By the light of the moon

could race that engine all
day, and it would sound as pretty as any engine ever built, but you
wouldn't go anywhere.
    'Nine minutes,' Shep said.
    Dylan handed the Minute Minder to him: a mechanical timer made
for use in the kitchen. The round white face featured sixty black
checks, a number at every fifth check.
    Shep brought the device close to his face, scrutinizing it as
though he had never seen it before, and carefully set the dial at
nine minutes. He picked up a bar of Neutrogena, the only soap he
would use in the shower, and he stepped into the tub, holding the
Minute Minder by the dial to prevent the timer from engaging.
    To avoid an attack of claustrophobia, Shep always showered with
the curtain open.
    Once he was under the spray, he stood the Minute Minder on the
edge of the tub, releasing the dial. The ticking proved audible
above the hiss and splash of water.
    The timer always got wet. In a couple months, rust would have
made it useless. Dylan bought the gadgets by the dozen.
    Immediately Shep began to soap his left arm, directly applying
the Neutrogena. Although he wouldn't look at the Minute Minder
again, he would allot precisely the desired amount of time to each
area of his body. Two or three seconds before the timer went off,
he would anticipate it by loudly announcing Ding! with a
note of satisfaction.
    Perhaps he kept track of the elapsing time by counting the ticks
of the Minute Minder – one per second. Or maybe after all
these years of precisely timed baths, Shep had developed a reliable
inner clock.
    For the past decade, Dylan had been chronically aware of his own
clock relentlessly counting off his life, but he had refused to
think too much about time, about where he would be either in nine
minutes or in six months, a year, two years. He would be painting
the world, of course, traveling to art festivals, making a circuit
of galleries across the West. And looking after Shep.
    Now his inner watchworks ticked not faster but more insistently,
and he couldn't stop contemplating the suddenly fluid nature of his
future. He no longer knew where he might be tomorrow or in what
situation he would find himself by sunset this very day, let alone
where twelve months might take him. To one who'd lived a singularly
predictable life for ten years, these new circumstances should have
been frightening, and they were , scary as hell, but they
were also undeniably exciting, almost exhilarating.
    He was surprised that the prospect of novelty had so much appeal
for him. He had long conceived himself to be a man of constancy,
who respected tradition, who loved what was immemorial and did not
share the interest in newness for the sake of newness that had made
this society so rootless and so in love with flash.
    Guilt brought a blush to his face as he remembered his tirade on
the hilltop, when he had railed at Shepherd about 'maddening
routine' and 'stupid repetition,' as though the poor kid had any
choice to be other than what he was.
    Being exhilarated by the possibility of revolutionary change in
his life, while having no clue whether the coming changes would be
for good or ill, at first struck him as reckless. Then in light of
the recognition that those changes held more peril for Shepherd
than for anyone, this excitement had to be judged worse than
recklessness: It seemed selfish, shallow.
    Face to face with himself in the mirror, he argued silently that
his rush to embrace change, any change, was nothing more and
nothing worse than a reflection of his eternal optimism. Even if it
had been made aloud, that argument would not have resonated with
the ring of truth. Dismayed by the man he saw, he turned away from
the mirror, but even though he counseled himself to face this newly
fluid future with more caution, even with alarm, his excitement had
not been in the least diminished.
    * * *
    No one would ever accuse Holbrook, Arizona, of being a noisy hub
of commerce. Except perhaps during the Old West Celebration in
June, the Gathering of Eagles show of Native American art in July,
and the Navajo County Fair in September, an armadillo could cross
any local street or highway at a pace of its own choosing with
little risk of death by motor vehicle.
    Nevertheless, Jilly discovered that this two-star motel provided
an in-room modem link separate from the phone line. In this regard,
at least, they might as well have been holed up in the Peninsula
hotel in Beverly Hills.
    Ensconced at the small desk, she opened her laptop,