"Hey You did great."

"No, I didn't!" Amy exclaimed. "I almost made us flip!"

JT shrugged dismissively "It's never one person's fault."

It was in this case, Amy wanted to say. And she flashed back on the image of her lying on top of JT-smooshing him, really, all 237 pounds of her; of burying her face against his neck for the briefest of moments (warm skin, creased and tacky and smelling of maple); and she thought that he was an awfully good man, a better man than any she had ever met, the kind of man she hoped one day would see her for the person she was, underneath all this flab.

31.

Day Seven, Evening Mile 108 It astonished Peter how easy it had been for Abo to get laid last night. Pretty girl shows up on the river and boom, off she goes with the paddle captain. He saw it with his own eyes, Abo heading upriver after everyone else had gone to bed. Was this their first time? Or had they already slept together?

Peter sensed there was an awful lot of s.e.x in the life of a river guide. Probably every time you went down the river, you fell in love with someone and had a lot of great s.e.x. It occurred to him that he might inquire, while he was here, about getting his guide's license. It couldn't be all that hard; the way he saw it, you simply made friends with gravity and let the water do the work.

It was early evening on the day they'd run Crystal, and Peter and Amy were, at the moment, sitting on the edge of Dixie's boat, drinking beer and listening in as the guides talked about their day in the Big Ones. Peter could barely keep his eyes off Dixie, who was twisting herself into a pretzel on the side tube. Her blue sarong lay crumpled in the well. Peter wondered, were he to get a sunburn, if Dixie might lend him that blue sarong to drape over his shoulders.

"So are we stopping at Shinumo tomorrow?" Abo asked.

"That's the plan," said JT. He was wearing a pair of black drugstore gla.s.ses, which sat crookedly on his nose as he made notes in a three-ring binder. "Everybody loves a waterfall."

"Prime Christmas photo op." Dixie untangled her limbs and popped open a can of Olympia, nearly causing Peter to swoon. Eyes closed, can tilted to her lips, a quick sparkle of lager-Dixie was the girl on a greeting card he'd received long ago. He felt like G.o.d had just invented the five senses, for him alone.

"How much you want to bet we get a card from the Compsons next Christmas," said Abo, "all four of them, standing in front of Shinumo Falls."

"Maybe Mitch.e.l.l would like to take another group photo," Dixie suggested, which prompted a chuckle from JT and Abo.

JT twisted back to Peter and Amy. "Cover your ears," he told them.

"Lemme ask you," Abo said. "Is Mitch.e.l.l really writing a book? Because if he is, I'm worried. What if I'm in it? What's he going to say about me?"

"He'll say you drink too much," said Dixie. She turned on her side and began doing leg lifts. Peter had to use all the self-restraint he could muster not to look at the hollow at the top of her thigh.

"You think I drink too much, Boss?"

"Only after Crystal and Lava," JT replied.

"Oh! Well, then it doesn't count," said Abo, opening another beer. "Peter. Amy. Catch," and he tossed a can to each of them.

"Mitch.e.l.l drinks a lot of gin," Amy volunteered.

"We know," said all three guides in unison.

"And he doesn't share," Abo grumbled.

"Okay, Abo," JT said. "That's enough."

"I'm just saying."

"Zip it."

"We don't mind," Peter said.

"Well, I do," said JT.

"Speak of the devil," said Dixie.

Up on the beach, Mitch.e.l.l and Mark were doing push-ups, clapping between lifts.

"Hey, Mitch.e.l.l!" Abo shouted. "Are you trying to embarra.s.s us or something?"

Mitch.e.l.l grunted but kept going.

JT turned to Peter and Amy. "We like Mitch.e.l.l," he confided, "but Mitch.e.l.l can be a little intense. And you're not hearing any of this."

"Twenty more, Mark!" Abo called.

"You like Mitch.e.l.l," said Dixie. "Mitch.e.l.l takes himself way too seriously for me. We need to put Mitch.e.l.l in his place. A few practical jokes wouldn't hurt. Maybe I should get out my bugs." like Mitch.e.l.l," said Dixie. "Mitch.e.l.l takes himself way too seriously for me. We need to put Mitch.e.l.l in his place. A few practical jokes wouldn't hurt. Maybe I should get out my bugs."

Here, finally was the chance Peter had been waiting for since stepping off the bus back up at Lee's Ferry.

"What bugs?" he asked pleasantly immediately regretting it, for it sounded s.e.xual, though he couldn't say why.

"Show Peter your bugs, Dixie," said Abo.

