Travel Glasses

by Chess Desalls

  A young suitor, Romaso Bredani, presented her with the blank journal one afternoon at a festival in Venice as a parting gift. He explained that “se vedemo” was not a good-bye but a Venetian phrase indicating hope for future meetings, more literally “if we see each other again.” Shirlyn left with her parents for their subsequent destination that same day.

  Shirlyn’s entries often reverted back to the topic of Romaso even after she returned to her family’s estate in England. In bits and pieces throughout the journal, Shirlyn described Romaso’s liquid brown eyes, his impish grin and the way he stood before her when presenting the journal on their last day together. His English was broken, but Shirlyn found that charming. She’d recorded her favorite phrases used by Romaso, sometimes combining them with her own in describing the way she saw the world around her.

  Throughout my time at the workshop, I’d browsed through nearly half of the journals in the washroom library, each vivid with descriptions of specific persons, real individuals who had lived in defined time periods and about whom there was enough physical and behavioral detail for me to search for if necessary. Edgar had welcomed me to take as many of these diaries as I wanted. He had no particular use for them. I did, however. When I wasn’t reading it, I kept Shirlyn’s journal in my backpack. It inspired a plan—one that I didn’t feel comfortable telling Edgar about.

  STREAMS OF light glittered into the workshop windows through the surrounding trees before Edgar felt satisfied with the thoroughness of his experiments. He refused to answer any of my questions with anything other than yawns and promises that he would explain everything tomorrow. Exhausted from the impromptu all-nighter, I eventually had to admit that Edgar was right. I slept through most of the day.

  After waking up I wandered outside where I found Edgar in the garden tending to reddish-purple celery stalks.

  “What’s the verdict?” I asked.

  “Someone certainly tampered with my invention,” replied Edgar. His thinning white hair stood on end. “After many attempts, I was able to contact the acquaintance of mine who I’d hoped dabbled in similar work.”

  I nodded. That sounded encouraging. “Did your friend know anything that could help us?”

  “We had some discussion and compared notes. She—Enta’s her name—built her set of glasses much later than I did and added the communication feature as an afterthought. I learned a great deal from her. For instance, the communication feature seems to work by one particular method requiring that the communicants wear compatible lenses.”

  I blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “Person A must know who he or she wants to contact much like when time traveling to a specific person. Person B, the object of Person A’s contact, must be wearing the glasses at the same time.”

  “Okay, I think I understand. Valcas tried to contact me when I was wearing the glasses. He probably tried that many times when I wasn’t wearing them. So then how could Valcas and I see each other, but not anything else around us?”

  “Here’s where it gets very dangerous, Calla. The technology has a flaw, the fix for which has not yet been fully developed. You see, Enta has learned through unfortunate circumstances that if one person tries to travel to someone else who is also wearing travel glasses, one set consumes the other which leads to the death of both persons A and B. Enta made identical pairs of glasses for her young twin daughters. She still regrets that decision very much.”

  “You mean they died?”

  Edgar frowned as he cut through a stalk of celery.

  “Now I’m even more worried about using the glasses to return to my family.” I doubted that Mom or Uncle Al would have a pair. I couldn’t speak for my father. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. “So then Valcas couldn’t travel to me when he spoke to me because it would be suicide?”

  “Exactly. He must have had some knowledge of what would happen. I’m not surprised. He is very intelligent and well-traveled, pardon the expression. He may have been testing whether it was safe to travel to you by first trying to communicate with you. He needed to know whether or not you were still using the glasses and therefore likely arranged the contact in the form of a warning. Valcas also correctly assumed that you would not attempt to travel to him, such that it was safe for him to wear the pair he is now using.”

  “I’ll give him well-travelled, but he’s an idiot if he thinks I’m going to sit here and wait around for him.”

  I shuddered. Valcas knew much more about the travel glasses than he’d told me. He also knew an awful lot about me. I still had no idea how he’d known my name or how to find me at Winston Lake. Fine, so he was a knowledgeable idiot. That didn’t make me feel any less exposed.

