"Skiing? All those nymphs in titty sweaters."

"I don't know," I said. "I'd like to do something more religious. Explore America in the screaming night. You know. Yin and yang in Kansas. That scene."

"Maybe I'll come with you," Sullivan said.

"Seriously?"

"I'd like to do it, David. I really would."

"I have to go out West anyway in a few months to do a documentary on the Navahos. I thought I'd take my vacation a couple of weeks before that and spend the time driving out there."

"We can take Pike with us."

"Sure," I said. "He can get somebody to run things for a while."

"We'll let him map out our route. We'll give him a battlefield commission. He'll like that."

I felt good. It was a good idea. The man came back with their drinks. We were introduced and then I went looking for B.G. Haines. The bathroom was empty. I went into the bedroom and examined the coats on the bed. Her coat wasn't among them. I looked in the closet and it wasn't there either. Then I went into the kitchen. It was empty too. I stood there awhile. Then I opened the refrigerator door and took an ice tray out of the freezer. There were four ice cubes left. I brought up phlegm from my throat and spat on each of the cubes, separately. Then I slid the tray back into the freezer and shut the refrigerator door.

I went back to the living room. Sullivan was still talking to the round gray man. I couldn't take my eyes off that empty shoe.

2

I was an extremely handsome young man. The objectivity which time slowly fashions, and the self-restraint it demolishes, enabled me to make this statement without recourse to the usual modest disclaimers which give credit to one's parents or grandparents in the manner of a sires-and-dams book.