"But why, Harry, why?"
He couldn't stand to see her crying. He went to her, kissed her wet
cheek, spoke more softly. "It'll do me good, like when I was a kid."
"If you say so, Harry."
He left quickly. He went outside and across the yard to the road. He
looked up it and down it, to the north and to the south. It was a
bright night with moon and stars, but he saw nothing, no one. The road
was empty. It was always empty, except when Walt and Gloria walked over
from their place a mile or so south. But once it hadn't been empty.
Once there'd been cars, people....
He had to do something. Just sitting and looking at the sky wouldn't
help him. He had to go somewhere, see someone.
He went to the barn and looked for his saddle. There was no saddle. But
he'd had one hanging right behind the door. Or had he?
He threw a blanket over Plum, the big mare, and tied it with a piece of
wash line. He used another piece for a bridle, since he couldn't find
that either, and didn't bother making a bit. He mounted, and Plum moved
out of the barn and onto the road. He headed north, toward town.
Then he realized he couldn't go along the road this way. He'd be
reported. Breaking travel regulations was a serious offense. He didn't
know what they did to you, but it wasn't anything easy like a fine.
He cut into an unfenced, unplanted field.
His headache was back, worse now than it had ever been. His entire
head throbbed, and he leaned forward and put his cheek against Plum's
mane. The mare whinnied uneasily, but he kicked her sides and she moved
forward. He lay there, just wanting to go somewhere, just wanting to
leave his headache and confusion behind.
He didn't know how long it was, but Plum was moving cautiously now. He
raised his head. They were approaching a fence. He noticed a gate off
to the right, and pulled the rope so Plum went that way. They reached
the gate and he got down to open it, and saw the sign. "Phineas Grotton
Farm." He looked up at the sky, found the constellations, turned his
head, and nodded. He'd started north, and Plum had continued north.
He'd crossed land belonging both to himself and the Franklins. Now he
was leaving the Franklin farm. North of the Franklins were the Bessers.
Who was this Phineas Grotton? Had he bought out Lon Besser? But
anything like that would've gotten around.
Was he forgetting again?
* * * * *
Well, no matter. Mr. Grotton would have to excuse his trespass. He
opened the gate, led Plum through it, closed the gate. He mounted and
rode forward, still north, toward the small Pangborn place and after
the Pangborns the biggest farm in the county--old Wallace Elverton's
place. The fields here, as everywhere in the county, lay fallow. Seemed
as if the government had so much grain stored up they'd be able to get
along without crops for years more.
He looked around. Somehow, the country bothered him. He wasn't sure
why, but ... everything was wrong.
His head weighed an agonized ton. He put it down again. Plum went
sedately forward. After a while she stopped. Harry looked up. Another
fence. And what a fence! About ten feet of heavy steel mesh, topped by
three feet of barbed-wire--five separate strands. What in the world had
Sam Pangborn been thinking of to put up a monster like this?
He looked around. The gate should be further west. He rode that way.
He found no gate. He turned back, heading east. No gate. Nothing but
fence. And wasn't the fence gradually curving inward? He looked back.
Yes, there _was_ a slight inward curve.
He dismounted and tied Plum to the fence, then stepped back and figured
the best way to get to the other side.
The best way, the only way, was to claw, clutch and clamber, as they
used to say back when he was a kid.
It took some doing. He tore his shirt on the barbed wire, but he got
over and began walking, straight ahead, due north. The earth changed
beneath his feet. He stooped and touched it. Sand. Hard-packed sand.
He'd never seen the like of it in this county.
He walked on. A sound came to him; a rising-falling whisper. He
listened to it, and looked up every so often at the sky, to make sure
he was heading in the right direction.
And the sand ended. His shoes plunked over flooring.
Flooring!
He knelt to make sure, and his hand felt wooden planks. He rose, and
glanced up to see if he was still outdoors. Then he laughed. It was a
sick laugh, so he stopped it.
He took another step. His shoes sounded against the wood. He walked.
