A Catskill Eagle |
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A Catskill Eagle |
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Latest Update 08 October 2003 by Bob Ames
| Hardcover Edition | |||
| Published by: | Delacorte Press | ||
| Publication Date: | 1985 | ||
| ISBN: | 0-385-29385-2 | ||
| Paperback Edition | |||
| Published by: | Dell Publishing Co., Inc. | ||
| ISBN | 0-440-11132-3 | ||
| Large Print Edition | |||
| Published by | G.K. Hall | ||
| ISBN | 0-816-13892-3 | ||
| Audio Cassette Edition | |||
| Published by: | Books on Tape | ||
| Read By: | Michael Prichard | ||
| Length | 5 cassettes, 300 min. | ||
The above information is from the online catalog of the Minuteman Library Network and my own collection.---Bob
"For Joan"
Taken from the back cover of the paperback edition
"In the detective business, Spenser sometimes had to bend the law. Other times, he broke it. But he lived by his own inviolate rules. He didn't kill unless he had to. He helped a friend in trouble. And he loved just one woman, even though she was the one woman he'd just lost.
So when Susan's desperate letter arrived, Spenser didn't think twice. His best friend Hawk faced a life sentence in a California jail. And Susan had gotten herself into even bigger trouble. Now Spenser had to free them both...even if it meant breaking his own rules to do it.
[now THIS is a decent back cover blurb! -ed]
My guess is that Spenser is the eagle, and in the course of rescuing Susan, he does some pretty low things (murder, arson, theft, etc), but since he's doing them for a good cause (mainly Susan's well-being), that he's still better than your common criminal who might do all of those things. Anyone else care to comment?
To which Ernest Hemingway mockingly replied, in his story
The Snows of
Kilimanjaro, "Yes, they have more money."
In the very beginning of Chapter 39, Spenser says, "We could skip killing Costigan . . . and concentrate on recovering the stuff we left in Pequod." FBI agent replies, "Not funny, McGee."
McGee is a reference to Travis McGee, a character in a series of novels by John MacDonald. McGee's schtick was recovery; he would recover anything you needed, and keep half its value as payment.
However, Steven Rubio replies:
Always possible, of course, but I don't think that's what's going on here. I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure one of the catchphrases on the long-running radio comedy, "Fibber McGee and Molly" would come when Fibber would say something silly. Molly would reply, "T'aint funny, McGee."
"Leslie Feidler in Love and Death in the American Novel, which was really long, suggests that this is probably a repressed homoeroticism and that the racial divide between the two keeps the homoeroticism from emerging. I find the white-nonwhite companionship interesting; I have no particular suspicion that it's homoerotic. I want to say this about Mr. Fiedler. I think he was wrong about that. And if you see him, you tell him I said that, and you explain to him who the hell I am."
"The Messenger found him 'I loosed you, the tendon of your feet were pierced and fettered.' Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, Line 1034."
"a trademark now owned exclusively by Northern States Power Company, a familiar warm and endearing symbol in the electric industry. His distinguishing features include a red, lightning-bolt body and light-bulb nose."
Let's see how long it takes their lawyers to issue a cease and desist order for this unauthorized usage. Of course by then I hope to have tracked down some R. Crumb artwork.
"From the 1984 book of the same name by Dan Jenkins. Sports fiction,
follow-up novel to Semi-Tough. 'I guess you could say we were laughing at
life its ownself...' The quote is from the last page.
I know that Billy Clyde Puckett talks about life its ownself
somewhere else in the book, probably with a better quote, but I
could not find it with a quick skim."
"Comment and discussion as to river. In the tunnel, RBP really mixes his metaphors. Spenser is Jonah, descending into the belly of the beast. Spenser is Hercules or Orpheus, descending into the Underworld, wondering about crossing a river (the Acheron) and nervous about Cerberus ("dog with several heads"). Could be Dante too, who followed along the same path some time later and who is mentioned in the next chapter. That would confirm the river as the Acheron and not the Styx, as quoted on the site. (The Greeks seemed to have a lot of rivers to cross, Lethe, Styx, Acheron...Hawk would be more comfortable perhaps with the Jordan?) I like Hercules for S. Spenser is compared to a salamander, creature who lives in the dark in tunnels. And Spenser becomes Alice, as he steps thru the looking glass.
So many roles, so little time!"
Lethe is a body of water in the center of the underworld which the dead drink of and forget all thoughts of a previous existence. It is the root of the English word "lethal" and the key to Jubal Harshaw's locked drawer of a suicide drug in "Stranger in a Strange Land."
