Darkscope

by J. Carson Black

But his name would not come.

  She knew he was important to her. That knowledge was part of her flesh, part of her soul. She recognized him, yes, but not the way she recognized the woman. Her response was visceral, the blood humming in her veins like an electric wire during a storm. His features resonated in her memory, taut and full with meaning.

  Chelsea stared harder at the picture, as if it could give her the answer. But no answer came. Only the silence across the years, only the conviction that the man in the photograph was somehow important to her.

  The trail of fire ants fanned out across her back, hot and cold at the same time.

  Chelsea’s eyes wandered to the last photograph.

  This picture had been shot to finish the roll. Sunshine had been standing at the converging roads of the town’s entrance, her thumb out as if to hitch a ride. But in this photograph, instead of the curve of road into Bisbee and the overpass behind it, railroad tracks and buildings jumbled together to create a scene of unrest. Sacramento Hill loomed up behind, caved in at one side, as if something had taken a big bite out of it, much the same as it was now. But the Lavendar Pit behind the hill was gone. In its place were hills dotted with houses. A depot stood where Naco Road and OK Street met. Cars from the 1930s parked nose-in to the tracks. Dark smoke hung in air, as if a train had just passed through. The man and woman walked toward the camera, wearing the same happy expression of the previous photo. The man wore a double-breasted suit, a fedora, and carried a heavy overcoat. The girl’s hair was longer than in the other picture, pulled back from her face by barrettes. She wore a flowered dress, its simple lines accentuating her figure, and a red belt to match her shoes.

  Chelsea reviewed the photographs in her mind: the little girls on the horse, the children in front of the pharmacy and the Lyric Theatre steps . . . all of them had one thing in common. The main subject in every one of them was the girl—as a child, as a teenager, as a young woman. The dark- haired girl.

  Without thinking, Chelsea crossed to the cupboard above the stove, where she had put the box camera. She took it down, hefted its familiar weight, carried it over to the kitchen table, and held it as she sat. What must it have been like, back in the 1930s? Coming out of a terrible Depression on the brink of another World War? Did that man fight in the war? Did he survive to return to the woman he loved? Did they have children, grandchildren? Were they living now?

  Chelsea wanted to know. And she wanted to know now.

  The camera pulsed in her hand, its reptilian skin suffused with a malignant heat. Warm-blooded, she thought, as if it pumped blood instead of images. If anyone asked her, she wouldn’t be able to say why she was holding the camera that scared her so much.

  She stared at the photographs, her mind trying to find the wedge that might lift up one corner of that world for her to enter, for her to know . . . who were these people?

  Her hands gripped the camera.

  The quality of light in the room changed, became golden. The more Chelsea stared at the photographs, the more lightheaded she became, until at last she leaned back and closed her eyes, dizzy. When she opened them, the room had taken on a brown tint, yellowing at the edges like an old newspaper. She looked down at her hands. They, too, were tinged with the color of age. The camera gleamed in the autumnal light, its solid bulk warm on her lap. The photographs lay on the table like tarot cards, and their world seemed more real than Chelsea’s own.

  A voice sounded in her brain, a voice edged with excitement. (Almost there)

  What am I doing?

  (Almost . . .)

  A cylinder-topped refrigerator, oblong, tall, with curved black legs, merged with the stove. It shimmered for a moment like a mirage, then disappeared.

  (. . . there)

  I shouldn’t do this; I really shouldn’t.

  (Almost . . .)

  Chelsea’s fingers gripped the camera tighter.

  (. . . there)

  Outside, a neighbor started up an electric hedge clipper. The sun poured in along with the sound. Then the hedge clipper faded, and Chelsea heard the high whine of a car engine. She looked out the window in time to see a thirties-style car negotiating the hill. Sun winked off the metal strip dividing the front windshield. The car was big, solid, dark.

  I’m here! I’m really here!

  She had gone back in time.

  The cylinder-topped refrigerator returned. The sound of Benny Goodman’s clarinet floated out of an art deco radio on a drop-leaf table by the door. Milkmaids, cows, and chickens cavorted on white wallpaper. Ranked along the shelf by the door were canned goods with unfamiliar labels: Flako Pie Crust, Nunso Corn, Crescent Seasonings.

