The Cookbook Collector (21 page)

“Oh, good,” said Raj as soon as he walked in and saw Nick’s bottle. Perfect, George thought. Raj was carrying a 1975 Chateau Petrus, peer and rival to the Latour.

Small, dark, and handsome, Raj wore shades of black and gray. His glasses were gold-rimmed, his hair parted on the side. His body was slight, and his eyes unusually large and beautiful. He had been an academic once, and then a lawyer, but at the moment he spent most of his time wrangling with an unreliable Bentley, two Westies, and a rich ex-boyfriend. He lived in a cottage in Palo Alto, the pocket-sized guesthouse of a larger estate where, as he put it, he worked at home, buying, trading, and selling rare books.

“We’re going to have a competition,” George explained from the stove where he was searing tournedos of beef. “Nick’s Latour versus your Petrus. And both against my Heitz.”

When George decanted the Latour, the friends watched with some solemnity, each anticipating the taste to come. The two French wines which promised greatness. The luscious Californian, from a year they knew to be exceptional.

“A toast,” Raj insisted.

“Well,” George began, “the markets are down….”

“For the moment,” Nick said.

“Bush and Gore are neck and neck.”

“Not an attractive image,” said Raj.

“I don’t think we can toast necks.” George fingered his glass. He knew what he would be toasting secretly. His great new find.

“What, then? Or whom?” Raj asked pointedly.

“I don’t have a whom,” George said.

“I’m relieved to hear that.”

“Why?”

“Because you get so boring, darling,” Raj confided. “Love does not become you.”

“To old friends, then.” Nick raised his glass.

The wines were great, and better by the minute, even as the drinkers softened. Just as wines opened at the table, so the friends’ thirst changed. Their tongues were not so keen, but curled, delighted, as the wines deepened. Nick’s Latour was a classic Bordeaux, perfumed with black currant and cedar, perfectly balanced, never overpowering, too genteel to call attention to itself, but too splendid to ignore. Raj’s Petrus, like Raj himself, more flamboyant, flashier, riper, ravishing the tongue. And then the Californian, which was in some ways richest, and in others most ethereal. George was sure the scent was eucalyptus in this Heitz, the flavor creamy with just a touch of mint, so that he could imagine the groves of silvery trees. The Heitz was smooth and silky, meltingly soft, perhaps best suited to George’s tournedos, seared outside, succulent and pink within, juices running, mixing with the young potatoes and tangy green beans crisp enough to snap.

They finished dinner with lemon sorbet garnished with fresh mint, and carried their glasses and their bottles into the enormous living room where they sat on George’s monumental chairs, built like heartwood thrones. George lit a fire, and as the three friends watched the flames in the great fireplace, Nick became dreamier, Raj more argumentative, and as for George, he found himself discoursing on every subject—from books to cars to the economy to the school shootings in Columbine.

“Kids are numb,” George said. “They live in a simulated world, a gaming cyber world, and they lose the distinction between the virtual and the real. They want to feel. This is a fin de siècle problem.”

“I disagree,” said Raj. “It’s a First World problem. Americans, Japanese, Koreans live a virtual life because they can afford a violent simulated world. In other countries the real is quite real. All too real. If you walk through Calcutta, the real will find you, and chase you down the street and try to kill you or steal from you or both.”

“Granted,” George said, a little miffed. Generally an unrepentant aesthete, Raj turned political and brought up India when you least expected it. “But I’m making a different point. Violence isn’t just a matter of impaired judgment. It comes from sensory deprivation.”

“This is First World deprivation that you’re talking about,” said Raj. “Boredom, anomie, et cetera. Other people can only aspire to that sort of spiritual bankruptcy.” He smiled rakishly. “I know I do.”

“Even now?” asked Nick.

“Of course. Having achieved a certain level of comfort, I look for more, whenever possible.” Raj took a long sip of the Latour.

“Then you’re never content,” said Nick.

“If I have the luxury to choose, then I prefer the chase; I like pursuit better than so-called fulfillment. Everybody does.”

Nick shook his head. “Not true.”

“You’re no exception,” Raj insisted. “You love risk. It’s an erotic pleasure.”

“It is not.”

“Look at your positions in Veritech and Inktomi. Look at you playing with Angelfire. It’s just gambling, and gambling is just like risky sex.”

“You forget,” Nick told Raj, “that I’m actually interested in new technology. I’m not a thrill seeker. I’m investing in the information revolution.”

Raj held out his glass for George to refill. “Violence is luxury, and in America the revolution comes with a prospectus and a public offering.”

