The Spirit Photographer

by Jon Michael Varese

  No, she was not seeing clearly.

  She pressed her fingers into her eyes, and then examined the letters again.

  VJG

  V-J-G. Those were not William’s initials. Someone had been in her bedroom. Someone had exchanged the rattle.

  Or had someone simply altered it? The rattle was almost twenty years old. Who could have found the same kind of rattle, and used it to replace her William’s?

  She looked at it once more. The rattle glistened back at her. Had someone scratched out one of the W’s lines? Where were the signs of the crime? The silver was smooth. The silver was perfect.

  Could the girl have come back into the house?

  No, Elizabeth thought. It was that impudent Jenny. This time she had gone too far.

  Elizabeth screamed and Jenny rushed into the bedroom. It was the first time that Jenny would see the rattle out in the open.

  “Ma’am!” Jenny exclaimed. “No … no!”

  Elizabeth was pacing now, the rattle in her hand. Her eyes were reddened, and she glared at Jenny. She could not restrain her hatred.

  “You wicked creature,” she said. “After all that we’ve done for you. After all that James has done for you. How could you be so cruel?”

  “Ma’am, no …” Jenny fumbled, approaching her mistress with caution.

  “Explain this to me right now, you wicked, wicked creature!”

  And she thrust the rattle before Jenny’s eyes.

  “Master William,” Jenny whispered.

  “Yes, that’s right,” Elizabeth said.

  And then she cried out: “William!”

  Jenny touched the shaking hand, her coarse fingers brushing Elizabeth’s sleeve.

  “Explain it,” Elizabeth said. “I demand that you tell me what this means. Tell me what you mean by meddling with my William’s rattle, or I swear, Jenny … I swear by God—”

  “Ma’am … Master William’s rattle … you ordered it out of the house all those years ago. I took those things out of the house myself.”

  “The letters, you brazen woman. Look at these letters!”

  And she forced the thing into Jenny’s hands.

  Jenny studied it.

  “I’m not sure what it is you want me to see,” Jenny said.

  Now she was really playing tricks. This thankless woman whom they had saved. She was old and growing more useless. And in recent years her sight had begun to go. In the old days, she wouldn’t have fetched two hundred dollars.

  Elizabeth snatched the rattle from Jenny, and collapsed upon the bedroom floor. She wanted to continue this fight—to slap Jenny as she had once before—but the floor had pulled her down, and she could no longer wage this battle. The rattle had sounded when she fell … a tiny tinkling that mocked her muffled cries. She could not see anything beyond the rattle now. The rattle was only a light.

  Jenny kneeled down next to Elizabeth, and took the shining object from her hands.

  Jenny understood. She knew what it meant to lose.

  “It’s alright, ma’am,” she said. “Everything will be alright.”

  XXII

  WHEN JOSEPH AWOKE on deck the next morning, the boat was approaching that twisted place in the river that joined the deformed fingers of three separate states. Even there the river was wide—about a half a mile in breadth—and because of the many bends the boat faced great challenges. On one side of the river, green forests covered elevated banks, and on the other, yellow sand shelves extended out into the water. Sometimes the sand was on the right, and sometimes on the left—always stretching out from one side, but never from both sides at once. The river had stolen from Kentucky what it gave to Missouri, then robbed Missouri to pay back Kentucky for what it had taken. Year after year it had been forming and destroying plantations … tearing away, without remorse, the land that it had so suddenly built up.

  The boat pressed on through that second day, nearing Memphis by sundown that evening. At every stop along the way, no wharves greeted the steamer, but the empty riverbanks alone, which demanded skilled maneuvering. Near Memphis, the plantations practically stooped down to touch the river, their landings little more than tree clearings where groups of freedmen and mules stood waiting. Planters exited the boat at nearly every makeshift landing, and though a few continued to board, the crowd thinned considerably after Tennessee. The same held true for the deck passengers, who carried away their life’s possessions as they made their way off the boat. Bedding and washbasins, cold chests and spinning wheels, hen-coops and kettles were all part of the parade. North of Vicksburg, a group of sixty workers took leave of the steamer in unison, their destination one of the many plantations still in ruins on the banks of the river.

  It was not until late in the evening of that second night that Joseph spied Moody again, creeping down one of the staircases.

  Joseph leapt up, and stepped over a sleeping body.

  “Edward,” he whispered. “Are you out of your mind?”