  Edgar placed the celery stalk in a basket along with the rest of the produce he’d collected. I lifted the basket off of the ground and followed him into the workshop.

  “I’m sure he has greater plans, Calla. I wish I knew whether it was safer for you to wear the travel glasses or avoid them altogether.”

  “You said something about a fix not being fully developed. So what has been done?”

  “Enta said there’s a way of avoiding certain communications, a type of call block. I studied your glasses and cannot find any such device. We tried to see if I could block her incoming contacts. Unfortunately, I was not successful.

  “Enta has a theory that if the wearer were actually traveling somewhere, then other incoming contacts would be blocked. Calla, she would like to help by taking a look at the glasses. She feels that helping you may in some way make up for her own past dealings with the travel glasses.”

  “You could draw me a picture of Enta or describe her to me so that I can travel to her. There aren’t any large hills or mountains nearby. I suppose I could try running—”

  “No, no, Calla. I think it is far too dangerous for you to wear the glasses until they’ve been more thoroughly inspected. I will personally take you to Enta.”

  “YOU’RE JOKING, right, Edgar?”

  After washing up and repacking my backpack for our visit to Enta, I’d stepped outside to find Edgar standing next to a boxy green truck that he’d unearthed from who knows where. Its dull black trim was tinged with rust. A spare tire hung off of the driver’s side. The truck looked ancient.

  I examined Edgar more closely. His wispy white hair was parted in the middle and smoothed down. He wore a fresh white lab coat. Gray eyes shined with pride as he looked at me over his glasses.

  “This is a 1929 Ford Model A pickup,” he said as he patted the spare tire. “It used to be really something back in my day.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  “All right, Calla, go on inside. There should be enough clearing to get us going.”

  I sat down in the passenger’s side of the vehicle. “Can this thing go any faster than thirty miles per hour?”

  Edgar squinted at me through his window. “I’ve gotten it up to about fifty-four miles per hour.”

  I bit my lip for three full seconds before I laughed.

  “That’ll be enough of your pluck, young miss,” he said as he got in the driver’s seat. “Did you ask Valcas to estimate for you how fast he was able to row the small boat?”

  We both laughed. I handed Edgar the travel glasses which he placed on his nose in front of his round spectacles.

  “You may want to keep your eyes closed,” he warned.

  The truck puttered forward through the grassy clearing. I closed my eyes just as we entered the dazzling white light.

  I OPENED my eyes to a sky of pale pink, beige and buttery yellow. Grassy fields extended out to hillsides dotted with windmills. The pickup truck, now a horse and buggy, lumbered forward. Edgar slowed the horse to a halt and parked near an unpainted barn.

  “How very interesting,” he said as he dismounted the forest green buggy. The dark black horse in front of it whinnied.

  Edgar patted its mane and looked around. “This is unexpected.”

  I agreed. Based on his description o
f Enta, I’d expected the truck to turn into a spaceship. But instead of stars and planets, earthy smells of straw, grass and livestock hung in the air. Everything about this place made it feel like we’d traveled back in time.

  “Didn’t you say Enta worked on the travel glasses after you did?” I asked.

  “That is true,” rang out a female voice. “That was long ago. I decided to spend retirement in an earlier past with a simpler lifestyle.”

  A tall, fair woman emerged from the barn and smiled. Her gentle face appeared younger than Edgar’s, but soft lines creased the corners of her lips and eyes. She wore a blue muslin dress and black buckled shoes. The strings to her matching bonnet were drawn into a bow under her chin. I wasn’t sure whether I should bow, curtsy or shake her hand.

  Edgar offered his hand. “It is a pleasure to see you again, Enta.”

  “Welcome, friend,” Enta said as she hugged Edgar, ignoring his outstretched hand. “It’s been too long.”

  Then she smiled at me. “You must be Calla.”

  I smiled back. “Thank you so much for offering to help me.”

