VERNON’S MIND WILL NOT COME DOWN TO HIM. HE IS running; he knows that he is running, that he is digging, pulling, crying to get away from that man, that his hands and feet are grabbing into dirt and weeds, yet his mind is apart, is running a distance above his madly working throat and lungs. Nor does it seem his mind at all, as he climbs and pulls, but his mother’s mind. Her mind and eyes are within his own as he climbs, slides and climbs up the ragged path, letting him know that he has really done it this time, that she doesn’t know if she can help him this time, and as he struggles on, it seems that neither of them will leave him alone, will let him think for a second.
He slides to his belly, to his chin, and grabs weeds again, gains footholds, to push on. He keeps slipping and falling, bruising his fingers and palms, his knees and shins, his feet sliding, his left ankle paining and throbbing from jamming against something hard. She clings, allowing him no way to duck under her; the big detective stays at his back, too, stays there and stays there so he keeps feeling like he is going to explode, is going to pop like a balloon if they won’t leave him alone.
Sliding to his belly, he frantically unhooks his foot from something, shoots a glance back, sees the form of that man, a form like that of a bear, on all fours, climbing after him. He cries within, in his anger and disappointment. Still he pushes on, keeps himself moving through the weeds and brush, at no greater speed than that of a turtle, as it comes to him that he knows more than she does now, that is why she can’t help him, because he knows more than she, knows of peace of mind, of salvation, of death, and that no one can help him now.
He continues, as if alone. Losing momentary strength and conviction, he collapses for several seconds, gasping and crying, praying to be left alone by the man, and pushing himself up, returns to crawling and clawing, until he collapses to his face and belly yet again. But he returns to crawling and clawing still again, even as he has little sense of what it is that is making him go on.
Nor, in the next moment, does he seem to know who he is, or where he is, or what he is doing or why. He feels terribly hot, as if he has entered the mouth of a furnace, and he sees that he is opposite the highway railing, is coming opposite the highway surface, where cars are roaring by one after another, two by two, by three, where ground and highway and bridge all merge. On something of a new charge, he gets himself over the ground and over crushed rock and gets a hand on the steel railing, but cannot pull himself higher and clings a moment with knees and one side in the crushed rock. The railing would be less than waist-high if he were standing on the other side, in the breakdown lane, but he has to give up his handgrip on the cold metal and crawl and pull along another six feet, or eight feet, before he can make headway and gain the footing he needs to pull himself up to the lip of the pavement and slide his belly and his legs over the railing, into a collapsed crouch on the pavement, within the immediate zing-zing of passing cars, facing uphill yet again, looking up yet another long and gradual hill, but this one altogether over pavement and in the direction of the State of Maine, a mile or so away.
Thus, not even looking to see if the grizzly bear is still after him, Vernon begins moving his feet one after another over the pavement, bending at the waist, looking to the pavement, in the flow of air here, gasping, dragging one foot forward and then the other, upon the skyward angle and curve of the bridge, and feeling some glimmer of hope, a new toss of the dice, until, suddenly, there is a horn blast from one of the passing cars, and all seems dashed, all seems lost yet again as his heart cries out to the unseen driver, Why did you do that? Oh God, why did you do that?
He has to look then, has to take a glimpse back to see if he has been seen, and all his worst fears come home to him, for there is the grizzly bear of a man, draped over the railing, lying over the railing and looking after him, sliding over the railing, he sees then, sliding into a pile on the pavement of the breakdown lane and beginning at once to strive to get himself upright again, sending the shock of death directly into his weary heart this time even as he is staggering on, eyes front again more or less, eyes on his knees and on the pavement between them more or less, as the nightmare of his life seems close enough to be flapping its wings not far at all above his back and shoulders and just when he thought he might be getting away.