“Do you really think we’re all so decadent?” asked George.

Raj cast his eyes over the enormous room with its bookcases like upended treasure chests, its massive beams, its woods glowing in the firelight and resonating with the crackling logs so that the whole house seemed cello-like. “We’ve got an acquisitive gene. We want and want, and there’s no way around it.”

“I think you’re discounting the nature of discovery,” George said. “You forget that some aesthetic experiences satisfy. This wine, for example.” He held up his glass. “This Petrus is an end in itself. I want nothing more than to taste this wine.” He grasped the thick edge of his armrest. “This chair. This oak is solid. There are objects sufficient in themselves, and experiences which are complete. There is such a thing as excellence, and I do know it when I see it, and when I find it I am fulfilled. I don’t want to keep on hunting endlessly. If I’m restless, that’s not because I want to be or because I can’t help it. I’m not chronically dissatisfied; I’ve been disappointed. There’s a difference. When I discover something beautiful and right and rare, I’m happy. I’m content. I am …”

“What did you discover that’s so beautiful and right and rare?” asked clever Raj.

“You’ll be jealous,” George demurred, savoring his secret. “Consumed with jealousy.”

“Try me.”

“I’m not going to tell you.”

“Animal, vegetable, or mineral?” asked Nick.

George thought of the recipes for trout and leeks, the descriptions of sea salt. “All of the above.” How he delighted in puzzling his friends. How he loved secrecy. Childishly, tipsily, he enjoyed his secret so much that he could not keep it any longer. “I’ve discovered a cookbook collection. A great one. You can come with me to the owner’s house and look. You can touch them if you like, but you can’t have them. I made her promise.”

“Who is she?” Nick asked. “Is she a whom?”

“She is not a whom; she is a witch, and she lives in a little house crammed with crap, and a cat named Geoffrey.”

At which Raj began to sing in a light tenor:
“For I will consider my cat Jeoffry. / For he is the servant of the living God duly and daily serving him …”

“These are the most important books I’ve ever found directly,” George told Nick. “I have never unearthed anything like this on my own. It’s like opening an ancient Egyptian tomb and stumbling upon a gold sarcophagus….”

“… at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way,”
Raj continued, for he had been a choral singer at Cambridge. “
For this is done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness….”

“I said I’d keep the books together. She wants a private sale.”

Raj broke off singing. “The books are good. They’re wonderful. Strange about the oven, but nothing’s burnt.”

“You saw them!”

“Yes, of course.” Raj’s eyes sparkled. He was so pleased with himself. “I saw them several weeks ago.”

Now George set down his glass of wine, and his evanescent joy burst and dissipated all at once. “Sandra showed them to you first.”

“Why wouldn’t she?” Raj asked.

“She never told me that.”

Raj shrugged.

“And you never told me either.”

“That wouldn’t have been like me,” Raj pointed out.

“Did you offer?”

“I’m considering,” Raj said.

“She promised me,” George repeated.

“What, exactly, did she promise? Did she say she would accept your unknown offer?”

“Did she accept yours?”

“She said she would consider it.”

This was maddening. George should have written Sandra a check right there. But for what amount? What was the collection worth? More than he could spend lightly. More than Raj could afford without selling off some volumes. What was the value of those books? A complicated question. Value to whom? To the dead collector who had valued privacy? To Sandra, who needed cash? To some aesthetic ideal of excellence and rarity? Honor, fear, shame, jealousy, all those factors came into play, even as George told himself that value was simply what the market would bear. “I am seriously interested,” said George, “and I believe she is seriously interested in selling to me.”

“We’ll see,” Raj replied.

“What do you mean, ‘we’ll see’?”

“As I said,” Raj told Nick. “He’s boring when he falls in love.”

It was late, past one, when Nick and Raj departed, and George began to clear the table and wash the wineglasses one by one, turning them under the running water, rubbing his fingers inside their rims. Oh, he regretted showing his hand. He rued sounding so excited before his friend and rival. Raj would never make a mistake like that, but then Raj had been a dealer longer. Sly and witty, Raj needed money, and he was brilliant, while George, who had much deeper pockets, still thought like an amateur.

The trick was not to fall in love at all. Better to pursue unfeelingly, play the market, and enjoy the chase. Better to look dispassionately at these city lights.

He poured out the last drop of the Petrus and wished earnestly that he were less earnest. He hated his sincerity, and resolved to give it up. As Raj said, it did not become him. Yes, George could be heartless on occasion. He could bargain with the best of them. Sarcasm, light banter, a cynical veneer—he could manage that, but Raj and Nick saw through him. Selfishness was one thing, but George was sentimental too. That was unforgivable. Scratch the surface and he was all enthusiasm, like the Heitz, strongest at the beginning against the French, but lacking structure in the end.

