Chapter 23 Section 21

Last night, the heavy snow accompanied me to sleep, and the air was fresh and quiet in the early morning.There was something stern and bleak about the January morning light, tough and confident.The boots creaked as they trampled on the snow, and the plane drew white wakes high in the sky.Climate matters, although I didn't realize it at first. I turned into the main street where my house was located, past people spraying white gas and plowing snow with shovels on the driveway.A squirrel glides down a branch—the continuity of this motion makes it appear as if it has its own natural laws, different from those we now believe.When I was halfway down the block, I looked up to see Heinrich squatting on the ledge outside the attic window of his home.He's wearing his camouflage uniform and cap, and the outfit has a complicated meaning to him—a fourteen-year-old boy trying desperately to grow up without being noticed—and it's a secret we all know.He looked east with his binoculars.

I walked around the house and went back to the kitchen.The dishwasher and dryer in the foyer work well.I could hear Babette talking on the phone. She was on the phone with her father.Guilt and worry are mixed with impatience.I stood behind her and put my cold hands on her cheeks—a little naughty thing I love to do.She hung up the phone. "Why did he go up on the roof?" "Heinrich? Something happened to the train yard," she said. "It was just reported on the radio." "Should I call him down?" "why?" "He's going to fall." "Don't say that to him."

"why not?" "He'll think you underestimated him." "He's squatting on an outside ledge," I said. "I must be doing something." "The more anxious you are, the closer he'll be to the edge of the roof." "I know, but I still have to get him off the roof." "Coax him back into the room," she said. "Be considerate and caring. Let him talk about himself, without making rash moves." When I went up to the attic he was in the room, standing by the open window, still looking through the binoculars.There is litter everywhere, and there is something suffocating and unsettling in the midst of exposed beams and fiberglass insulation.

"What happened?" "The radio said a tanker was off the rails. But I don't think it came off the rails where we could see it. I think it got knocked out of a hole by something. There's smoke over there now, and I don't like that son." "What does it look like?" He gave me the binoculars and took a step aside.I hadn't climbed onto the outer ledge of the roof so I couldn't see the train yard and the derailed tanker.However, the smoke was clearly visible, and a thick, irregularly shaped black mass hung in the air on the other side of the river.

"Did you see the fire truck?" "There are fire trucks all over the place," he said, "but I don't think they're very close together. It must be too poisonous, or explosive, or both." "It's not going to float here." "How do you know?" "It just won't. Now the question is, you shouldn't be standing on the icy roof ledge anymore, which worries Babe." "You think that if you tell me it worries Babe, I'll feel guilty for not doing it. But if you tell me you're worried about it, I'll do it anyway."

"Close the window," I told him. We went downstairs to the kitchen together.Steffi was sifting through the red and green mail, looking for coupons, lotteries, and contests.Today is the last day of school holiday.Hill Academy resumed classes a week later.I sent Heinrich to sweep the snow off the sidewalk.I watched him stand outside motionless, with his head turned slightly, looking thoughtful.It took me a while to realize that he was listening to sirens on the other side of the river. An hour later he was back in the attic again, but this time with the radio and road maps.I climbed the narrow stairs and borrowed a telescope from him to observe again.The puff of smoke was still there, a little bigger than before, in fact it was now a big puff, maybe darker, going straight up into the sky.

"They call it a plume on the radio," he said, "but it's not a plume." "What is it?" "Like something shapeless and growing. Something emitting thick black smoke. Why do they call it a plume?" "Airtime is precious, and they can't go out of their way to describe it. Did they say what kind of chemical it was?" "It's called Neodin Derivatives or Neodin-D. We saw it in a school movie about toxic waste. And rats that were videotaped." "What will it do?" "That movie couldn't be sure what it did to humans. The movie was mostly about rats growing deadly lumps."

"That's what the movies say. What's the radio saying?" "At first they said it caused itching and sweaty palms. But now they say it's nausea, vomiting and wheezing." "We're talking about people feeling sick, not rats." "Not a mouse," he said. I returned the binoculars to him. "It's not going to come here." "How do you know?" he said. "I just know. It's totally inactive and stationary today. Every year when it's windy at this time, it blows that way instead of this way." "What if the wind blows here?"

"Will not." "Just this one time." "No. Why is that?" He paused, then said flatly, "They just closed some interstates." "Of course they would think of doing that." "why?" "That's what they do. Sensible precaution. It's a way to facilitate things like public transport. There are a lot of reasons to do it, but none of it has anything to do with the wind or the direction of the wind." Babette's head appears on the landing.She said a neighbor told her the tanker leaked 35,000 gallons.People are being told to leave the area.A plume of smoke was seen over the spill site.She also said girls were complaining of sweaty palms.

"There's a way to get over it," Heinrich told her. "Tell them they should vomit." A helicopter flew towards the scene of the accident.The voice on the radio said, "For a limited time only, the optional capacity hard drive." Babette's head receded and disappeared.I watched Heinrich tape the road map to two posts.Then, I went downstairs to the kitchen to write a check to pay the bill.At this time, I realized that there were some colored light spots moving rapidly around to the right and behind me. Steffi said, "Can you see the plume of smoke from the attic window?"

