“And dogs want to fly,” I said. This woman was completely crazy.
“I noticed that, too,” Fred said, winking at me.
“So don’t believe me,” she said with contempt.
“Oh, for hell’s sake,” I said. “You don’t really expect us to believe that thing is some sort of bus, do you?”
She shrugged. “In a way that’s exactly what the mirror is. There are many more like it scattered around the world, most of them untraceable. This is the third one I have gotten near by following a wave energy they emit. The first two I found I couldn’t get close to for security reasons. This is the first one I have been able to actually touch.”
“So it’s a damn small bus,” Fred said. “You mind telling us how it works?”
“It’s like on Star Trek,” I said. “You remember Beam me up and all that.”
“In a way,” Susan said. “It’s more a time machine used for taking random samples from the current Earth society.” She held the mirror up in front of her again and ran her hand across the back. Then she laid it down on the table, same as before, and waited, one hand on the pack beside her.
Again nothing happened.
I stood and shook my head. A ghost playing music under water had been enough. Now we had some nut case telling us a story.
“You’re a writer,” I said. “That’s it, isn’t it? That’s how you know all of this? I bet you even know who would want to take these random samples of our population. Right?”
She shrugged and inspected the mirror again. “Believe what you want.”
“Game’s over,” I said, again reaching out and snatching the mirror from her like a parent would a toy from a bad child. I was damn sick of all this. All I wanted was some simple, straightforward answers.
Now Susan really looked pained. She stood and picked up her pack. “I’ll be in my cabin. Would someone please let me know when dinner is ready?”
Constance nodded. “I’ll ring the bell.”
“Thank you,” Susan said, then tossed the pack up on her shoulder on one strap and headed out the front door.
“I think I made her mad,” I said as I laid the mirror down in the middle of the coffee table.
Fred laughed as he dropped onto the couch and grabbed his drink. “You just might say that.”
Constance patted the still glassy-eyed Steven on the shoulder and sat in the overstuffed chair. “Well, I don’t think it’s funny at all.”
“Women,” Fred said. “They always stick together.”
I laughed and raised my drink in a mock toast. “I’ll drink to that.”
***
Susan was good as her word and didn’t reappear until Constance rang the dinner bell. I took a two-hour nap and somehow kept from dreaming.
The conversation around the table strayed only a few times onto the events of the day. Mostly Constance, Fred, and I talked about good old times we’d had and other crazy things we’d done. Steven talked about other ghosts he’d investigated and what he was working on in his research at the university. Susan didn’t say much at all except to laugh in the right places and make a few mentions about a sister that she used to do a few things with.
By the end of the meal, I knew nothing more about her than I did going in. And I didn’t like her much more either. Twice I noticed her glancing at the mirror. It was now sitting up out of harm’s way on the fireplace mantel where Constance had put it, glass facing out.
I thought the evening was going to end without anything else wild or crazy happening. Even with the nap, I was feeling damned tired and my body ached in places I hadn’t noticed in twenty years. I wanted to finish one last drink and then not wake up until the sun cleared the tops of the mountains. Susan had other ideas. As everyone was getting settled around the fireplace, she asked me if I would take a walk with her. Not far, she said.
What the hell. My poor body had already been beaten by a horse, frozen in a lake, and scared into heart stoppage by a ghost. What could a walk in the dark in the mountains with a crazy woman hurt after all that? Besides, if I worked it right, I might find out a little more about her. Fred gave me one of his raised-eyebrow sort of looks as we put on our jackets and headed out the front door.
We ambled without talking down the main path and then turned toward the logjam. The night was one of those clear, crisp mountain nights that you only see in the city in beer commercials. There were a few night noises and every so often the crack or pop of something in the fireplace of the lodge. Otherwise, the silence overwhelmed even the massive number of stars.
“Let’s sit here,” Susan said, indicating a log off to one side of the trail that offered a good view of the black water and the opposite dark valley wall. The lake was a giant black hole in the floor of the valley. It was hard to imagine that a few hours before, I had been in that hole. It didn’t seem possible. The events of the dive were already fading into one of those memories of something that you remember doing, but never quite believe.
“Nice night,” I said, trying to break the thickness between us with stupid chatter. “Cold though.”
“That it is,” she said. “I love the stars. Where I’m from we can’t see the stars like this.”
“Can’t where I live either,” I said. “And that’s in this same state. Where exactly are you from?”
Susan never took her gaze off the stars. She sat there and let the question hang in the cold night air until it gathered frost.
But I heated it back up. “Don’t want to tell, huh? Is it that bad?”
“No,” she said. “It’s that you wouldn’t believe me. And besides, I’m really not allowed to tell you.”
“Why? You a spy or something?”
She laughed. “No, not in the sense you think.”
“You know, you sure are a vague woman.” It was the nicest thing I could think to say at the moment.
“I thought men found that attractive.”
“Not in this case. It’s more annoying.”
For the first time, she looked over at me. “I really am sorry. I think I might actually tell you if I could.”
