The Sisters Brothers

searched through these for the formula’s recipe but could not understand hardly any of what he had written down, this owing less to my ignorance of science and chemistry than to his penmanship, which was atrocious.

preoccupied as he was with his vomiting and unwellness.

For an instant I was surprised by this, then not.

he poured us each a cup of coffee, the taste of which was so poor it actually startled me,

‘My feelings about San Francisco rise and fall with my moods. Or is it that the town alters my moods, thus informing my opinions?

‘The skill and patience involved with the making of this boot humbles me.’

In the static world of hard facts and figures it was approximately twenty-five minutes before the gold ceased glowing, but the moments that passed while we worked the river were neither brief nor long, were in fact somehow removed from the very restriction or notion of time—we were outside of time, is how it felt to me; our experience was so uncomm

me. I pinned a suicide note to my front door and left town in one hell of a shameful hurry.

This was my dream, and it was a powerful, vivid one, but I did nothing to enact it,