When The Spirit Moves You

by Thomas DePrima

  The party lasted until almost three a.m., although many of the guests who were not staying at the house had left by then. As Jeremy walked Amelia to the room she was sharing with Martha, Amelia longed to pull him into a private place so they could embrace and do a little passionate necking, but she reminded herself of when she was and only allowed him one brief kiss in the hallway after they had reached her door.

  * * *

  Sunday morning and early afternoon was spent visiting with seldom-seen relatives and friends who had traveled a long distance for the party. By late afternoon, most of the guests to the estate had gone, and it was time for Amelia, her parents, and Martha to leave for home on the last train of the day. Elizabeth and Roberta, who had to travel much farther, had taken earlier trains, as had most everyone else.

  Jeremy accompanied the Turners and Martha to the train station and would wait with them until the black, coal-burning behemoth spewing billowing steam and ash chugged out of the station on its way to Hartford and points north. Since Amelia and Jeremy were now officially betrothed, her parents allowed them a little privacy, although they would never be out of sight as they sat together on a bench near the end of the platform. Martha remained with Amelia's parents.

  "Happy, darling?" Jeremy asked as they sat down.

  "I've never been happier? You?"

  "Yes, I'm happy, but also a little sad. I won't see you again for weeks. I miss you already."

  "I know that feeling. I've felt it every time we've parted since we first met."

  "Even when you were angry with me for kissing you?" Jeremy asked.

  "Especially then. I cried myself to sleep the next night because I thought that we'd never be together again."

  "Really?"

  "Really."

  "I didn't realize how angry you were the first night, but I didn't sleep a wink the next."

  "I thought that you didn't respect me," Amelia said.

  "Oh dearest, nothing could be further from the truth. I was just so captivated by your charms that I failed to contain myself. "

  "I know that now."

  After a few seconds of awkward silence, Amelia said, "I half expected Margaret Stemple to show up this weekend and attempt to do what she threatened to do during Anne's party."

  "She did," Jeremy said.

  "What?! She came to the house?"

  "Remember when I was called away just before the dance started? Margaret was outside, demanding to be admitted."

  "What happened?"

  "When I arrived outside she was screaming at the servants that she was my wife and that she was going to fire every one of them if they didn't get out of her way. They had been warned that she might show up and were told to dismiss her outrageous rants. As soon as she saw me she ordered me to clear the servants from her path."

  "And?"

  "I told them to ignore her assertions and threats, and to escort her to the front gate and see that she left the grounds. I told them that they had my permission to remove her physically if that's what it required, and that she was not to get onto the grounds again under any circumstances. Then I turned around and came back into the house. I had a quick brandy in the front parlor and then returned to your side."

  Amelia was quiet for a few seconds before asking, "Do you think she'll try to get into the wedding as well?"

  "I wouldn't be at all surprised, but the regular staff knows what she looks like and they'll stop her."

  "I hope so."

  "Don't worry, darling. I won't let her spoil our special day."

  "That sounds a bit like what my father said after I received her threatening note. I'm beginning to believe that she won't stop of her own accord."

  "People are already beginning to talk. If she persists with this foolish behavior, it will cause her family great embarrassment. I find it difficult to believe that her father hasn't taken action to stop her." Trying to change the subject, Jeremy said, "I've been thinking a lot about what we discussed at length in the garden."

  "About my past life?" Amelia asked cautiously.

  "Yes. I want to believe your story, but it's so hard."

  "I know, my love. I realize how crazy it sounds. I promise never to hold your skepticism against you."

  "You said that the spirit that brought you here was that of my father?"

  "While we were in the foyer, trapped by the spirit, the luminous shape that approached us appeared to assume the image of your father. As we emerged in this period, your father happened to occupy that same space in front of me, further enhancing the impression that your father's ghost had brought us here. And I can't think of another reason why a spirit would want to pull us back through time, other then to save Anne. The other spirits have told us that such a task would require an enormous amount of energy, and I can't imagine spirits completely draining themselves on a whim."

  "Other spirits?"

  "Uh, oh, I guess I didn't tell you about that."

  "No, you made no mention of other spirits."

  "Well, it was only the spirits of Martha, Elizabeth, and Amelia. We contacted them when we were trying to return to our own time. They told us that it was impossible."

  "You contacted spirits? You actually spoke to them— and they replied?"

  "Yes, we held another séance, but we were more successful the second time with making contact. We reached the spirit of Martha Fuller first. We thought, after speaking with her, that we were here forever, but then later on I thought that we might be returned to our original time because of the paradox, so we called Elizabeth, and then Amelia."

  "Paradox?"

  "Yes. You see, if Anne was happily married, there would be no need for your father's spirit to haunt the house, or to pull us back here. He would simply move on to the immortal world to enjoy his everlasting life with loved ones as soon as he passes on. If he isn't there to pull us back, then we could never be here in the first place, and the time line would revert to the original course."

  "This is very confusing."

