manner and smiledmlasciviously. Then r she
leaned over and gave me a frank view’ of her chest,
picked a banana and began eating it in a rather
crude manner–” He stopped, stammered–“you’ll
have to excuse me, Doctor, I’m sixty-three, from
another generation, and it’s hard for me to be as
uninhibited about this kind of thing as is fashion-
able.”
I nodded, trying to seem empathetic. “You look
much younger.”
“Good genes.” He smiled. “Anyway, that’s the
story. She made a production out of eating the
banana, smiled at me again and told me it was
delicious. Licked her fingers and ran off down the
road. The encounter unnerved me because even as
she vamped there’d been hatred in her eyes,’ A
strange mixture of sex and hostility. It’s hard to
explain.”
He sipped his tea, then asked, “Has any of this
been relevant ?”
Before I could answer the waitress returned with
the charge slip. Maimon insisted upon leaving the
tip. It was a generous one.
We walked out to the parking lot. The night was
cool and fragrant. He had the springy step of a man
a third his age.
His truck was a long-bed Chevy pickup. Conventional
tires. He took out his keys and asked, “Would
you like to stop by and visit my nursery? l’d like to
show you some of my most fascinating.specimens.”
He seemed eager for companionship. He’d unloaded
a lot of alienation, ‘probably for the first
time. Self-expression can become habit forming.
“It would be my pleasure. Could being seen with
me cause problems for you?”
He smfied and shook his head.
“Last Fheard, Doctor, this was still a free country.
I’m located several miles southeast of town. Up
in the foothills where most of the big groves are.
You’ll follow me, but in case we disconnect I’ll give
you directions. Weql cut under the freeway, ride
parallel with it, and turn right on an unmarked
road–I’ll slow down so you don’t miss it. At the
foot of the mountains there’ll be a left turn onto an
old utility trail. Too narrow for commercial vehicles
and it floods when the rains come. But this
time of year it’s a handy shortcut.;’
He went on for a while before I realized he was
directing me to the back roadI’d seen on the county
map in the sheriff’s office. The one that bypassed
the town. When I’d asked Houten about it he’d said
it was sealed off by the oil company. Perhaps h
considered a utility trail too insignificant to be
thought of as a road. Or maybe he’d lied.
I wondered about it as I got into the Seville.
2O
THE TURNOFF was sudden. The road, apart from
being unmarked, was hardly a road at all. Just a
narrow dirt ribbon, at first glance one furrow of
many that cut through the vast table’ of farmland.
Anyone unfamiliar with ‘the area would have missed
it. But Maimon drove slovly and I followed his
taillights through moonlit fields of strawberries.
Soon the freeway sounds were behind us, the night
hushed and aglitter with moths spiraling up toward
the stars, pressing frantically and hopelessly for
the heat of distant galaxies.
The mountains hovered above us, grim hulking
masses of shadow. Maimon’s truck was old and it
lurched as he shifted into low gear and began the
climb into the foothills. I stayed several car-lengths
behind and trailed him into darkness so dense it
was palpable.
We climbed for miles, finally reaching a plateau.
The road veered sharply to the right. To the left
was a broad mesa surrounded by chain-link fence.
259
otl Jonaoum Kellerman
Pyramidal towers rose from the flatlands, skeletal
and still. The abandoned oilfields. Maimon turned
away from them and resumed the ascent.
The next few miles were groves, unbroken stretches
of trees recognizable as such by the serrated silhouette
of Star-kissed leaves, shiny satin against the
velvet of the sky. Citrus, from the perfume in the
air. Then came a series of homesteads, farmhouses
on one-acre plots shadowed by sycamore and oak.
The few lights that were on blurred as we drove
by.
Maimon’s turn signal went on two hundred feet
before he swung left through an open gate. An