C Corwin - Dig

“It was a cocoa can.”

Since buying all those cans from Mickey Gitlin, I’d had Eric do a little research for me. “Was it a Hershey’s can? There were lots of different brands in those days. But Hershey’s is what most people bought.”

Penelope grinned with embarrassment. “In my mind I see it as a Hershey’s can-those silver letters on the brown background-but that was a long time ago.”

I nodded sympathetically. “Wait until you’re my age. You won’t be able to trust half your memories. But for the sake of discussion we’ll have to assume your mind is telling you the truth. Now, was it a real old can? An antique?”

Her eyes went back and forth like one of those Krazy Kat clocks. “I think it was just a regular cocoa can. I doubt I would’ve thrown it out if it looked real old or valuable.”

“That’s a good point,” I said. “Can you remember if it was made out of tin or cardboard?”

“Tin I guess. Why?”

“For a couple reasons,” I said. “First, it would help date the can. The real old cocoa cans were made out of tin. Then during World War II when metal was scarce the sides of the can were made out of cardboard, with a tin top and bottom. And it easily could have been one of those World War II cans. According to what Gordon told you, Kerouac found it in 1956. Just eleven years after the war ended. That’s not a long time for a can to be in a kitchen cupboard, let alone in a fire tower in the middle of nowhere. So if it was cardboard, it could have rotted in the dump along with the pine cones inside.” Now I contradicted myself. “Of course from what Gordon’s graduate assistant tells me, under the right conditions things made out of paper can survive underground for years and years.”

Surprisingly, Penelope was following me. “So even if it was a cardboard can, Gordon still might have hoped to find it intact thirty years after I threw it out?”

“Yes, I think so,” I said. “Anyway, Hershey went back to the all-tin cans in 1947. Other companies about that time, too. Everything’s made out of plastic now, of course.”

Penelope suppressed a yawn. “So it was probably an all-tin can, but it could have been part cardboard? But either way Gordon must have figured he had a good chance of finding it?”

“That’s right. Now, did it have one of those oval snap-in lids?”

She answered quickly. “I’m sure it did.”

I asked my next question slowly. “Did you bother looking inside the can before you threw it out?”

Now she suppressed a flash of anger. “That’s exactly what Gordon asked me. Only he was screaming at the time. And the truth is, yes, I did look inside. If there was cocoa inside I was going to put it back in the kitchen.”

“So you saw the pine cones?”

“I saw them.”

“Didn’t it occur to you that maybe he wanted them?” I asked.

The anger on her face was now directed toward herself. “I know I should have-but I was in a cleaning frenzy. Gordon had junk everywhere and I was going to get rid of it. To make him love me more. Consider me for a wife I suppose. God, I don’t know how many bags I carried out to the trash.”

The story Penelope told me that morning at Speckley’s-as bizarre as it sounded-nevertheless jelled with my own research into Jack Kerouac’s life. Or should I say Eric’s research. Earlier that spring he’d Googled up all sorts of interesting stuff for me. Anyway, it boiled down to this:

In June of 1956, Jack Kerouac hitchhiked from San Francisco to the Mt. Baker National Forest in Washington State. He worked as a fire lookout for 63 days, perched alone in a tower, atop a mountain, watching the horizon for wisps of smoke, bored to near insanity by the desolation of the place. Each night, to mark the passing of another interminable shift, he placed a tiny pine cone in an old cocoa can he found amongst the tower’s clutter. When he began working his way east at the end of the summer, he took that can of pine cones with him, as a souvenir of his foolishly spent summer. In November he dropped in on Gordon and Chick here in Hannawa. And before leaving for New York, he gave his pine cones to Gordon.

According to what Gordon told Penelope fifteen years later, the gift had been “purely a materialistic one.” Gordon had given Kerouac several bottles of cold Schlitz beer for the bus trip and he simply had to make room in his duffel bag. “Why don’t you hold onto these for me, good daddy?” he said to Gordon.

I’m sure Gordon fantasized about Kerouac coming back for his can of pine cones some day. I’m sure he fantasized how Kerouac, overcome with gratitude, would invite him to join his inner circle. To wander America’s back roads with him, hobnobbing with the likes of Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Neal Cassady, Larry Ferlinghetti and Lucien Carr. I bet he even fantasized how Kerouac would make him a character in one of his novels.

Jack Kerouac never came back for his pine cones. But that apparently did not diminish their value to Gordon. I can only imagine how precious they became when Kerouac published Desolation Angels in 1965. In that novel, Kerouac described his 63 days on Desolation Peak as a fire watcher. He described how his alter ego, Jack Dulouz, each night dropped a new little pine cone into an old cocoa can, to mark the end of another excruciating day. When Gordon read that, I’d venture to say he pretty much figured he had the beatnik version of the Holy Grail in his possession.

When Penelope told me about the pine cones that morning at Speckley’s, I simply could not believe that Gordon could have had such a treasure in his possession and not told anyone. Only after a long afternoon at Ike’s, rattling his patient eardrums with my cockamamie theories, did Gordon’s secretiveness begin to make sense to me: Jack Kerouac had given those pine cones to him. And the fact he didn’t tell anybody underscored just how deeply it had touched his young bohemian soul. So much that he created a secret shrine to Kerouac’s gift on his window sill-a shrine that included beer bottles that just maybe touched Kerouac’s lips, and pots of violets that, despite his good intentions, he forgot to water.

“Now wait a minute,” Ike objected when I explained all this to him. “I can understand why the professor didn’t tell you about those pine cones. And maybe some of those other crazy folks. But I can’t believe he wouldn’t have been tempted to rub Chick Glass’ nose in them. Considering how those two carried on over that cheeseburger all those years.”

I was nodding, watching the dribble of traffic outside his coffee shop. “I think maybe it just comes down to the kind of guy Gordon was,” I said. “He knew those pine cones would trump what the great Jack Kerouac had or didn’t have for lunch. He knew it would make him Kerouac’s undisputed apostle at Hemphill College, and not Chick. He also knew it would destroy their friendship.” It was six o’clock. Ike got up with a long, Saturday afternoon groan. He flipped the sign on the door over to CLOSED. I kept talking. “And so for fifteen years Sweet Gordon kept that cocoa can of pine cones to himself. A literary artifact of immeasurable value. Until his new girlfriend in a fit of love-induced tidiness threw them out.”

Ike returned to the table with a handful of Ghirardelli chocolates from the counter. “So how does all that help you find Gordon’s murderer?”

I popped one of the balls of chocolate into my mouth and attempted to answer. “Who the hell knows? But I am certain about one thing, Ike. Gordon was not out there digging for drums of toluene, or the weapon used to kill David Delarosa, or even a restaurant receipt from Mopey’s. He was digging for that cocoa can of pine cones.”