The Heat of the Sun by David Rain Page B

sitting beside me, seemed unamused. He twisted his
hands. During ‘Three Little Maids from School’ he bolted from his seat. I found him in an alley outside, pale and shaking, but when I asked him if he were sick he shook his head almost
angrily and demanded that we find a drink, another drink.
    Ships – two of them, far apart – laboured blackly against the grey horizon. To my relief, Trouble brightened. ‘Guess what the fortune-teller said? I’ll become a gentleman
of great importance and marry an exotic beauty. That would have to be Louise Brooks, wouldn’t it?’
    That evening I was meeting ’Gustus Le Vol at Benedict’s, a Village diner much favoured among Aunt Toolie’s crowd. I had been surprised to hear from Le Vol;
since leaving Blaze he had been out west and had written to me seldom. I wondered if we still had anything in common.
    It was a Friday, and Benedict’s – ‘Eggs’, as we called it – was crowded: the usual mixture of college students, writers, artists, and general riffraff, eager for
their steak or eggs or goulash washed down with bitter coffee, before they jangled out into the night, ready for pleasures of a less innocent kind.
    A hand waved to me from a rickety table. Le Vol was hemmed in on all sides. The editorial committee from a magazine called Explosion! was meeting close by, arguing over its latest
manifesto; at the next table, a bushy-bearded mesmerist leaned forward lasciviously, caressing the hand of a fey-looking girl; behind them, a party of tarts caroused so loudly that one suspected
their coffee had been supplemented with the contents of an illicit flask.
    Le Vol stood and shook my hand. He had barely changed. Le Vol as a man was Le Vol as a boy, only more so: coily red hair coilier and redder, long limbs longer, frayed cuffs more frayed.
    He asked me if we couldn’t go somewhere else. ‘I was hoping for a quiet talk.’
    ‘We will. First, eat! I’m starving, aren’t you?’
    ‘New York City’s a bit much for me, I suppose. Too big. Too crowded.’
    ‘Where is it you’ve been – Wisconsin, Wyoming?’
    A waiter plunked down dog-eared menus. Le Vol, packing his pipe, barely glanced at his; I knew what I wanted already and he said impatiently that he would have the same. ‘The thing
is’ – he rushed on – ‘I met Morrison Reeves in Cody. Can you believe it?’
    I had no idea who he meant.
    ‘What Reeves taught me, it’s amazing! He’s been working on a big project for years, documenting conditions of life and labour throughout the western states. Men laying
railroads. Men working land. Men building dams. And I was his assistant – me!’ cried Le Vol. ‘What Reeves doesn’t know about pictures, it’s not worth
knowing.’
    Reeves? Now I remembered: the socialist photographer. A magazine I wrote for had reviewed one of his exhibitions a few months before. Excitedly Le Vol reached into a satchel, drew out a manila
folder, and fanned gleaming black-and-white eight-by-tens across the table. I glimpsed stubbled, ugly faces, pickaxes swinging, dirt roads fading into long perspectives.
    He lit his pipe. ‘How you can live in this rabbit warren, I don’t know. Life out west’s hard, but it’s real.’ He riffled through the pictures, showing me a forest,
a lake, a mountain range. ‘And the space! Wind in your hair. Pastures rolling for ever. The smell of pines, thick and resinous. There’s a world out there, Sharpless. It’s big.
It’s frightening. But beautiful too.’
    I praised the pictures, and meant it. ‘Reeves is really something.’
    ‘Reeves?’ said Le Vol. ‘These are mine.’
    His eyes grew bigger and he leaned across the table. ‘Reeves gave me an introduction to his publishers. That’s where I’ve just been. They want me to do my own book, can you
believe it? The Wild West Today – oh, it’ll be wonderful, the things to see, the places to go! I’ve an old Model T back in Buffalo. That’ll be my covered wagon.
I’ll