"That's not a plume of smoke." "But do we have to leave the house?" "Of course not." "How do you know?" "I just know it." "Remember that time why we couldn't go to school?" "That's indoors. That's outdoors." We heard the sirens go off.I watched Steffi's lips make a oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh.When she saw me watching her, she smiled cunningly, as if gently awakened from some absent-minded joy. Denise came in, running her hands over her jeans. "They're using snow blowers to spray stuff on the spill," she said. "What kind of thing?" "I don't know, but it's supposed to be used to render the spill harmless, which doesn't explain what they're doing with that plume." "They're trying to keep it from getting bigger," I said. "When are we going to eat?" "I can't say for sure, but if it gets any bigger, it'll get here with or without the wind." "It's not going to get here," I said. "How do you know?" "Because it won't." She looked at the palms of her hands and went upstairs.The phone rang, and Babette walked into the kitchen and picked up the receiver.She looked at me while listening to the phone.I wrote two checks, and in between I glanced up at intervals to see if she was still looking at me.She seemed to be trying to make sense of what she was hearing on the phone from the look on my face.I pursed my lips in a look I knew she hated. "That's the Stoffers," she said. "They called the weather center directly outside Glass. They stopped calling it a plume." "What do they call it now?" "A rolling cloud of black smoke." "It's a more accurate name, and it shows they're doing everything they can to fix the problem. That's nice." "Also," she said, "some kind of air mass is expected to be moving here from Canada." "There's always an air mass moving here from Canada." "That's true," she said. "There must be nothing new about it. Since Canada is to the north, if the rolling smoke were blowing due south, it would be quite a distance away from us." "When do we have dinner?" I said. We heard the siren again, this time it was a different signal, louder—not a police car, a fire engine, an ambulance.I understood that it was an air raid siren, and it seemed to be coming from a small market town called Sawhand to the northeast. Steffi washed her hands in the kitchen sink and went upstairs.Babette started to get something from the refrigerator.I grabbed the inside of her thigh as she walked across the table.Holding a box of frozen corn in her hand, she twisted gracefully. "Maybe we should have paid more attention to that rolling cloud of smoke," she said. "We insisted it was going to be okay because of the kids. We didn't want to scare them." "Nothing is going to happen." "I know nothing is going to happen, you know nothing is going to happen. But, at some level we should always think about it, just in case." “These things happen in exposed areas where the poor live. Societies are structured in a particular way, and as a result the poor and the uneducated are the main victims of natural and man-made disasters. Dwellers in low-lying areas suffer from floods. Squatter dwellers suffer Hurricanes and tornadoes. I'm a college professor. Have you ever seen a college professor rowing a boat down the street he lives on in a flood scene on TV? We live in a nice, neat little town There's an oddly named college nearby. These things don't happen in places like Blacksmiths." She's sitting on my lap now, and the desk is cluttered with checks, bills, contest forms, and coupons. "Why do you have dinner so early?" she whispered to me provocatively. "I didn't have lunch." "Shall I make some fried spicy chicken?" "great." "Where's Wilder?" she said inarticulately.I ran my hands over her breasts as I tried to unbutton her bra with my teeth through her blouse. "I don't know. Maybe Murray stole him." "I ironed your pajamas," she said. "Great, great." "Did you pay your phone bill?" "Can't find the bill." Now our voices were indistinct.Her arms were folded over mine so I could just read the directions on the corn-on-the-cob box in her left hand. "Let's think about that billowing smoke. Just for a second, okay? It could be dangerous." "What's in the tanker is dangerous. But it's long-term and all we have to do is avoid it." "We must take this matter to heart." She said, standing up, and repeatedly knocked an ice tray on the edge of the sink, and the ice cubes were knocked out in twos and threes. I pouted at her.Then I climbed up to the attic again.Wilder was with Heinrich, who gave me a quick, reproachful glance. "They don't call it a plume anymore." He said that without looking at me, as if to save himself the embarrassment of seeing me. "I already know." "They call it rolling black smoke now." "it is good." "Why