“Why is it that I don’t believe that?” I laughed and looked back down at the lake. “Belief. What a funny word to be using today. I didn’t used to believe in ghosts.”
She chuckled as she went back to gazing at the night sky filled with dark shadows of mountain peaks and bright pinpricks of stars.
“Look,” I said, “that ghost seems to want someone to help her. What I am actually more concerned with is helping Fred and Constance get rid of that ghost so that they can get on with running their lodge here and I can get back to running my own business. If I let you play with that mirror and you end up taking this trip you mentioned, is that going to help either them or the ghost?”
“It might,” Susan said as she turned to face me.
“But you don’t think so. Right?”
I could see she agreed, even in the faint light.
“Then give me another reason why Fred and I should let you monkey with that mirror.”
“Because it’s far more important than you think, that’s why.”
I could tell she was getting angry, so I pushed. “Oh, something like saving the world from a terrible fate worse than death? I think I read about that somewhere.”
“Something like that.” It was impossible for me to miss the sarcasm in her voice.
She went back to staring up into the night sky and I went back to studying the black lake and thinking about warm things to keep from shaking too much. Finally, after a few long minutes, she spoke up.
“You mentioned beliefs and how you didn’t used to believe in ghosts.”
“I didn’t. And I’m still not completely sure I do. But I’m more open to it now than before the dive and that episode this afternoon.”
She smiled. “If I told you the truth, you wouldn’t believe me any more than you believed in that ghost before today. In fact, you’ll just laugh.”
“Go ahead,” I said
. “It’s been one of those days. Try me on part of it. I promise I’ll stop you when I think it’s getting too deep.”
“All right. On two conditions. You let me try to trigger the mirror and you don’t tell anyone else.”
I shook my head no. “You tell me and you are telling Fred, Constance, and Steven. I can safely say that the four of us will not tell anyone else. But I will not keep secrets from my friends in there.”
She thought for a moment and then nodded. “All right, but no one else.”
“Promise,” I said. “If you promise to not damage the mirror.”
“Deal,” she said. Then she took a deep breath and let out a long sigh as if some major decision was made and that was that. “I don’t exactly know where to start.”
“How about where you’re from.”
She smiled and her teeth seemed extremely white in the dark night. “Get ready, because this is the biggest part that you won’t believe.”
“I’m ready,” I said. And I suppose at that point I really was ready for damn near any wild story she might toss at me. I wasn’t going to believe any of it, but I was betting that she would say she was from some high-tech computer firm and they were trying to do something with the space program. Or that this mirror was some artifact from a crashed UFO. Or maybe even Atlantis. Something crazy like that, I was ready for.
“I’m from the future,” she said without taking her eyes off the stars.
I was right. Totally crazy.
But I didn’t laugh. At least not for the first five minutes.
CHAPTER SIX
Monumental Lodge
June 28, 1990
I AWOKE TO Fred banging on my door and announcing breakfast. I was amazed that I hadn’t had nightmares all night. But in fact, I had slept right through and felt something just short of what I am sure death feels like.
Somehow I crawled out of bed without screaming from all the stiff muscles. I felt a little better after a good, hot shower. Not much, but a little.
Fred was cooking the best-smelling bacon I could have ever imagined as I eased my sore body down the stairs. I was the last to arrive. Constance, Steven, and Susan were all sitting at the kitchen table reading newspapers.
“Morning,” Constance said as I hit the bottom of the stairs and padded across the room in my bare feet. “Sleep okay?”
“Like a drunk,” I said. “How about you, Fred?”
“Didn’t even notice Constance’s snoring.”
“That’s because I was awake listening to yours,” she said without looking up from her paper.
“Coffee on the stove,” Fred said, pointing with a fork at the pot.
I glanced at one of the newspapers as I passed the table. The date at the top was yesterday’s. “Where’d you get the papers?”
“Mail drop this morning,” Fred said. “Didn’t you hear the plane?”
“I didn’t hear a thing from the time my head hit that pillow to the time you knocked on the door. Nothing.”
“Plane drops off our mail, guest arrivals, and newspapers twice a week in the clearing above the lake. If we’re not there to wave at it, or have already put a red flag on one of the small trees beside the meadow, they send in the rescue squad. It’s kind of our safety net in case something really bad goes wrong and neither one of us can get to help. The guy lives down in Yellow Pine and he also lets us know when guests are on their way in. He’s our contact with the real world.”
“Good thinking,” I said. “Considering how far out in the boondocks this is.”
“Oh, we’re not that bad,” Constance said. “There are ranches down on the Middle Fork that are a hundred miles from the nearest road.”
“But don’t they have airstrips?” I asked as I filled my cup and went over to the table. “Morning,” I said as Susan looked up.
“Some of them,” Constance said.
“Good morning,” Susan said without so much as a smile. She went back to reading her paper. She was obviously still mad at me for laughing at her last night. Hell, with a story like her “I’m a time traveler from the future” one, what did she expect? I’d tried to be open-minded. I’d listened as long as I could keep a straight face. If I hadn’t been so tired, I might have lasted longer.
