According to Annie Proulx, Ennis hoped to find the aromas of Jack and Brokeback Mountain in the fabric of the pair of shirts:
He pressed his face into the fabric and breathed in slowly through his mouth and nose, hoping for the faintest smoke and mountain sage and salty sweet stink of Jack but there was no real scent, only the memory of it, the imagined power of Brokeback Mountain of which nothing was left but what he held in his hands.