is this good?" "It shows that they're sort of taking it seriously now. They're the ones in full control." Putting on a bored and determined look, I opened the window, picked up the binoculars, and climbed onto the outer window sill on the roof.I was comfortable enough in the cold air in my thick jumper; but I managed to keep my weight on the side of the house, and my son had his arms outstretched to grab my waistband.I felt his support for my little mission, and he even hoped that I would be able to add the weight of my mature and considered judgment to his sound observations so that it would stand.It is, after all, a parent's job to do so. I raised my binoculars and peered through the deepening twilight.Beneath the fumes of chemicals was a tense and chaotic scene.Searchlights sweep across the yard.Military helicopters shot beams of light down at the scene of the accident at various points.The colored lights of police patrol cars complement these broad beams.The tank car lay dead on the rails, and the mist seemed to rise from a hole at one end of it.Apparently the hitch on the second car punctured the tanker.Fire trucks were parked some distance away, and ambulances and police cars were parked farther away.I could hear the siren, the call on the bullhorn, a bit of radio static distorting it slightly in the cold air.People rushed from vehicle to vehicle, unloading equipment and carrying empty stretchers.Others, wearing yellow Milex suits and gas masks, carried death gauges and moved slowly through the glistening smoke.The snowblower sprayed a pink substance on and around the tanker truck, forming a thick arc of fog in the air that looked like a giant decoration at a Patriotic Day concert.The snow blowers are the kind used on airport runways, and the police cars are the kind used to transport casualties in riots.Smoke drifted into the darkness from the red beams and out from the white beams of the searchlights.The man in the Milex suit proceeded cautiously like a man on the moon, every step an anxiety-provoking gesture rather than a human instinct.Fire and explosion are no longer a danger here.This death will infiltrate, infiltrate the human genetics, and manifest itself in the unborn human.They were troubled by the concept of the nature of time, and they traveled as if they were crossing an endless wasteland of drifting moon dust. I crawled back into the room with some difficulty. "How do you feel?" he said. "It's still hanging there and it looks like it's rooted there." "So you're saying, you don't think it's going to come here." "I can hear from your words that you know something that I don't." "Do you think it will come here, or not?" "You want me to say it won't be here in a million years. Then you can use your little pile of data to attack. Come on, as I crawled outside, the radio said something what." "It doesn't cause nausea, vomiting, wheezing, unlike what they've said before." "And what does it cause?" "Palpitations and hallucinations." "Illusion?" "It evoked a false element of human memory or something. And that's not all. They don't call it rolling black smoke anymore." "What do they call it now?" He looked at me carefully. "Aerial poisonous fog incident." He uttered the words in a foreboding crisp tone, as if he were aware of the menace contained in the terminology that this particular situation produced.He continued to scrutinize me, trying to find in my face some assurance that there was no possibility of real danger—an assurance which he would immediately deny and dismiss as false, a tactic he was accustomed to play. "These things don't matter. What matters is the location. It's there and we're here." "A huge air mass is moving here from Canada," he said quietly. "I already knew that." "That doesn't mean it's not important." "Maybe, maybe not. It depends." "The climate is about to change," he literally yelled at me, his voice lamenting the special moments of his life. "I'm not just a college professor, I'm a department chair. I can't run away from an aerial smog incident. That's what people who live in trailers near fish farms in the backcountry do." We watched Wilder go backwards down the attic stairs, the tallest in the house.During dinner, Denise stood up several times, put her hand over her mouth, and trotted hurriedly to the bathroom outside the hall.We paused awkwardly to listen to her sputtering as we chewed and sprinkled salt on our food.Heinrich told her she was showing symptoms of past dates.She squinted at him for a moment.In an age of winking and endless empathy, I generally appreciate this way of conveying feeling.Body temperature, noise, lighting, countenance, words, gestures, personality, equipment.Frequent dialogues make family life a medium of perceptual