he never saw his old former crewmate Mad Matty Pemulis, a sure source of compassion, looking up and out and down and back up, aghast in recognition of what Poor Tony has come through the corridor to resemble.
A thought occurs here re: the ending. This sort of call-forward/flashback setup is employed several times throughout, and we often get allusions to an event before witnessing it. So the book sets up one half of the structure with Hal's inability to speak, then denies us the resolution we are conditioned to expect.
