Recessional: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

front seemed becalmed. “I’m glad to see that,” Zorn said. “I planned to leave Chicago this afternoon. Have my little trailer packed.”
    “To drive where?”
    “Wherever you sent me.”
    “You knew I’d hire you?”
    “Yes. I have a great deal to offer you, Mr. Taggart.” Again, that three-step process: a smile, a chuckle, a laugh: “But I never dreamed I was to be a doctor without a medical kit,” he added ruefully.
    “The lawyers made that decision for you. When I learned of your plight I determined to use you at your maximum capacity. Besides, at the Palms you’ll have little use for your obstetrical skills. Average age of our women guests, seventy-two.” When Andy laughed, Taggart asked: “Are you starting your drive south now? On these icy roads?”
    “Look. Traffic’s resumed. On the main highways I’ll be using, the sleet will be gone by one o’clock because the big trucks will melt it off. A doctor like me who drives a lot does appreciate those big trucks that clear the way for us.”
    He intended leaving at this point, but Taggart detained him a fewmore minutes, going back to the alcove, where he picked up the three blocks. Returning with them he said: “Your job will be to keep these three properly in the air.” And as he tossed aloft first one block then another he said: “Retirement, Assisted Living, Extended. Keep them in balance and always heading up,” and with that he juggled the blocks adeptly, keeping them all in the air at the same time while Andy promised from the elevator: “I’ll try.”
    —
    When Andy returned to the miserable hotel to which he had moved after the closing of his medical practice and the settlement of his divorce, he went to the desk, closed out his account and said good-bye to the kindly proprietress, who had looked after him. He then went out into the parking lot to check for the third time the condition of the intricate coupling that would hitch his rented trailer to his sedan, one of the few things left him after his divorce. As meticulous in such mechanical matters as he had been in his medical practice, where he left nothing to sudden unprepared decisions, he kicked each of the six tires that must carry him to Florida and concluded that they were properly inflated: On icy roads it’s better to be just a little soft. Gives better traction.
    Taking his place in the driver’s seat, he announced aloud: “Here we go.” Gingerly he eased his tandem out of the icy parking lot and onto wide Jackson Boulevard, where traffic had already cleared off most of the sleet. He drove cautiously eastward to Lake Shore Drive, which would also be fairly clear of ice, and as he was about to turn right into its growling traffic he had a moment of exhilaration comparable to those he had known as a boy when starting an important trip: “How appropriate! My map shows that the moment I get my wheels on old Route 41 I stay on it and never turn left or right, straight to Tampa and my new home. Route 41, here I come! Be good to me.”
    The plan he had worked out hastily when he learned that he would be working in Florida required him to make Evansville, Indiana, this first night. It would be a drive of nearly three hundred miles, but since his days in high school he had been accustomed to covering five or six hundred miles a day and doing it alone if other young men in Denver had not been free to go along and share the driving. In those exciting days when he was fanning out to places like Seattle, Los Angeles and Chicago, if he did have to drive alone he did so untilhe felt the first signs of fatigue. He would then pull off to the side of the highway, lock all doors and roll up all the windows except for a little crack up front, and sleep crammed sideways for a couple of hours, awaking with such renewed energy that he tore along the next portion of his trip. He had formed the habit of using a motel only on the third night, when he judged that his body deserved total relaxation