knowledge, which contains the usual shock of the soul. I watched the girls talking with their eyes half closed. "Are we a little early for dinner tonight?" Denise said. "What time is morning?" said her mother. Denise glanced at Steffi. "Is it because we want to avoid it?" "In case something happens," Steffi said. "What's going to happen?" Babette said. The girls looked at each other again, a serious and long exchange of glances that indicated that some ominous surmise was being confirmed.The air raid sirens sounded again, this time so close that we both felt uneasy and even managed to avert each other's eyes in order to deny that something unusual was happening.The sound comes from our own red brick firehouse, which hasn't been used in over a decade.The noise they made was like the harsh cry of some Mesozoic animal defending its territory.A carnivorous parrot with a wingspan as large as .The great uproar of the savage infestation filled the house, so that its four walls seemed to burst.The sound monster is so close to us, so definitely above our heads.It is almost unbelievable that it has been hiding near us for so many years. We continued to eat, quietly and swiftly, taking less and less food with each bite, and asking for things to be passed on with courtesy.We become cautious and reticent, shrinking our movements and buttering our bread like experts restoring a fresco.The horrible harsh sound was still ringing.We still avoided eye contact and were careful not to rattle the cutlery.I'm sure we're all terribly lucky that that's the only way we'll go unnoticed.It’s as if the sirens are announcing the existence of some kind of control mechanism—as long as we don’t argue and spill the food, we can keep things from escalating and everything will be fine. It wasn't until we heard a second voice amidst the loud sirens that it occurred to us to end our nervous episode of politeness.Heinrich ran to open the front door.All kinds of sounds mixed together in the night rushed into the room, and reappeared around me with a sense of freshness.Looking at each other for the first time after a long time, we realized that the new voice was speaking from a loudspeaker, but couldn't be sure what it was saying.Heinrich came back, he pretended to be deep and mysterious when he walked.The meaning seemed to be that he had been petrified by some momentous circumstance. "They asked us to evacuate." He didn't meet our eyes as he spoke. Babette said: "Do you have the impression that they're just making a suggestion, or do you think it's a little bit coercive?" "It was coming out of the loudspeaker in the fire chief's car, and it was going pretty fast." I said, "That is to say, you didn't have time to pay attention to the subtle tone of it." "That voice was yelling." "Because of the alarm," Babette helped. "That said something like: 'Evacuate all dwellings. Deadly chemical fumes, deadly chemical fumes.'" We sat there with soft cakes and tinned pears we were eating. "I'm sure there's plenty of time," Babette said, "or they'd be urging us to hurry up. I want to know how fast the air mass is moving." Steffi wept softly as she read the coupon description for Lux baby soap.This made Denise wake up.She ran upstairs to tidy up for all of us.Heinrich took two flights of stairs at a time and rushed to the attic for his binoculars, road maps, and radio.Babette ran to the pantry and got a pile of bottles and jars with health labels on them. Steffi helped me clear the table. Twenty minutes later we were all in the car.A voice on the radio said that those who lived on the west side of the city should head to the abandoned Boy Scout camp, where there would be Red Cross volunteers handing out juice and coffee.Those coming from the east of the city should take the boulevard to the fourth service area, and from there to a restaurant called "Kung Fu Tang," a multi-winged building surrounded by pavilions, lotus ponds, and live deer. We were latecomers to the former group, just joining the traffic onto the main road out of town, a dingy line of clunkers, fast food joints, discount pharmacies and boxy movie theaters.As we waited to squeeze onto the four-lane highway, we heard a voice from a loudspeaker, overhead and behind us, addressing the people in the dark houses behind the plane trees and fences that lined the street: "Get out of all residences. Get out now, get out now. Poison fumes, chemical fumes." As the radio trucks came and went in and out of the street here, the shouts came and went, then faded, and then rang out again.Toxic smog accident, chemical smog.After the voice faded away, its tone was still faintly discernible, becoming a series of voices echoing in the distance.The danger, it seems, demands that the widely advertised