Sentimentally, he thought of Jess. Irrationally, he imagined her. Sadly, he despaired of having her. But this was not a question of pursuit. Raj would laugh at him, and Nick would look askance. His fantasies were nurturing, not predatory. If he could have Jess, he would feed her. Laughable, antique, confusingly paternal, he longed to nourish her with clementines, and pears in season, fresh whole-wheat bread and butter, wild strawberries, comté cheese, fresh figs and oily Marcona almonds, tender yellow beets. He would sear red meat, if she would let him, and grill spring lamb. Cut the thorns off artichokes and dip the leaves in fresh aioli, poach her fish—thick Dover sole in wine and shallots—julienne potatoes, and roast a whole chicken with lemon slices under the skin. He would serve a salad of heirloom tomatoes and fresh mozzarella and just-picked basil. Serve her and watch her savor dinner, pour for her, and watch her drink. That would be enough for him. To find her plums in season, and perfect nectarines, velvet apricots, dark succulent duck. To bring her all these things and watch her eat.

16

“J
ess,” said George as she taped clear plastic covers on a complete set of P. G. Wodehouse, “can I trust you?”

She looked up from the work table, an old metal desk in the back room. “What kind of question is that?”

“I mean, can I trust you to keep a poker face if I bring you into someone’s house?”

“Whose house? Is it Sandra?” she asked immediately. “Does she really have a collection to show you?”

“You wouldn’t talk about how amazing it was, would you? You wouldn’t gush?”

“I would never gush!” Jess protested.

“I might need your help when I go to the house, but only if you’re quiet. It’s a difficult situation. She’s skittish.”

Jess nodded.

“She keeps postponing the date. We’ve got a competitor as well. At least one. It’s going to be tricky to evaluate her books, and we’ll have limited time. What do you think? Could you come to her house for three days straight, if necessary?”

“What are the books like?”

“The most amazing I have ever seen in a private home,” George said.

Her eyes widened.

“But that’s not to be repeated.”

“I know, I know.”

“Would you be available at short notice?”

“Of course.” Jess had never before heard George speak this way. She liked the urgency in his voice.

Working at the store, she had become a connoisseur of sorts, someone who knew the difference between a first printing and a latter-day edition. She had come to appreciate white rag paper and color plates with tissue over them and marbled endpapers and gilt titles. Once, she had insisted that content was all that mattered. Now form began to matter too, and her eye delighted in elegant type, and her hand loved thick creamy pages. She treasured what was old and handmade, and began to enjoy early editions more than new. George had influenced her this way, not so much by what he said, but by example. His passion and his knowledge inspired her. When he acquired a new book, he called her over. “Jess, come quick!” Sensing her interest, he explained what made the volume scarce and fine. At those moments, she wished she could work longer hours at Yorick’s. The trouble was that she had so little time.

She knew that she was overextended, but she couldn’t help herself. Student, tree lover, citizen of the Earth, she was busier than ever as she raced through Berkeley on her bicycle, and stood on street corners with petitions. She was a blithe spirit, and increasingly a hungry one. Vegan, but not always strict. She never ate meat or tuna fish or honey harvested from indentured bees, but sometimes she craved eggs, and cheese, and even butter, and she bought herself a croissant or ate a slice of whole-wheat pizza, or a whole box of saltine crackers which she ate in bed, one by one, so that they dissolved on her tongue like the heavenly host. She felt bad afterward, and her guilt mixed with missing Leon.

A year ago, she and Leon had been inseparable. They had driven north to Humboldt County, and camped near ancient roots where he held her in his arms and whispered he would make a climber of her, show her the ropes. He promised he would rappel with her into redwood crowns that swayed and creaked like floating islands in the sky, rich ecosystems unto themselves, of lichen and lungwort and insects, and even miniature trees, bursting forth like Athenas full grown from the Creator’s brow. If only Jess had overcome her fear of heights to join Leon up there. If only she were not afraid, she might have been with him, and lived
in
the trees—not merely for them, or under them. Alas, the very thought of climbing made her ill. Her heart and mind longed to glide into the air, but she could not overcome her fear. Leon had tired of cajoling her to try on a harness and practice on the old oak in the Tree House yard. Impatient, he reminded her that even children could climb trees this size. Then Jess steeled herself. She said she would, but at the last minute, her stolid feet refused to leave the ground.

