Chapters (60)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Personae
- I: Early Days
- One. Control
- Two. Doubt
- Three. Fate
- Four. Same
- Five. Fine Arts
- Six. In Loco Parentis
- Seven. Settling
- Eight. Neighbors
- Nine. Prospects
- Ten. The Lucky
- Eleven. Instruction
- Twelve. Same
- Thirteen. This Is a Pipe
- Fourteen. This Is Not a Pipe
- Fifteen. The Reason
- Sixteen. That Person
- Seventeen. Predictably
- II: Writing Teacher
- Eighteen. Early Poems
- Nineteen. Motivation
- Twenty. Allegory
- Twenty-One. Grief
- Twenty-Two. A Portrait
- Twenty-Three. Veils
- Twenty-Four. Soft Power
- Twenty-Five. Lists
- Twenty-Six. A Break
- Twenty-Seven. Elsewhere
- Twenty-Eight. Custom
- Twenty-Nine. Parity
- Thirty. Fortune
- III: Volta
- Thirty-One. Images
- Thirty-Two. A Very Interesting Young Man
- Thirty-Three. Letters
- Thirty-Four. We Prefer to See Ourselves Living
- Thirty-Five. Love
- Thirty-Six. The Iceberg
- IV: Your Best Reader
- Thirty-Seven. A Novelist
- Thirty-Eight. In Advance of the Broken Arm
- Thirty-Nine. Their Penultimate Encounter
- Forty. Détente
- Forty-One. Worlds
- Forty-Two. Recognition
- Forty-Three. Persistence
- Forty-Four. And Then
- Forty-Five. Mingling
- Forty-Six. You
- Forty-Seven. Persona
- Forty-Eight. Est et Non
- Forty-Nine. The Author
- Epilogue
- Afterword: The Libertine
- Acknowledgments
- About the Authors
Somehow the wind is also—or, rather—emerging, originating from this being. The being becomes bigger and bigger. Harry can make out details of her form. She is a monkey or a cat, he thinks, but covered in feathers. Harry can see that the feathers are composed of extremely fine frosted glass. She has the bladelike wings of a swan or other large waterfowl, affixed to her back upside down.
“Madame Singe,” hisses the Glass Hat Man.
Now Harry sees the face. He begins to hear trumpets, the sound of hundreds of columns in a hall. Madame Singe’s face is doors, not a face. It is a gate that shudders as the ladder rocks—
Harry wakes with a jerk, soaked in sweat.
He listens, grateful, to a passing car.
Twenty-Eight. Custom
Twenty-Eight
Custom
Harry is trying to believe that it is a good idea. He wants to give Loudermilk a chance to make up for his increasingly numerous and protracted absences.
Loudermilk has appeared out of nowhere with a bottle of scotch. Loudermilk is in the house again and is not even listening to Harry’s concerns.
“We’re going,” Loudermilk says.
“Unwise,” Harry repeats.
“No, no.” Loudermilk shakes his head. “No, no, no! You’re not getting what I’m saying, little one. I wasn’t looking for clarification. I’m pretty much sure it’s been almost a month since you went outdoors. What was the last time? All Hallows’ Eve? I’m telling you, this is not even a fucking conversation. Plus, you accompanying me is still the best strategy of all time. We’re hiding you in plain sight! P.S.: Is that what you are wearing?”
“I am physically wearing these clothes.”
“Again with the attitude, dude. Switch that up and make it some gratitude! I’m asking, Harrison, you want to wear that? You look, seriously, like shit, dude.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Now change.”
Harry says that he does not feel like changing.
Loudermilk takes a lap. He is walking without bending his knees. “It’s always like this with you these days, dude.”
It is 11:00 a.m. on Thanksgiving. There has been a frost. Clouds loom, and an odd, saffron-colored light hovers over the front lawn.
Loudermilk says that perhaps Harry does not comprehend the progress that he, Loudermilk, has recently made with his instructor Don Hillary, his amazing incursion into the man’s good graces. Loudermilk says that he, for all intents and purposes, has everything sewn up for next year as far as stipend money is concerned if Harry would just come make nice with these hamsters. “Please help me seem humble, dude!”
Harry asks to know how exactly his presence will contribute to Loudermilk’s humility.