discourse must have a rhythm, as if there is a coherent coherence in the rhythm with which we can counteract whatever meaningless and violent events come to our minds. We finally reached the road when it started to snow.We had very little to say to each other, our minds not yet adjusted to the reality of the situation, the absurd fact of withdrawal.The general picture is that we look at people in other cars and try to guess from their facial expressions how frightened we must be.The traffic was moving at a slow crawl, but we figured that at this speed there would always be a few miles to go, and once we reached the gap in the barricade, our westbound traffic could use all four lanes.The two lanes on the opposite side were empty, indicating that the police had blocked vehicles coming in this direction.An encouraging sign.The most common fear people have when they evacuate is that the powerful have already fled, leaving us to deal with the chaos. The snow was getting heavier, and the vehicles stopped and went.A lifestyle exhibition sale is going on in a home furnishings emporium.Under the bright lights, men and women stood by the huge window and looked at us curiously.It makes us feel like a bunch of idiots, like tourists doing all kinds of wrong things.Why are they idling about shopping for furniture while we panicked and stranded in tortoise-crawling cars during a storm?They know something we don't.In a crisis, real facts are whatever other people say they are.Anything anyone knows is more reliable than what you know yourself. The air raid sirens were still sounding in two or three towns.Just when we all feel that there is roughly a road to safety in front of us, the aforementioned furniture buyers are slow to act. I wonder what they know?I kept pressing the buttons on the radio.We have some new and important information from Glasstown Radio.People who have been inside are asked not to go out.We can only speculate on its significance: Are the roads severely congested?Are Neodin tokens falling from the sky? I kept pressing buttons, hoping to hear someone say the inside story.A female editor of consumer affairs issues, began to discuss from a medical point of view the possible problems that the human body may produce once it is exposed to airborne poisonous fog.Babette and I exchanged a careful look.She was talking to the girls right away, and I turned the volume down so they couldn't hear them, lest they imagine these things were about to happen to them. "Convulsions, coma, miscarriage," said the informant in a brisk voice. We drive past a three-story motel.Every room was lit, and every window was crowded with people staring out at us.We became a group of exhibited fools, not only helpless against the falling chemicals, but also subject to the contemptuous judgment of others.Why weren't they out there at this moment, sitting behind the windshield scraper, in their baggy clothes, in the silent, falling snow?Our first priority is to get to the Boy Scout camp, get into the building, close the door, curl up on the camp bed with juice and coffee, and wait for the red flag to clear. The vehicle began to climb up the grass of the curb slope, forming an extremely sloping third lane.We were in the original right-hand lane, and watched helplessly as the cars passed us at breakneck speed, slightly higher than us off the horizon. We drove slowly towards an overpass and saw people walking on it.Carrying boxes and boxes, items wrapped in sheets, they stumbled into the falling snow in a long line.Pets and young children are embraced, an elderly man is wrapped in a blanket over his pajamas, and two women carry a rolled-up rug over their shoulders.There were people on bicycles, and children were pulled in sleds and carts.Someone is pushing a supermarket shopping cart, and people in all kinds of baggy coats are peering out of deep hoods.One family covered themselves entirely with a huge sheet of clear polythene.They marched in unison under their hood, the couple at the front and back, and the three children in between, all wrapped in shiny raincoats as a second layer of protection.The whole thing seemed well-rehearsed, and they were content now, as if they had been waiting months to show off their trick.People continued to emerge from behind a high embankment, with snow on their shoulders, and walked through the overpass with difficulty. Hundreds of people marched with mournful and determined expressions.Another round of sirens sounded.The forerunners did not quicken their heavy steps.They neither looked down at us nor looked up into the sky for signs of wind-blown smoke.They just kept crossing the bridge in the dancing snow and dappled light.They were in the wilderness, next to their children, carrying