“Pshaw,” Mr. Leverett said with a little grin that made it impossible to tell how seriously he meant to be taken. “Bees are highly intelligent insects, entomologists say they even have a language, yet they do nothing but buzz. I hear voices in the electricity."
He rocked silently for a while after that and Mr. Scott sat.
“Yep, I hear voices in the electricity,” Mr. Leverett said dreamily. “Electricity tells me how it roams the forty-eight states—even the forty-ninth by way of Canadian power lines. It's sort of pioneer-like: the power wires are its trails, the hydro-stations are its water holes. Electricity goes everywhere today—into our homes, every room of them, into our offices, into government buildings and military posts. And what it doesn't learn that way it overhears by the trace of it that trickles through our phone lines and over our air waves. Phone electricity's the little sister of power electricity, you might say, and little pitchers have big ears. Yep, electricity knows everything about us, our every last secret. Only it wouldn't think of telling most people what it knows, because they believe electricity is a cold mechanical force. It isn't— it's warm and pulsing and sensitive and friendly underneath, like any other live thing."
Mr. Scott, feeling a bit dreamy himself now, thought what good advertising copy that would make— imaginative stuff, folksy but poetic.
“And electricity's got a mite of viciousness too,” Mr. Leverett continued. “You got to tame it. Know its ways, speak it fair, show no fear—make friends with it. Well now, Mr. Scott,” he said in a brisker voice, standing up, “I know you've come here to check up on how I'm caring for Peak House. So let me give you the tour."
And in spite of Mr. Scott's protests that he had no such inquisitive intention, Mr. Leverett did just that.
Once he paused for an explanation: “I've put away the electric blanket and the toaster. Don't feel right about using electricity for menial jobs."
As far as Mr. Scott could see, he had added nothing to the furnishings of Peak House beyond the rocking chair and a large collection of Indian arrow heads.
Mr. Scott must have talked about the latter when he got home, for a week later his 9-year-old son said to him, “Hey, Dad, you know that old guy you unloaded Peak House onto?"
“Rented is the proper expression, Bobby." “Well, I went up to see his arrow heads. Dad, it turns out he's a snake-charmer!"
Dear God,thought Mr. Scott,I knew there was going to be something really impossible about Leverett. Probably likes hilltops because they draw snakes in hot weather.
“He didn't charm a real snake, though, Dad, just an old extension cord. He squatted down on the floor— this was after he showed me those crumby arrow heads—and waved his hands back and forth over it and pretty soon the end with the little box on it started to move around on the floor and all of a sudden it lifted up, like a cobra out of a basket. It was real spooky!"
“I've seen that sort of trick,” Mr. Scott told Bobby. “There was a fine thread attached to the end of the cord pulling it up."
“I'd have seen a thread, Dad."
“Not if it were the same color as the background,” Mr. Scott explained. Then he had a thought. “By the way, Bobby, was the other end of the cord plugged in?"
“Oh it was, Dad! He said he couldn't work the trick unless there was electricity in the cord. Because you see, Dad, he's really an electricity-charmer. I just said snake-charmer to make it more exciting. Afterwards we went outside and he charmed electricity down out of the wires and made it crawl all over his body. You could see it crawl from part to part."
“But how could you see that?” Mr. Scott demanded, struggling to keep his voice casual. He had a vision of Mr. Leverett standing dry and sedate, entwined by glimmering blue serpents with flashing diamond eyes and fangs that sparked.
“By the way it would make his hair stand on end, Dad. First on one side of his head, then on the other. Then he said, ‘Electricity, crawl down my chest,’ and a silk handkerchief hanging out of his top pocket stood out stiff and sharp. Dad, it was almost as good as the Museum of Science and Industry!"
Next day Mr. Scott dropped by Peak House, but he got no chance to ask his carefully thought-out questions, for Mr. Leverett greeted him with, “Reckon your boy told you about the little magic show I put on for him yesterday. I like children, Mr. Scott. Good Republican children like yours, that is."
“Why yes, he did,” Mr. Scott admitted, disarmed and a bit flustered by the other's openness.
“I only showed him the simplest tricks, of course. Kid stuff."
“Of course,” Mr. Scott echoed. “I guess you must have used a fine thread to make the extension cord dance."
“Reckon you know all the answers, Mr. Scott,” the other said, his eyes flashing. “But come across to the patio and sit for a while."
The buzzing was quite loud that day, yet after a bit Mr. Scott had to admit to himself that itwas a restful sound. And it had more variety than he'd realized—mounting crackles, fading sizzles, hisses, hums, clicks, sighs. If you listened to it long enough, you probably would begin to hear voices.
Mr. Leverett, silently rocking, said, “Electricity tells me about all the work it does and all the fun it has— dances, singing, big crackling band concerts, trips to the stars, foot races that make rockets seem like snails. Worries, too. You know that electric breakdown they had in New York? Electricity told me why. Some of its folks went crazy—overwork, I guess—and just froze. It was a while before they could send others in from outside New York and heal the crazy ones and start them moving again through the big copper web. Electricity tells me its fearful the same thing's going to happen in Chicago and San Francisco. Too much pressure.
“Electricity doesn't mind working for us. It's generous-hearted and it loves its job. But it would be grateful for a little more consideration—a little more recognition of its special problems.
“It's got its savage brothers to contend with, you see—the wild electricity that rages in storms and haunts the mountaintops and comes down to hunt and kill. Not civilized like the electricity in the wires, though it will be some day.
“For civilized electricity's a great teacher. Shows us how to live clean and in unity and brother-love. Power fails one place, electricity's rushing in from everywhere to fill the gap. Serves Georgia same as Vermont, Los Angeles same as Boston. Patriotic too—only revealed its greatest secrets to true-blue Americans like Edison and Franklin. Did you know it killed a Swede when he tried that kite trick? Yep, electricity's the greatest power for good in all the U.S.A."
Mr. Scott thought sleepily of what a neat little electricity cult Mr. Leverett could set up, every bit as good as Mind Science or the swami that got blown up with dynamite. He could imagine the patio full of earnest seekers while Krishna Leverett—or maybe High Electro Leverett—dispensed wisdom from his rocker, interpreting the words of the humming wires. Better not suggest it, though—in Southern California such things sometimes had a way of coming true.
Mr. Scott felt quite easy at heart as he went down the hill, though he did make a point of telling Bobby not to bother Mr. Leverett any more. The old man seemed harmless enough, still...
But the prohibition didn't apply to himself. During the next months Mr. Scott made a point of dropping in at Peak House from time to time for a dose of “electric wisdom.” He came to look forward to these restful, amusingly screwy breaks in the hectic round. Mr. Leverett appeared to do nothing whatever except sit in his rocker in the patio, yet stayed happy and serene. There was a lesson for anybody in that, if you thought about it.
Occasionally Mr. Scott spotted amusing side effects of Mr. Leverett's eccentricity. For instance, although he sometimes let the gas and water bills go, he always paid up phone and electricity on the dot.