Diary of a Drug Fiend

166 The Diary of a Drug Fiend The morphine has certainly done me a world of good. I am quite myself. I feel it by the way I am writing this entry. I have a quiet impersonal point of view. I have got back my sense of proportion. I can think of things consecutively and I feel physically much stronger, but I’ve got very sleepy again... . Joy! Cockie has just come in full of good news. He looks fine—as fine as he feels. He had a sample from a pediar he met in the Wisteria. It’s absolutely straight stuff. Pulled him round in a second. There are two of them in it; the man with the dope and the sentry. They talk business in the lavatory, and if another man comes in, the pedlar disappears. In case of real danger, he gets rid of his sample in a flash beyond any possibility of being traced. The loss is trifling; they can buy the stuff at a few shillings an ounce and sell it for I don’t know how many times its weight in gold. We shall have a great night to-night ! August 22 A hellish night ! Cockie kept his date with the pedlar, got ten pounds’ worth of H. and fifteen of C., and the H. was nothing at all and the C., so adulterated that we took the whole lot and it was hardly worth talking about. , What filthy mean beasts people are! ... How can men take advantage of the bitter needs of others ? It was the same in the war with the profiteers. It’s always been the same. I am writing this in a Turkish bath. I couldn’t stand that loathsome house any more. It has done me lots of good. The massage has calmed my nerves. I slept for a long while, and a cup of tea has revived me. I tried to read a paper, but every line opens the wound. They seem to have gone mad about dope. . . I suppose it’s really quite natural. I remember my father telling me once that the inequality of wealth