Orin and Hal on the phone (ii)
‘So that so what if Ottawa didn’t formally subjoin the Concavity to any particular province. Really big favor, I’m sure. Because the map speaks for itself. Bits of western New Brunswick and a smidgeon of Ontario aside, the Concavity—the physical fact and fallout of the Concavity—it’s Québec’s problem. Something like 750 clicks of border along the Concavity, with attendant seepage, for Notre Rai Pays.’
Context
The I.-day-Eve Orin–Hal call (n110), Hal naked with his ankle in a bucket of Epsom salts, unknowingly answering "Helen" Steeply's questions at one remove. His account of why Québec bears the Concavity turns exactly on the map/territory gap: the formal cartography never assigned the Concavity to any province, but "the map speaks for itself" — contiguity, 750 clicks of border, and seepage are facts of the territory no paper subjoining can re-route.