  And he moved forward, grabbing ahold of Moody’s arm, and forcing him into the shadows.

  “I told you that you can’t be seen down here. We still have nearly two days—”

  “We may be in even more danger,” Moody insisted. “Something has happened. Something—”

  Moody spoke deliberately, but with a slight tremble.

  “What is it?” Joseph said.

  “It’s the negative,” Moody answered. “Something is happening to her.”

  The small leather case was in his hands now, and he was opening it, and removing the negative.

  “You must see the thing with your own eyes,” Moody said.

  And he looked at it, but did not offer it to Joseph.

  Joseph reached for the glass, but Moody held it firm. Moody was not letting go of the negative.

  “I cannot see,” Joseph said, tugging.

  But Moody tightened his own grip.

  “Edward—” Joseph said.

  And Moody at last released the glass.

  Joseph tilted the negative and the varnish shined silver. In the moonlight, the negative became a mirror. On the surface there was Isabelle, in all her stunning beauty—and there, too, the Garretts, half-occluded by their stains.

  Then he noticed it.

  Was it—? No, it couldn’t be. He had varnished the negative immediately—right after he had led Moody out of the dark room.

  Joseph peered into the negative, tilting it again in the moonlight.

  “I see it,” Joseph said.

  “And you are certain you varnished the negative?” Moody said.

  “The varnish is plainly there.”

  The two men looked at each other in the darkness. Was she leaving them again? Were they both driving her away?

  “What does it mean?” Moody demanded.

  But Joseph did not answer. He could not bring himself to admit what he was seeing. There were of course chemical reactions—mistakes—that could cause such things, but he had been so careful during every step of the preparation.

  “I don’t know what it means. It’s strange—that this would happen as we draw—”

  And then it hit him all at once, like a downpour.

  He looked at her. He could see but her silver remnants in the shadows. She was receding as they drew closer. Joseph now understood what she wanted.

  “We are on the right path to finding her,” Joseph said. “She has returned so that we might find her. And when we find her—”

  He paused, calmly handing the negative back to Moody.

  There was no need to explain. When they found her she would be gone.

  XXIII

  FOR TWO MORE days the Sotto Voce sailed through rising mists, as the riverbanks continued to crumble. The river had made a practice of breaching the neglected levees, and in many places had swept them entirely away. It had flooded whole plantations, and carried boats and rafts inland. Where it had generously retreated, roads of debris marked its path.

  While the ruin was constant, the
landscape began to change just north of Louisiana. Moody watched from the promenade deck as the trees grew their beards—“Spanish moss,” one passenger explained. The clumps of hairy strands, which became ever more widespread as the boat traveled south, accentuated the riverbank’s already somber and dismal character. In New England, memories were locked behind brick walls and heavy doors. Here, the trees seemed to weep with them.

  At Natchez, Mr. Pemberton at last disembarked.

  “It has been a great pleasure, Mr. Moody, a great pleasure,” he said. “If only we had been able to dine together more often. Do you eat, Mr. Moody? I must say, I tried my best to find you at dinner, but never with success. And as you can see, I’m a man who doesn’t wait to do his eating.”

  “I have been—” Moody began, but then thought the better of it. “I have been overcome with spiritual messages on this journey, and have needed to keep to my room.”

  Pemberton nodded ferociously.

  “Of course, Mr. Moody, of course. A great man like you—”

  But Moody held up his hand.

  “Good day to you, Mr. Pemberton.”

  “Good day to you, Mr. Moody.”

  And then bending forward, as if to whisper a secret, he said:

  “And worry you not, sir. I’ve told no one of your passage. There was a gentleman at dinner one night who had never heard of the spirit photographs. I told him my story—of my Anabelle—referencing the empty chair that I had saved for you. This man was astonished—man by the name of Wells, Mr. Moody, in case you should ever need to know—this man was astonished, and talked of going to Boston to meet you. And I said to him, I says, ‘You never know where the spirit photographer is likely to appear,’ and I give a nod to your chair as if you might be expected. But I said not a word more than that, Mr. Moody, and the gentlemen present were none the wiser.”

  “I thank you for your discretion,” Moody said.

  “I am only at your service.”

  And with that, Pemberton joined the mass of planters and freedmen who were pouring out onto the land.