The rivers down there depend upon your source. Here's what I came up with:
"Beach the vessel beside deep-eddying Okeanos and pass on foot to the dank domains of Hades. At the entrance there, the stream of Akheron is joined by the waters of Pyriphlegethon and a branch of Styx, Kokytos." -Odyssey 10.513-515
"Once is enough to have beheld the unlovely realm of Hell, once to have gone across the stream of Styx." -Metamorphoses 14.593
"He [Herakles] was sent to Hades the gate keeper to fetch horrible Hades' watchdog from Erebos, he never should have escaped the steep streams of the Stygian river." -Iliad 8.368-369
"The theme of descending into the heart of darkness fits. The theme of search for a man fits. Spenser has undergone "horror" to get this far. That fits. Jerry's abuse of power fits. The Narrator pities Kurtz, yet knows he deserves to die for the horror of the things he has done for wealth. That fits."
"A kid with tie-dyed hair strolled by wearing a white plastic vest and soft boots like Peter Pan. He had no shirt on and his chest was white and hairless and thin. He glanced at himself covertly in the store windows, filled with the pleasure of his outlandishness. He was probably hoping to scare a Republican, though in Kenmore Square they were sparse between ball games."
"At Hertz I got a Buick Skylark with the window crank handle missing on the driver's side. Where was O.J. when you needed him."
- That's the trouble with making time-sensitive joke headers. Nowadays he swings his 5 iron through sand traps and out-of-bounds shrubbery searching for the elusive killer. Fortunately, the cuts to his hand have healed nicely.
"I pulled in, shut off the Buick, took my bottle of muscatel and rinsed my mouth out a couple of times. The wine tasted like tile cleaner. But it smelled bad...As soon as I came into public view I began to weave, my head down, mumbling to myself. It is not easy to mumble to yourself if you don't feel moved to mumble. I didn't know what to mumble and finally began to mumble the starting lineup for the impossible-dream Red Sox team of '67. 'Rico Petrocelli,' I mumbled, 'Carl Yastrzemski...Jerry Adair.'
I sat on the front steps of the town library and took a swig from my bottle, blocking the bottle neck with my tongue so I didn't have to swallow any. What I was going to do didn't get easier if I did it drunk.
...
'Mike Andrews...Reggie Smith...' I blew my nose with my naked hand and wiped it across my shirt. 'Hawk Harrelson...Tony C.' I raised my voice. 'Jose goddammned Tartabull,' I snarled. Up at the town hall a black and white Mill River Police car turned out of the parking lot in front and cruised slowly down toward the library.
I stood and smashed the muscatel bottle against the steps.
'Joe Foy,' I said with cold fury in my voice. Then I unzipped my fly and began to take a leak on the lawn. Provocative. The cruiser pulled in beside me before I had finished and a Mill River cop in a handsome tan uniform got out and walked toward me....'Hold it right there, mister,' he said.
I giggled. 'Am holding it right there, officer.' I lurched a little and smothered a belch.
The cop was in front of me now. 'Zip it up,' he snapped. 'There's women and children here.'
I zipped my fly about halfway. 'Women and children first,' I said.
'You got some ID on you?' the cop said.
I fumbled in my hip pocket, and then at my other hip pocket and then at my side pockets. I looked at the cop, squinting to bring him into focus.
'I wish to report a stolen wallet,' I said, speaking the words carefully like a man trying not to be drunk."
"Hawk spoke into his clenched hand. 'All units,' he said, 'be on the lookout for gorgeous Afro-American stud in company of middle-aged honkie thug.'"
"'You leaving the bag?' Hawk said.
'Yeah, less conspicuous.'
'How bout I carry it on my head and walk behind you.'
'Probably be a good cover,' I said, 'but it might perpetuate a racial stereotype.'"
"A black and white San Francisco Police car stopped out front and two cops got out and came into the restaurant...They got coffee and French-twist donuts to go and left.
'Probably looking for a gorgeous Afro-American and a middle-aged honkie,' I said. 'No wonder they didn't make us.'"
"Hawk and I got in back with Meg. Fay sat up front with the cabbie.
'What are your names?' Meg said.
'Frick,' I said.
'Frack,' Hawk said.
Meg nodded seriously. 'I'll remember by rhyming them,' she said. 'Frack as in black.'
'And Frick as in prick,' Fay said from the front seat. The cabbie laughed and pulled away."
