“Please tell me you didn’t use the microwave,” Hudson said.

“Relax,” said Marty. “It’s just a can of soup.”

“Can!” Hudson exclaimed. “As in metal? Are you—”

“I’ll call you in a few days,” said Marty, and hung up.

Hudson started to call back, then put the phone down. Visions of the house going up in flames filled his thoughts. He couldn’t believe Marty would do something so stupid. Yes I can, he corrected himself. The man doesn’t even know you’re supposed to add water. But he didn’t call back.

Instead, he looked at his own dinner. He’d picked up Chinese from a restaurant nearby. Now the cartons sat open before him on the table on the sunporch. It was a warm night, still very much light, and the room retained a feeling of summer, as if it had soaked into the very fabric of the couch. Hudson took up a fork, plunged it into the Schezuan pork, and took a bite.

It had been a good day, he thought. His initial disappointment in the state of Cannery Row had dissipated somewhat, mostly due to his meeting with Ben Ransome. Knowing that someone else lamented the effects wrought by time and progress made him feel that he at least had company in his desire to experience life as it was. And if Ben could get him into Ed Ricketts’s lab, that would be a real thrill.

He would try not to get his hopes up. In his experience, people often made promises but seldom came through. He’d given Ben his number, and that was really all he could do. Still, he hoped he would call, if only because it would be nice to talk to him again.

Switching from the pork to the tangy slickness of sweet and sour chicken, he turned over the pages of the manuscript that he’d spread out on the table. He’d been making notes—again—and wanted to compare a later section to the one concerning Tom’s near-battle at the bar.

It seemed to Charlie, walking home, that the Row was something of a dream. Whenever he thought he understood it, it changed itself, becoming a new mystery. Some days he woke up thinking that he knew who he was, and where he was going. But as soon as he stepped outside, he would find himself once again in an unfamiliar landscape. It made his head hurt, trying to figure it out. So he’d mostly stopped trying.