On weekends Leon began driving north to tree-sit in Wood Rose Glen. He scaled a redwood the Savers called Galadriel, and spent nights in her lovely branches. Jess envied that beautiful redwood, and all the people in it, although she pretended that she didn’t, and went to dinner at the Bialystok house, and sometimes attended mysticism class where she sat with Mrs. Gibbs and listened to Rabbi Helfgott hold forth on God’s laws, which were numerous, and His designs, which were intricate. She enjoyed the company on a Friday night. Fellow students, Israelis, tourists, Russians, sad-eyed runaways, a panoply of souls.

Jess didn’t eat, but she loved to listen to the Friday-night blessings over candles, wine, and bread, and the singing, especially the wordless tunes called
niggunim
, which Mrs. Gibbs hummed and Jess sang in chorus with the others at the table. While she did not believe in mystic Judaism, she enjoyed its tropes and songs and angels. The Tree House felt chilly without Leon. At the Bialystok house, the rabbi and his wife, Freyda, welcomed her as an honored guest.

One wet December night, Freyda Helfgott sat with Jess at dinner and introduced her to her sister Chaya Zylberfenig, who was visiting from Canaan.

“This is Jess!” Freyda told Chaya. “She is one of our best singers. And she is a philosopher.”

“Really?” said Chaya, and she looked at Jess with her shrewd dark eyes.

“Well, I’m not really a philosopher yet,” Jess demurred.

“You look like a Gould,” said Chaya.

Freyda cocked her head and looked Jess up and down. “Do you think so?”

“What’s a Gould?” Jess asked, thinking that perhaps Chaya was talking about some mystic sect.

“Freyda and I are Goulds,” Chaya said warmly. “A Gould is one of us.”

Jess knew the Tree Savers did not feel quite the same about her, although she tried to pull her weight. While Leon was away, no one looked overjoyed to see her, or saved a place for her at the kitchen table. No one moved a car to help her park in the communal driveway when Jess returned that night, driving her sister’s car. Emily was back east for the holidays, and she had left her new Audi for Jess to use.

After Friday night dinner, Jess had to drive several blocks before she found a space. Just her luck. As soon as she parked, it began to rain. She ran to the Tree House in a downpour.

Once inside, she pulled off her shoes, left them on the rubber mat, and ran all the way upstairs in her wet socks. She was hoping Leon had come home, but when she opened the door, the room was just as she had left it, bed unmade, desk strewn with unfinished problem sets for logic class, and a badly tangled Hegel paper in notes and drafts. Chilled, she took off her dripping clothes and hunted in the closet for dry sweatpants and a warm sweater.

She picked up her Fichte reader and her Hegel and her reading notes, and turned once more to her term paper on “being for self.” She was staying in Berkeley for winter break so that she could take care of her Incompletes. But the work was lonely, and she paced the room and thought of Leon. Sometimes late at night he slipped into bed with her, and she turned and wrapped her arms around him, and he pulled off her T-shirt and slid on top of her to take his first rough kiss. And then sometimes she woke and realized that she had been dreaming, and she was still alone. She did not expect to be with her boyfriend all the time. She had always known he was a traveler and a politico, and she admired him for it, but she missed him, even as she wondered why she needed companionship so much.

This is a mistake, she thought as she took
Phenomenology of Spirit
into bed. The book made her sleepy at her desk. Under the covers she didn’t have a chance.

What was it about Hegel that got her down? His sentences bristling with bony definitions? His arguments disguised as systems of the universe? He was everything Jess had come to loathe in her philosophy classes: stentorian about the world, but somehow alien from it. She had come to philosophy reading Plato’s dialogs, and now she found herself waist-deep in inner monologs about the Self. Was there a future for her in this marshy field? Or did she like forests too much? And leafleting? And living? She propped her head on the pillow and alternately read and dozed, and dreamed that Emily asked her in Hegelian fashion:
What is now?

Now is night
, Jess answered.

What is this?
Emily inquired, pointing to a lonesome pine.

This is a tree
, said Jess.

If I turn around the tree vanishes
, said Emily.

Now is still now
, said Jess.
This is still this. Here is still here
.

How do you know?

Cautiously Jess said,
Because I’m still me
.

Really?
Emily pressed.
Are you sure?

When Jess opened her eyes and saw the blue morning light, she wasn’t sure at all. She could not remember what Hegel said about consciousness; she could not even remember her own dream. All she knew was that she had to drive to San Francisco to pick up Emily from the airport.