I studied her for a moment. She looked tired. Last night, after our “talk,” I hadn’t told anyone about her strange rantings. I had been too damn pooped to fight it through. Fred had asked me what went on and I had told him I’d give him a good laugh in the morning. I had mentioned keeping the mirror with me, but he suggested a safer place under a floorboard in their bedroom. So that’s where we had put it. I noticed that it was now back sitting on the fireplace. I also noticed that Susan’s pack was leaning against the wall.
Somewhere in the middle of my shower, I had decided that we should let Susan play with the mirror before I told Fred and Constance her story. It made more sense that way. Let her prove herself nuts without me doing or saying a thing. Maybe then we could get on to something that might help.
Nothing was mentioned about the mirror until after everyone was finished reading the paper and stuffing themselves on Fred’s incredibly good bacon, eggs, and home-baked bread. I swore three times I couldn’t eat another bite and then found myself, because of the smell of the bread or the taste of the bacon, taking more.
Somehow, I finally pulled myself away from the table and motioned for Fred that he should join me out on the front porch as I staggered for the front door.
The sun wasn’t yet above the mountain, leaving the porch buried in shadows and a sharp, cold bite in the air. It felt refreshing. I did a few quick stretches to try to loosen a dozen more sore muscles, then went over to the log rail and leaned on it. This morning the water looked blue-gray. My imagination still could not grasp the fact that there used to be a town sitting there. It was too much a picture postcard lake to have such a strange history.
Behind me, Fred pulled the front door closed. “Great breakfast,” I said. I tapped my stomach. If I survived this trip, I was going to be doing sit-ups for a month.
“Thanks,” he said. “You find out any more about our guest last night? I noticed you two were being a little cold to each other over breakfast. She turn your pass down?”
“Didn’t even give it a try. You know I like redheads. This one is too weird to make an exception.”
“That bad, huh? I have an uneasy feeling about her myself.”
“Totally crazy doesn’t come close. She now claims she’s from the future. Or something like that. It all sounded more like the ravings of an asylum escapee. I don’t know what to make of it.”
“You have got to be kidding.” Fred’s eyes were wide.
I shook my head. “Nope. She was dead serious. And she wants to try a few things with the mirror.”
Fred shook his head. “Not a chance this side of hell. Let’s get her on a horse and headed back up that trail.”
“Hang on. I was figuring we should let her play with it for a few minutes. Let her play out her fantasy and then send her packing.”
Fred laughed. “That does make more sense. But we can’t let her hurt it.”
“I doubt she would. She seems to think it’s incredibly important.”
“Hell, what more did she say? The bacon in my stomach is twisting with curiosity.”
I laughed. “Do me a favor and let me wait a little longer. I think you’ll end up with most of it as she plays with the mirror. Besides, if you and Constance are asking her questions we can twist her up in no time. No one could keep a story like hers straight for long. It was too off the wall.”
Fred nodded. “So we let her do what she wants with the mirror, within reason. We’ll both stay close to her, in case. She’s crazy enough to try anything.”
“You called it,” I said.
I took one more quick look down at the lake and then held the door open for Fred as we went back inside.
***
I told Susan that we had decided she was free to t
ry her experiments, as long as she didn’t damage the mirror. I took the mirror off the mantel and laid it glass up on the coffee table. Then I sat down on the couch beside the table so that I could easily reach the mirror.
“Thanks,” she said, and nodded at me as she leaned the pack against the overstuffed chair and sat down.
Fred came over and stood in front of the fireplace with its small daytime fire. When I looked up, he nodded at me and then at the rifle leaning beside the fireplace behind him. He was ready for anything. Smart man.
Constance and Steven sat down on the other couch.
“Exactly what is it you’re trying to do?” Fred asked.
Susan glanced at me.
“I haven’t told them a thing,” I said, and then smiled. She didn’t look happy.
She picked up the mirror, studied it for a moment, and then glanced up at Fred. “I’m trying to trigger this device and go where the ghost’s lover went.”
“And where might that be?” Fred asked. Fred was playing it a lot straighter than I could. He wasn’t even smiling.
Susan shrugged. “I’m not really sure. Any one of two dozen or so places.” Carefully, she rubbed her hand along the back of the mirror, then looked into the glass and laid the mirror on the table.
We all waited in silence.
Nothing.
“Damn,” she said. “There has to be some sequence of events that wouldn’t often occur naturally, but would occur with enough frequency to pull the required number of people.”
“You know where these places are?” I asked.
Susan nodded. “Of course.”
“Then why don’t you go directly there, instead of through the mirror? Would seem to make more sense.”
“We can’t. All the original locations are shielded from us. The only way in is through the original devices.”
“Are they all mirrors?”
“No,” she said. “But they are all glass of some sort or another. It’s the special glass that with a boost of power warps time and allows passage through it.”
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