And that sounded even more s.e.xual! Wait! Did Abo intend a double meaning? Had Dixie said something to him in private about what a skilled paddler Peter was or how brave he'd been while swimming Hance? He swung his legs around and climbed across the gear. Dixie, meanwhile, had brought out a baggie of plastic bugs-not the neon-colored ones you'd get in a gumball machine but lifelike versions, the kind you might find at a museum gift shop. She picked out a scorpion and tossed it to Abo, who jumped and screamed in a falsetto.

"Bed or day bag?" said Dixie. "Coffee mug maybe?"

Peter felt so privileged to be a part of this plot that he had to restrain himself, for he had a lot of practical jokes up his sleeve, his sister could attest to that, and if the guides wanted to put Mitch.e.l.l in his place, Peter would be only too glad to help.

But JT was shaking his head. "Forget the jokes, people," he said, slapping his menu book shut. "I don't need Mitch.e.l.l having a heart attack. He's a pain, but we're not going to play around with him. That's all I need, is more s.h.i.t on this trip."

"Boo," said Abo. "Hiss."

They all fell silent. Peter picked through the bugs and found a centipede and laid it on his thigh and admired it.

"Speaking of which," Abo said after a moment, "how's Ruth's leg?"

"Terrible."

"Even with the Cipro?"

"Doesn't work that quick."

"Think we'll evacuate?" asked Dixie.

"G.o.d, I just don't know! I sure wish she'd started that Cipro earlier," JT said.

"Why didn't she?" asked Abo.

"Saving it for something important, probably," sighed JT. "Isn't that always the case?" He got up and balanced his way across to his own boat, where he opened up the cooler and began gathering the ingredients for the night's dinner.

This had the effect of breaking up the group, for Abo and Dixie were on dinner duty, and Amy trudged off to her campsite. Peter stayed there, alone on Dixie's boat. She'd left her ammo box open, and there was a creased picture of Dixie and her boyfriend, taped to the inside of the lid. The boyfriend barely had any hair at all. Peter wished he hadn't seen the picture because he didn't want to imagine Dixie with a guy who had no hair.

He tucked the centipede in his pocket and smoothed his hand over the rubbery surface of her sleeping pad. He thought of her lying on this pad at night, with her blue sarong loosely covering her hips. He pictured that twisted silver amulet, the ancient horse, warm in the hollow of her throat-which opened the floodgates, and Peter finally allowed himself to wonder what it would be like to make love on a raft in the middle of a smooth stretch of dark water, floating to Baja.

"Not at all, honey," Jill a.s.sured Sam. "Dad just wants to sleep by the rocks, and I'd rather sleep by the water tonight."

"Well, he looks looks mad," said Sam. mad," said Sam.

"Silly goose," said Jill, rubbing his back.

July 10 Day Seven

I'm the only one up, and I'm sitting on a rock where no one can see me. Very peaceful. Everyone else is asleep, even Mom. I think I'm having a better time than she is at this point. I will make a point to be nicer to her. She's so pathetic.

Today we almost tipped over in Crystal, thanks to FAT GIRL. Do the guides actually think we're going to remember what to do when there's an emergency? We hit something, the boat goes up, and JT's yelling at me to highside. WTF!? How am I supposed to remember what that means? Of course, even when he told me what to do, I still couldn't do it. So he does it himself and yanks me up so I'm lying on top of him.

I probably broke his ribs, and he's too nice to say anything.

DAYS EIGHT AND NINE.

River Miles 108150 Lower Ba.s.s to Upset

32.

Days Eight and Nine Miles 108150 A side from Jill and Mark barely speaking to one another, the next two days were glorious. For one thing, by now they'd all pretty much internalized the routines of life on the river, so those baffling challenges of the first few days-packing bags, loading and unloading-were now automatic. Expertise bred confidence, which in turn bred a collective good mood, no small factor on a river trip. side from Jill and Mark barely speaking to one another, the next two days were glorious. For one thing, by now they'd all pretty much internalized the routines of life on the river, so those baffling challenges of the first few days-packing bags, loading and unloading-were now automatic. Expertise bred confidence, which in turn bred a collective good mood, no small factor on a river trip.

For another thing, after the Big Ones came a relatively gentle and magical stretch of the river, and JT made a point of letting them stop and play in the shady waterfalls and pools that were such a contrast to the harsh landscape of the last several days. The Compsons did indeed get a Christmas picture of all four in front of Shinumo Falls (a terrible photo though, wooden smiles, stick postures); farther down at Elves Chasm, the cool mossy rocks and trickling water soothed everyone's nerves, still raw from the day before. The only moment of ill will came when Mitch.e.l.l climbed up on a big boulder and dove into the pool below, reminding JT how quickly everything could change.

