Beckett took part in the June 1940 exodus from Paris before the advance of the invading German army, and arrived in Vichy later that summer. It was there that he saw Joyce for the last time. The hotel in which he and the Joyce family were staying was, like most of the hotels, being evacuated, and he had to “get on, clear out.” Joyce and his family went to a little town near Vichy where Madame Jolas (of Transition fame) had a school. Joyce stayed there until December, when he obtained a permit to go to Switzerland. Beckett started south on foot from Vichy. On the way he managed to board a train that went as far as Toulouse. There he avoided the refugee center, slept out on benches, and finally got a bus west as far as Cahors, where it was “all out” in the pouring rain. Famished, exhausted, he finally managed to find a spot on the floor of a shop dealing in religious articles, where he spent the night. Hiding in a truck the next day he succeeded in getting out of Cahors and traveling as far as Arcachon, where he was able to locate Mary Reynolds, an American he had known in Paris.