Volta smiled, a boyish gleam in his eye. ‘The music you hear is a 427 Chrysler. This is an authentic moonshiner truck – not much to look at, granted, but since it’s rocket on the road, all you see’s a blur.’ Volta tapped the gas.
‘You like power, don’t you?’ Daniel said.
‘Properly applied.’ Volta slipped the truck into first and applied some.
It was just as well Daniel couldn’t think of a reply, for it would have been lost in the engine’s chattering howl.
The narrow road soon left the river plain and began twisting up a long ridge. An hour later they dropped down and crossed the north fork of the Eel, its water shivering with starlight. A few miles farther on they turned onto a dirt road blocked by a sturdy metal gate. Volta pushed a button under the dash and the gate swung open. Daniel assumed they’d arrived, but it was another chucked and rutted seven miles and three gates before the road sloped down off the broad point of the ridge, curving slowly north as the land leveled, ending abruptly at a small frame house with an adjacent barn and scattered outbuildings. Volta touched another button under the dash and the house and yard lit up.
Daniel drawled – a fraction too slowly, Jean Bluer would have noted – ‘I got it figured ’twernt any ol’ moonshiner done did your ’lectronics.’
‘No, it was a young electromagnetic genius, a German anarchist in love with waves.’
‘I heard Wild Bill claim more than once that “German anarchist” was a contradiction in terms. That the best you could hope for was a Hegelian Baptist.’
Volta laughed. ‘Bill’s prejudices are notorious. But let me welcome you to my retreat, which is known locally as Laurel Creek Hollow. I wouldn’t forbid you to reveal its location, but I ask you, as I do all visitors, to exercise the utmost discretion.’
‘You may depend upon it,’ Daniel promised, vaguely mimicking Volta’s formality.
‘Tell me,’ Volta said, ‘do you find me a bit grandiose and dramatic?’
‘A little,’ Daniel answered.
Volta leaned toward him, his gaze so intense that Daniel was surprised when he whispered, with a mixture of apology and exasperation, ‘That’s show biz, Daniel. Pure show biz.’ Before Daniel could respond, Volta pointed out the window, adding, ‘And that’s the house. It’s four fifteen. I suggest you unload our bags while I start a fire and cook us some breakfast. It’ll be your last meal for a while, and I’d like to make it special.’
It was. Air-light buckwheat pancakes with fresh butter and Vermont maple syrup. Ham from the Blue Ridge Mountains, cooked with a peach glaze and sliced thin. A fruit dish of apples, grapes, and slivered pecans, barely sauced with curried sour-cream. For beverages: Gravenstein apple juice and a choice of Vienna Roast espresso or Volta’s own blend of tea, the latter with a squeeze of lemon and a dollop of fireweed honey.
As Volta cooked, he told Daniel about the origins of the ingredients. The buckwheat was grown and milled by a Montana woman named Jane Durham. She sent him a fifty-pound sack every year because Volta had personally tracked down her grandfather’s grave – he’d been a Wobbly organizer – and purchased a headstone for it. Tick Hathaway cured the ham, the last of twenty Volta had received in exchange for the 1925 Honus Wagner baseball card Tick needed to complete a collection. The apples were from a feminist commune in coastal Sonoma County, juiced on an old screw press. Smiling Jack had brought him ten gallons of maple syrup from the Hewlitt Jefferies’ farm near Burlington. The honey was from the five-percent dues of another commune, whose members rejected the use of money – Dead President Trading Cards, as they called it.
Although Daniel felt both the urge and obligation to savor each morsel, it was all he could do not to wolf the food. It had been almost twelve hours since the airline dinner of gooey Yankee pot roast and boiled vegetables. Daniel was eyeing the last slice of ham, half listening to Volta recount the geological history of the Eel River watershed, when suddenly Volta stopped and delicately pushed the ham platter toward him.
‘I’m sorry,’ Daniel said. ‘I’m so hungry I’m afraid I can’t really appreciate how good it is. But I do appreciate you cooking it for me; I really do.’
‘I’m sure the food appreciates your hunger as much as my preparation. Hunger, you know, has always fascinated me. I have seen people on the verge of starvation standing in line to give food away. This was in Tibet, in a small mountain village. There was a holy man who lived in a cave higher up the mountain. Every full moon, for as long as it was visible in the sky, he would receive petitioners at the mouth of his cave. Each petitioner brought him a gift of food. In exchange, he would answer one question. When the holy man had enough food to last the month, he would start giving each gift to the next person in line. It was a rough climb to the cave, remember, and food was scarce, but the line of petitioners would begin forming well before sunset. There were often over a thousand people in line, and all of them knew that the holy man would withdraw when the moon set.
‘The first time I visited I asked him, “What is reality?” Without hesitation he replied, “A handful of rice.” Sort of your standard holy-man answer. The second time, I asked, “What is the greatest obstacle to wisdom?” He shut his eyes a moment, and when he opened them they had this wonderful delighted twinkle. “Wisdom is easy,” he said. “The mind is difficult.”’
Daniel wiped his lips. ‘I don’t know about how easy wisdom is, but the mind being difficult, he got that right.’
‘Indeed. But I mention it because I’m experiencing some of that difficulty. I have reservations about your attempting to vanish. Gut reservations, nothing I can explain – except to assure you that they reflect uncertainties regarding my judgment, not yours.’
Daniel, surprised by the turn of the discussion, said, ‘I
Volta said, ‘I don’t accept responsibilities that can be absolved. Clearly, since your approval is necessary to the attempt, and my instruction may be critical to your success and safety, it is a mutual decision. I’ll be responsible for my part; you take care of yours.’
‘That’s all I was trying to indicate – that I intend to.’
Volta leaned back in his chair and looked at Daniel closely. ‘All right. From this moment onward, Daniel, don’t speak to me. Don’t speak at all. If you do, or if you violate any subsequent instructions, our work will end there, and along with it, my responsibility. Now please, finish your tea.’