"While Hawk drove I canvassed the briefcase...We were back on 101 south of the airport when I finished.
'Eleven thousand, five hundred, and seventy-eight dollars,' I said.
'Eight bucks?' Hawk said. 'Who pays a whore eight bucks? "Give you round-the-world for thirty-eight big ones, honey."'
'The pocket money from Allie's wallet, probably,' I said.
'He looks like a guy carries eight bucks,' Hawk said."
'You get some horn-rimmed glasses,' Hawk said, 'and shave off that five-day growth you might get by using those cards and licenses. You preppy like Leo.'
'I'll leave the beard,' I said. 'They'll think I've grown a beard since the picture and it will cover up the fact that I have a strong manly jaw and Leo's is weak and unassertive.'"
"'Remember where Mill River Boulevard is?' I said.
'Un huh.'
'Jerry Costigan lives off it on something called Costigan Drive in something called The Keep.'
'The Keep?' Hawk said.
'The Keep.'
'The more money you honkies get,' Hawk said, 'the sillier you get.'
'Wait a minute,' I said. 'Didn't you grow up in a place called The Ghetto?'
'Shit,' Hawk said. 'You got me.'
'See, you intolerant bastard.'
Hawk drove quietly for a moment and then he began to laugh. 'Maybe I move to Beverly Farms,' Hawk said, 'buy a big house call it The Ghetto.' He made ghetto a two-word phrase.
'The WASPS would turn lime green,' I said.
'Match their pants,' Hawk said."
"The weight of our guns tended to tug at our pants. They'd removed our belts at Mill River PD.
'Next stop,' I said softly to Hawk across the narrow road, 'we gotta get belts.'
'Rescuing maidens suck if your trousers fall down,' Hawk said.
'Didn't Sir Gawain say that?'"
"'We need to get him out,' Hawk said. 'But we don't want to do it with a big ruckus 'cause we only want him.'
'The tar baby,' I said.
'You speaking to me,' Hawk said.
'You ever read Uncle Remus?' I said.
'You gotta be shitting,' Hawk said.
'Br'er rabbit and the tar baby,' I said. '"Tar baby sit and don't say nuffin."'
Hawk was quiet, watching the guardhouse.
'I'm going to go out and sit in the road and wait for him to come out and see what the hell I'm doing.'
...
I walked slowly up the road directly toward the gate, and when I was about ten feet from it I sat down in the road and folded my hands in my lap with the gun out of sight and stared at the gate.
The guard came out of the guardhouse and looked at me through the gate.
...
'You hear me?' he said. 'What are you doing out there?'
Tar baby sit and don't say nuffin.
...
The guard took a big breath. 'Shit,' he said, and opened the gate. As he walked toward me he took a leather sap from his right-hand hip pocket.
When he got to me he said, 'Okay, pal, last chance. Either you get on your feet and haul ass out of here, or I put a knot on your head while you sit.'
I unfolded my hands and pointed the .25 straight up at him as he bent over me. 'How dee doo, Br'er Bear,' I said.'
...
The guard did what I told him to. I kept the gun near my body and the guard between me and the gate in case someone came down and saw us. At the edge of the road I said, 'Step ahead of me into the woods.' Five feet into the woods Hawk was leaning against a tree. When we reached him he hit the guard across the back of the head with the jack handle. The guard grunted once and fell forward. He lay still except for his right leg, which twitched slightly.
'Br'er tire iron,' Hawk said."
"Hawk stepped across Rocky's prone position and sapped Bob. Bob lurched forward off the stool and took a staggering step and Hawk hit him again and he pitched forward, toward the monitor panels. I caught him before he hit them and guided him to the floor.
'Twice?' I said.
'It's an unfamiliar blackjack,' Hawk said. 'Ain't got the feel quite right."
"'We after Susan," Hawk said. "That makes this your show. But I ain't along on this just 'cause I care about you.'
- ...
'I know,' I said. 'I know that. It's the way I know you're human.'
- 'She make both of us human, babe," Hawk said. 'I don't want to lose her much more than you do.'"
"'How the Christ did we end up here,' I said.
'I the victim of sociological forces,' Hawk said.
'You're a goddamned leg breaker because of racism?' I said.
'No, I a leg breaker 'cause the hours are short and the pay is good. I end up here 'cause I hanging around with a middle-aged honkie thug."
"'Have some trail mix,' I said.
Hawk took a handful of trail mix and chewed it without pleasure.
'I look like fucking trail mix to you?' he said. 'I look like a fucking granola bar? I eggs Benedict, and mimosa, I room service, man.'
