But I know now. As I discovered on Barter Island, they dump it into a sewage lagoon two feet deep, chlorinate the water and drink it. And how do they dispose of general garbage on the North Slope? They don’t; they leave it on the surface, where it becomes the highest and most scenic feature of the landscape.

Beef stroganoff for supper. The Russian influence lingers on in nostalgialoving Alaska.

Loaded with aspirin and more of Jensen’s horse medicine, I retire early to my tent, still not feeling too good. Forgot to bring a towel, forgot the cigars, forgot to bring a book. So I borrow a paperback from Maureen—something called Still Life with Woodpecker? Yes, that appears to be the title. I glance at the blurbs, the summary on the back cover. “You didn’t bring anything for grown-ups?” She has not. “Did anybody?” I ask the group.

Dana offers me a book called The Dancing Wu Li Masters by a Mr. Gary Zukav. Another California-type book. “How about a Gideon’s Bible? Or a dictionary?” Mark offers his ammo-can edition of Merriam-Webster’s. “Already read that one,” I say. I borrow the first two, churlish ungrateful bastard, and skulk off. The wind has died; a number of dancing Wu Li masters follow me into my tent. I slaughter them and bed down with Tom Robbins and Mr. Gary Zukav. Ménage a trois…de poupée…entente…

I was sick for the next two days.

JUNE 27—Morning, so to speak. Mark asks me how I’m feeling. “Great!” I say, lying through the skin of my eyeteeth.

“You sure?”

“For Chrissake, Jensen, I was sleeping in elk pastures when you were wearing Pampers in the sixth grade.”

“We can stay here another day, you know. Lots of time.”

“To hell with that. Down the river! Onward!”

Breakfast goes by in a blur. We load the boats, shove off, glide down the current between walls of turquoise-colored Aufeis. An ice gulch. Horned white sheep, like woolly maggots, crawl upon the distant hillsides. Clouds cover the sun; the Arctic wind comes sweeping up the river. Dana strains at the oars, sweating hard to keep up with Mark while I sit huddled in the bow swaddled in layers of Pendleton and polyester and self-pity. Dana tries to keep the conversational hacky-sack in the air, working manfully to maintain both civility and headway against the wind. “Let me know if you see a GRIZ,” I growl, nodding off. He nods.

Hours pass, along with some gravel bars, a few willow thickets, more walls of ice. This is the kind of thing, I say to myself, that no one actually wants to do. And afterward you’re not even glad you did it. Unlike the infantry, or suicide, or exploratory surgery. I become aware of danger ahead. Trouble: I look up hopefully.

Mark has beached his rubber raft on a most unlikely, rough and difficult spot. Emphatically he signals Dana to bring his boat alongside. “Ready for a fast landing,” Dana says, pulling hard toward shore. I pick the coiled bowline from under my rubber boots. We grate onto the ice and gravel, I stagger out with the rope and hold the boat against the violent tug of the current. Dana jumps out, we heave the boat higher onto the gravel. There is nothing here to tie up to: all hands are summoned to drag both boats out of the river.