ten times worse than it is now, Ott-ten times worse-then I’ll ask you how much sympathy you feel for all those addicts who knew better and took their first puff anyway.” coneaIt won’t get that bad here.” “You think the black militants and liberals who run this town are gonna fix things? You met Aldana this afternoon. Like hell it won’t get that bad!”
“Didn’t you just say that Aidana would get his sooner or later?”
“It isn’t Aldana I’m worried about. It’s all the other flies that kind of money will attract.” When Mergenthaler left and went back to his office, Jack Yocke tried to write some more and found he couldn’t. He was fuminand irritable. His eye fell on the front page of today’s paper with its photo of George Bush sailing off Kennebunkport, Maine. Bush was waving, wearing a wide grin. Jack Yocke threw the paper into the wastepaper basket.
Rock Creek Park is Washington’s attempt at Central Park. Unlike that vast expanse of trees and grass in New York City, Rock Creek Park is not a pedestrian’s paradise. Part of the reason is geography.
The park begins a dozen miles north of the Potomac River in Montgomery County, Maryland, as an undeveloped stretch along a modest creek meandering southward toward the river.
For several hundred yards after the creek flows under the eight-lane beltway, houses and yards come right to the edge of the water. The gentle trickle soon reaches the grounds of the Walter Reed Army Hospital, however, with its vast expanse of lawns. South of the hospital grounds the park is about a quarter mile wide for several miles. Here it is a pleasant oasis of trees and greenery on the steep banks of the creek ravine.
Crossing into the District, the green belt finally assumes park-like dimensions. For the next four miles the park is about a mile wide and provides a site for a golf course and numerous scenic stretches of two-lane blacktop that wind through the wooded, boulder-choked ravines of aptly named Rock Creek and its tributaries.
The park narrows at the National Zoological Park, which occupies its entire width. South of the zoo, the park along the creek drainage is only several hundred yards wide, merely the sides of the steep Rock Creek ravine, and is crisscrossed by bridges that carry the major streets and avenues of Washington. Two miles south of the zoo the creek deposits its saline solution of street and lawn runoff into the Potomac. The creek mouth is directly across the Georgetown Channe Theodore Roosevelt Island. The park there provides a from modest accent of green near the water, a mere foreground for the vast urban skyline behind it.
For most of its length the park consists of uncomfortably steep, rock-strewn hillsides densely covered with hardwood trees. In spite of the mild autumn, by early December the trees had lost all their leaves and transformed themselves into a semi-opaque wilderness of gray branches and trunks that gently muffled some of the city noise.
Henry Charon automatically adjusted the placement of his feet to avoid fallen branches an se rocks, yet the thick carpet of dead, dry leaves rustled loudly at every step. A good soaking rain, he knew, would leave the leaf carpet sodden and allow a man to walk silently across it. Not now, though.
Below him, on his right, cars hummed along Ross Drive, one of the scenic lanes along Rock Creek that functioned as an alternate commuter route during rush hour. Charon strode along the hillside in a tireless, swinging gait with his eyes moving. He paused occasionally to examine major outcrops of rock, then resumed his northward movements.
This type of terrain he knew well. It would be a wonderful area in which to hide, if he could find the right place. These sidewalk warriors would be on his turf if they hunted him here.
He consulted his map again, then changed course to top the ridge. This ridge wasn’t high, only a hundred feet or so, but it was far too steep for casual urban walkers and hikers.
“Didn’t you just say that Aidana would get his sooner or later?”
“It isn’t Aldana I’m worried about. It’s all the other flies that kind of money will attract.” When Mergenthaler left and went back to his office, Jack Yocke tried to write some more and found he couldn’t. He was fuminand irritable. His eye fell on the front page of today’s paper with its photo of George Bush sailing off Kennebunkport, Maine. Bush was waving, wearing a wide grin. Jack Yocke threw the paper into the wastepaper basket.
Rock Creek Park is Washington’s attempt at Central Park. Unlike that vast expanse of trees and grass in New York City, Rock Creek Park is not a pedestrian’s paradise. Part of the reason is geography.
The park begins a dozen miles north of the Potomac River in Montgomery County, Maryland, as an undeveloped stretch along a modest creek meandering southward toward the river.
For several hundred yards after the creek flows under the eight-lane beltway, houses and yards come right to the edge of the water. The gentle trickle soon reaches the grounds of the Walter Reed Army Hospital, however, with its vast expanse of lawns. South of the hospital grounds the park is about a quarter mile wide for several miles. Here it is a pleasant oasis of trees and greenery on the steep banks of the creek ravine.
Crossing into the District, the green belt finally assumes park-like dimensions. For the next four miles the park is about a mile wide and provides a site for a golf course and numerous scenic stretches of two-lane blacktop that wind through the wooded, boulder-choked ravines of aptly named Rock Creek and its tributaries.
The park narrows at the National Zoological Park, which occupies its entire width. South of the zoo, the park along the creek drainage is only several hundred yards wide, merely the sides of the steep Rock Creek ravine, and is crisscrossed by bridges that carry the major streets and avenues of Washington. Two miles south of the zoo the creek deposits its saline solution of street and lawn runoff into the Potomac. The creek mouth is directly across the Georgetown Channe Theodore Roosevelt Island. The park there provides a from modest accent of green near the water, a mere foreground for the vast urban skyline behind it.
For most of its length the park consists of uncomfortably steep, rock-strewn hillsides densely covered with hardwood trees. In spite of the mild autumn, by early December the trees had lost all their leaves and transformed themselves into a semi-opaque wilderness of gray branches and trunks that gently muffled some of the city noise.
Henry Charon automatically adjusted the placement of his feet to avoid fallen branches an se rocks, yet the thick carpet of dead, dry leaves rustled loudly at every step. A good soaking rain, he knew, would leave the leaf carpet sodden and allow a man to walk silently across it. Not now, though.
Below him, on his right, cars hummed along Ross Drive, one of the scenic lanes along Rock Creek that functioned as an alternate commuter route during rush hour. Charon strode along the hillside in a tireless, swinging gait with his eyes moving. He paused occasionally to examine major outcrops of rock, then resumed his northward movements.
This type of terrain he knew well. It would be a wonderful area in which to hide, if he could find the right place. These sidewalk warriors would be on his turf if they hunted him here.
He consulted his map again, then changed course to top the ridge. This ridge wasn’t high, only a hundred feet or so, but it was far too steep for casual urban walkers and hikers.
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