'The rain is nice,' I said.
'Refreshing,' Hawk said.
Along with the woodsmoke I could smell coffee, from the lodge.
'If they start to fry bacon in there,' I said, 'I'm going to cry.'"
"'You ever been to the Spokane airport?' Hawk said.
'Yeah.'
'They got food there?'
'Sort of.'
'Good. I ain't had anything since breakfast yesterday except that goddamned weasel food you bought.'
'Weasels don't eat granola,' I said. 'Weasels are carnivores.'
'So am I,' Hawk said. 'And I don't want to eat no more fucking seeds and dates.'
'Nuts too,' I said. 'Hazel nuts.'
'Let Hazel worry 'bout them,' Hawk said. 'I'm getting me a mess of good boondock airport food.'
'Probably get a meal on the plane too,' I said.
'Lawzy me,' Hawk said, 'I done died and gone to heaven.'"
"McKinnon said, 'McKinnon, FBI. This is Ives.'
Ives looked like a salt cod. He was lean and weathered and gray-haired. His raincoat was open and under it I could see a green bow tie with little pink pigs on it.
'I'm with the three-letter agency,' he said.
'You with the Tennessee Valley Authority,' I said. 'Well damn, I always wanted to meet someone like you. TVA is my favorite.'
'Not TVA,' Ives said.
'He's with the fucking CIA,' Quirk said.
When Quirk said the sacred letters Ives looked uncomfortable, like he was fighting the impulse to turn his coat collar up.
He said, 'Let's not broadcast it, Lieutenant.'
Hawk said in a full voice, 'Broadcast what?' and Quirk looked away, trying not to smile."
"'When the arrest warrants for you two started flowing in from California, he [Quirk. -ed] came in to see me. See if we could do anything to get your ass out of the crack, you know? I'd been talking with other people'--he nodded at Ives--'about their problem with Costigan and I got hold of them, and here we are.'
Hawk looked at Quirk and raised his eyebrows. 'I knowed that, I give you two bites of my toast.'"
"'You really a lesbian,' Hawk said.
'I really am,' Rachel Wallace said.
'Well,' Hawk said, 'save money on diaphragms I guess.'
Rachel Wallace, halfway into a sip of Scotch, burst into laughter and nearly spilled all of her drink. Hawk grinned. This time there was warmth. I patted Rachel Wallace on the back until stopped choking on the half-swallowed whiskey.
'Hawk has that special insight into minority situations,' I said."
"'Connecticut,' he said when I was through. 'Christ. We should have enrolled in one of those frequent flyer programs when this started. Get ourselves a free trip to Dallas or something.'
'Second prize is two free trips to Dallas,' I said."
"Hawk looked at his plate and then at me. The steaks were wide and flat, covering nearly the whole plate, and about a half-inch thick at best. There was a large bone in each steak.
'Better wait and drink the second martini,' I said.
'What kind of steak you figure this is,' Hawk said.
'Camel.'
Hawk nodded. 'Well, we didn't exactly say beef steak, did we.'
The waitress brought the second martinis. Hawk and I each drank some.
'Gin,' we said simultaneously.
'We could send them back,' Hawk said.
'Yeah, but the next one might be made with Kool-Aid,' I said."
"Red and I locked left hands.
'I'll call it,' Red said.
'Sure.'
Red said, 'Go,' and I slammed his hand down onto the lit cigarette. The force scattered the cigarettes.
'Wait a minute,' he said. 'Wait a minute. I wasn't ready.'
'Okay,' I said. 'We'll do it again. You call.'
We locked hands again. Red took in a couple of deep breaths.
'All right,' Red said. 'When I say go.'
'Sure.'
'Go.'
Red's grip tightened and he tried to turn my wrist.
'You ready?' I said.
Red nodded, straining against my wrist.
'You sure?'
'Ya.'
'Okay,' I said and slammed his hand against the table.
The waitress arrived with a tray of beer bottles and there was silence while she distributed them and picked up the empties. She went away.
'Where the fuck did you guys come from,' Red said. You guys got to be from another fucking planet.'
'It's because our hearts are pure,' I said."
"His face had reddened and for the first time his speech began to slur a little. If I'd had that many boilermakers they could iron clothes on me."
"On the thirteenth day, Hawk said, 'I think I in love with Doreen.'
'Don't blame you,' I said.
'How you feel about interracial marriage,' Hawk said.
'Against the law of God,' I said.
'You sure?' Hawk said.
