IVIV20: No way to tell, 367-368

[Paul Nightingale]

And so, as the final section of the final chapter begins, we must, and not
for the first time, infer continuity. Doc "watche[s] everything slowly
disappear" (367). Cf the opening to Ch20, Doc "gaz[ing] into each image till
one by one they began to float apart into little blobs of color" (351).
Here, there is "no way to tell" what he is looking at (367). A reader
without a text.

The rules of the convoy are familiar, "one of the few things he'd ever seen
anybody in this town, except hippies, do for free" (368). Throughout, the
narrative has scrutinised Doc's status; here, we see him confirmed as a
regular citizen, no longer (merely) a hippie.