ATDTDA dust passages

[mikebailey]

comparing and contrasting:

(p 127) "So had her grandson Hunter painted her, [Constance Penhallow]
standing in a loose, simple dress in a thousand-flower print in green
and yellow, viewed as through dust, dust of another remembered country
observed late in the day, risen by way of wind or hoses from a lane
beyond a walled garden...."

this is describing a portrait of Constance Penhallow.  She and her
nephew appear only in the Iceland section.  Her character falls in
2 major AtD categories: slight differences that were mentioned in the
author blurb (she's supposed to have passed into legend, and be known
well enough that just mentioning her should conjure up all sorts of
ancillary knowledge on the part of the reader - like the
disaster in New York, details assumed to be well-known are elided),
and "people who are departed from forever" (like Webb, Mayva,
and Deuce, just to name a few)
the dust adding a sentimental glow, in my mind's eye


the other dust passage: p.272
"In any case it was all getting too complicated to last, and the
day finally did come when Sloat rode off up the trail headed
vaguely south, the air
unnaturally still that day, the dut he rasied behind him refusing
to settle, only growing thicker, until it seemed he had transmogrified
into a creature of dust miles long, crawling away.  Deuce leaning
on the fence watching the dusty departure for the better part
of an hour, silent for days after...."

a word-picture, but this time more grotesque with Sloat becoming
a "creature of dust"

Sloat, Deuce and Lake are indigenous to the story in that all
the details we're expected to get come from the tale, where Constance
Penhallow is asserted to have life, like the Chums, in the broader fictional
world...this is only one of her adventures...

Deuce takes Sloat's departure with much less grace than Constance does
her nephew's, in fact his gracelessness is pervasive the way her
grace is.

both passages point up the fact that dusty, unpaved roads and
horses were prevalent then - much rarer today.