IVIV20: Moving faster than Doc had ever seen him, 354-357

[Paul Nightingale]

20.1 appears transitional, from the departure of Bigfoot at the end of Ch19
to the renewal of the Golden Fang plotline in 20.2.

On 354 Doc is discovered waiting, as so often, reactive rather than
proactive, to be involved in the action (as Gilligan to Sauncho's Skipper). 

Doc-&-Sauncho is offered as an alternative to Doc-&-Bigfoot; when Doc is
arrested in Ch2, Sauncho appears in counterpoint to Bigfoot. The Golden Fang
is associated with Sauncho after his "strangely evasive" response to Doc's
question on 89; a couple of pages later he tells Doc "his firm ... ha[s]
been keenly, almost desperately, curious about the Golden Fang for a while
now" (91), which might explain why, relating the boat's history, he can tie
Mickey Wolfmann to it (93). Sauncho's first appearance (26-29) might lead us
to question his competence; viewed from Doc's pov he might appear as
threatening as Bigfoot. Subsequent reference to The Golden Fang (89-91)
introduces a note of mystery, again from Doc's pov. Moreoever, his
"fantasies" (91) echo Doc's own yearning for status.

Down the page on 354, another kind of reading. Viewed from the ocean,
Gordita Beach appears "in a spill of weather-beaten colors, like paint chips
at some out-of-the-way hardware store, and the hillside up to Dunecrest ...
looking from out here strangely flat, hardly there at all". The loss of
perspective indicated here is both painterly and reminiscent of the earlier
(two-dimensional) "glittering mosaic of doubt" (351). To emphasise Doc's
impressionistic reading: ". like paint chips". The extreme close-up and the
long shot are equally evasive.

On 356, the Golden Fang finally coming into view, Doc notes Sauncho's look,
one of "pure unrequited love"; this obsession recalls Bigfoot, who has
returned in flashback, courtesy of "Sauncho's old binoculars" (355). Here,
Doc imagines Bigfoot "at the outset of his career", contradicting the
parting view of Bigfoot on 350, Doc suppressing any thought of the "weird
twisted cop karma" and "what [Bigfoot] thought he needed to know" in favour
of the "young cop" on 355. Now that Bigfoot has departed Doc reverses time
much as he did when parting from Shasta (the "fool's attempt" on 314).