all that they might carry, as if part of some ancient destiny, connected in doom and ruin with the whole history of man's travails on the wilderness.There was an epic quality about them that, for the first time, baffled me about the scale of our predicament. The radio said: "The rainbow hologram on the credit card is a conspiracy to make the cardholder want to buy." We moved slowly under the overpass, listening to car horns and the beseeching wail of an ambulance stuck in traffic.Fifty yards ahead, the traffic squeezed into a driveway, and we quickly saw what was going on.A car rolled off the ramp and fell into a truck in our driveway.Horns blared in traffic.A helicopter hovered above us, shooting a white light at the pile of crashed steel.A few people sat dazedly on the grass, being attended to by two bearded paramedics.Two people were covered in blood.There was also blood on a shattered glass window.Blood seeps into the freshly fallen snow.A brown handbag was stained with blood.The wounded, the ambulancemen, the smoking steel, all shrouded in an intense and frightening light, the sight has the enormous appeal of a serious work.We drove by in silence, in a sense of wondrous awe, and even emotionally charged at the sight of the rammed cars and people who had been knocked to the ground. Heinrich had been watching from the back window, raising his binoculars as the scene gradually shrank in the distance.He gave us a detailed account of the number and placement of the wounded, the slippery ruts, the damage to the vehicles.When the wrecked vehicle was no longer in sight, he talked about everything that had happened since the air-raid sirens sounded over dinner.He spoke vigorously, expressing his admiration for such vividness and unexpectedness.I think we're all in the same state of mind: resigned, worried, confused.I hadn't imagined that one of us would find these things so exciting.I glanced at him in the rearview mirror.He sat idly in his camouflage uniform of nylon dungarees, blissfully immersed in the disaster.He talks about snow, traffic, people struggling.He estimated how far we were from the abandoned camp, and guessed what kind of primitive facilities there were.I had never heard him talk of anything so cheerfully and eloquently.He was so carried away.He must have understood that we might all die.Is this the madness when the "end of the world" comes?Was he seeking relief from his own small sorrow in the midst of some violent and irresistible event?His voice betrayed a desire for something terrible. "Is this a mild winter or a harsh winter?" Steffi said. "What do you do?" Denise said. "I have no idea." I think I saw Babette stuff something into her mouth.I took my eyes off the road for a moment and watched her carefully.She stared straight ahead.I pretended to focus on the road again, but turned her head quickly again when she was off guard, and she seemed to be swallowing something she had just put in her mouth. "What's that?" I said. "Drive your car, Jack." "I saw your throat constrict. You swallowed something." "Just a nutritional pill. Please drive your car." "You put a nutritional pill in your mouth, and then swallow it down without sucking it?" "Swallow what? It's still in my mouth." She turned her face to me and licked it with her tongue, making a small bump on her cheek.It's the tactic of an amateur con artist. "But you swallowed something. I saw it." "It's just spit I don't know what to do with. You can drive, okay?" Noticing that Denise was taking an interest in this, I decided not to press further.At this time, it is not appropriate to ask her mother what medicine she takes, what side effects it has, and so on.Wilder fell asleep, leaning on Babette's arm.The wiper blades on the windshield made a watery arc.We heard on the radio that dogs specially trained to sniff out nyodine derivatives were being transported to the area from a chemical reconnaissance center in remote parts of New Mexico. "Have they thought about what that does to the dogs when they get close enough to this thing to sniff it out?" Denise said. "It doesn't do anything to the dog," said Babette. "How do you know?" "Because it only works on humans and mice." "I do not believe you." "Ask Jack." "Ask Heinrich," I said. "It may be true," he said, obviously lying, "that they use rats to test for possible diseases in humans, which means that rats and humans will suffer from the same diseases. Besides, if they think they may harm dogs, Don't use them." "Why not?" "Dogs are mammals." "Mouse too," said Denise. "Rats are harmful animals," said Babette. "Rats in general," said Heinrich, "are rodents." "It's also a harmful animal." "Cockroach is a harmful animal." Steffi said. "A cockroach is an insect. You can tell by