Divisadero by Michael Ondaatje Read Free Book Online Page B

could.
Well, visit The Gentile fi rst, if you want to go up against Autry ’ s crowd. The Gentile will teach you. He ’ s become a civilian, but he hates everything about Vegas. Also, he
ran off with someone ’ s girl.
The one he won in the card game?
Yes.
So how do I get there?
First of all, you don’t ever call him The Gentile. His name is Axel. Get a bus
to Bakers fi eld,
then you can hire someone to drive you the seventy miles into the desert.
    The no longer functional
Jericho Army Base is where Axel and the woman have ended up, living in the 1980
Airstream they’ve hot-wired up to a transformer pole. They suggest that Cooper
sleep in an old surveyor’s tent not too far from their silver dwelling. Lina
shows him the well where they bathe. There are still traces of gold in the
water, she says. They cook all meals outside, and a propane tank hisses away
during breakfast and dinner. At night Cooper can see other lights in the far
reaches of the abandoned base. Two horses that belong to Lina drift near the
camp.
    Mentioning
Dorn to The Gentile breaks the ice.
    God, I knew his mother so
well, I could almost have fathered him.
He’s the smart one among us, Cooper says graciously.
The Gentile thinks, then mutters, And now they say
he’s a hippie.
It looks that way.
Coop watches Lina walk over and mount her horse, supple as a scarf, and
suddenly he thinks of Claire. The way she was always serene on an animal. Lina
has, according to The Gentile, a price on her head, her fi rst husband still unforgiving about her
escape from his bullying. A woman in distress... Cooper remembers. There
are mesas and horse trails and old gold mines to explore during the day. The
fact that Cooper knows horses surprises Lina. ‘Hey, a gambler
who rides!’ So the two of them trek into the desert. Cooper has to wait for night, in any case— Axel refuses to bring out cards
until it is dark, and then he takes Cooper into the Airstream’s den and closes
the door. They will emerge after three or four hours, at which point Cooper
walks to his tent and crashes into sleep.
Some afternoons he wanders alone through the deserted cafeterias and abandoned
barracks of the military base, which feels like a suburb of the moon. He meets
no one, though at night he will sometimes hear a generator or see a fi re. There are only Lina and Axel to talk
to. It feels like a parody of guru – disciple teaching,
except that The Gentile has a vociferous sexual life — he
has even apologized for the noise, and his yells often sound like screams for
help. Their sex takes place in the late afternoons, and shortly afterwards they
emerge from the Airstream like humbled dormice. Cooper, in his tent forty yards
away, has tied a thin cotton cloth over his eyes so he can nap in the three
p.m. glare, but it’s tough to ignore the shouts of surrender or epiphany coming
from the trailer.
After a week, The Gentile doubles the hours of card-playing. The games now last
at least six hours. At midnight they pause, Axel goes into the kitchen, and
returns with scotch and two glasses, and they begin again. ‘Beware the false
ending,’ he says, as if the previous hours had been only a rehearsal.
The Gentile records their theoretical credits and debits on a chart. By now
Cooper already seems to owe him $30,000. ‘Whoever loses rides into Miniver for
groceries,’ The Gentile announces, ‘and I don’t mount horses or mules.’ Another
night he raises the stakes. ‘If you win, you may sleep with Lina. Try dealing
from the middle of the deck. Anything goes tonight. If I catch you at it, the
bet is cancelled. If you win, you can show that affection I know you have for
her.’ Cooper is deeply embarrassed. ‘Some say I won Lina in a card game,’ The
Gentile continues, ‘though in fact she won me in that card game. But of
course I was the dealer. The CIA believes you can break anyone, turn anyone, if
you know their weakness. It’s usually sex, always number one, then money, or
power.