Jack listened to the tape three times before he erased it, then looked at Volta’s body. To Jack’s mind, once Volta had agreed to help her stop the theft, he had drawn his line in exactly the right place: He would honor her secret, but he wouldn’t die to protect treachery, no matter how lofty its cause. Volta had drawn his line precisely, honored his promise to the point of exposing himself, then honored himself at the threat of death by giving Shamus the truth. And died for it. There are no lines you can draw against an unbearable truth.
Smiling Jack carried Volta’s body to the kitchen and covered it with a sheet. Then he went down to the barn to make some calls.
He called Dolly Varden first. He wanted her there as quickly as possible to help with Volta’s remains. He made the other calls, then took a shovel from the tool rack and began digging a grave for Shamus.
Dolly, exhausted from the all-night haul from Portland, arrived at dawn. They cut off Volta’s blood-stiffened magician’s robe and had silently begun bathing him when Dolly said, ‘Holy shit. This for real?’
Jack didn’t see it. ‘What?’
‘This.’ She lifted Volta’s arm slightly, pointing to his wrist. ‘Unless old age is eating up my brain, it looks to me like a baby goldfish glued to his wrist here.’
Jack came around for a closer look. ‘Yeah – a baby goldfish. Don’t know about being glued, though. Its own slime or maybe some blood – that could make it stick.’
Dolly looked at Jack. ‘So, what do think? Scrape it off or leave it on.’
‘Leave it, I reckon. Volta always said, “Trust what’s there.”’
‘I’ll go for that,’ Dolly said.
When they had finished bathing Volta’s corpse, Smiling Jack slung him awkwardly over his shoulder. With Dolly leading the way, he carried him down to a shady alder flat along Laurel Creek, right above where it began its steep drop to the river. They left him face up in a clearing, arms folded on his chest, as Volta had requested years before.
Smiling Jack and Dolly continued on to the creek, stopping at a slow, deep pool. They stripped off their clothes and, with lung-cleansing whoops, plunged into the cold water.
THE SECOND NOTEBOOK OF JENNIFER RAINE MAY DAY
My name is Jennifer Raine.
I have come to an end I recognize but haven’t begun to understand. I left St Louis this evening without a destination. For the last two weeks I waited faithfully at Jim Bridger’s grave, entertaining myself with hopes, dreams, wishes, fantasies, yearnings, and the last of the drugs I brought from Reno. I’m glad they’re gone.
The DJ never showed. Daniel never came back. I can’t imagine Mia anymore.
I think Daniel may have been the DJ. I know he kissed my scar. I know what passed between us was us, a warm-rain moon waltz, everything joined and hurled at the stars. I know I imagined Mia, but Daniel was real, real enough to imagine me.
I kept the Diamond until today. I was convinced that Daniel was and is real and that the Diamond was not. I never looked at it once. But I did pick it up in its sack and caress it, because everything round invites caresses. Every day the Diamond seemed to lose weight, grow lighter but not smaller, and then I got scared that if I kept it, it would gradually exhaust itself, collapse into emptiness, and Daniel could never find his way back.
The Diamond, in an odd way, was all I had left of us, yet I didn’t believe it was real. So this evening at sunset I carried the Diamond out to the center of a bridge over the Mississippi River. I married Daniel. I honor vows, keep my promises.
I slipped the Diamond from the sack and looked into it as deeply as I could. I wanted a sign, a vision in the crystal ball, something to keep. I saw nothing, felt nothing.
I opened my hands and let it go. I watched it fall, utterly certain it would hit the water and sink without a ripple, like a breath entering the air.
The Diamond hit the river like a comet, half the Mississippi erupting in a geyser, a magnificent fountain turned golden by the setting sun.
I don’t know a fucking thing. That must mean I’m finally sane. And that’s an excellent place to start going crazy again.
Also available from Canongate
NOT FADE AWAY
By Jim Dodge
Introduced by KEVIN SAMPSON
Floorboard George Gastin is part of an insurance scam to wreck a pure white, mint condition ’59 Cadillac originally intended as a present to The Big Bopper from an ageing admirer. But in the name of love, Floorboard George has other ideas, and disappears with the car, gangsters and cops in hot pursuit.
On the road, the crazy characters and demented hitch-hikers he meets provide high-octane entertainment as Floorboard George covers many miles – and states of mind – in his quest to find the true spirit of rock ‘n’ roll.
“The best road novel never to be adapted for the big screen … Vanishing Point with a point, Easy Rider with no hippies and a sense of historical depth.” Guardian
“… a potent mix of bawdy folk-tale, philosophy and principled techno-awareness. Strong threads of humanism work within a fabric of vibrant characters, hillbilly landscapes and cathartic wit.” Dazed and Confused
“[Jim Dodge is] in an affectionately satirical tradition that stretches back to Twain … he also happens to write snappier dialogue than anyone this side of Elmore Leonard.” Scotland on Sunday
Acknowledgements
My gratitude to the following people for their help, encouragement, and forbearance:
Victoria Stockley (first, foremost, and more), Patricia Sinclair, Leonard Charles, Lynn Millman, Richard Cortez Day, Jeremiah Gorsline, Gary Snyder, Freeman House, Jacoba, Jack Hitt, Melanie Jackson, Robert Funt, Jack Gilbert, T. J. Mullen, Jenny Berry, Morris Graves, Gary Fisketjon, and Anne Rumsey (tune and tone).
About the Author Stone Junction
JIM DODGE is the author of three books of fiction: Fup, Not Fade Away and Stone Junction. Rain on the River, his collection of poetry, is also published by Canongate. He lives on an isolated ranch in California’s Western Sonoma County.
Copyright
First published in 1990 in the USA by The Atlantic Monthly Press
First published in Great Britain in 1997 by Rebel Inc.,
an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd,
14 High Street, Edinburgh, EH1 1TE
This digital edition first published in 2011 by Canongate Books
Copyright © Jim Dodge, 1990
Introduction copyright © Thomas Pynchon, 1997
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review