  “Let’s get you two inside where I have dinner ready. I hope you like bread pudding and fresh milk.”

  Edgar’s droopy eyes brightened as he smacked his lips. I was pretty sure that he hadn’t had much to eat or drink other than hard biscuits, vegetable soup and tea for a very long time.

  As Enta led us to her home, she chattered about how much she enjoyed her life at the homestead.

  “The longer I stay here, the more I feel the stresses of my past melt away,” she said.

  I remembered her daughters’ accident and silently wondered what else could have happened to Enta to make her choose this of all places.

  We approached a two-story house made of wood and stone. The planked front porch creaked as we walked across it.

  “Welcome,” Enta said, opening the front door.

  I followed Enta and Edgar into a candlelit kitchen, completely devoid of any modern appliances. Edgar and I sat down at a simple wooden dining table. Still chattering, Enta brought over plates of roast beef and potatoes, followed by a fluffy bread pudding and mugs of warm milk.

  “I keep my dairy cow and pig in the barn next to where you arrived,” she said. “I’ve never been able to bring myself to slaughter that poor old pig. Seeing as the mercantile is only a three-mile walk away, I feel no need to assume the duties of a butcher.”

  I took a bite of roast beef and sighed. Her cooking was so much better than Edgar’s.

  “So, are you and Edgar going to fix whatever’s wrong with the travel glasses after dinner?” I asked in between mouthfuls.

  Enta smiled. “I see no reason to rush. Today is Sunday, a day for visiting. We will experiment with the travel glasses tomorrow.”

  Edgar, sated and relaxed, appeared to be in agreement. I tensed. Valcas’ metal shackles looked solid and strong, but I was sure that he’d figure out how to escape them. Then he’d be after me—he’d made that pretty clear during his warning. We needed to fix the glasses now. But instead, Enta told us about the joys of using oil lamps and manual hand tools. I hoped that her workshop had more modern resources.

  It soon grew dark outside. Before showing us to our rooms, Enta whipped up a simple green nightdress for me on her treadle sewing machine. She insisted that I not sleep in my daytime clothes. That night I even slept in a proper guest room curled up under a handmade quilt.

  A KNOCK at the bedroom door woke me up the next morning. Smells of coffee and pancakes infused the air. For a moment I thought I was still dreaming.

  “Good morning, Calla,” Enta called out. “Breakfast is ready.”

  I peeled myself out of bed and followed her to a washroom where she’d set out additional homespun clothes that fit me surprisingly well. I felt uncomfortable wearing them, though, so I changed into a clean pair of jeans and the sweatshirt I’d brought with me.

  As I approached the breakfast table, I choked back a chuckle. Edgar sat there in a new outfit complete with suspenders and a straw hat. We ate while watching Enta bustle around the kitchen. She never stopped moving…or talking.

  “What was she like before coming here to de-stress?” I asked Edgar under my breath.

  “Happy,” he said.

  ENTA’S WORKSHOP was in a separate building, similar to Edgar’s but larger and more modern. Still, there were several pieces of equipment that looked like they belonged to a time period from ages ago. I perched myself on a stool at one of the two lab tables while Edgar and Enta remained standing over a pile of glass bottles and brass instruments.

  Several pairs of dark glasses hung on wall pegs. I wondered how many pairs of travel glasses were floating around out there.

  Edgar handed Enta Valcas’ pair.

  She flipped them to inspect the insides of the lenses. “Now I see. These are very well made for someone with your time period’s resources, Edgar.”

  “Thank you.” He blushed.

  “Here is where someone else appears to have adapted the lenses for a communication apparatus. The feature seems to be working properly, but isn’t done quite the way I would have. Edgar, can you hand me that basket of tools? I’ll need to disassemble this part here.”

  I craned my neck, trying to see what Enta was talking about. The travel glasses had always looked like an ordinary pair of sunglasses to me. I couldn’t imagine what she would be disassembling or how she could tell there was any type of apparatus on them.