More wood. Wood that went on, as the sand had. And the roaring sound
growing louder. And the air changing, smelling like air never had
before in Cultwait County.
* * * * *
His entire body trembled. His mind trembled too. He walked, and came to
a waist-high metal railing, and made a tiny sound deep in his throat.
He looked out over water, endless water rolling in endless waves under
the night sky. Crashing water, topped with reflected silver from the
moon. Pounding water, filling the air with spray.
He put out his hands and grasped the railing. It was wet. He raised
damp fingers to his mouth. Salt.
He stepped back, back, and turned and ran. He ran wildly, blindly,
until he could run no more. Then he fell, feeling the sand beneath him,
and shut his eyes and mind to everything.
Much later, he got up and went to the fence and climbed it. He came
down on the other side and looked around and saw Plum. He walked to
her, mounted her, sat still. The thoughts, or dreams, or whatever they
were which had been torturing him these past few weeks began torturing
him again.
It was getting light. His head was splitting.
Davie. His son Davie. Fourteen years old. Going to high school in
town....
_Town!_ He should've gone there in the first place! He would ride east,
to the road, then head south, back toward home. That would bring him
right down Main Street. Regulations or not, he'd talk to people, find
out what was happening.
He kicked Plum's sides. The mare began to move. He kept kicking until
she broke into a brisk canter. He held on with hands and legs.
Why hadn't he seen the Pangborns and Elvertons lately--a long time
lately?
_The ocean. He'd seen the ocean. Not a reservoir or lake made by
flooding and by damming, but salt water and enormous. An ocean, where
there could be no ocean. The Pangborns and Elvertons had been where
that ocean was now. And after the Elvertons had come the Dobsons.
And after them the new plastics plant. And after that the city of
Crossville. And after that...._
He was passing his own farm. He hadn't come through town, and yet here
he was at his own farm. Could he have forgotten where town was? Could
it be north of his home, not south? Could a man get so confused as to
forget things he'd known all his life?
He reached the Shanks' place, and passed it at a trot. Then he was
beyond their boundaries and breaking regulations again. He stayed on
the road. He went by a small house and saw colored folks in the yard.
There'd been no colored folks here. There'd been Eli Bergen and his
family and his mother, in a bigger, newer house. The colored folks
heard Plum's hooves and looked up and stared. Then a man raised his
voice. "Mistah, you breakin' regulations! Mistah, the police gonnah get
you!"
* * * * *
He rode on. He came to another house, neat and white, with three
children playing on a grassy lawn. They saw him and ran inside. A
moment later, adult voices yelled after him:
"You theah! Stop!"
"Call the sheriff! He's headin' foah Piney Woods!"
There was no place called Piney Woods in this county.
Was this how a man's mind went?
He came to another house, and another. He passed ten all told, and
people shouted at him for breaking regulations, and the last three or
four sounded like Easterners. And their houses looked like pictures of
New England he'd seen in magazines.
He rode on. He never did come to town. He came to a ten-foot fence with
a three-foot barbed-wire extension. He got off Plum and ripped his
clothing climbing. He walked over hard-packed sand, and then wood,
and came to a low metal railing. He looked out at the ocean, gleaming
in bright sunlight, surging and seething endlessly. He felt the earth
sway beneath him. He staggered, and dropped to his hands and knees, and
shook his head like a fighter hit too many times. Then he got up and
went back to the fence and heard a sound. It was a familiar sound, yet
strange too. He shaded his eyes against the climbing sun. Then he saw
it--a car. _A car!_
* * * * *
It was one of those tiny foreign jobs that run on practically no gas at
all. It stopped beside him and two men got out. Young men with lined,
tired faces; they wore policemen's uniforms. "You broke regulations,
Mr. Burr. You'll have to come with us."
He nodded. He wanted to. He wanted to be taken care of. He turned
toward Plum.
The other officer was walking around the horse. "Rode her hard," he
said, and he sounded real worried. "Shouldn't have done that, Mr. Burr.
We have so very few now...."