The Lincoln Highway

When he and Duchess arrive at Woolly’s sister Sarah’s house, no one is home. Duchess is impressed by the size of the house and by the 1941 Cadillac convertible Woolly inherited from his father, parked in the garage. Duchess tells Woolly that this is the car Emmett should drive to California. Woolly agrees that they should. Duchess leaves Woolly behind to wait for Sarah, and Woolly takes an extra dosage of his medicine when Duchess has gone. Woolly remembers that Sarah stores a key underneath the flowerpot. Woolly lets himself inside, taking note of aspects of the household that have changed in his absence.

In his bedroom, his belongings have been boxed up, and one of the four walls has been painted blue. Woolly peruses the familiar contents of the boxes: a cigar box filled with his “treasures” and a dictionary. Woolly appreciated the reassurance that any word outside his scope of knowledge could be found and further explored through the definitions of other words. Conversely, he had hated the thesaurus that had come with the dictionary, finding the formatting disorienting and troubling. At St. Mark’s, he took the thesaurus to the football field and set it on fire. The trail of gasoline Woolly carelessly dripped on the field engulfed a goal post.