Лоуренс Блок - Random Walk - A Novel for a New Age

Thom slept at her side. He woke up once outside of Rock Springs and walked up the aisle to the lavatory, then returned smelling faintly of liquid soap and slipped back effortlessly into sleep. She dozed off herself, and when she opened her eyes he was already awake and they were coming into Salt Lake City.

They had almost four hours before their bus left for Portland. They checked their bags and had breakfast, then followed signs to Temple Square, where they joined a group for a guided tour of Mormon headquarters. You couldn’t enter the temple unless you were a paid-up tithing Mormon, but there was a great deal else to see, and just by standing in front of the temple she could sense the spiritual balance within it.

After the tour he said, “Mom, your eyes are getting worse, aren’t they?”

“How can you tell?”

“I don’t know, I just can. They are, aren’t they?”

“The tunnel’s narrowing. And there’s a little less light at the end of it.”

“But you’re not afraid?”

“Oh, a little bit, Thommy. The idea of not having my eyes to see with is scary. I have to keep reminding myself that I’m getting more vision than I’m giving up.”

“Why can’t you have both?”

“Some people probably can. But in my case I evidently have to let go of one in order to open up to the other.”

“And the way you can see now is better?”

“It’s better for me. At least it is right now.”

“That was great the way we found that place in Omaha. Can you see where we’re going to have lunch?”

“We just had breakfast.”

“Well, aren’t we going to eat before our bus leaves?”

“I suppose so.”

“Well—”

“How does Chinese sound?”

“Is that what you see when you close your eyes?”

“Nope. It just occurred to me we haven’t had any in a while.”

“You know where there’s a Chinese restaurant?”

“No, but somebody else probably does. Sometimes you let your inner vision guide you, Sport, and other times you ask a cop for directions.”

On the bus he said, “What happens when we get to Portland?”

“I think we get a room for the night. We could probably both stand a night’s sleep in a real bed. And I know we could use a bath, and we’re not likely to smell all that sweeter twelve hours from now.”

“Is that when we get into Portland?”

“He said fourteen hours. I forget where we stop. Boise, but there was someplace else.”

“I wasn’t paying attention. Mom? Besides a hotel room, what else do we do in Portland?”

“Get on another bus.”

“We’re not staying in Portland?”

“Just long enough to sleep and shower. And eat — God knows I wouldn’t dream of making you miss a meal.”

“Those spareribs were good.”

“I’m glad you approved.”

“So was the lo mein. Do you suppose the Chinese people at the restaurant were Mormons?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea.”

“Aha, something you don’t know. Are there any Chinese Mormons?”

“Didn’t they say so on the tour? There must be, they send missionaries everywhere. Why?”

“I just wondered. Where do we go from Portland?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know ?”

“Not yet,” she said. “But I will.”

In downtown Portland they shared a fifteen-dollar room at the Jack London Hotel on South Alder. The bathroom was down the hall. They took turns soaking in the huge footed tub, then got into their beds. He fell asleep right away. She lay awake for a while listening to the man next door, whose cough sounded serious, and possibly tubercular.

After breakfast they stopped at a Salvation Army store, where Thom noticed a used paperback of Martin Eden on a table outside. He wanted to buy it because they’d just stayed at the Jack London. “It’s good we didn’t stay at the James Joyce,” she said. “You’re a little young for Finnegans Wake. ”

At the bus station she asked the clerk for two tickets to Bent. “There is such a place, isn’t there? Or it could be Ben.”

“There’s Bend.”

“Yes, Bend,” she said. “Of course, Bend. Is there bus service there?”

“Or there’s North Bend,” the woman said helpfully.

“Are they close to each other?”

“You’d think they would be, but they’re in different directions altogether. Bend is south and east of here and North Bend is on the coast next to Coos Bay, if you know where that is.”

She didn’t, but it didn’t matter. She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them. “Is there bus service to Bend?”

“There is, but we don’t go there. Trailways does, though. You know where their station is?”

She didn’t, but the woman gave her directions and it wasn’t far. Their timing was perfect; there was a bus leaving for Salem and Bend in forty-five minutes.

The ride to Salem took less than an hour on the Interstate. There half the passengers got off and a handful got on, and they headed south and east on Route 22. The road wound and climbed its way through the mountains, and the bus stopped at every little town it came to, and it took all day to get to Bend.

When they arrived her inner vision was perfect. She knew just where to go, and without hesitation she led Thom through the little bus station to the street, where a man with a visored cap was sitting on the fender of a rusted-out Ford and reading a newspaper. He asked if she needed a taxi and when she nodded he took their suitcases and put them in the trunk.

She asked if there was a motel called the Pine Haven. There was, he told her — just south of town on 97. The Pine Haven turned out to be a U-shaped one-story structure of twenty-seven units. It had modest rates, a small pool, cable TV, a 7-Eleven next door and a Wendy’s across the road. It also had a vacancy, and they took it.

“This is neat,” he said. “They even got HBO. I wonder what’s on.”

“Something wonderful, I’m sure.”

“Hope so. That pool looks pretty good. Did I bring a swimming suit?”

“Wear a pair of shorts.”

“Underwear?”

“No, regular shorts. I know I packed your blue shorts, and they’re polysomething, they’ll dry overnight.”

“Won’t it look weird?”

“Do you really care?”

He thought it over. “Not a humongous amount,” he decided, and threw himself down on a chair. “We’re here, huh? This is it?”

“We’re here and this is it.”

“We weren’t supposed to go to North Bend instead?”

“No.”

“‘This is the place.’ Isn’t that what Brigham Young said when he saw Salt Lake City?”

“His very words.”

“When was that they told us?”

“I forget. Eighteen-something.”

“No, I mean when was it we were there. Yesterday? No. Wait a minute. We were in Portland last night, yeah, yesterday morning we were in Salt Lake City. ‘This is the place.’ And he wasn’t even going blind.”

“Well, different strokes for different folks.”

“Different visions for different decisions. Hey! Did you hear that?”

“Not bad.”

“‘Different visions for different decisions.’ I like that.”

“Your cleverness is matched only by your modesty, sport.”

“Thanks,” he said. He puffed his cheeks, blew out air, slapped his palms together and then against his thighs to simulate hoofbeats. “Now what?”

“Take a swim, if you feel like it.”

“Yeah, but what I mean is now that we’re here, now what?”

“They’re very close.”

“Who are?”

“Our friends.”

“We’ve got friends coming?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Who are they?”

“Two men. One is taller, with dark hair. The shorter one has a beard.”