'Says right in the Bible,' I said. 'Thou shalt not marry a spook.'
'Shit,' Hawk said, 'you right. I remember that part. How 'bout I just fuck her?'
'Far as I know that's okay,' I said."
"Ives frowned and looked at me hard. 'You work too hard at being a wise guy, Lochinvar.'
- 'It's worth the effort,' I said.
'Man ain't lazy,' Hawk said."
"'Okay,' I said. 'Thanks.'
'Oh shit,' Quirk said. 'No need for thanks. The entire City of Boston Police Department is at your disposal. We've decided to give up crime-stopping altogether.'
'Probably just as well,' I said. 'You weren't making that much progress anyway.'
'And you, hot shot?'
'Less,' I said."
"'You figure they know what we look like,' Hawk said.
'Probably got descriptions. Maybe pictures. Costigan owns Mill River and they had pictures of us.'
'Or maybe they just got orders to blast every handsome black man they see with an ugly honkie.'
'We'd be safe,' I said."
"'What do you suppose he's got in the gym bag?'
'Sophisticated kung fu weapons,' Hawk said. 'Like maybe a Uzi.'
'Or a sawed-off,' I said. 'Where's Bruce Lee when you really need him.'"
"She ate her club sandwich by taking off the top slice of bread and nibbling on the ingredients one at a time. I could eat a brontosaurus in the time it took her to eat a club sandwich that way."
"'He is also a white supremacist'
- 'Him too,' Hawk murmured.
Rachel Wallace smiled. 'And an anti-Semite. He seems to believe that America is in danger of being overrun by blacks and Jews and foreigners and' - she smiled again - 'lesbians.'
- 'The lesbians are arming?' I said.
'And gay men,' she said, 'and feminists, and the IRS.'
- 'How about the worldwide Roman Catholic conspiracy,' I said.
'You get the idea,' Rachel Wallace said. 'Costigan appears to be fearful that America will be overrun by Americans.'"
(thanks to Jonathan Andrew Sheen, who suggested this one)
""I need a drink,' Rachel Wallace said. 'Or maybe twelve.'
'I go out and get a bottle,' Hawk said. 'Stretch my legs.'
'Why not have it sent up,' Rachel Wallace said. 'You might be spotted.'
Hawk looked at her as if she'd said the world was flat.
'Or someone might follow you back here,' Rachel Wallace said.
Hawk looked at her as if she had just fallen off the edge of the world."
"The house was still. It was so big it would seem still if someone were building a nuclear submarine in the other wing."
"My foot hit the edge of a drop. I stopped, pulled back. Stairs? Bottomless pit? I guessed stairs. I dropped on my stomach and inched forward. A guy paranoid enough to build this underground fortress, and then a private escape hatch, was paranoid enough to booby trap it coming in. I dropped my hands over the edge and felt. A stair. I reached farther. Another stair. I stood and felt along the wall and stepped one step down. There was a railing. I hung on to it. A railing. Life was good. I held the railing with both hands and took another step. And another. Joy is relative. Right now the railing was better than sex and almost as good as love."
"At the end of Chapter 46, we have Spenser and Hawk proving that boxers don't have to count past ten. Mathematicians they are not. If one sets out from Mill River at 50 mph and drives for 12 hours, one travels 600 miles. In the next line, Spenser slips up and says that it is sixteen miles! Then Hawk calculates the area of a circle of radius 600 miles as 3,600 square miles (this is 60 squared, not 600 squared...) Now 360,000 is 600 squared, but he still hasn't multiplied by 3.1416 to get the final area of 1,130,976 square miles. Probably just as well. They might have got discouraged!! The real question is: since there is not the slightest doubt that Dr. Parker knows how to calculate the area of a circle, what is the purpose of this half page? (Note that in the next chapter, Spenser refers to 3,600 miles, not square miles, thus confusing the issue further!)"
I would also like to note that for a search area
of 3,600 square miles the radius is 33.85 miles. Perhaps the Costigans traveled
for 12 hours at 2.8 mph, or at 50 mph for 41 minutes. I will leave
the above figures as an exercise for the student.
"Once Susan has been rescued from Russell, Spenser and Susan are talking and Susan asks Spenser if he had any siblings and he said no. She then says 'I was the youngest' ... In Sudden Mischief <chapter 6>, when Spenser and Susan are talking about Susan's past, Susan says 'They were childless until me.'"
Much the same way that Spenser went from having had a mother in the earlier books to her having died during childbirth when Parker had a better idea years later.
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