Right out of the blue, Hewlitt stopped his thrashing and turned to fix them with a reproving gaze. “I’ve spent my entire life as a liar and an incompetent,” he said.
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Eldorado,” Tony said, with poorly concealed alarm.
“Bogus vitamins on the Internet? How about swingin’ doors and painted women?”
“That’s all behind you, now.”
“If only I could believe you!” Hewlitt cried.
Tony was paralyzed by the strangeness of this, but Jack stepped forward and snatched the willow switches away. He got right in Hewlitt’s face.
“How much of this do you think we can stand?”
“Well, I—”
“We’re not on this trip to hear about your problems. We don’t even know you. I came here to be with my friend because we need to talk. This is a freak show, and we shouldn’t have to pay for it. We thought we’d catch some fish!”
This seemed to sober Hewlitt, who replaced his look of extravagant self-pity with one of caution and shrewdness.
“I’m the only one who can get you out of here, son. No brag, just fact. You make me feel respected or you’re SOL. I’d like to be a fly on the wall when you try backing this tank down a class-five rapid. That’s the only way home, punk, and I’m unstable.”
“Jesus,” said Tony. “This is insane! This trip was my reward as a vassal of Medicare!”
Hewlitt responded by pretending to play a violin and whistling “Moon River.” Jack raised a menacing finger in his face, and he stopped. Then Hewlitt was talking again.
“How about you try going broke on eating-disorder clinics to wake up to find your wife still gobbling her food? Forty K in the hole and she’s facedown on a ham!”
Jack turned back to Tony. “I don’t know what to do.”
Hewlitt’s lament rushed onward. He had dug deep in his pharmacist days to throw a big wedding for his daughter, apparently; she had married way above their station thanks to her big blue eyes and thrilling figure. It was, in Hewlitt’s words, a hoity-toity affair with the top Arizona landowners, the copper royalty, and the developers, and Hewlitt’s caterer food-poisoned them all. Several sued, his wife and daughter blamed him, and in this way Hewlitt found himself at the end of his old life and the beginning of the new. He took a crash course in wilderness adventures at an old CCC camp in Oregon, graduating at the top of his class and getting a book on the ethics of forestry in recognition. Hewlitt seemed to think that this was all an illusion, that no one really cared about him at all.
Tony and Jack maintained compassionate, respectful smiles throughout this tirade. By the end Hewlitt was so upset his cheeks trembled. When he finished, Jack raised an imploring hand in his direction, but to no avaiclass="underline" Eldorado Hewlitt walked past them and into his tent.
“Doesn’t look like a fishing day,” Jack said.
Once they were back in the tent, Jack stretched out on his sleeping bag, and Tony turned to grab a thick paperback from his pack, a book about zombies with the face of someone with white eyeholes on the cover. He slumped back on his bedroll, drew his reading glasses from his shirt, and was on the verge of total absorption when Hewlitt flung open the tent flap. Tony slowly lowered the zombie book.
“Sorry to disturb you,” the man said, though there was no evidence of that. “I have to ask: What is your problem? ‘Old friends’? Is that what you are, ‘old friends’? Grew up together in the same little town? I know I have problems; I’m famous for my problems. I’m told by qualified professionals that I have ruined my life with my problems, but these few days with two ‘old friends’ have completely unnerved me. What did you two do to each other? Where is this bad feeling coming from? I’m terrifically upset, and I don’t know what it is. But it’s coming from you two, I’ve figured out that much. Can’t you work this out? You’re killing me!”
Hewlitt hurled down the flap and left. Jack and Tony looked at each other, then quickly glanced away.
“What was that all about?” Tony asked, unpersuasively.
Jack said nothing. He had found his box of lures and was lifting one up as though to examine it. A blue frog with hooks.
After a minute he got to his feet. He went out of the tent, looked around, and came back in with their rods. He made a show of breaking them down and putting them back in their travel tubes. Tony, staring determinedly now at a single page of his zombie book, barely lifted his eyes to this activity, which caused Jack to raise the intensity of it. He held up a roll of toilet paper in his hand. Tony couldn’t look at him.
“Might as well take a shit. Nothing else to do around here.”
Tony kept his eyes on the book and gave him a little wave.
A short time later, the toilet paper flew back into the tent, followed by Jack. He slumped on his bedroll with a sigh.
“I’ve got another book,” said Tony.
“I hate books.”
“No, you don’t. You loved The Black Stallion.”
“I was twelve.”
“So don’t read. Who cares?”
“What’s the other book?”
“Silent Spring.”
Jack snorted. “Thanks a bunch.”
Tony dropped the book to his chest. “Jack, what do you want?”
“In the whole world?”
“Sure.”
“I’d like you to tell me in plain English what my wife saw in you.”
Tony exhaled through pursed lips and looked at the ground. “We did this a long time ago. Either you shoot me or throw her out, but otherwise there’s nothing more to say. The whole thing is both painful and negligible to me, and kind of an accident and kind of ancient history. We have managed to stay friends despite my very serious personal crime against you. It is a permanent stain on my soul.”
“What do you mean by that?” Jack said. “You don’t even believe you have one.”
“Well, you do, and you’re innocent. I have a soul that is blemished by shame. All right? I’m not proud of myself.”
Jack lay facedown on his bedroll, chin on laced fingers, and looked miserably toward the tent flap. He fell asleep thus, after a while, and so did Tony, glasses hanging from one ear. Hours later, they were awakened by the cooling tent and diminished light.
Jack got to his feet abruptly, seeming frightened, and rifled through a pile of clothing until he found his coat.
“You going to find us something to eat?” Tony asked.
“I am like hell. I’m going to have a word with our guide.”
Tony raised a cautioning hand. “Jack, we’re dealing with a very unstable—”
“Well put, Tony. That’s exactly what I am, but I plan to do something about it. I’m upset. And it’s his fault.”
“Jack, please—”
But Jack had already gone. Tony slumped back with his hands over his face. It went through his mind that patiently putting up with Jack was an old habit. That’s what had started their mess. Jack had done something dumb — gotten drunk and driven his car on the railroad tracks, in fact, nearly ruining it — that had caused Jan and Tony, in an accidental encounter at the post office, to commiserate with each other, and the next thing they knew they were in bed, bright sunlight coming through the thin curtains of the Super 8. It wasn’t anything, really, but Jan threw it into an argument with Jack the next year during the Super Bowl, and the half-life was promptly extended to forever.
Jack came back in through the tent flap, slapping it open abruptly. He crouched down, staring at Tony. Then he said, “He’s dead.”
Tony sat up. The zombie paperback splattered on the dirt floor. He stood and walked straight past Jack, out through the flap, then came back in, kicking the book out of his way, and lay down again.