counting its legs." "It's also a pest." "Can cockroaches get cancer? No," Denise said. "Since both mice and people get cancer but cockroaches don't, that means that even though mice and cockroaches are both harmful animals, mice are more like people than humans." Like cockroaches." "Put it another way," said Heinrich, "she's saying that two things that are both mammals have more in common than two things that are both pests." "Are you people telling me," said Babette, "that rats are not just pests and rodents, but mammals?" Snow turned to sleet, and sleet turned to rain. Where we are now, the concrete barrier is gone, and there is a flower bed in the middle, about the height of the curb, twenty yards wide.But instead of state troopers directing traffic into the two new lanes, we do see a man in a Milex suit waving us away from the exit.Just behind him was a pile of scrap metal where a snowplow and a sack were buried.A plume of tawny smoke rose from the huge crooked wreck.Brightly colored plastic utensils were strewn across a large area.没有受害者和鲜血的痕迹，这使我们相信那辆游乐车压到雪犁上去有一段时间了，从当时的情况看，也许就在心存侥幸的一刹那出了事。一定是大雪迷眼，使得司机在跃过中间地段时没有注意到另一边的物体。 “我似乎看见过这一切。”斯泰菲说。 “你是什么意思？”我说。 “这种事以前发生过一次，就像这样子。穿黄衣服、戴防毒面罩的男人。一大堆残骸躺在雪中。它完全与这一模一样。我们都在这儿，坐在车里。雨点在雪上滴出一个个小窟窿。每一件事情都一样。” 这是海因利希告诉我的，说暴露在化学废气中可能使一个人产生幻觉。他说这话时斯泰菲不在场，但是她可能已经从厨房里的收音机中听说过了；她和丹妮斯在掌心出汗和呕吐之前，可能已经知道有关这些症状的事情了。我想斯泰菲并不明白幻觉是怎么回事，但是可能芭比特已经告诉过她了。然而，幻觉不再仅仅是尼奥丁污染的通常症状。它已经被昏迷、痉挛、流产所取代。假如斯泰菲从收音机中听说了幻觉，但是遗漏了其后恶化的更加致命的症状，那就表示她正处于被自己的暗示功能欺骗的状况。她和丹妮斯整个晚上都滞后了。她们掌心出汗晚了，恶心晚了，幻觉又晚了。这一切表示什么？斯泰菲是真的想象她以前看见过这具残骸，还是仅仅想象她自己想象到了它？有没有可能出现幻觉的虚假感觉？是否存在真实的幻觉和虚假的幻觉？我怀疑她的掌心是否真的出汗，或者她只是想像到了某种潮湿的感觉。她是否真是易受暗示，因此出现了她所说的各种症状？ 我为人们感到悲哀，也为我们在灾难中扮演的奇怪角色感到悲哀。 假如她没有听到收音机里的话，也不知道幻觉是怎么回事，那怎么办呢？假如她是自然地出现了真正的症状，那又怎么办呢？或许科学家们在把事情越说越严重以前，原先的说法倒是正确的。实际的或是自我引发的症状，哪一样更糟糕呢？事关紧要吗？我盘算着这些以及有关的问题。我在开车子的同时，发现自己正在根据中世纪游手好闲的人们几个世纪以来乐此不疲的诡辩的巧妙观点，一问一答地进行着口头测验。一个九岁的女孩会不会因为暗示的力量而流产？她是否需要先怀孕？暗示的力量会不会强大到足以使整个事情都逆向发展：先流产，后怀孕，然后再月经来潮，最后排卵？月经和排卵，哪一样先出现？我们在谈论的仅仅是症状，还是深陷其中不能自拔的情况？症状是一种标志，还是一样东西？一样东西是什么？我们如何判断它不是另一样东西？ 我关掉了收音机—不是为了帮助思考，而是为了使自己不再思考。车辆颠簸打滑。有人从车窗往外扔口香糖的包装纸；芭比特愤慨地谴责在公路上、在乡村乱扔垃圾的缺乏公德的人。 “我来告诉你们另外一件从前发生过的事情，”海因利希说，“我们的汽油快用完了。” 指针在刻度盘的E字母上抖动。 “总是会有剩油的。”芭比特说。 “怎么总是会有剩油呢？” “油箱就是这样制造的，这样你就不会把油全部用完。” “不可能总是会有剩油。如果你让车继续行驶，就会把油用完。” “你不会让车永远行驶的。” “你怎么知道什么时候停车呢？”他说。 “当你经过加油站时。”我对他说。说话间就见到一个，那是一个日晒雨淋、被废弃的汽车停车场，一排彩旗下傲立着一些油泵。我将车子开进去，跳下车，脑袋缩在竖起的衣领里跑向油泵。油泵没有锁，说明加油站的人是仓促逃走的，一切都照当时的原样留下来而令人好奇，就像中的印第安人所留下的工具和陶器、烤炉中的面包、摆好了的三人食用的饭桌，成为萦绕后世一代代人头脑中的神秘事物。我抓起无铅油泵的油枪。彩旗在风中噼噼啪啪地响。 几分钟之后，我们重新回到公路上，这时我们看见一幅壮观和令人吃惊的景象。它出现在我们前方和左边的天空中，促使我们在座位上压低身子、低下脑袋，以便看得清楚一些，我们禁不住用不完整的句子惊呼着对方。这就是那团滚动的黑烟，空中的毒雾，由七架军用直升飞机明亮的探照光束照亮着。直升飞机正在跟踪它随风飘移的动向，将它置于视野之中。每辆汽车里，脑袋在转动，驾车者鸣响喇叭警示他人，两边的车窗上贴着人们的面孔，每个人都露出惊讶的表情。 那个巨大的黑团犹如斯堪的纳维亚传说中的死亡船只，由一群穿戴盔甲、长着螺旋形翅膀的怪物护送，在黑夜中向前飘移。我们不知该怎样做出反应。这是一团看起来可怕的东西：这么近，这么低，携带着氯化物、挥发油、苯酚、碳氢化合物，或者任何实际有毒的物质。但是，它也是壮观的，它是一个大规模事件的宏伟的组成部分，就像调车场上的生动场面，或者像一群被剥夺了一切的悲剧人物，携儿带女、肩挑食品和家当、步履艰难地行进在大雪覆盖的立交桥上。伴随我们恐惧的是一种近似宗教的敬畏感。对于威胁你生命的东西，你肯定会产生敬畏之感，并且把它看做比你自身庞大得多、更加有力、由本质的和执拗的节律所创造的一种宇宙力量。这就是实验室里制造出来的死亡，它性质明确并且可以量化；但是目前我们以简单和原始的方式看待它，把它当作洪水和风暴之类的地球的季节性肆虐，某种无法控制的东西。我们的无奈似乎与一个人为事件的想法扯不到一起。 孩子们在车后座上为了占用望远镜而争斗。 这事整个儿令人惊讶。他们似乎正在为了我们而照亮那团烟雾，就像那是声光表演中的一幕，是一团令人愁肠欲断的雾气慢悠悠地飘过一座高高的城垛，那里有一位国王刚刚被砍了头。但是我们现在目睹的并非历史。它是某样神秘的恼人的东西，某种让人从睡梦中惊醒的梦幻情感。直升飞机射出的光焰令人目眩，红色和白色的光线汇成奶油色的光束扫来扫去。驾车者鸣响喇叭，孩子们拥在所有的车窗边，一张张面孔歪斜着，一双双粉红的小手紧贴在车窗玻璃上。 公路拐了弯，渐渐离开了那团烟雾，一时间车辆前进更加顺畅了。接近童子军营的十字路口时，有两辆校车加入到主车流中，车上载的都是铁匠镇疯人院里的疯子。我们认识这两个汽车司机，看到了车窗里熟悉的面孔。我们惯常看见这些人坐在疯人院稀稀落落的篱笆后面草地上的椅子里，或者转着圈子走步，而圈子越来越小，走步的速度越来越快，就像旋转装置上旋转着的坨子。我们对他们生出尴尬的爱怜，见到他们由专业人士勤勉地照看着而感到宽慰。这似乎表明社会结构仍然完整无损。 我们驶过那个“美洲照相之最的农舍”的指示牌。 车辆用了一个小时汇入驶往营房的单车道。穿米莱克斯服的人用手电棒照照这里，照照那里，并且竖起涂着日辉牌荧光漆的标杆，引导我们进入停车场、运动场和别的空地。人们从林子里走出来，有人头戴照明灯，有人拎着购物袋、拉着孩子、牵着宠物。我们沿着土路摇摇晃晃驶过沟壑和土墩。在主楼附近，我们看到一群拿着写字夹板和对讲机的男女、不穿米莱克斯服的官员、新兴的疏散科学的专家们。斯泰菲与怀尔德两人时睡时醒地睡着。雨停了。人们关掉汽车的前灯，茫然地坐在车里。奇特漫长的跋涉总算结束了。我们等待出现某种满足感、静悄悄的成就气氛中的某种情绪、千辛万苦之后的疲惫及其所预示的安静和沉沉的睡眠。但是，人们只是坐在黑洞洞的汽车里，从关闭的窗户里往外互相张望。海因利希吃一根糖果条，我们听见焦糖和葡萄糖粘住他的牙齿发出的声音。最后一件事就是，有一个五口之家从一辆千里马牌汽车中走出来。他们身穿救生衣，手持火把。 有几个人周围聚集了小堆人群。那是信息和谣言的来源。其中一个人是在化工厂干活的，另一个人则是偶然听到了某种说法，第三个人是州政府某个机构职员的亲戚。从这几个密集的人堆开始，通过住宿地传播出真实的、虚假的和其他各类消息。 谣传说，明天一清早我们就会被允许回家；政府正在设法掩盖真相；一架直升飞机进入有毒烟雾后就再也没有出现；警犬已从新墨西哥州运达，并冒险在夜间空投到一片水草地；也有人说农耕镇四十年内将无法居住。 种种说法处于永远飘忽不停的状态。没有一桩事比另一桩事更有可能或更不可能，人们惊慌失措得失去了现实感，我们因此没有必要去做鉴别了。 有些家庭愿意睡在自己的车里，而另一些家庭则迫于无奈只好这样，因为此地七八幢楼房里已经没有他们的地盘。我们待在一座大营房里，是童子军营里三座同样的建筑中的一座，现在发电机发了电，我们还是相当舒适的。红十字会提供了行军床、活动取暖器、三明治和咖啡。除了已有的顶灯之外，还加点了一些煤油灯。很多人带着收音机、羊毛毯、沙滩椅、备用衣服，以及与他人共享的多余食物。这地方拥挤不堪，却仍然相当冷；但是，我们看到有护士和志愿工作者，总算觉得孩子们还是安全的，眼前其他处于困境的人、带着婴儿的年轻女人和老弱病残者则令我们生出一种坚定和决心，以及无私地希望把他们作为一个共同体的意愿。这个巨大的灰色区域几个小时前还是潮湿的、空无一物的，湮没在历史之中，此刻却是一个奇怪地令人欣慰的地方，充满了一种社区的蓬勃生机及鼎沸的人声。 打听消息的人们从这一堆人扎进另一堆人中，他们喜欢滞留在人多的人群里。我也这样慢慢地在营房里移动。我了解到一共有九处疏散中心，包括这里和功夫堂。铁城尚未全部撤离，本地区其他大多数城镇也未全部撤离，据说州长正乘坐直升专机，在从州议会大厦来此的路上。直升飞机可能会降落在被遗弃的镇外一块大豆地里，好让穿着丛林衫、神色凝重且信心十足的州长在摄影机镜头的范围内，亮相十秒钟或者十五秒钟，以示他坚不可摧的形象。 