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By Root 342 0

say something very quietly to Lang and point and, there, in absolutely impenetrable foliage or hidden in the reeds near the riverbank was just the bird we had said to Lang the day before we especially wanted to look at. Every morning, Lang and he took us out on these nature trips or to visit another caboclo village, which was more primitive, on an island nearby, and once to a village that was pure Indian and pure Lévi-Strauss. That was probably the most remarkable experience we had during our stay. A place of complete serenity: huts on stilts, women grinding food in wooden bowls, naked children dozing in the dust under the huts, and then the arrival of the men in canoes filled to the rim with fish. The women met them at the edge of the river, and the men threw them the catch, still jumping. They didn’t have to ask for the fish—we couldn’t see any connection between the givers and the takers. It was distributed like manna. Then, at night, Lang would take us out to look at alligators. We would drift near the bank. Suddenly, he would turn on his flashlight and there would be those burning red eyes. The whole bank seemed to come alive!

Remember when the Indian boy caught one?

Yes, that was quite a trick. Lang put the boy on shore, and we pushed off and drifted a little. Then the boy gave a sort of whistle, Lang turned on his lamp, and in the beam we saw the boy on the bank holding up an alligator by the gills. He had crept up on him from behind. Why the other alligators didn’t eat him is beyond me. We never understood it, because Lang showed us they can move really fast on land. It’s a weird, terrifying kind of sprint.

It all sounds quite splendid, but do you think it’s for me? Alone? I have never had a powerful interest in nature—bird-watching or anything like it.

This is different. It’s not like sneaking around in the brambles surrounded by Yalies with binoculars and skin cancer on their noses. Nature is quite simply there: overpoweringly beautiful and omnipresent. You are in it. Besides, we were there in the bad season, when there really are no flowers, but you will have amazing orchids in the trees, other blossoms covering the water as far as you can see. But if you want company, come to Venice with us. We would really like that.

Venice is out of the question. Let me think about the island.

Think fast. I would hate to find it had been reserved for someone else.

The woman in felt slippers served coffee in the library—that is, served it to Schmidt. Both Blackmans drank chamomile and both sat on the sofa facing the fire, which was fit to roast an ox. Felt Slippers must have added logs to it during dinner. The room was so warm that Schmidt didn’t worry about blocking the fireplace. He stood again with his back to the fire.

This stuff isn’t decaffeinated? he asked.

No, we would have warned you.

Then I would like some more.

If he couldn’t sleep, he would take a pill. It was nice of Gil to remember his addiction to coffee. He should reciprocate by drinking an unreasonable amount of it. With a new and insistent feeling of benevolence, Schmidt surveyed the neat bookshelves, the Fairfield Porter watercolor of Gil done in the garden behind the house where Gil had lived when he was still married to Ann, the predictable but sound arrangement of the furniture, and Gil and Elaine themselves. Couldn’t consolation be drawn from this scene, regardless of his actual distance from it? Keep envy at bay. The small aches in his neck and shoulders, and also in his left ankle, which, twisted so often, became sore as soon as the cold weather began, were melting away. He eyed the bottles on the silver tray on the coffee table and the snifters and was about to ask for a brandy when he realized that neither Blackman had spoken for some minutes. That must mean they thought the evening should end.

Beautiful Elaine, he said. Thank you! I had better return to my Schloss.

Forgive me. I know my eyes are closing. It must be Gil’s all-purpose Merlot.

Nonsense! It’s the bliss of having given your old pal the first home-cooked meal he has had in