The road by Cormac McCarthy Page A

sand for the boy's hips and
shoulders where he would sleep and he sat holding him while he tousled his hair
before the fire to dry it. All of this like some ancient anointing. So be it.
Evoke the forms. Where you've nothing else construct ceremonies out of the air
and breathe upon them.
     
    He woke in the night with the cold and rose and
broke up more wood for the fire. The shapes of the small tree-limbs burning
incandescent orange in the coals. He blew the flames to life and piled on the
wood and sat with his legs crossed, leaning against the stone pier of the
bridge. Heavy limestone blocks laid up without mortar. Overhead the ironwork
brown with rust, the hammered rivets, the wooden sleepers and crossplanks. The
sand where he sat was warm to the touch but the night beyond the fire was sharp
with the cold. He got up and dragged fresh wood in under the bridge. He stood
listening. The boy didnt stir. He sat beside him and stroked his pale and
tangled hair. Golden chalice, good to house a god. Please dont tell me how the
story ends. When he looked out again at the darkness beyond the bridge it was
snowing.
     
    All the wood they had to burn was small wood and
the fire was good for no more than an hour or perhaps a bit more. He dragged
the rest of the brush in under the bridge and broke it up, standing on the
limbs and cracking them to length. He thought the noise would wake the boy but
it didnt. The wet wood hissed in the flames, the snow continued to fall. In the
morning they would see if there were tracks in the road or not. This was the
first human being other than the boy that he'd spoken to in more than a year.
My brother at last. The reptilian calculations in those cold and shifting eyes.
The gray and rotting teeth. Claggy with human flesh. Who has made of the world
a lie every word. When he woke again the snow had stopped and the grainy dawn
was shaping out the naked woodlands beyond the bridge, the trees black against the
snow. He was lying curled up with his hands between his knees and he sat up and
got the fire going and he set a can of beets in the embers. The boy lay huddled
on the ground watching him.
     
    The new snow lay in skifts all through the woods,
along the limbs and cupped in the leaves, all of it already gray with ash. They
hiked out to where they'd left the cart and he put the knapsack in and pushed
it out to the road. No tracks. They stood listening in the utter silence. Then
they set out along the road through the gray slush, the boy at his side with
his hands in his pockets.
     
    They trudged all day, the boy in silence. By
afternoon the slush had melted off the road and by evening it was dry. They
didnt stop. How many miles? Ten, twelve. They used to play quoits in the road
with four big steel washers they'd found in a hardware store but these were
gone with everything else. That night they camped in a ravine and built a fire
against a small stone bluff and ate their last tin of food. He'd put it by
because it was the boy's favorite, pork and beans. They watched it bubble
slowly in the coals and he retrieved the tin with the pliers and they ate in
silence. He rinsed the empty tin with water and gave it to the child to drink
and that was that. I should have been more careful, he said. The boy didnt
answer. You have to talk to me. Okay.
    You wanted to know what the bad guys looked like.
Now you know. It may happen again. My job is to take care of you. I was
appointed to do that by God. I will kill anyone who touches you. Do you
understand? Yes.
    He sat there cowled in the blanket. After a while
he looked up. Are we still the good guys? he said. Yes. We're still the good
guys. And we always will be. Yes. We always will be. Okay.
     
    In the morning they came up out of the ravine and
took to the road again. He'd carved the boy a flute from a piece of roadside
cane and he took it from his coat and gave it to him. The boy took it
wordlessly. After a while