He’s about 45 or 50 years old, and is known by everyone in town, whether you’ve lived here for years or weeks. Cap is mildly retarded; a little on the slow side, but once he has learned something, he retains it for life. He knows more about the railroads, forestry, firefighting, and Indians than most people will ever forget. And he will freely distribute his knowledge to everyone. He can read, but writing comes a little hard to him. He can do it, but sometimes he gets a little confused as to whether the tail on a “g” goes to the left or right. (Or is that a “q”?) But he loves to read. Books are an endless fascination to him, and he reads everything (nonfiction, of course; he could never understand the appeal of “fake stuff”). Still, he has an amazing amount of determination, a trait picked up from his mother. Cap’s father had died when he was seven, leaving Cap’s mother to raise him and a baby sister. She worked two jobs, but they made it through. Cap drives a 1967 Ford pickup truck that Rick Murchison at the Texaco gave him for Christmas one year.
