A Walk in the Woods

"That mountain. There isn't a scrap of vegetation on it."
"I wouldn't know. I'm not paid to look at hillsides."
"Well, you should look sometime. I think you'd be surprised. So is that the zinc factory
then?" I said, with a nod at the complex of buildings over his left shoulder.
He regarded me suspiciously. "What do you want to know for?"
I returned his stare. "I'm out of zinc," I replied.
He gave me a sideways look as if to say "Oh, a wise guy, huh?" and said suddenly,
decisively, "I think maybe I'd better take your name." With difficulty he extracted a
notebook and a stubby pencil from a back pocket.
"What, because I asked you if that was a zinc factory?"
"Because you're trespassing on private property."
"I didn't know I was trespassing. You don't even have a sign up."
He had his pencil poised. "Name?"
"Don't be ridiculous."
"Sir, you are trespassing on private property. Now are you gonna tell me your name?"
"No."
We went through a little back and forth along these lines for a minute. At last he shook
his head regretfully and said, "Play it your way then." He dragged out some
communication device, pulled up an antenna, and got it to operate. Too late I realized
that for all his air of exasperation this was a moment he had dreamed of during many
long, uneventful shifts in his little glass booth.
"J.D.?" he said into the receiver. "Luther here. You got the clamps? I got an infractor in
Lot A."
"What are you doing?" I asked.
"I'm impounding your vehicle."
"Don't be ridiculous. I only pulled off the road for a minute. Look, I'm going, OK?"
I got in the car, started the engine, and made to go forward, but he blocked the way. I
leaned from the window. "Excuse me," I called, but he didn't move. He just stood with his
back to me and his arms crossed, conspicuously disregarding me. I tooted the horn
lightly, but he was not to be shifted. I put my head out the window and said, "All right, I'll
tell you my name then."
"It's too late for that."
"Oh, for God sake," I muttered and then, out the window, "Please?" and then, whinily,
"Come on, buddy, please?" but he had set a course and was not to be deflected. I leaned
out once more. "Tell me, did they specify 'asshole' on the job description, or did you take
a course?" Then I breathed a very bad word and sat and steamed.
Thirty seconds later a car pulled up and a man in sunglasses got out. He was wearing
the same kind of uniform as the first guy but was ten or fifteen years older and a whole
lot trimmer. He had the bearing of a drill sergeant.
"Problem here?" he said, looking from one to the other of us.
"Perhaps you can help me," I said in a tone of sweet reason. "I'm looking for the
Appalachian Trail. This gentleman here tells me I'm trespassing."
"He was looking at the hill, J.D.," the fat guy protested a little hotly, but J.D. raised a
palm to still him, then turned to me.
"You a hiker?"