Kyrie slept in the hotel room that night. The rest of us settled down on our cots inside the camper. Just before I went to sleep, I imagined myself fighting with Brand. We hit each other dozens of times. Then something else moved across my mind, possessions, things in my home, shapes of objects un-fondled of late, the Olivetti Lettera 32, the Nikon F, and then girls in purple stockings rolling across a paper plain, and James Joyce and Antonioni and Samuel Beckett sitting in my living room, six legs crossed at the ankles, Tana Elkbridge naked on Riverside Drive while her husband read Business Week at thirty thousand feet, and Jennifer naked in the West Eighties, something touching about her hipbones, and Meredith naked in Gramercy Park, and Sullivan naked in the bath. Then we were fighting again. I backed away from a long right and came back with a left to the cheekbone and a short straight right square on the point of the chin. Brand went to his knees and hung there, breathing blood. I kicked him in the stomach and went to sleep.

We had breakfast in a diner the next morning. Men in short-sleeve shirts came and went. I formed my hand into a claw. Brand sat at the table laughing. Then Sullivan began to laugh. People at the counter turned to look at them. Brand was slumped over the table, arms folded, and his head rocked as he laughed. Sullivan sat rigidly, facing Brand, laughing out over his head. I formed both hands into claws and bobbed up and down in the chair. Lips parted slightly, curling down at the corners, I bared my lower set of teeth and dug them into my upper lip. I knew they were not laughing at me and yet I continued to make ghoulish faces and claw at the air. I did not like to be left out. I did not know why they were laughing and so I pretended they were laughing at me. Pike began to laugh. I turned toward the people at the counter and clawed at their backs. Kyrie was laughing now. The waitress came with our food and Brand looked up at her and nearly fell off the chair howling. My claws became hands again. Kyrie pointed at his scrambled eggs and this set them off on a fresh wave of laughter. The waitress smiled as she stood by the table writing out the check. Brand pointed at her pencil. She looked at it and began to laugh. Everything was funny. It was a clear day in spring and suddenly everything was funny. I went to the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror.

They laughed all through breakfast. Somebody would point to something and they'd all laugh. The ketchup bottle was hilarious. Brand continually took off his glasses and wiped them with a napkin. His was the universal face of alumni bulletins. Assistant plant manager of the general foam division, Tenneco Chemicals, East Rutherford, N.J. Training and education officer, Air University's Warfare Systems School, Maxwell AFB, Ala. Brand the junior partner. The young Republican. He was about an inch taller than I was. He weighed 210 or so. His eyes were panes of muddy glass, gray and very distant. Now he stood and blessed the restaurant, his face deadpan again, his right hand making crosses over the heads of the assembled men and women. I finished breakfast and left a twenty-dollar bill on the table. Pike followed me out. We stood on the sidewalk in front of the hotel. It was called Ames House, I noticed.

"See if you can answer this," Pike said. "Think about it as long as you want before answering. Here it is. Open up the stomach of a killer whale and roughly how many seals and porpoises are you likely to find?"

"You'd better let me think about it."

"Two dozen," he said.

Checkout time was noon. I went up to the room, called downstairs and asked the voice to get the office in New York. When the switchboard girl at the network came on, I asked to speak with David Bell. It was an odd feeling. Binky answered.

"Miss me?" I said.

"Who's this?"

"The person you admire most in the whole world."

"Stop fooling around."

"Dave Bell's my name; cinematography's my game."

"David, how are you?"

"Miss rne?"

"Yes, it's so boring around here."

"It's boring out here too."

"Where are you?" she said.

"Fifty-third and Lex."

"Guess what? There's a rumor going around that Grove Palmer is a fag. Jody told me Sid Slote ran into him accidentally in Bermuda and he was hanging around with some very swishy types."

"It figures. I always wondered about that guy."

"Guess what else?"

"Go ahead."

"I was waiting for you to guess. Harris Hodge? The first replacement Weede hired after the mass rape and execution? He showed up yesterday."

"What's he look like?"

"He's a very neat guy, David. A terrific sense of humor. And he's really cute-looking. Hallie thinks he looks like Paul Newman, only younger."

"How much younger? I want to know his exact age."

"I haven't been able to find out yet."

"If you got off your ass once in a while."

"Don't get angry."

"What else?" I said.

"Trotsky struck again."

"When?"

"Two days ago."

"Great, great. Whose name was signed to the memo? Wait, I want to guess."

"Like forget it," she said.

"I figure we were about due for a Giambattista Vico."

"Forget it, sweetie."

"I was thinking about Beckett last night. Was it Beckett?"

"You'll never guess so I may as well tell you. It's a three-name person. Otto Durer Obenwahr."

"Trotsky really pulled one out of the hat this time."

"I'll say. Everybody's trying to figure out who Otto Durer Obenwahr is. Ed Watchold sent his secretary to the library this morning. The place is in a minor uproar."

"What does it say? What's the quote?"

"I saved it for you. Ready? Fools! Fools! To square the circle is child's play. It is the reverse which leads to the beatific vision."

"Interesting," I said.

"What do you think it means?"

"Very interesting."

"Thanks a lot."

"Listen, find out everything you can about this bastard Harris Hodge. But especially how old he is."

"Okay."

"Does Weede like him?"

"They're having lunch tomorrow."

"Find out if Weede likes him. I'll call you again somewhere between here and the Navahos."

"Okay. Have a good time."

"So long, Bink."

"David, I almost forgot."

"Yes?"

"Ted Warburton had to be rushed to the hospital."

"When was this?"

"Yesterday afternoon. He collapsed at his desk."

"Goodbye," I said.

All five of us sat in the camper all afternoon. Pike drank Old Crow from a paper cup and made occasional growling sounds. Ahead were the Rockies, dripping sweat, paws scraping the earth, set to pounce, his keeper the lion. Brand was lost behind his glasses, traveling back, I thought, to some timeless room at the center of his being, bungled memories of four walls and the gray medicine man. Kyrie bit the knuckle of his right thumb. Somebody parking a car hit our rear bumper lightly and we nodded. I was wearing my Comanche moccasins, a pair of green wide-wale cords with a garrison belt, and a black sport shirt.

"Sully, who's Otto Durer Obenwahr?"

"Expert on liquid oxygen and high altitude drogue chutes."

"Seriously, ever hear of him?"

She seemed to be trying to tear circles out of the newspaper she was reading. She tore circles and handed them to Kyrie. He was sitting on the floor. He handed the circles up to Brand.

"I'm going for a walk," I said.

"Bring back some Mars Bars," Brand said.

"You owe me change of twenty," I said. "I left a twenty on the table."

"Don't look at me, Davy. I didn't pay the check."

"I didn't pay it," Kyrie said. "Don't look at me."

"Somebody owes me change of twenty."

"I left when you left," Pike said.

"Somebody owes me change. I've been paying for everything around here."

"Bring back some jujubes," Kyrie said.