  “All right, now,” Enta continued. “Edgar, would you mind trying on a pair of my travel glasses to see if you can contact me?”

  Edgar did so and found that he could not see Enta through the glasses no matter how hard he tried.

  “Success!” he rejoiced. “Now switch glasses with me, Enta.”

  “I can still see you, Edgar. You can’t just rely on the glasses. Close me out with your mind.”

  I watched closely, unsure whether this was something I also would be able to do.

  “Brilliant, Enta! Let’s start over.”

  Both inventors took off their glasses, replaced them and tried again. This time Edgar readily succeeded in blocking out Enta’s attempt to communicate with him.

  “All right, enough work for now. I’m exhausted,” said Enta, handing me the pair of travel glasses she’d just fixed. “Let’s go back to the house and sit outside on the porch.”

  I thanked Enta the entire way back to the house. She returned my thanks with a warm smile and a glass of lemonade. I sipped while rocking in a wooden chair. The sky was painted with the same pastel colors of what I’d thought was a sunset the day before. I drank in the peaceful calm, wondering how long Edgar and I would get to stay.

  I looked up to see Enta standing over me with a pitcher of lemonade, ready to refill my glass.

  “Oh dear,” she whispered. “This has been a busy week for visitors.”

  Chills went up my spine at the word “visitors” as a lone, dark-clad figure upon a dun mustang quickly approached. The animal’s coat was golden blond. Its mane and points were of the blackest midnight. Valcas’ glasses and riding boots glistened against the backdrop of the strawberry landscape.

  Blood pulsed through my temples. I’d been expecting the chase to begin for many weeks, but still couldn’t believe it was happening now, here in the most serene of places. Wishing I could spend more time saying good-bye, I thanked Enta and Edgar for their help in a low voice.

  “We will speak with Valcas,” said Edgar. “Go quickly through the house. Exit through the rear and run around the house to the barn.” Edgar’s voice was calm, but his fingernails dug into the wooden arms of his rocking chair.

  “We will stall Valcas for as long as we can,” added Enta. “Take the horse and buggy.”

  I tore through the house, grabbing my backpack on my way out. Back outside again, I sucked in short gulps of air as I sprinted toward the barn. Lemonade, now mixed with stomach acid, kept crawling back up my throat. I choked it back down,
resisting the urge to vomit.

  Sweaty and out of breath, I reached the barn and looked around. A mess of straps and buckles hung off of the buggy. I pulled at one of the reins. It was chewed through.

  “Come on, really?”

  The black horse looked at me, chewing a mouthful of grass with bits of straw in it, showing me her yellowed teeth.

  “Fine then. The carriage can stay here. But you’re coming with me.”

  I found a stepladder in the barn and set it down next to the horse. Content with her chewing, she stayed still as I climbed on her back and put on the travel glasses. I kicked both legs into her muscular middle, bareback, the way I’d seen casual riders do so at the lake. The black horse whinnied and then jetted forward. I grabbed onto bits of mane, folds of skin, anything I could to not fall off.

  I was headed for seventeenth-century Venice. Trying to hold on for my life would have been challenging enough without having to simultaneously search for an accurate image of Romaso.

  I hoped Romaso would help me find Shirlyn. I’d read and reread Shirlyn’s diary with the purpose of committing it to memory. I wanted to visit her during the specific time period that she wrote about. But I had no idea what she looked like. She’d never written about that.

  Without more details for the search, I worried that I wouldn’t be as fortunate in finding Shirlyn as I was with finding Edgar. As far as I knew, I’d only traveled to presently existing people, regardless of whether they lived in a past world. The idea of visiting someone’s past life frightened me, especially if there was a chance that they were still alive somewhere in the present. I was certain that Romaso, who lived in the 1600s, was already dead. I was not comfortable about the situation, but Shirlyn and her twentieth-century family had been able to visit him. I planned to use her descriptions of Romaso and his surroundings in my attempt to travel there.