It was no big deal to walk it, and I wouldn’t even mention it if it weren’t for my furry little enemies. The tunnel was full of them, and those I didn’t see I invented. I went from tie to tie, plagued by the idea of stepping on one. The further I went the more it worked me over, and I fought it off like a kid in the dark telling himself there are no rats, there are no rats, while my body overheated like an engine racing in first gear and the smell of me brought them squeezing through the chinks and cracks. I guess it’s a dumb enough phobia for a grown man. I mean, you know they’re there. Some say the underground population of Paris, France, is several times larger than the human Besides, hadn’t there been that time in my life, on the far side of the globe, when we’d hunted and roasted them, a gaunt band of scarecrows armed with sticks and bare hands? Sure, there’d been that time. Still, when the tracks finally started climbing in a big slow leftward curve, I broke into a run.
