“What gave me the idea—though I didn’t realize it at the time—was a ride in a high-speed Coast Guard patrol boat off Key West, back in ’03…”

Though it had led him to fame and fortune, even now Emerson preferred not to recall certain aspects of that trip. It had seemed a good idea at the time—a short pleasure cruise through Hemingway’s old stomping grounds, at the invitation of a cousin in the Coast Guard. How amazed Ernest would have been at the target of their antismuggling activities—blocks of crystal, about the size of a matchbox, that had made their way from Hong Kong via Cuba. But these TIMs—Terabyte Interactive Microlibraries—had put so many U.S. publishers out of business that Congress had dusted off legislation that dated back to the heydays of Prohibition.

Yes, it had sounded very attractive—while he was still on terra firma. What Emerson had forgotten (or his cousin had neglected to tell him) was that smugglers preferred to operate in the worst weather they could find, short of a Gulf hurricane.

“It was a rough trip, and about the only thing I remembered afterwards was the gadget on the bridge that allowed the helmsman to see ahead, despite the torrents of rain and spray that were being dumped on us.

“It was simply a disc of glass, spinning at high speed. No water could stay on it for more than a fraction of a second, so it was always perfectly transparent. I thought at the time it was far better than a car’s windshield wiper; and then I forgot all about it.”

“For how long?”

“I’m ashamed to say. Oh, maybe a couple of years. Then one day I was driving through a heavy rainstorm in the New Jersey countryside, and my wipers jammed; I had to pull off the road until the storm had passed. I was stuck for maybe half an hour; and at the end of that time, the whole thing was clear in my mind.”

“That’s all it took?”

“Plus every cent I could lay my hands on, and two years of fifteen-hour days and seven-day weeks in my garage.” (Emerson might have added “And my marriage,” but he suspected that his host already knew that. He was famed for his careful research.)