no more.
They are gone, forever.
Boards clatter softly in the wind, sand whines and trickles in small storms upon the still air.
Along the road toward the colorless ruins comes the old night watchman to unlock the gate in the high barbed-wire fence and stand looking in.
There in the moonlight lie Alexandria and Moscow and New York. There in the moonlight lie Johannesburg and Dublin and Stockholm. And Clearwater, Kansas, and Province-town, and Rio de Janeiro.
Just this afternoon the old man saw it happen, saw the car roaring outside the barbed-wire fence, saw the lean, sun-tanned men in that car, the men with their luxurious charcoal-flannel suits, and winking gold-mask cuff links, and their burning-gold wrist watches, and eye-blinding rings, lighting their cork-tipped cigarettes with engraved lighters....
"There it is, gentlemen. What a mess. Look what the weather's done to it."
"Yes, sir, it's bad, Mr. Douglas!"
"We just might save Paris."
"Yes, sir!"
"But, hell! The rain's warped it. That's Hollywood for you! Tear it down! Clear it out! We can use that land. Send a wrecking crew in today!"
"Yes, sir, Mr. Douglas!"
The car roaring off and gone away.
And now it is night. And the old night watchman stands inside the gate.
He remembers what happened this same still afternoon when the wreckers came.
A hammering, ripping, clattering; a collapse and a roar. Dust and thunder, thunder and dust!
And the whole of the entire world shook loose its nails and lath and plaster and sill and celluloid window as town after town following town banged over flat and lay still.
A shuddering, a thunder fading away, and then, once more, only the quiet wind.
The night watchman now walks slowly forward along the empty streets.
And one moment he is in Baghdad, and beggars loll in wondrous filth, and women with clear sapphire eyes give veiled smiles from high thin windows.
The wind blows sand and confetti.
The women and beggars vanish.
And it is all strutworks again, it is all papier-mache and oil-painted canvas and props lettered with the name of this studio, and there is nothing behind any of the building fronts but night and space and stars.
The old man pulls a hammer and a few long nails from his tool chest; he peers around in the junk until he finds a dozen good strong boards and some untorn canvas. And he takes the bright steel nails in his blunt fingers, and they are single-headed nails.
And he begins to put London back together again, hammering and hammering, board by board, wall by wall, window by window, hammering, hammering, louder, loude
r, steel on steel, steel in wood, wood against sky, working the hours toward midnight, with no end to his striking and fixing and striking again.
"Hey there, you!"
The old man pauses.