“Guess I’ll stay here and write a letter. You fellers go on back to the station when you want to, and I’ll meet you there.”
Gil seemed pleased. He excused himself, for a moment, wandered off into the gloom at the back. Noni turned the blue wings, turned the sleepy eyes, and said:
“How is it, Blom?”
“It’s all right, Noni.”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite. He asked some questions this morning, fishing a little to find out if I knew more than he did—”
“Do you think he really thinks so?”
“I think he did, a little. But now I think it’s all right. You’re doing wonders, Noni — keep it up.”
“Thank you, Blom, dear. So are you.”
“But now be sensible and take it easy; and try to get some sleep. It’s going to be worse before it’s better! The trains might be crowded, you never know. And maybe hot.”
“Yes.”
“Is there anything special I can do.”
“Do you think he’s jealous?”
“No. No more than Gil ever is; no.”
She sighed, relaxed, looked at him gratefully.
“That’s good. He’s been a little silent.”
“Just upset by the whole thing, that’s all.”
“I guess so.”
“Here he is.”
“Okay. Suppose I meet you at five, then. Or ten to? At the station bookshop.”
“Right!”
She rose to join Gil, took his arm; and he sat still, watching them go out into the bright street and turn to the left. Then he took out the folded sheets of paper and began to write, half listening to the voices at the bar.
III
“What is man that thou art mindful of him? What is time, and what is reality? And what on earth ever put it into the mind of man that any god or gods were mindful of him? As you see, Clint, I’m on my way; and as you doubtless also observed, I didn’t get to Cambridge to see you before I left. As you can imagine. And I was sorry, too, for, among other things, I wanted to ask you a favor. Key, as you will surmise as soon as you see the St. Louis — or wherever — postmark, came across with a hundred dollars, and made it possible. But only barely possible; that’s the point. Now, if things go wrong, or it takes longer than we had thought, or anything of that sort, we’ll need more money; and I’m afraid Key is the only chance. So, if I should wire you from Mexico just the one word ‘Key’ would you be an angel and do what you can? Another hundred, for a guess — but if I have any more definite idea of our exact needs I’ll perhaps add the figures. I hope you don’t mind — and in fact I’m sure you won’t or I wouldn’t ask it. It’s only that we may really need a watchdog in Boston when we get way off there in the wilderness.… Wilderness — my God, as if we weren’t already in a wilderness! You must come and see this country of ours — it’s a wonder. Talk about your wastelands — it’s purely and simply, I’m afraid, a spiritual desert. These faces! They’re made of a kind of pale and pasty leather, no ray ever touched or lit them, and the eyes are blind as stones. Arid, dry, withered, there’s nothing left of them; they’re like old corn shucks hung up in a barn and forgotten. All the faces, mind you — and everywhere. There’s simply no trace of refinement, or sensitiveness, or subtlety of awareness; and I can’t begin to tell you how wonderfully depressing it is. Not, of course, that in a way it’s not a godsend, if only as a diversion from the matter in hand! As to that — well, by God, you see me for once not reading novels for a publisher, but actually in one. It really is a novel. Talk about Hart Crane or D. H. Lawrence or whoever, going to Mexico to die, going down to the everlasting dark! What about Blom the embalmer? Blom the undertaker? Blom the best man at the funeral? Blom the chief, if not the only, mourner? No, that’s not fair — for Gil does, in his dry wounded way, love Noni; he really does. But just the same he’s spared, unlike Noni and myself, the burden of foreknowing, and there are times when in spite of myself I can’t help being irritated with him. Poor old Gil! At the bottom of his heart he must simply hate my being here at all, and he must certainly wonder himself sick as to why Noni insisted on my coming. But he’s a sport about it, I must say, and I admire him for it. As for Noni — well, you know Noni! She’s a good soldier. She just marches up against the battery as if it wasn’t there; and she hasn’t changed her behavior by a hair’s breadth. And so far, anyway, she’s standing it better than I feared she would. Next to no sleep at all last night — we found out only when we were halfway across New York State that we had to change at a place called Galion, Ohio — think of it — at half past four in the morning. You can imagine what it was like, trying to sleep with that hanging over us! Gil really slept — I did fairly well — but Noni was awake pretty much all night. And the change itself wasn’t too good, in pitch dark, a hell of a hurry the whole length of two trains, and Noni was in some distress. In spite of which she really seems pretty well today, and has actually been enjoying this odd city very much. And the river. The river moved her deeply — obviously meant something very private to her. You know how she is about such things; I’ve often thought Noni ought to have been a poet. We took a walk down to see it, through a very fine slum section, much against Gil’s will; she insisted she must put her hands in it, and did so. It was nice! One of those things you like Noni for. Then we came back and had a drink at a café which looks to me remarkably like a bagnio, if you know what I mean, and it’s there that I’m sitting to write this.… It’s funny; half the time I can’t really believe a word of it — it doesn’t seem actual at all. Of course journeys are a little like that, anyway — but this more so, I suppose, because it all happened so suddenly and with so little time for thinking about it. And then, naturally, the situation about Noni makes it all even harder to believe. The truth is, I can’t admit it to myself; it just doesn’t make sense. Things like this don’t happen, do they? People don’t have to die like that — and we all know that there is a God, and there is justice, and there is beauty — or do we? Noni is here, alive; I saw her stooping to wet her hands in the muddy water of the Mississippi an hour ago. I shall see her again at five, and yet we both know that this is coming to an end, that she will presently — well, vanish. It beats me, Clint! I can’t make head or tail of it. How explain such cruelty away? It’s enough to make you really hate the whole nature of existence: but then, the joke is, the existence of Noni, and the way she takes this business, makes me really believe in something extraordinarily good—she’s herself a sort of proof of the divine excellence of things. A very subtle reversal!..
“Next day. I’m finishing this on the train, so forgive the rocky handwriting. The Sunshine Special is rushing us into Texas, and all day, think of it, we shall do nothing but cross Texas. Noni and Gil are washing — I’m waiting for breakfast. These so-called De Luxe Coaches aren’t bad: but none of us did much sleeping, I’m afraid. We were grieved when they took away an extremely nice smoking car, with adjustable seat backs — very comfortable; but damn it, after we’d got our bags into it we found they were going to yank it off during the night. Almost the best thing so far was coming down the river from St. Louis — really magical. I wish there’d been more of it. We followed the river for about half an hour, at dusk — very fine — it’s an astonishing river — dark little bayous with flat-bottomed rowboats tied up under tropical trees — nice old farmhouses with lawns going down to the shore — levees, islands, ragged trees sticking up out of deep water where islands or points use to be — the general impression of something marvelously untamed. Noni ate it alive. Here come Noni and Gil now — I’ll finish this, and put it off at the next station — Arp, or Troup, or something. And I’ll of course drop you a line when we get to M. Remember, please, Clint, all this under your hat. Yrs., B.