Bilocations, Chapter Fifteen: More Mexican Skulduggery!

After that last short chapter about Frank, please enjoy another short chapter about Frank. The deal isn't taking place in "those very small back rooms down in the Chamizal, cigar smoke, self-destructive behavior, windows you could always jump out of." No, the place is getting Civilized, so it's one of "these damned little tearooms were showing up on every block" (644). But the good thing is, it turns out his contact is Stray. They talk about Reef, who used to live here: "he drifted around the sanitariums posint as a rich-kid lung case from back east, workin 'em dayrooms like ridin a circuit. Though he never did get the accent right" (645). But he's gone now, and she has accepted his goneness. Jesse, his son, is apparently a chip off, only two years old and already messing around with dynamite. They grow up so fast!

Outside, Frank and Stray run into "two local reps out from some metropolis of the bad" (646). Not really clear what they're here for, aside from being generic baddies, but it looks like it's going to come to blows until Ewball shows up: "'Well, hi everbody,' a cheerful voice broke in, "whatchy'all doin?' It was Ewball Oust, pretending not to be a cold, bleak-eyed anarchist who'd left all operational doubts miles back in the romantic mists of youth, whenever that was" (648). Damn, Ewball's hardcore now. We need to see more of him to understand his character.

Anyway, that breaks up the potential fight, and the three of them chat. Frank asserts that, in spite of having done in Sloat, he doesn't necessarily want to be known as a killer: "maybe there's kids out there one notch makes 'em a hardcase, but us older gentlemen are not always that eager for a career in firearms activity" (649).

Frank is having dreams about his dad, who is on the other side of a door that he can't get through. Symbolism! Sometimes his family members are there too, but--big surprise--"Lake, she's never there" (650). I mean, we ARE getting pretty far along in this book, and I'm becoming more and more convinced that I was right in my initial assessment, which is that Lake does NOT receive anything approaching a satisfying denouement.

Frank and Stray are not a Thing yet, but the potentiality does arise at the end of the chapter, with her fishing a little and him asserting that "Stray, the first time I saw you, I knew that I'd never see anybody that beautiful again, and I never did, until you want in that li'l doily joint the other day" (651). Not a bad line, really.

But now: BACK TO EUROPE! Please look forward to it!

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