  Chelsea had been sitting at the kitchen table. She was still sitting, but instead of a straight-backed chair with a cushioned seat, she felt the unforgiving curve of a captain’s chair.

  Who lived here now? Was she an intruder in the home of a person living fifty years ago? Were the man and woman from the photographs out there somewhere, in Bisbee, going about their daily routines?

  At any moment she expected the real owner of the house to walk in, and then she’d have some explaining to do.

  The radio blared. “And now a word from our sponsor . . .”

  HELEN: Why, Mavis, I see you’ve taken up smoking.

  MAVIS: My doctor told me that smoking Rollos at mealtime helps my digestion. You see, Helen, smoking helps to increase the flow of digestive fluids, so I don’t have that logy feeling after eating.

  HELEN: Really? I’ve always smoked because it calms my nerves, but now I have another reason to smoke Rollos.

  Chelsea thought she should stand up, go to the door, walk out. Maybe she would find the man, maybe the dark-haired girl was even now walking across the yard. But Chelsea stayed where she was. Her body felt heavy, listless, and she was afraid that if she left the kitchen—if she moved at all—she might put herself in danger. Imagine walking along a street in the 1930s and then suddenly being thrown back into your own time, just at the instant you were crossing a busy intersection? And what if a car in the present happened to be speeding along at that exact moment? No. She would stay here. And observe.

  A sense of peace filled her. She liked the kitchen, liked its coziness, its safety. It recalled times she hadn’t known except through old movies—simpler times. Freshly baked bread cooled in tins on an old-fashioned stove. The radio told her that the sure way to a man’s heart was through Bako Biscuits, and mothers should feel guilty if they didn’t feed their children a certain brand of cereal, or wash them with a certain brand of soap, or cover them with a certain brand of blanket.

  Chelsea knew that Bisbee was very different now. She knew what the long-lost town of Lowell looked like, could picture US 80 (called the Borderland Route) wending through a heavily populated area now lost to the Lavendar Pit. She knew where to find the Cochise Motor Company, and Allen’s Home Supply; Double Dip Ice Cream, Wooten Gas and Electric, Holway’s Men’s Store. She knew what the shift whistle sounded like and could sing the Bisbee High School anthem from memory. She knew . . . as if she were looking through someone else’s eyes, remembering with someone else’s brain. It didn’t seem important to wonder whose eyes, whose brain.

  Time slipped by slowly, but the afternoon remained golden.

  Fourteen

  In the first decade of the new century, Brewery Gulch had been a heady mixture of bars, gambling parlors, and houses of ill repute. But as the big mining companies came to power, they’d taken a paternal interest in their workers. Knowing that a man with a stable home life was a better employment risk than a nomadic “bindle stiff,” the companies had planned to give miners an incentive to stay and raise their families in Bisbee. After Arizona had become a state in 1912, civic-minded citizens, backed by corporate money, had built churches and schools, started clubs, and organized activities that appealed to a more wholesome population. But the notorious red light district known as the Tenderloin, in mortal peril by 1910, still showed signs of life—if a
person knew where to look.

  Harry Bright was such a person. Now a shift boss at Calumet and Arizona, Harry had suffered numerous indignities to his body and spirit since his confrontation with Lucas McCord. His sickly wife had finally died, leaving him without a soul to complain to. He was in debt to two faro parlors on the Gulch. And he had been in several fights—the last one resulting in the loss of his upper lip, endowing him with a perpetually unpleasant grin. Now, no woman would take him unless he paid extra. That this sudden turn in Harry’s fortunes coincided with his dismissal from the McCord mines did nothing to sweeten his opinion of his usurper.

  After a night’s drinking at St. Elmo’s Bar, Harry pondered his situation out loud. That sniveling McCord kid wasn’t going to get away with it. Not as long as Harry Bright had breath in his body. The bartender, who had been trying to stay upwind of Harry’s breath all night, watched in dismay as the drunken shift boss reeled down the sidewalk after the bar closed. The man was looking for trouble.