  "Yes, dearest, that's why it's called a paradox. I feared that when the timeline snapped back to its original course, we would simply awaken back in the future. I was frightened that I'd lose my opportunity to remain here with you."

  "Could that still happen?"

  "Anything is possible, my love, but I pray with all my heart that it doesn't."

  "Doesn't prayer conflict with what you believe about spirits?" Jeremy asked.

  "Not at all. Prayer is simply a form of communicating with God and those that have passed on before us. I consider the immortal world to be heaven. All the souls of the departed who have led decent lives go there, and you are reunited with those you love when you cross over. We've learned from those we've contacted that you take the love you have in your heart with you. They were delighted to learn that we had been placed in their bodies and that their loved ones wouldn't feel grief over the mortal deaths of their children. I'm sure that God is there also, somewhere."

  "Is this going to be an ongoing thing?"

  "What, dearest?"

  "This communing with spirits?"

  "The spirit of Martha Fuller said that my connection to the immortal world is very strong, but the spirits haven't been very helpful. I don't know if they don't have the answers, or are just unwilling to divulge the information."

  "I believe that many people would tend to be suspicious of someone who professes to commune with spirits. I'm quite sure the church would oppose it. Although they encourage you to talk with God and the Saints, they don't expect you to receive verbal replies and carry on conversations. All things considered, it might be best if you don't hold any more séances, lest someone learn of them."

  "I suppose you're right."

  "Then I have your promise that you won't do it again?"

  "Yes, dear."

  "Good; I think that's best. Tell me about the future. What's it like?"

  "It's both wonderful and dreadful. To paraphrase Charles Dickens in his Tale of Two Cities, it i
s the best of times, it is the worst of times, it is the age of wisdom, it is the age of foolishness, and so forth, and so on. We put a man on the moon in 1969, and recently we've had little automated machines called robots rolling around on the planet Mars, sending back images. But still we can't avoid war. There's always some fool who covets his neighbor's land or natural resources, or is simply hungry for more power. And far too many people continue to use their religion as an excuse to kill other human beings with dissimilar beliefs."

  "We put a man on the moon? The moon in the nighttime sky?"

  Amelia smiled. "Yes. Of course that happened a long time before I was born, but my parents have told me about watching it on television."

  "Television?"

  Amelia looked intently at Jeremy, trying to determine how to explain television to someone who has never seen a motion picture or heard a radio. "It's a device for the house, sort of like a large box on which you can see images sent out on wireless radio frequencies. It's like a telegraph without wires, but instead of a simple Morse code, elaborately complex codes with massive amounts of data are used to form images inside the device."

  "Images are formed inside the box?"

  "I know it's difficult to imagine, but in the next five years or so, a man named Thomas Alva Edison is going to invent the motion picture."

  "Tom Edison? Is that the same fellow who just installed electric lights in part of New York City last year?"

  "Uh, yes, I believe so. I couldn't remember exactly when he did that. Yes, it's the same man. I think he invents the record player next, and then the motion picture."

  "Record player?"

  "Uh, a phonograph. It's a device that allows people to capture their voice and replay it whenever they wish. Originally, they'll use tin foil, but it wears out too quickly and offers limited recording time. The next advance comes when Edison develops wax cylinders for recording voices and music. Later a flat disc made of vinyl, called a record, will play music on a Gramophone. I think that's invented by an inventor named Berliner."

  "I've heard of the phonograph. Edison developed that as a dictating machine for use in business offices. But what's vinyl?"

  "It's like plastic."

  "Plastic?"

  "Um, I don't know how to describe plastic. It's like hardened tar that comes in various colors. And it doesn't leave a mess when you touch it. You can mold it almost any shape."

  "Tell me more about the motion picture?"

  "Cameras take a number of still images, which when viewed very quickly appear to be moving."

  "Like a Praxinoscope or Zoopraxiscope?"

  "I don't know what they are."

  "They're moving-image devices. The Praxinoscope uses mirrors to project images printed on a short strip of paper. The Zoopraxiscope is used by a man named Muybridge in his lectures. He took twelve pictures of a trotting horse to prove that the horse does in fact have all four hoofs off the ground at times. As the Zoopraxiscope disc rotates, it shows the event as it occurred. "

  "They sound like early versions of the motion picture system. When the system is refined in a few years, many thousands of images will be sequentially projected onto a huge white screen up at the front of a theatre. To the audience, the replayed images will appear as lifelike, at least to the extent that a two-dimensional representation can seem lifelike, as the scenes appeared to the people who filmed them. Television won't be available until the 1930's."

  "This is all so fantastic. You really believe you've seen these things?"

  "Jeremy, I've been completely honest with you. I know that you find it difficult to believe my incredible story, but it's all true. I swear that to you. Look, I've just told you about the motion picture, right?"

  "Yes."

  "Have you ever heard of it before?"

  "I've heard of the Magic Lantern. That device shows projected images, although they don't move. And then there's the Praxinoscope and Zoopraxiscope."

  "Yes, I guess that all these things were part of the evolutionary progression to the motion picture. Well, in five years you'll know if I've been truthful."

