Orin and Hal on the phone (Maps and Territory)
Hal lowers the phone but doesn’t cover it. ‘It’s Orin, wanting to know why Québec and the F.L.Q. and so on haven’t tried bargaining with the Canadian administration, offering Québec’s cartographic adoption of the Concavity in exchange for Separation.’ Hal cocks his head slightly. ‘This could be Poutrincourt’s so-called Separation and return’s real meaning, it occurs to me.’
Context
Hal compressing the crux-proposal for the pacing, zipper-fiddling Pemulis, and getting his aperçu about Poutrincourt in the bargain. The verb does the theme's work: what Québec would "adopt" is not land but a map-position — "cartographic adoption of the Concavity" — territory changing hands purely as a change in notation.