  Lucas McCord arrived home late from the mine, as was his custom, and after a silent dinner, took his correspondence to bed.

  By the time Mary joined him, he was already asleep. She covered him, thinking as she did so how thin he looked. There had been a fevered brightness in his eyes lately; she knew he was disappointed in the mine and desperate to prove himself.

  Their own problems hadn’t been resolved. A civil, if strained, relationship had developed. Mary, by nature a procrastinator, was able to ignore most of their troubles. She directed her energies into furnishing the house, taking care of her husband the best she could, and making friends in the community. She was confident that when she had a child, Lucas’s indifference would be a thing of the past.

  Now, leaning over to kiss him, Mary turned off the lamp and fell asleep.

  Lucas was a light sleeper. Around two in the morning, a noise awakened him.

  The night was moonless and dark. Lucas crossed to the window. He saw nothing below, but decided to go down and investigate. Several people had warned him that Harry Bright was out for blood. He sat on the edge of the bed, pulled his pants on, and bent down to tie his shoes. An angry whine rocketed past his ear. The loud report echoed across the room in crashing fragments. A rifle shot!

  He lunged for the floor, sensing—not seeing—the burst of light from the window.

  Mary screamed, clutching the covers to her chest. With a loud scrape, the rifle in the window fell forward, hitting the bedroom floor with a clatter and setting off another discharge. Lucas thought: The stupid fool can’t even kill a man properly! He reached the window in two leaps. Below, the circular roof sloped down toward the ground. Lucas saw a dark shape scramble down the roof and jump to the grass, pelting down the street.

  Lucas raced down the stairs. By the time he reached the front yard, the man was gone. He searched the neighborhood for an hour, then drove into town to report the attempted murder.

  The next day the sheriff and two deputies showed up at Harry Bright’s house on Quality Hill, only to find it empty. Harry Bright was gone.

  The sharp knock jarred Chelsea back into the present.

  The wallpaper vanished, replaced by white enamel. Silence blotted out the radio in the middle of Amos and Andy. Outside, the sky had paled to the shade of turquoise, and the shadows in the room were deep and gloomy.

  The knock sounded again. Chelsea stood, her legs weak.

  Still disoriented, she glanced at her watch. Five o’clock! She’d been sitting in this room for four-and-a-half hours!

  Chelsea tried to pull her mind back into the present, but kept slipping back to that other room, the kitchen of the thirties.

  “Anybody home?” The voice was male, familiar.

  Chelsea walked to the back door.

  Ben Fletcher stood on the porch.

  Comprehension slapped her like cold air after a bath.

  His eyes. She hadn’t really noticed them before, but now, in her state of heightened awareness, they danced before her like blue flames. Light blue, feral, like the eyes of a husky, Ben Fletcher’s eyes contrasted with his tanned, lean face and dark hair. If someone had asked her to describe him before this moment, she wouldn’t have been able to. But suddenly the force of his presence hit her like a brick.

  “Sorry to bother you,” he said. “But I have something of yours.” He produced the photograph and leaned against the doorjamb, his gaze never leaving her face. Chelsea stared down at the picture. The last of the eight. The last of the set. The dark-haired woman, standing in front of the Muheim Brewery Building, hand on the shiny fender of an Auburn Phaeton automobile.

  A memory of something unpleasant stirred in the far reaches of Chelsea’s consciousness; a shadow suspended from the Brewery entrance, black, bulky . . . dead. And then it was gone.

  A nearby cricket sounded like a creaking rocking chair. Cool night air rushed in through the screen. Chelsea looked back at Ben, thinking he was perhaps the most attractive man she had ever seen. How could she not have noticed before?

  “Aren’t you going to let me in?” he asked.

  Chelsea hesitated, then stood back to let him pass. “Thank you for bringing the picture. You didn’t have to.”

  “No problem. Can I see the others?”

  Chelsea followed him inside. He seemed to know where he was going. “They’re in the kitchen.” She trailed behind him. Chelsea was a good height, five seven, but Ben Fletcher completely dwarfed her. It wasn’t that he was so much taller—he might be six one—but rather the way he seemed to fill a space with his presence. Chelsea was reminded of the acting class she’d taken in San Diego. The instructor had told the class to “make themselves bigger” and “take the stage.”