"I told you guys the first day, NO DIVING!" he exclaimed. "You want to crack your head open?"

("Did you get a picture of me?" Mitch.e.l.l asked Lena.) But there were other, more unique twists of fate that were helping too. The Cipro seemed to be working, for starters. Evelyn stopped trying to be so useful all the time. And Mitch.e.l.l's dreaded camera ran out of memory, at least until the end of the day when he could retrieve the spare memory card from his overnight bag.

In any case, those two days went more smoothly than any since leaving Lee's Ferry. Or so it seemed to JT. He'd done too many trips to read much into this and knew it portended nothing, really; but he definitely enjoyed the good luck that extended through Day Nine, especially when Mitch.e.l.l figured he had more than enough liquor for the rest of the trip and offered gin and tonics to everyone who was of legal age. Also when Jill spoke a few words to Mark, which gave him hope that he wasn't going to witness another marital bust-up on this trip. The most magical moment came just before bedtime, when Lloyd experienced a mysterious window of lucidity and told them all of early trips on the river, when they wore canvas sneakers and cutoffs, and there was no such thing as sunscreen, and Glen Canyon Dam hadn't been built, and the water was warm and wild and the tamarisk hadn't yet taken over the corridor and jets were nonexistent and at night, if it was cool, you could build a campfire and fall asleep to the snap of embers sparking up through the chimney of cliffs into the starry sky above.

Only Susan was having a hard time at this point. Although she appreciated the ease of routine, a certain weariness was creeping in. Dare she call it boredom? Sometimes the rapids all seemed alike; sometimes the canyon walls felt closed in. Was she the only one who was getting tired of all this beauty?

By now her wine tasted like plastic, and it was never cold enough. The coffee was muddy. And to be perfectly frank, she was tired of group camping. Everyone snored, it seemed, and the mats were so thin that every morning she woke up with sore shoulders and a knot in her neck and a pain in her lower back that didn't disappear even after Dixie showed her how to stretch. There were scorpions to worry about, and red ants, and rattlesnakes.

She was dragging her overnight bag down to the boats that morning when the obvious occurred to her: There was an end to all this There was an end to all this. Had she forgotten? In five days she'd emerge from the canyon heat and walk into an air-conditioned hotel room, with a pillow-top mattress and cool sheets and her own personal refrigerator. There would be a clean robe hanging in the closet, chilled wine in the little refrigerator. She would step into a hot shower, stand beneath the silt-free spray, and wash thirteen days' worth of grit down the drain.

"How do the guides do it?" she asked Jill the next afternoon. They were riding in the back of Dixie's boat, lounging with their feet up. Peter was rowing; Dixie herself was riding up front, advising Peter as needed.

"Do what?" asked Jill.

"Stay so enthusiastic! I can't imagine making this trip twice, let alone a hundred and twenty-five times."

"Oh, I could live down here," Jill said. "No laundry, no grocery stores, no carpools ..."

Susan would have agreed with her the first few days. But not at this point. At this point, she wanted a bath. She wanted to see a street lined with fat-leafed maple trees.

"I miss my bed," she said. "And a mattress-what a concept! Air-conditioning, a quiet room to myself ..."

"But hasn't this trip been good for you and Amy?" Jill asked.

"Amy wants absolutely nothing to do with me down here."

Jill didn't reply, which disappointed Susan, for she'd hoped Jill would have some inside knowledge about Amy's feelings that would contradict her.

"Amy would rather spend her time with Peter," Susan said.

"But that's good, isn't it? She's seventeen, after all. Don't discount the power of peer relationships."

Peer? thought Susan. He's twenty-seven.

And he's always giving her beer, if you haven't noticed, said the Mother b.i.t.c.h. If Amy weren't so fat, you'd think he was trying to take advantage of her If Amy weren't so fat, you'd think he was trying to take advantage of her.

Susan felt her eyes smart. With two fingers, she reached under her lenses and dabbed at her lower lids.

"What's the matter?" asked Jill.

Susan smiled ruefully. It was hard for her to put her finger on it. She felt like such an awful mother for thinking the thoughts she had sometimes. But there they were. Perhaps this mother of two from Salt Lake City would understand, down here on the river.

"Did you have a mental image of your children, before they were born?" she asked.