he says. Renart strumps about from room to room, mumping and mulligrumphing, thrunched by the right moger of the place to a crunkle of brow and a clamp on the jut of his chaft, thumb under chin, forefinger curling up under pursed lips. Over the weeks of merry visits from Ana Massinger (primarily to gab in billows of blue smoke over red wine, it seemed, and only secondarily to salve her sisterly fret that Puk—ensconced in the treehouse with Jaq but making regular barbarian raids on civilization for the sake of grub or ablution—was not hassling Renart to distraction, I hope,) curious prodding finally won from her, yesterday evening, an admission that all Renart’s return jaunts into Erehwyna have indeed been diverted to work, café, park, restaurant, tavern, tabac, in short any elsewhere than the Massinger home, because in all the stint they’ve been here on Mars, in Erehwyna, she still hasn’t sorted it to presentable. Presentable? Renart says, having coaxed acceptance of a pataphysician’s eye and hand, it being, after all, his art to hone a life’s ergonomics to a healthy set of attitude, flesh and environs.
