A Confederacy of Dunces (52 page)

"I certainly hope it isn't snowing up north. My system simply will not function under those conditions. And please watch out for Greyhound Scenicruisers along the way. They'll demolish a toy like this."

"Ignatius, all at once you're your old horrible self. All at once I think I'm making a very big mistake."

"A mistake? Of course not," Ignatius said sweetly. "But watch out for that ambulance. We don't want to begin our pilgrimage with an accident."

As the ambulance passed, Ignatius hunched over and saw

"Charity Hospital" printed on its door. The rotating red light atop the ambulance splashed over the Renault for a brief moment as the vehicles passed each other. Ignatius felt insulted. He had expected a massive barred truck. They had underestimated him in sending out an old, well-used Cadillac ambulance. He would easily have been able to smash all of those windows. Then the glowing Cadillac fins were two

blocks behind them and Myrna was turning onto St. Charles Avenue.

Now that Fortuna had saved him from one cycle, where would she spin him now? The new cycle would be so different from anything he had ever known.

Myrna prodded and shifted the Renault through the city traffic masterfully, weaving in and out of impossibly narrow lanes until they were clear of the last twinkling streetlight of the last swampy suburb. Then they were in darkness in the center of the salt marshes. Ignatius looked out at the highway marker that reflected their headlights. U.S. 11. The marker flew past.

He rolled down the window an inch or two and breathed the salt air blowing in over the marshes from the Gulf.

As if the air were a purgative, his valve opened. He breathed again, this time more deeply. The dull headache was lifting.

He stared gratefully at the back of Myrna's head, at the pigtail that swung innocently at his knee. Gratefully. How ironic, Ignatius thought. Taking the pigtail in one of his paws, he pressed it warmly to his wet moustache.

John Kennedy Toole (1937-1969)