  At last she knew what the instructor had meant.

  Ben paused in the kitchen doorway to scrutinize her. “I don’t see the resemblance.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Is she your mother?” He gestured to the photograph in Chelsea’s hand.

  “Oh. No.”

  “I’m curious. How did you color it?”

  “What?” Chelsea was completely in the dark now.

  “Are the other ones colored, too?”

  “Forgive me if I appear dense,” Chelsea said, “but what are you talking about?” “The photographs,” Ben replied impatiently. “How did you do it?”

  “I don’t have the vaguest idea what you’re talking about.”

  “I take it you don’t know that this snapshot should be in black and white. They didn’t make color film in those days.”

  Chelsea realized that she had been bothered by the color in the photographs, too. The pictures had just looked . . . wrong.

  At that moment someone rapped on the door again. “Excuse me,” said Chelsea, brushing past Ben to reach the porch.

  A man from Lopez Appliance Repair asked, “Are you Chelsea McCord?” She nodded and let him in,

  “Let’s see what we have here.” The repairman approached the washing machine and set down his toolbox.

  Ben stood by the table, looking through the photographs. He seemed oblivious to Chelsea and the repairman.

  “Have to move the machine away from the wall so I can get in the back,” the man said.

  Chelsea helped him push the washing machine away from the wall. Still absorbed with the pictures, Ben didn’t make a move to help.

  Chelsea shot him a murderous glance. Her mood didn’t improve when the repairman addressed Ben. “You’ve got a bad contact on the first rinse cycle,” said. “Nothing major, but it’s gonna be hard to get to.”

  “Go ahead and fix it,” Ben said absently, holding one photograph up to the light.

  Who the hell did he think he was?

  “It’s getting late,” Chelsea said pointedly. “How long do you think this will take?”

  “About an hour maybe,” the repairman said.

  Chelsea looked from one man to the other. She should kick Ben out. It had been a long day, and she was beginning to get s
leepy. The thought of curling up in bed was almost overpowering. But Chelsea had the feeling Ben would give her a hard time about leaving, and she didn’t want a scene. Might as well test the water. Yawning, she said, “Boy, am I sleepy.” Ben didn’t take the hint.

  “Well, I’ll leave you two experts to it.” Her voice heavy with sarcasm, Chelsea walked past Ben into the living room. He didn’t even look up.

  She sat on the couch. What a boor. He didn’t even have the good sense to know when he wasn’t wanted.

  Funny how the repairman had assumed Ben was in charge. What a pair of chauvinist pigs. They were probably trading farmer’s daughter jokes right now.

  In another minute I’m going right back in there and tell him to leave and to hell with what the repairman thinks. It was her last conscious thought.

  Two men, looking just like the Blues Brothers, were trying to strap her arms into a straitjacket. Panicked, Chelsea got one arm loose, grabbed a hold of her attacker’s hair, and pulled as hard as she could.

  “Hey! That hurts!”

  Chelsea found herself looking into Ben Fletcher’s eyes, which were watering. She was home on her couch, and Ben was sitting beside her.

  “You had a dream,” Ben said.

  “What—”

  “The washing machine is fixed. It’s seven o’clock at night, and you just had one hell of a dream. And if I go bald, I can blame you.”

  Chelsea sat up, shaking. “I’m sorry I hurt you. It was so terrible.”

  “I know. You kept saying you weren’t crazy. Are you?”

  “What?”

  “Crazy?”

  Pulled up from the depths of a frightening dream, Chelsea’s defenses were down. “I don’t know.”

  Ben’s brow furrowed. “You don’t know?”

  “Yes . . . I mean, no. No.”

  “You said ‘the photographs are real’ three or four times. Do you mean these photographs?” He motioned to the snapshots on the sofa table.

  What could Chelsea say? I have this magic camera, and when you take pictures in the present they come back developed as pictures of the past. Not only that, but I’ve been back in the 1930s all afternoon, and to tell you the truth, it was kind of fun. I didn’t even want to leave. Yeah. That would go over big. She sighed. “It was just a dream.”