The Great Northern Express Read Online Free Page A

called out. “That sign is there for a reason.”
    â€œWhat’s the reason?” I said.
    â€œRead the sign. We’ve got an author coming this afternoon. That place is reserved.”
    I pretended to study the sign. “I’ll get right out of here,” I said.
    â€œWell, you’d better,” said the Scourge of the Steppes. “Can’t you read?”
    I hopped back into my thundering car, pulled out of my designated parking spot, flashed the chain-store manager a thumbs-up, and drove around behind the mall, parking beside a large green Dumpster.
    â€œI’m not telling you what to do, Howard,” said Uncle Reg. “But I can tell you what
I’d
do in this situation.”
    I was sure I knew exactly what he would do in this situation, and it would not be pretty. Then again, I wasn’t my uncle. I removed my baseball cap and jacket and made my way on foot around to the front of the store, where the child Genghis was worriedly looking at his watch.
    â€œHe isn’t here yet?” I said. “Your author?”
    The guy shook his head. “Sometimes they don’t show up at all. You wouldn’t believe how high-handed some of these writers are.”
    I realized that not only did my corporate friend not recognize me as his author—he hadn’t even connected me with the poor apparitional dummy in the Loser Cruiser.
    I gave him a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “I imagine your writer will be here any minute,” I said, and headed in to do my event at the first and last chain bookstore on my itinerary. This was starting to be fun, and I wasn’t even out of New England yet.

10

An Inauspicious Beginning
    Queequeg was a native of Kokovoko, an island far away to the West and South. It is not known on any map; true places never are
.
    â€”H ERMAN M ELVILLE ,
M OBY -D ICK
    I paused and peered over my teacher’s copy of
Moby-Dick
at twenty bewildered students. “What do you think Herman Melville means when he writes that true places can’t be found on a map?”
    ?
    Then, from Bill, who I’d been told was something of a teenage genius, “What do
you
think he means, Mr. Mosher?”
    Aha! The night before, preparing my first-ever set of teaching lessons, I had underlined the phrase “true places” and had written in the margin, “Discuss!” Not six months earlier, my own American literature professor had explicated this grand and mysterious passage, which had stimulated all kinds of compelling—and certainly a few not so compelling—discussions in lit courses, graduate-level seminars, and Great Books readinggroups. Fifteen seconds into my new profession, here was my chance to shine. Thank you, Bill.
    There was just one problem. At the moment, I couldn’t recall a single word of what my professor had said about
Moby-Dick
or any other book. Truth to tell, I didn’t have the faintest notion what Herman Melville was talking about. What’s more, it was on the tip of my tongue to say so. At least I might get a laugh out of these solemn Vermont kids.
    Then came salvation. Sort of.
    â€œMr. Mosher?”
    â€œYes, Bill?”
    â€œYou know Cody? The kid you loaned your car to right before class? Who said he had an emergency at home?”
    â€œYes?”
    This yes was more tentative. Already I was wondering how I could have done anything so dumb. Tossing my car keys to a kid who, just as Bill had been lauded as the class star, had been pointed out to me as a born troublemaker.
    Bill craned his neck to look out the window. “He’s driving by the school in your station wagon at about sixty miles an hour.”
    â€œJesus Christ!” I shouted, running to the window to see. The whole class was up and making for the window.
    As I stumbled over a desk, Bill, peering down onto School Street, nodded admiringly and said, “In reverse.”

11

An Encounter
    Moose can be aggressive any