Later she recalled forebodings, an inner certainty that something bad had happened, but in fact she felt no inkling until she discovered that Emily’s car was not where she had parked it. She was sure she’d left it on the right side of Derby. Anxious, she walked up and down. Then, more anxious still, she crossed the street and walked up and down again, calling softly under her breath, “Car, car, where are you?” as though she were out looking for a cat. Had she really been so stupid? Had she really lost Emily’s new car?

She ran back to the Tree House and burst into the kitchen where a bunch of Tree Savers were eating oatmeal. “Where do you call if you think your car was towed?”

Daisy looked up from her bowl. “Maybe it wasn’t towed. Maybe somebody stole it.”

“No!” Jess gasped. “But it’s Emily’s Audi!”

“Not anymore,” said Daisy.

“Take a breath,” a Tree Saver named Siddhartha suggested.

“Have some oatmeal,” Noah offered, and he tried to serve her from the pot on the stove.

“I can’t! I can’t have oatmeal. I have to pick her up from the airport!” Jess rushed outside and hopped on her bike for the BART station. On the platform a flautist in patchwork pants was playing a husky, breathy “Killing Me Softly with His Song,” but Jess scarcely noticed.

Emily, I have bad news. Emily, something bad happened. Emily, I’m sorry
. Jess rehearsed all the way to the airport on the rattling train, until the woman sitting next to her changed seats.

“I’m sorry I’m late.” Jess ran toward Emily at the baggage claim. “I’m sorry…. I’m so sorry.”

“What happened?”

“Well …,” Jess began, and suddenly she thought it would be better to tell the news outside, and she started walking.

“Are you all right?” Emily followed her through the automatic glass doors.

“I’m fine,” said Jess. “Except …”

“Jess!” Emily stopped suddenly on the walkway and her rolling suitcase stopped with her, like a well-trained dog. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I’m fine.”

Emily sighed with relief. “Okay. Let’s see.” She studied the signs. “Ground transportation. Central parking. Short-term parking.”

“Um, we won’t need to … We don’t have to go in there,” Jess said.

“Where did you park?” Emily asked.

“Well—I didn’t, because—I’m so sorry. I’m pretty sure someone stole your car.”

“Really?”

Jess nodded miserably. “Right off Derby Street.”

“Did you call the police?”

“Oh, God, I didn’t think of that! I was afraid I wouldn’t get here in time, so I just rushed to catch the train.”

Emily shook her head at Jess.

That did it. The gesture of disbelief, with its suggestion of great forbearance. Jess burst into tears right there in front of the United Airlines terminal. “I had a feeling when I woke up this morning,” she sobbed. “I just had a feeling something was wrong, and then …”

“Jess”—Emily unzipped the outer pocket of her rolling bag and produced a travel package of tissues—“come with me.” Emily wheeled her obedient suitcase back into the airport.

“Where are you going?”

“To rent a car,” said Emily.

“But what will you …? How will you …?”

“Please stop crying,” Emily begged her sister. “I have insurance. It’s just a car. It doesn’t matter. I’ll buy a new one.” And Jess recalled that her sister was worth more than $100 million. Emily never acted spoiled or materialistic—not in the ways you would expect, but at times like these the money showed.

“Who are you calling?” Jess asked.

“Laura.”

“On Saturday morning?”

“Hi, Laura. How are you? Really?” She smiled. “Listen, could you call the police and also Commerce Insurance about my car? We think it was stolen last night in Berkeley. I know!”

“I need an assistant,” Jess said after Emily got off the phone.

“Why?” said Emily. “You have me.”

Do I? Jess thought. Emily could give her money, but Jess’s asking would have meant explaining how she’d donated her stock to Save the Trees. Emily could give advice as well about school, and Leon, and life in general, but none of the advice was what she wanted to hear.

She felt like an item on Emily’s to-do list: (1) fly to Banff with Jonathan; (2) establish Veritech Foundation to promote math education in underserved communities; (3) ask Jess what she’s doing with her life.

More like a fabulous old aunt than a sister, Emily began to pick up Jess every couple of weeks and take her to brunch at Greens, where she plied Jess with French toast, and Jess abstained and ordered blueberries with nothing on them. Then they would walk along the Presidio walls, with the wind whipping their hair, and they would gaze out at the ocean, and Emily would ask earnestly, “Are you sure you really want to be with Leon?”

Or Jess would sleep over at Emily’s condo, and they would drive together to the White Lotus in San Jose for vegan Southeast Asian food. Coconut soup, summer rolls with peanut sauce, mock squid lo mein, mushroom hot pot, and no-dairy flan for dessert. And Emily would say, “Are you sure you want to be in grad school if you’ve taken so many Incompletes?”