我在一个最挤的人堆外围小心翼翼地游动时，吃惊地发现我自己的儿子身处事态的中心，正用一种新学来的腔调在演说，口气里有一种对于逃亡的兴高采烈。他正从专业的角度谈论空中毒雾事件，但是他的口气几乎是预言式的揭示。他幸灾乐祸地说着尼奥丁衍生物这个术语，从这声音中获得病态的快乐。人们专心地听着这个半大不小的小子滔滔不绝，他身穿野战服，头戴野战帽，脖子上套着望远镜，腰带上挂着一个即时成像的傻瓜照相机。无疑，人们由于他的年龄而对他刮目相看。他一定诚恳老实，不会别有用心，他对于环境有一种新的意识，他的化学知识新颖、现代。 我听见他说：“他们喷洒在调车场大片泄漏物上的东西可能是苏打粉。但是，这种情况下就嫌太少和太晚了。我猜测天亮时他们要送几架农作物喷粉机到天空中，对毒雾喷洒更多的苏打粉，把它冲开打散，变成上百万个无害的小雾珠。苏打粉是碳酸钠的俗称，它可用来制造玻璃、陶瓷、洗衣粉和肥皂。它也用来制造碳酸氢钠，即你们中很多人夜里在镇上咕嘟咕嘟地大喝的某种饮料。” 人们被这男孩的知识和聪明所打动，因此围得更紧了。听到他在一大群陌生人面前侃侃而谈，我感觉真好。他是否正在发现他的自我在学习怎样从别人的反应当中来确定自身的价值？他是否可能从这个可怕事件的混乱和冲击中，学会在这个世上取得成功？ “或许你们大家都在想，老是在说的尼奥丁衍生物究竟是什么东西？这个问题问得好。我们在学校里学到过它，我们在电影里看到过老鼠痉挛等等。所以，行了，它简单极了。尼奥丁衍生物是生产杀虫剂的副产品，它们是被丢弃后堆积而成的一堆东西。其原产品杀死蟑螂，副产品杀死其余的一切东西。这是我的老师开过的一个小玩笑。” 他打了一个响指，又让左腿抖动了几下。 “它在粉末状态下是无色无臭的，而且非常危险，但是似乎没有人准确地知道它会对人类或人类的后代产生什么后果。他们进行了多年的试验，然而他们要么是知道得不确切，要么是知道了不说。有些事情公开的话是很糟糕的。” 他舌头舔在嘴角，皱起了眉头并开始喜剧性地抽搐，我吃惊地听到人们大笑起来。 “它一旦渗漏到土壤里去，将会在土里存活四十年，比很多人的寿命都长。五年之后，你们将在自己的衣服和食品中，也在你们家的窗户和老虎窗之间，发现长出了多种多样的菌类。十年之后，你家的金属纱门纱窗将会锈蚀，并开始变得坑坑洼洼和腐烂。壁板弯曲翘起；玻璃脆裂；宠物受伤。二十年之后你可能不得不把自己关在阁楼上，只能等待静观。我想从这一切之中确实可以吸取教训。去了解你们的化学用品吧。” 我不想让他看见我在那里。这会使他局促不安，让他想起自己从前郁郁寡欢、东游西荡的童年生活。让他在不幸、恐怖和突发的灾祸中焕发青春吧—如果他正在这样做的话。所以，我悄悄地走开了，我经过一个穿着外裹塑料薄膜的雪地靴的男人，向我们先前住过的营房另一头走去。 我们的旁边是属于的一个黑人家庭。夫妇俩带着一个十二岁模样的男孩。父子俩正在向附近的人们散发宗教宣传小册子，而且好像轻而易举就找到了愿意接受小册子的人和心甘情愿的听众。 那女人对芭比特说：“这事不是有些不同寻常吗？” “现在不再有什么事情让我惊讶了。”芭比特说。 “那不正是事实。” “会让我惊讶的是，往后是否没有令人惊讶的事了。” “这话听起来差不离。” “或者往后是否几乎没有令人惊讶的事了。那倒会是一件令人惊讶的事，而不是像现在这样的情况。” “上帝耶和华那里有比这更大的令人惊讶的事情。”那女人说。 “上帝耶和华？” “就是这一位。” 斯泰菲和怀尔德在一张帆布床上睡着了。丹妮斯坐在屋子的另外一头，埋头看《内科医生手册》。靠墙堆着几张空气床垫。应急电话前排着长队，人们打电话给亲戚或者设法与某个听众电话点播节目取得联系。这里的很多收音机基本上都调到这一类节目。芭比特坐在野营椅子里，查看一只帆布袋子，里面满满的都是小点心和其他食品。我注意到其中有在冰箱或食品柜子里放了几个月的瓶罐和盒子。 “我想现在可是少吃多脂食品的好时机了。”她说。 “为何专门是现在？” “这个时刻需要克制和精神上的坚强。我们真的非如此不可了。” “我觉得有趣的是，你竟然将一次可能的灾难看做使自己、你的家人和成千上万别的人减少多脂食品的一个机会。” “人们总是在有可能时进行克制。”她说，“假如我现在不吃乳酪，我就非常可能从此不再买那玩意儿。但是这种麦芽我想就不谈了。” 商标的名字看起来像是外国货。我拿起那个麦芽罐头，仔细地看上面的标贴。 “这是德国货。”我告诉她，“吃吧。” 有些人穿着睡衣和拖鞋，有一个男人肩膀上挎了一枝步枪。孩子们爬进睡袋。芭比特打手势，要我凑近一些。 “我们把收音机关了吧。”她低语道，“这样姑娘们就听不见了，她们还没有摆脱幻觉。我想让事情到此为止。” “假如症状是真的那怎么办？” “怎么可能是真的呢？” “为什么不可能是真的呢？” “他们的这些症状只是广播里说过之后才出现的。”她低声说。 “斯泰菲从收音机里听到了有关幻觉的广播吗？” “她肯定听到了。” “你怎么知道的？广播时你和她在一起吗？” “我不能肯定。” “好好想想。” "I can't remember." “你是否记得告诉她什么叫幻觉吗？” 她用匙子从纸盒里舀了一点儿酸乳酪，似乎顿了一下，陷入沉思。 “这事以前发生过。”她最后说。 “以前发生过什么？” “坐在这儿，边吃酸乳酪，边谈论幻觉。” “我不想听到这话。” “酸乳酪在我的匙子里。我看见了它，在我眼前一闪。整个事情。天然、全奶、低脂的。” 酸乳酪还在匙子中。我看着她一副沉思状地把匙子凑到嘴边，试图将这个动作与幻影中原先的相似动作进行比较。我蹲在那里招手让她靠近一点儿。 “海因利希好像正从他的壳里出来。”我低声说。 “他在哪里？我没见到他。” “看见那一堆人吗？他就在那堆人的中央。他在告诉他们有关毒雾事件他所知道的情况。” “他知道些什么？” “现在证明他知道相当多的情况。” “他为什么不告诉我们呢？”她低声说。 “他很可能厌烦我们。他认为不值得在自己家人面前花工夫表现得有趣和讨人喜欢。这就是儿子们的做法。我们代表了挑战的错误方式。” “有趣和讨人喜欢？” “我猜想他从来就有这本事。问题仅仅是要找到合适的时机来施展他的才能。” 她凑近过来，我俩的脑袋几乎碰在一起了。 “你不认为该到他那里去吗？”她说，“让他看见你在人堆里。让他知道他父亲目睹了他了不起的时刻。” “他看见我在人群中只会感到不安。” "why?" “我是他父亲嘛。” “所以，假如你走到那里去，你会因这层父子关系让他难堪并受约束而毁了全部好事。但是，假如你不过去，他永远不会知道你曾目睹他了不起的时刻，因此他会认为他在你面前的行为举止仍然必须像以往一样—有点儿乖戾和被动—而不是像现在这种讨人喜欢和兴高采烈的新模样。” “这是一种两难的境地。” “我过去会怎么样？”她低声说。 “他会认为是我让你去的。” “有那么可怕吗？” “他会认为我利用你来让他做我想做的事。” “那其中可能有一点儿道理，杰克。但是，如果养父母在血亲之间的小冲突中派不上用场的话，他们还有什么用呢？” 我凑得离她更近一些，说话声音甚至也更低。 “就是一颗营养丸。”我说。 "what?" “就是一点儿你不知该怎么办的口水。” “它确实是一颗营养丸。”她小声说，一边用大拇指和食指做成一个O形。 “给我一颗。” “那是最后一颗。” “什么味儿—快说。” “樱桃味儿。” 我收拢双唇，做出吮吸的小声响。手拿小册子的黑人男子走过来，在我旁边蹲了下来。我俩认真并长久地握手。他直直地盯着我看，给人的印象是，他之所以举家迁徙，风尘仆仆地在崎岖不平的路上跋涉，不是为了逃避化学物泄漏，倒是为了寻找一个会明白他的话的人。 “这种事到处都在发生，不是吗？” “差不多吧。”我说。 “政府对此在做什么呢？” “什么事也没做。” “你说出来了，我可没有说啊。只有这一句话才描述了他们正在做什么，而你确切地说出了它。我一点儿也不吃惊。但是，当你设身处地考虑此事时，他们又能够做什么呢？因为正在到来的事情确确实实在到来。世界上没有一个政府强大到足以制止它。就以你来说，你知道印度的常备军有多少人吗？” "one million." “我没有说出来，你说了。一百万名兵士，他们也没法儿制止它。你知道世界上谁拥有最多的常备军队吗？” “是俄国吧，虽然越南军队应该提一下。” “告诉我这一点，”他说，“越南军队能够制止它吗？” "cannot." “它到了这儿，不是吗？人们感觉到它了。我们内心里明白：上帝的王国正在到来。” 他是一个又高又瘦的男人，头发稀疏，门齿中间有一条齿缝。他悠然地蹲着，看起来灵巧和舒坦。我意识到他穿戴着全套西服领带，脚上却是一双跑鞋。 “现在是不是伟大的时刻？”他说。 我仔细地观察他的脸，试图找出正确答案的线索。 “你感觉它在到来吗？它是否在到来的途中？你要它到来吗？” 他说话时踮着脚尖蹦跳。 “战争、饥荒、地震、火山爆发。一切都在开始喷发。用你自己的话说，一旦它形成势头，还有什么东西可以制止它呢？” "No." “你说出来了，我没有。洪水、龙卷风、新的怪病的流行。这是不是一个信号？这是不是事情的真相？你有准备吗？” “人们是否真的从内心深处感觉到它了？”我说。 “好消息传得快。” “人们谈论它吗？在你挨家挨户访查时，你是否有印象他们需要它？” “这不是他们是否需要它的问题。这是我到哪里去搜集签名的问题。这是让我现在马上离开此地的事情。人们问：'上帝的天国里有没有四季变化？'他们问：'那里收不收过桥费？是否回收瓶子？'也就是说，我是在告诉你，他们正深入事情的实质。” “你觉得这是出现了地块隆起。” “准确地说，是一种骤然的汇聚。我看一眼就知道了。这是个明白人。” “从统计学角度，地震不是向上的。” 他投给我一个居高临下的微笑。我感到自己活该受到这样的对待，虽然我不清楚为什么。也许，面对坚定的信仰、巨大的恐惧和强烈的欲望，应用统计数字真是太琐碎了。 “你计划怎样度过你复活后的一生？”他说，口气好像是在询问下一个长周末。 “我们都有一次复活吗？” “你们每个人，不是有罪的恶人，便是被上帝拯救的善人。恶人在大街上行走时就在腐烂和走向毁灭。他们渐渐感觉到自己的眼珠从眼眶中滑落出来。凭他们浑身的黏黏糊糊和肢体残缺，你就可以识别他们：这是一些匍匐在他们自己分泌出来的黏液上的人。中闪光耀眼的一切都在溃烂。被上帝拯救的人们互相通过整洁和矜持来辨认。凭着他不喜炫耀这一点，你就知道他是一个被上帝拯救的人。” 他是一个严肃的人，从他的头一直到他的跑鞋，都透出平淡自然和讲究实际。对于他怪诞的自信和毫无疑虑，我感到纳闷。难道这就是哈米吉多顿善恶大决战的关键？不能模棱两可，不再怀疑。他随时准备着跑步进入下一个世界。他正在强行将下一个世界渗透到我的意识中去，巨大惊人的事件对于他，似乎都是平淡自然、不言而喻、合情合理、紧迫而真实的。我并未在内心深处感觉到这场大决战，但是我为那些感觉到它的人担忧，他们强烈地渴望着，不断地向四处打电话，从银行取出存款，随时准备着。假如有足够多的人愿意它发生，它会发生吗？多少人算是足够多的人？我们俩交谈时，为什么像土著人似的蹲着呢？ 他递给我一本小册子，名叫《关于世界末日的二十个常见错误》。我费力地从蹲姿中站起来，感到头晕和背疼。大厅前面有一个女人正在谈论有关暴露于有毒物质的情况。她的小嗓门几乎湮没在营房里乱哄哄的喧闹声中，那是人在封闭的大空间中惯常弄出的低沉的吵嚷声。丹妮斯放下手里的《内科医生手册》，然后冷冷地看了我一眼。那种眼光她一般是用来看她父亲的，他最近丢了混饭吃的工作时，她就是用这种眼光看他的。 “有什么问题吗？”我对她说。 “你没有听到那女人在说什么