Eureka by Jim Lehrer

Author:Jim Lehrer [Lehrer, Jim]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-1-58836-788-4
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2009-03-24T04:00:00+00:00

TIS BEGAN TO relax after a few minutes. There was no Deputy Canton coming up behind him with flashing lights, and the familiar had returned. The highway once again had more bumps and cracks and rough patches on it than it did cars or trucks or buses.

Buses. There were no buses. Otis had a vague notion that Greyhound was about the only bus company left in Kansas, and they sped by the small towns on the interstates from Kansas City west across the state to Denver, and south to Wichita on into Oklahoma. Buses were something that went with Red Ryder, Cushmans, cast-iron fire engines, and wet dreams. In the ’40s and ’50s, the crimson-and-cream buses of the Santa Fe Railway’s bus company, called Santa Fe Trailways, had been the major form of transportation in and out of Sedgwicktown for Otis, his family, and most everyone else he knew. The bus had stopped at Hutchinson’s Rexall in the center of town on Harper Street, across from city hall, the bank, and most everything else that mattered. Until college, Otis had left on every major excursion of his life aboard one of those roaring machines that spewed black smoke and blared with the sound of air horns and hissing brakes. They were the magic chariots of escape, of tomorrow, of glory, of somewhere else. Now they were mostly no more.

And there came the first sign warning of the detour ahead for the Chanute River Bridge.

BRIDGE CLOSED AHEAD I MILE—FOLLOW DETOUR SIGNS.

The large black letters were emblazoned on a three-foot-square orange metal sign.

The signs grew in size and intensity as he got closer, the last being:

DANGER AHEAD. ALL VEHICLES MUST TURN LEFT.

There was a barricade made of orange barrels and heavy board slats across the road. Otis saw a red Dodge pickup and a blue Oldsmobile in front of him turn left as they’d been told.

But Otis decided not to do as he’d been told. Why not at least take a look at this old bridge? He was in no hurry. Deputy Canton had clearly turned up nothing that required a highspeed chase of a Cushman down old U.S. 56.

No car could make it around the barricade, but on the right—the north side—there was a gap large enough for him and his scooter to squeeze through. Otis dismounted and walked himself and pushed the scooter through the small opening.

Then he got back on the scooter and started riding. He could see the outline of bridge spans about a hundred yards ahead. There were the remnants of houses and stores on both sides of the road, but nothing that was still alive—structures or people. What small signs of life and business that may have remained had obviously departed with the closing of the bridge. The barricades made regular access impossible.

There were more barriers and warnings at the bridge, which Otis again walked his scooter around.

The last sign had the harshest words of all:

DANGER! BRIDGE UNSAFE!

PROCEED NO FARTHER!

TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED!

STATE LAW!

At a glance, the bridge resembled something from truly ancient times.

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