taller buildings in a narrow lot the high-rise moguls had somehow overlooked. Inefficient bastards!
A block farther on, the bus overtook him and he got aboard—it would save a minute. Transferring to the N-Judah car at Market, he got a start (and had to sidestep swiftly) when a pallid drunk in a shapeless, dirty pale gray suit (but no shirt) came staggering diagonally from nowhere (and apparently bound for the same place). He thought, “There but for the grace of God, et cetera,” and veered off from those thoughts, as he had at Cal’s from the memories of Daisy’s mortal disease.
In fact, he banished all dark stuff so well from his mind that the creaking car seemed to mount Market and then Duboce in the bright sunlight like the victorious general’s chariot in a Roman triumph. (Should he be painted red and have a slave at his elbow reminding him continuously in a low voice that he was mortal?—a charming fancy!) He swung off at the tunnel’s mouth and climbed dizzying Duboce, breathing deeply. It seemed not quite so steep today, or else he was fresher. (And always easier to climb up than down—if you had wind enough!—the mountaincering experts said.) The neighborhood looked particularly neat and friendly.
At the top a young couple hand in hand (lovers, quite obviously) were entering the dappling shades and green glooms of Buena Vista Park. Why had the place seemed so sinister yesterday? Some other day he’d follow in their path to the park’s pleasantly wooded summit and men stroll leisurely down the other side into the festive Haight, that overrated menace! With Cal and perhaps the others—the picnic Saul’d suggested.
But today his was another voyage—he had other business. Pressing business, too. He glanced at his wristwatch and stepped along smartly, barely pausing for the fine view of the Heights jaggedy crest from the top of Park Hill. Soon he was going through the little gate in the high wire fence and across the green field back of the brown-sloped Heights with their rocky crown. To his right, two little girls were supervising a sort of dolls’ tea party on the grass. Why, they were the girls he’d seen running yesterday. And just beyond them their Saint Bernard was stretched out beside a young woman in faded blue denim, who was kneading his loose, thickly furred mane as she combed her own long blonde hair.
While to the left, two Dobermans—the same two, by God!—were stretched out and yawning beside another young couple lying close together though not embracing. As Franz smiled at them, the man smiled back and waved a casual greeting. It really was the poet’s cliche, “an idyllic scene.” Nothing at all like yesterday. Now Cal’s suggestion about the dark psionic powers of little girls seemed quite overwrought, even if charming.
He would have lingered, but time was wasting. Got to go to Taffy’s house, he thought with a chuckle. He mounted the ragged, gravelly slope—it wasn’t all mat steep!—with just one breather. Over his shoulder the TV tower stood tall, her colors bright, as fresh and gussied-up and elegant as a brand new whore (Your pardon, Goddess). He felt fey.
When he got to the corona, he noticed something he hadn’t yesterday. Several of the rock surfaces—at least on his side—had been scrawled on at past times with dark and pale and various colored paints from spray cans, most of it rather weathered now. There weren’t so many names and dates as simple figures. Lopsided five- and six-pointed stars, a sunburst, crescents, triangles and squares. And there a rather modest phallus with a sign beside it like two parentheses joined—yoni as well as lingam. He thought of—of all things!—de Castries’s Grand Cipher. Yes, he noted with a grin, there were symbols here that could be taken as astronom-and/or astrological. Those circles with crosses and arrows—Venus and Mars. While that horned disk might be Taurus.
You certainly have odd tastes in interior decoration,
A block farther on, the bus overtook him and he got aboard—it would save a minute. Transferring to the N-Judah car at Market, he got a start (and had to sidestep swiftly) when a pallid drunk in a shapeless, dirty pale gray suit (but no shirt) came staggering diagonally from nowhere (and apparently bound for the same place). He thought, “There but for the grace of God, et cetera,” and veered off from those thoughts, as he had at Cal’s from the memories of Daisy’s mortal disease.
In fact, he banished all dark stuff so well from his mind that the creaking car seemed to mount Market and then Duboce in the bright sunlight like the victorious general’s chariot in a Roman triumph. (Should he be painted red and have a slave at his elbow reminding him continuously in a low voice that he was mortal?—a charming fancy!) He swung off at the tunnel’s mouth and climbed dizzying Duboce, breathing deeply. It seemed not quite so steep today, or else he was fresher. (And always easier to climb up than down—if you had wind enough!—the mountaincering experts said.) The neighborhood looked particularly neat and friendly.
At the top a young couple hand in hand (lovers, quite obviously) were entering the dappling shades and green glooms of Buena Vista Park. Why had the place seemed so sinister yesterday? Some other day he’d follow in their path to the park’s pleasantly wooded summit and men stroll leisurely down the other side into the festive Haight, that overrated menace! With Cal and perhaps the others—the picnic Saul’d suggested.
But today his was another voyage—he had other business. Pressing business, too. He glanced at his wristwatch and stepped along smartly, barely pausing for the fine view of the Heights jaggedy crest from the top of Park Hill. Soon he was going through the little gate in the high wire fence and across the green field back of the brown-sloped Heights with their rocky crown. To his right, two little girls were supervising a sort of dolls’ tea party on the grass. Why, they were the girls he’d seen running yesterday. And just beyond them their Saint Bernard was stretched out beside a young woman in faded blue denim, who was kneading his loose, thickly furred mane as she combed her own long blonde hair.
While to the left, two Dobermans—the same two, by God!—were stretched out and yawning beside another young couple lying close together though not embracing. As Franz smiled at them, the man smiled back and waved a casual greeting. It really was the poet’s cliche, “an idyllic scene.” Nothing at all like yesterday. Now Cal’s suggestion about the dark psionic powers of little girls seemed quite overwrought, even if charming.
He would have lingered, but time was wasting. Got to go to Taffy’s house, he thought with a chuckle. He mounted the ragged, gravelly slope—it wasn’t all mat steep!—with just one breather. Over his shoulder the TV tower stood tall, her colors bright, as fresh and gussied-up and elegant as a brand new whore (Your pardon, Goddess). He felt fey.
When he got to the corona, he noticed something he hadn’t yesterday. Several of the rock surfaces—at least on his side—had been scrawled on at past times with dark and pale and various colored paints from spray cans, most of it rather weathered now. There weren’t so many names and dates as simple figures. Lopsided five- and six-pointed stars, a sunburst, crescents, triangles and squares. And there a rather modest phallus with a sign beside it like two parentheses joined—yoni as well as lingam. He thought of—of all things!—de Castries’s Grand Cipher. Yes, he noted with a grin, there were symbols here that could be taken as astronom-and/or astrological. Those circles with crosses and arrows—Venus and Mars. While that horned disk might be Taurus.
You certainly have odd tastes in interior decoration,
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