Stone Junction

got him, Eli! I finally got him.” And he starts laughing.

‘I go in with the lantern and there’s Jamie, grinning, his eyes locked on something far away. He’s sprawled out against the back of the stall, and his right hand is icepicked to the wall straight through the palm. He says, “Look, Eli, I finally got him.”’

Eli left Daniel thinking about this at the Junction of 93 and I-40, Eli’s right rear turn signal erratically blinking as he headed east for his home on the range.

Standing with his thumb out for another ride, Daniel decided it was a cautionary tale, wisely taken to heart. Maybe Volta was right. Maybe he should just let it go. The old men seemed to think so, anyway, and he would be foolish not to consider their counsel when he was at a loss about what to try next. Maybe if he physically let it go, he could open it through memory and imagination. He looked at his upraised thumb, then opened his hand as if setting an invisible bird free. He imagined how it would feel to drive an icepick through his palm, imagined it so clearly he almost cried out with the pain.

Shamus was sitting at the tiny desk in a cheap Sacramento motel. His silver-scarred hand was pressed to his ear, dictating possibilities his free hand jotted down on a yellow legal pad.

‘A.T. Al times three. Three Al’s? Try that. Alalal. Allah? Swiss accent. Male, mid-thirties. Three owls, maybe? That budge anything loose in that compacted bowel you call a brain? Think, shithead! Help me out. Three owls. Awls? Laws? Three Laws? No, no, wrong direction. Al Triple X? Al to the Third Power – what’s that, Al Nine? Third power. Al Thrice? Al Thrice! That’s it! You get it, bumble-fuck?’

‘No,’ Shamus said dully. He was very drunk.

‘Al for Alchemy. Thrice-Great. Trismegistos. “For this reason I am called Hermes Trismegistos, for I possess the three parts of wisdom of the whole world.” C’mon, Shamus – you tell me.’

‘Volta. That rotten, snitching prick,’ Shamus said, rage stirring him from stupor. ‘And it’s just like that arrogant bastard to use Hermes Trismegistos and alchemy all scrambled into a cute code. That’s his style, and he’s so fucking confident, he gave it to us. And we knew it all along.’ Shamus wrote Volta’s name so savagely the lead snapped when he crossed the t. ‘Volta the All Wise. Perfect sense. A Swiss accent would be a snap for Volta. And then he rubs our faces in it. Guess he forgot we studied with Jacob Hind. We’re damn near the alchemical scholar he was. How could he think he could sneak that kind of cuteness by us?’

Shamus’s scarred hand said in his ear, ‘Maybe he knew he couldn’t, you idiot; ever think of that?’

Shamus was baffled. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘He wants you to think it was him, to deflect you from Daniel. Figure it out, dildo – somebody had to tell Volta what was going on.’

‘It was them together, just like we thought. But where are they?’

The scarred hand moved from his ear to face him. ‘Listen: one will lead you to the other. Find one, you find them both.’

* * *

Daniel’s next ride was an hour coming. When he saw the Chevy pickup with a camper begin to brake, his first impulse was to run. It was his truck, somehow reborn from a cube of metal. With a rush of relief he noticed the Michigan plates and the reflecto-decal lettering arched above the camper door:

ERNIE & IRMA

Geritol Gypsies

Irma scooted over to make room for him in the cab. She was a tiny, delicate, white-haired woman, mid-sixties, in brown slacks, fresh yellow blouse, and a brown knit cardigan. She held a small poodle on her lap. The dog eyed Daniel tremulously. The poodle seemed somehow incomplete to Daniel but he wasn’t sure why.

Ernie reached around the poodle to shake hands. Daniel could never have disguised himself as Irma, but Ernie would have been easy. Like Daniel, he was six feet and blue-eyed, but with forty years and as many pounds added. Daniel would have had to exhaust hundreds of wardrobes to match Ernie’s polyester shirt, which had a line of Conestoga wagons running up his right arm, a cattle drive up the trail of his left, and a blazing pastel sunset across the back. Daniel found the shirt so improbable he blinked to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating.

After Ernie introduced himself and pulled back on the road, Irma patted the panting little poodle and said, ‘This is Chester.’

Daniel smiled at the dog. ‘Howdy, Chester.’

Chester shivered, then wagged his haunches.

Daniel noticed that Chester either had lost his tail or it had been docked extremely close.

Irma explained: ‘A great big Doberman Pinscher bit off Chester’s tail.’ She bent down and cooed, ‘We don’t like big dogs, do we Chester?’ Chester buried his head between her knees. Irma looked at Daniel proudly. ‘Chester understands everything I say.’

‘Where ya headed, Herman?’ Ernie said a little too quickly, as if embarrassed.

Daniel, forgetting for a moment that he’d introduced himself with the name on his bowling shirt, wasn’t sure who Ernie was addressing. He blustered, ‘Oh, you know, just on down the line for now.’ Frisco eventually, but the pro tour still is a while off, so I’m sort of making do with what action I can find. Heard they’ll gamble on anything in Nevada.’

‘That’s why they call it Lost Wages,’ Ernie grinned.

‘So I’ve heard,’ Daniel said politely, having wearied of this on the poker circuit. He had decided to avoid Las Vegas. Too many people knew him and he didn’t feel like working up a more elaborate disguise.

‘So you’re on the loose,’ Ernie said.

‘Yeah, basically. And I’m not sure if I’ve got no place to go, or too many.’

Thoughtfully, Ernie said, ‘Know what ya mean. I was like that when I was young and roaming, right before W. W. Two started. It was like I couldn’t even imagine my life, know what I mean?’