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By Root 838 0

their tenacity was for going, not for staying. Once they were out on the trail they fell like flies. Some took a day, two days, others were gone in a matter of hours, and Dr. Rapp never stopped for them. He remained beautifully consistent: he was there to work and he would continue to work. He would not ferry back the weak and the lame. They had chosen to get themselves in and they would simply have to figure the means to get themselves out. People were quick to accept these terms until they themselves were weak. Then they changed their tune entirely, then they said Dr. Rapp was heartless. They couldn’t slander him as a scientist but they said no end of scurrilous things about him as a man. He hadn’t rescued them! He hadn’t been their father and mother! I will tell you, none of that troubled his sleep. If he had made them his responsibility, either by dissuading them from their ambitions or by bailing them out of their folly, the greatest botanist of our time would have been reduced to a babysitter. It would have been an incalculable blow to science, all in the name of saving the stupid.”

The air, ever heavy, now was paralyzed. Milton had slipped his pencil and pad in his pocket without thinking, and Rodrigo had put his pencil down as well. While Dr. Swenson continued to calculate how much food she would need to take back with her, the other three stood breathless and unblinking. Marina felt as if she were trying to remember the answer when there hadn’t been a question posed. They were all waiting. “I don’t think you’ll find me to be nearly that much trouble,” she said finally.

Dr. Swenson, who had been distracted by a small bin of socks, did not look up. “As much trouble as what?”

“The mongrels,” Marina said. “The malingerers.”

“Don’t be so self-referential. I was telling you a story. I wasn’t telling a story about you.”

At that Milton inhaled as abruptly as Nixon at his desk. “There you go,” he said, willing himself to accept the explanation. “How many cans of apricots?”

Dr. Swenson waited a moment, as if making a tally in her head. “A case more than usual,” she said, looking at Marina. It was impossible to know how many apricots a person would eat once they had been removed from civilization.

It was agreed then that Milton would pick Marina up in front of the Hotel Indira at eleven, and despite the heat of that hour she was standing ready at the front of the hotel, tucked beneath the awning with her half-empty bag. She had said goodbye to Tomo, who was more than happy to store her coat and sweaters until she returned. She had not said goodbye to Mr. Fox. This city, so busy when she woke up that morning, was practically empty now. The dogs pressed themselves into doorways beneath thin strips of shade. The cars drove by slowly, as if every driver was trying to decide if he was the one who was supposed to take Marina to the docks. They looked at her carefully and tapped their horns.

When Milton did arrive, Easter was in the passenger seat. When he saw Marina through the open window, he reached both of his arms out to her as if he were hers alone in all the world. There was something brilliant about being recognized, the happiness on his face entirely disproportionate to his knowing her. Marina went to him and took both of his small hands in her hands and he gave her an enthusiastic shake. Milton put a thumb on the boy’s shoulder and pointed to the backseat. Easter immediately flipped backwards, a trick he had been saving.

“Forgive me,” Milton said in a tired voice when she got in the car. He was sitting on a folded towel, his shirt and pants and hair soaked through. Even the small straw hat on the back of his head was wilted and damp. There could have been a rainstorm blocks from here that Marina never saw. He could have fallen in the river.

“Forgive you for what?”

Milton shook his head. “It took us longer to load the boat.” He took out a smaller towel and wiped down his face.

Easter was craning his entire upper body out the window to see as far as he could in every direction: boy as turtle, car as shell. The