"That could put us in Chicago before nightfall," reckoned Randolph St. Cosmo.
* * * * * * * * * *
What Pynchon is expressing here is that the Chums of Chance will soon be at the Chicago's World Fair (aka the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago if you like lengthier—probably girthier—names). Possibly before nightfall.
Is this the moment where the reader experiences the title of the novel? They're racing against the day to get to Chicago! Hmm, no, probably not.
Since this line seems short on subtext, maybe the real point of this sentence is to show how Pynchon can't ever shorten Randolph St. Cosmo's name. That's some weird cosmic angel shit right there, right?
I haven't done an anagram of Randolph St. Cosmo's name because I can't come up with anything clever. I mean, how do I explain "Scalp door months" or "Maths pond colors"? And I've just interpreted his name as a kind of vague feeling. But maybe you're supposed to read "Randolph" as sort of "random" and "Cosmo" as cosmic so that we get the view of Randolph's universe as chaotic and random but, generally, tending toward good ("St."). Unless the "St." is supposed to be read as "street"! Then maybe his name is the intersection between randomness and the cosmic (which isn't random because it relies on consistent natural laws even if those laws produce events that are basically random).
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