maw and her sister Katy. A man can get killed out there at this time of year. Ask Gash here. She hails from Wyoming, the equality suffrage state. Tell him about the elk herds, booboo. How it gets too cold for even an elk to tolerate. That’s where I draw the line, at fur-bearing animals. When it’s too cold for them, count me out.”
“I’d like to live in a big wet greenhouse,” the girl said.
“Blizzards,” Pike said.
“They want blizzards,” I said. “The network wants blizzards. We want to show how much progress the Navahos have been making and if we can get a blizzard at the same time the show’ll be that much more interesting. Airlifts by helicopter. Makeshift hospitals.”
“You’ll garner the industry’s choicest awards. But count me out.”
“Look, that part of it is beside the point. We’ll just drive out there, that’s all, just for the hell of it. We won’t be going for a few months so the weather’s bound to be a lot better than it is now, even out there. I think we can pick up a camp trailer in Maine. And we’ll just go. You can map out the route. It won’t cost us much. Food and gas. And I’ll spring for the gas.”
“Ask Jack if he’s ever driven cross-country before. Ask him if he knows how boring it can be in the deepest contiguous sense of that word. I’ve done it a number of times, windshield wipers beating in my brain.”
“Look, my last two years in college I took my T-Bird out and back. It was terrific. I stopped only to sleep and eat. This time we’ll go slower. We’ll stay off the superhighways. We’ll discover all the lost roads of America. I’m bringing my movie camera. We’ll get it all on film. Your spiritual father, Pike. You’ve always talked about meeting a cougar. Well, he’s out there, crouched on some big brown rock, swishing his tail.”
The girl wasn’t drinking. I couldn’t figure out the connection between them. She was about one-third his age and seemed very attached to him but in a way I could not quite define. Her blankness intrigued me. She looked almost alluring in Pike’s windbreaker, small and dumb and tentative. I felt a need to know more about her, to fill out that incomplete image. Only completed could it begin to tell me whether I had a further need to demand from it some small recognition of my galvanic potentials as a man. I remembered the attractive couple in the restaurant during lunch that same afternoon, legs touching beneath the table. Pike was beginning to fade.
“Why are you driving when you can fly?” she said. “Don’t you love to fly? I love it. It’s the sexiest thing there is.”
“This is a religious journey,” I said. “Planes aren’t religious yet. Cars are religious. Maybe planes will be next.”
“Planes are sexy.”
“That’s right, the way cars used to be. But cars are religious now and this is a religious trip.”
Something stirred.
“He’s out there, you say, swishing his tail. I’ve always wanted to confront a cougar face to face without bars between us. Something might happen. We might feel some kind of flow between us. It’s hard for a layman like yourself to understand that. But getting up face to face with a gorgeous steaming beast like that. It’s a mystical thing, Jack. A mystical thing. The cougar. The mountain lion. The catamount. The puma. I first saw him in a zoo when I was no more than ten. Even then I felt a bond between us. I’d like to confront him face to face. No iron bars. Something might happen.”
“We’ll go up into the Rockies,” I said.
“I’d like to confront him before I die.”
“We’ll go up into the Rockies. That’s where he is, crouched in the shadows, maybe waiting for an epiphany of his own. You get a battlefield commission. Sully said so. And you can map out our route.”
“I have to do peeps,” the girl said.
“The head’s back there.”
We were silent until she returned; she punched him on the back when she sat down. Then Pike said to
“I’d like to live in a big wet greenhouse,” the girl said.
“Blizzards,” Pike said.
“They want blizzards,” I said. “The network wants blizzards. We want to show how much progress the Navahos have been making and if we can get a blizzard at the same time the show’ll be that much more interesting. Airlifts by helicopter. Makeshift hospitals.”
“You’ll garner the industry’s choicest awards. But count me out.”
“Look, that part of it is beside the point. We’ll just drive out there, that’s all, just for the hell of it. We won’t be going for a few months so the weather’s bound to be a lot better than it is now, even out there. I think we can pick up a camp trailer in Maine. And we’ll just go. You can map out the route. It won’t cost us much. Food and gas. And I’ll spring for the gas.”
“Ask Jack if he’s ever driven cross-country before. Ask him if he knows how boring it can be in the deepest contiguous sense of that word. I’ve done it a number of times, windshield wipers beating in my brain.”
“Look, my last two years in college I took my T-Bird out and back. It was terrific. I stopped only to sleep and eat. This time we’ll go slower. We’ll stay off the superhighways. We’ll discover all the lost roads of America. I’m bringing my movie camera. We’ll get it all on film. Your spiritual father, Pike. You’ve always talked about meeting a cougar. Well, he’s out there, crouched on some big brown rock, swishing his tail.”
The girl wasn’t drinking. I couldn’t figure out the connection between them. She was about one-third his age and seemed very attached to him but in a way I could not quite define. Her blankness intrigued me. She looked almost alluring in Pike’s windbreaker, small and dumb and tentative. I felt a need to know more about her, to fill out that incomplete image. Only completed could it begin to tell me whether I had a further need to demand from it some small recognition of my galvanic potentials as a man. I remembered the attractive couple in the restaurant during lunch that same afternoon, legs touching beneath the table. Pike was beginning to fade.
“Why are you driving when you can fly?” she said. “Don’t you love to fly? I love it. It’s the sexiest thing there is.”
“This is a religious journey,” I said. “Planes aren’t religious yet. Cars are religious. Maybe planes will be next.”
“Planes are sexy.”
“That’s right, the way cars used to be. But cars are religious now and this is a religious trip.”
Something stirred.
“He’s out there, you say, swishing his tail. I’ve always wanted to confront a cougar face to face without bars between us. Something might happen. We might feel some kind of flow between us. It’s hard for a layman like yourself to understand that. But getting up face to face with a gorgeous steaming beast like that. It’s a mystical thing, Jack. A mystical thing. The cougar. The mountain lion. The catamount. The puma. I first saw him in a zoo when I was no more than ten. Even then I felt a bond between us. I’d like to confront him face to face. No iron bars. Something might happen.”
“We’ll go up into the Rockies,” I said.
“I’d like to confront him before I die.”
“We’ll go up into the Rockies. That’s where he is, crouched in the shadows, maybe waiting for an epiphany of his own. You get a battlefield commission. Sully said so. And you can map out our route.”
“I have to do peeps,” the girl said.
“The head’s back there.”
We were silent until she returned; she punched him on the back when she sat down. Then Pike said to
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