  "Five years? Why can't you just tell me something that's going to happen sooner?"

  "I don't remember anything significant happening in the next— wait a minute, I do remember something. In December of 2004 a major earthquake occurred, will occur, in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Sumatra. The resulting tsunami will kill almost a quarter of a million people when waves as high a hundred feet devastate the shores of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, South India, and other countries. It was discussed in a documentary about tsunamis on television a couple of months before we came here."

  "Tsunami?"

  "It's a Japanese term, I think. It refers to a seismically generated tidal wave. Anyway, in the same documentary they talked about an island named Krakatoa, near Sumatra, where a volcano exploded, or will explode, on August 26th, 1883. Two thirds of the island will be blown away, and the resulting 120 foot high tsunami will kill an estimated 36,000 people."

  "This will happen next week?" Jeremy asked incredulously.

  "Well, in five or six days. I always get confused when we have to take the International Date Line into consideration, but it's the afternoon of August 26th on Krakatoa when the island explodes. I only remember the date because my older sister was, will be, born on August 26th of 1983. I remember thinking that Krakatoa was exactly one hundred years earlier."

  "You seem so sure of all your facts. If I listen long enough, you'll have me convinced it's true."

  Amelia smiled. "I'm sure of the facts because I was born long after it occurred. For me, it's ancient history. If this latest information doesn't convince you, you'll have to wait five years for Mr. Edison because I can't think of anything else of great importance that happens before then."

  "As long as I have you, I can wait five years, or ten, or a hundred."

  The sounds of a chugging steam locomotive pulled their attention back to their reason for being at the station. Amelia noticed that her parents were standing now, looking in their direction.

  "It's time for me to go, my love," Amelia said. "The days will be unbearable until I'm with you again."

  "I'll see you in four weeks, as promised," he said.

  Although betrothed, Jeremy dared not kiss her on the lips in public, so raising her hands to his face, he kissed them. They stood facing one another, staring into each other's eyes, until her parents called out to her that it was time to board the train. There was no mistaking the passion evident in the eyes of both, but the fires of desire would have to be held in check for now.

  * * *

  Once back in Hartford, Amelia and her mother, with Martha assisting, busied themselves with every detail of the wedding. The design of the wedding dress and bridesmaids' dresses was the first detail to be worked out because the dresses would require the most time to prepare. They visited dozens of seamstresses over the next several weeks, collecting opinions of how fashion might change by the following spring, and after working out the design for the gowns, they selected a seamstress to prepare them.

  With that most important detail resolved, work began on the myriad of other details that needed to be addressed for the wedding, everything from the design of the invitations to the genus of the flowers used to decorate the mansion on the special day.

  Amelia was seated in the dining room working on the guest list on September 9th when Michelle, who functioned as both upstairs and downstairs maid, informed her that Mister Jeremy Westfield was in the foyer. Practically jumping up from her chair, she hurried to the foyer, stopping a few feet short of him when she saw the strange look on his face.

  "You're a week early," she said apprehensively.

  "I know. I couldn't stay away. It's happened."

  "What's happened?"

  "Krakatoa."

  "Oh," Amelia said, looking relieved. "Yes, of course it has, dear."

  "You really knew about it before hand."

  "Yes, dear."

&n
bsp; "According to the latest reports, it happened just as you said. Two thirds of the volcanic island is gone, and tens of thousands of people are missing and presumed lost from the tidal waves that swept the shores of land masses facing the island."

  "Yes, it was a terrible tragedy. And volcanic dust from the explosion will pollute the Earth's atmosphere for years to come."

  "We should have done something; warned somebody."

  "And told them what exactly, that your fiancée has come from the future to warn people about terrible events that are about to occur? Do you really think that anyone would have listened? Reflect on your own skepticism, and remember that you at least cared enough for me to listen to my 'outrageous ranting.' Besides, if we had managed to get people to listen, and take action, it could have serious consequences on the future. It could even alter things enough that I'm never born. No, we have to keep these things to ourselves. I don't understand why the first paradox didn't develop, but I don't want to risk any others; not now."

  Jeremy nodded and stepped closer to her. "Yes, you're right, no one would have listened. And I too don't wish to risk a paradox that would cause me to lose you, or prevent you from ever coming here in the first place. I can't imagine a life without you in it."

  As an engaged couple, in the privacy of the house, they were permitted to kiss, and they took full advantage of the privilege now as Jeremy closed the remaining distance to Amelia and took her in his arms. It's difficult to imagine who was more eager, but it was up to Jeremy to take the lead.

  A polite clearing of the throat a few minutes later, alerted them to the presence of Amelia's mother in the foyer.

  "Why Jeremy," she said, "we had not thought to see you for another week."

  Releasing Amelia, and taking a small step back as both took a deep breath, he said, "I couldn't remain away any longer, Mrs. Turner. I had to see Amelia again."

  She smiled knowingly and said, "Yes, of course. The time between engagement and the wedding ceremony can seem like an eternity. You'll be staying for lunch, of course, won't you?"