MDDM: Ch 34 - Summary

[Scott Badger]

Chapter 34 - Bad Debt

Well...maybe "they"...maybe just one...maybe it doesn't matter at this
point. Like a binary collapsed, or a set of data reduced to a single value,
more and more our pair seem fused into One. A violently unstable fusion, to
be sure; assuming the face of one, or the other - as easily as switching
hats. In any case, one or both, or One representing both, or maybe just
Wicks...is headed to Lancaster, site of the recent Indian massacre.

No sooner do they hit town, when Jabez, tour-guide to the stars, is at their
side, ready to steer them through the perilous *attraction* -- first stop,
the Dutch Rifle. (...first stop indeed, signs, not just of the Cape, but in
particular, of the evil presence 'one or both had spied' there). As it turns
out, it's Cha. and Jere who run interference for Jabez, and almost
immediately they are in a bit of a spot. Mistaken for 'the Press', Dixon
follows the lead extended by a 'Countryman' and turns on his Quaker charm,
selling the crowd on the most 'up-to-the-minute' surveying, 'London-Style'
and 'surprisingly cheap'. The crowd is less than convinced, so our boys fall
back on the tried and true, 'We're men of Science', which doesn't exactly
put them in the clear, but does seem to buy them time.

Dixon engages the Colonials in a debate on justice and retribution and, to
Mason's fearful surprise - and respect -, he confronts the local crowd,
'"They were said to be harmless, helpless people"'. The Americans respond
with a very fiduciary attitude - debts and payments in balance and
it's-all-just-business. Talk of victims soon turns to complaints of
victimization and the now familiar criticisms of everything British and/or
Royal. By this time, Dixon has adopted a somewhat lower profile and, after a
'Mysickal' interlude on the nature of Time and living off the land, he
*innocently* changes the subject, '"Whah's thah' smoahkin' Object in thy
Mouth"'?

The waters oiled, not to mention 'Heads a-reel', the Boys 'are surpriz'd to
discover', after 'several Hours'[!!], that the conversation has become
little more than background noise and there seems to be no second-stop on
Jabez's tour. So, they head off to bed.

'Does Britannia, when she sleeps, dream? Is America her dream?[...]all that
*may yet be true*[...]seen and recorded, measur'd and tied in, back into the
Net-Work of Points[...]Possibilities to Simplicities[...]assuming them unto
the bare mortal World that is our home, and our Despair.'

'Mason, insomniack,' is instead, thinking about dreams. Dreams as
outlets...and inlets. Dreams that when chased, are caught - and turn into
clay. Even among this Philadelphia 'Enthusiasts Fair', Mason's search for
transcendence continues in vain, unwilling as he is to accept Death (of
self?) as a 'pre-condition'. More than anything, he hopes for a visit from
Rebekah, his only assurance, but instead is left 'cycl[ing]' through
'well-mark'd memories'.

Early, and presumably not in the best state of mind, Mason slips out to
visit the jail. Though an enthusiast of the Gothick, and not easily spooked,
the site of the massacre 'torpedo[s]' him. An Evil, manifested as 'almost a
smell', lingers in the courtyard. Later, Mason tries to explain to Dixon;
that, worse than the murders even, is the ability of 'these People' to
forget - that the smell was of 'Lethe-Water'.

Dixon fails to take Mason seriously (which Mason, of course, takes
personally) and proceeds to ready himself for a visit of his "own". He is
unsure, though, how to dress, worrying that he may cause 'war-like Frenzy'
or 'sullen[ness]' with his usual Quaker or military style clothes. In the
end, taking along his Quaker conscience, and riding with a military resolve,
Dixon decides to go as Mason. Of course.

What follows, Dixon's experience of the massacre site, is, for me, one of
P's most powerful passages. Dixon's reaction parallels Mason's, but also
differs significantly; while Mason feels '"like a Nun before a Shrine"',
Dixon laments his lack of regular prayer - and his fear, which prevents him
from praying at the site; Mason despairs that it is the Acts, the murders,
which will be forgotten, but for Dixon, it is the voices of the victims 'no
one understood' which are lost. Both believe that there must be
'consequences' but only Dixon, it seems, feels that he, himself, should be
an agent of that retribution. Though shaken, Mason tells Dixon that he was
'"Torpedo'd"' which, I think, could be read as "emPOWERED" - in the way of
those seeking to be struck by lightning; for Dixon, the experience is
overwhelming and shattering, both to his sense of social ethic, as well as
to his sense of personal ethic. He is as unable to shoulder the personal
responsibility of meteing out 'appropriate Fates' as he is to understand
what could have possessed those responsible for such acts. But, and probably
because, he comes much closer to an epiphany, 'the lightness he feels now,
lightness premonitory to Flying'.

As was discussed in the '97 MDMD, the sense of Evil Dixon encounters,
'something in this Wilderness, something ancient, that waited for them, and
infected their souls when they came', seems not yer' usual Pynchon. Of
course, it's Dixon's reaction, as described by Wicks (who isn't even sure
Dixon was there...), that we have, not at all necessarily Pynchon's. But
there's such power and clarity to Dixon's despair, that I can't help but
imagine P (like Dixon) standing before that 'chipp'd' wall (still visible at
the Fulton Opera House in Lancaster) *wanting* to believe, at least, that
humanity *does not* possess such capacity. That the perpetrators of the
massacre must have been poisoned - their 'mortal envelopes' infected.
(188)'the death-faced Hunters below were not moaning that way from any
cause,--rather,'twas the Sound itself that posses'd them, an independent
Force, using them as a way into the Secular Air...' Is this Gnostic? Is the
Land(Matter) corrupted, or does 'Wilderness' mean something else? Whatever
it is, in America it seems to lay a whole lot closer to the surface.

Dixon returns to the rooms to find Mason 'reclin'd', the picture of Sloth -
smoking, perhaps to forget that terrible Smell. Both are already packed and
ready to leave town - post-haste - but with as little commotion as possible.
'"I am cool" Mason replies' -- Question is, does he care?