Dorothy was more optimistic. “In a few years Mount Rushmore will be finished,” she reasoned. “There will be a lot more traffic and business.”

She was half right. Every year the traffic that passed by Wall increased, but their business didn’t. Day after day the couple sat on the porch of their store and watched the cars drive by—few of them stopping in the dusty town.

Then, one day, Dorothy had an epiphany. Being in the middle of nowhere meant that all those people passing them by had been driving a long time across the hot, desolate prairie. “They’re thirsty,” Dorothy said. “They want water. Ice-cold water. And we’ve got plenty of ice and plenty of water.”

The next day, Ted painted several signs offering FREE ICE WATER. Then, following the model of the famous Burma Shave highway signs, he planted his signs every mile or so leading to their store. By the time he got back to their drugstore, people had already begun stopping for free ice water and Dorothy was running around like crazy trying to keep up with their other purchases.

Today, the world-famous drugstore draws millions of visitors a year, up to twenty thousand visitors a day. Their advertising signs, like the one I’d just seen, were smaller than conventional billboards, but what they lacked in size they made up for in frequency, with appeals designed to reach everyone.

From the moment I saw that first sign, there was always a sign in view.

Get a Milkshake. Wall Drug

Get a Rootbeer. Wall Drug

Pretty Near. Wall Drug

Free Coffee & Donuts for Vietnam Vets. Wall Drug

Still a slave to an old advertising habit of mine, I took out my journal and began writing down the slogans. When I started my recording, I had already passed four signs and I was still more than forty miles from Wall.

By evening I had put in around nineteen miles through vast stretches of nothing but plains, fields, and Wall Drug signage. The last of the day’s light was beginning to fade, and I was looking for a place to camp when a car pulled up about fifty feet behind me. The door opened and Pamela got out. She thanked the driver, then shut the door.

“Alan,” she said.

Unbelievable, I thought. She’s the Energizer Bunny of stalkers.

I postponed my plan to camp and continued to walk. Pamela followed. I walked perhaps another five miles until there was no sign of her—or anything else—except a lot of nothing and the Wall Drug signs. It was a warm night and I rolled out my pad and sleeping bag under a freeway overpass. I wondered how Pamela was planning to spend the night.