  THE BOAT SAILED, and on the final day of its journey, the landscape changed once again. The dense forests that lined the river, and the surviving cotton fields that competed with them, gave way to acres of sugarcane in that last coiled stretch after Baton Rouge. The cypress trees still towered from their strongholds in the water, but the cane fields dominated the flat open spaces that lay beyond the river’s edges. The sugarcane swayed, its sharp tips pricking the sky. An endless green ocean bound the river’s muddy waters.

  This was the land that Joseph had left behind—the plants and soil that he still smelled in his dreams. The last time he had seen these fields he had been traveling with the man who had saved him. Together they had stood on the deck of a steamship, watching the land go by. The sun had been setting on that day, too … setting over the sugarcane fields and tree-lined edges of the horizon.

  The boat rammed into the levee at New Orleans a bit farther upriver than the central landing at Jackson Square. Here, as in St. Louis, the packed earth sloped down toward the water, and small cities of cotton bales awaited departure, by river or by land. The levee was a fury of activity—mules, horses, carriages, and working men all moving in opposite directions. From a distance the cathedral’s steeple seemed to be glowering down at all the commotion, but its opinion—and certainly its dignity—was overshadowed by the countless feathered smoke stacks of the steamboats.

  Even as the light was fading, the commerce of the levee showed little signs of slowing. And this was fortunate for Joseph and Moody, who reunited and then blended into the crowd. They made their way through the mules and the cotton bales to Levee Street, the thoroughfare that rimmed the old French Quarter. Crossing over it, they entered into a city ablaze with life … a place of so much color that no picture could ever have captured it.

  Joseph had returned, and the smell was much the same—hot brick and dry dust and pipe smoke and horse urine. But the balconies and concealed gardens of those houses closest to the river released the aromas of their tropical inhabitants, in defiance of the city’s ranker smells. There was the fragrance of sweet olive, the scent of oleander and jasmine, the damp smell of banana trees, their six-foot leaves drooping toward the ground. Oranges protruded from decorative iron railings, and white roses climbed upon trellises and verandas. Where the old Spanish buildings had left room for larger things to grow, moss-draped oaks shaded the courtyards and the streets.

  Because a number of steamboats had released passengers at once, the crowds piling into the streets of New Orleans were unusually dense. In that crowd, Joseph noticed, every class and color of person was represented—white planters, black workers, white workers, and well-dressed freedmen. Creole mistresses, Creole servants, and mulattoes, old and young. The shop windows displayed signs in French and English. Everywhere around him, there was the clattering of both tongues.

  Joseph bumped into an old dark-skinned woman, dressed in vibrant silks.

  “Faites attention!” she scolded.

  “Excusez-moi, madame,” Joseph said.

  And the woman moved on.

  “You know the language,” Moody said.

  “I—” Joseph offered. “Well—it has been many years.”

  The two men continued moving with the steady stream of people, but once they had crossed over Chartres Street, Joseph slowed his pace.

  “Joseph?” Moody said.

  But Joseph did not respond. He was staring at an enormous building whose elaborate façade shadowed the street. He was inside of it again now—the old St. Louis Hotel—with its massive, echoing rotunda. He would be part of one of the sales, because old man Winter had gone and died. The sales took place here every afternoon—from twelve to three.

  From the oculus in the ceiling, the sun cast circular sprays of light, illuminating the alcoves where the auctioneers announced their goods. In one bay a man sold paintings; in another, goats and mules. Still other auction blocks sold deeds to estates … bales of surplus cotton, and barrels of spirits. The beauty of the room had been commented upon by all of the visiting journalists back then, for the Creoles had spared no expense in the building of this modern palace. Strangely, they had chosen to decorate it with depictions of eminent Americans—busts and frescoes of Washington and Jefferson, and other revolutionary heroes who had led the cause for freedom.

  Two men approached the auction block where Joseph and the others sat waiting. One eyed Joseph, and said something to the auctioneer. After more conversation, they led him behind a screen.

  “You speak English, boy?” one of them said.

  Joseph nodded.

  They then ordered him to remove his shirt.

  “A few marks,” one of them said. “Not ideal, but a very good sign.”

  The men then exchanged some words with the auctioneer. Joseph understood what was next. One of the men tapped his riding crop below Joseph’s navel. Joseph released his waist string, letting his pants fall to the floor.

  And then, the most unimaginable thing happened. They did not examine his thigh muscles. Nor did they inspect his calves. They did not feel his naked hips for robustness, nor move around in back of him to assess the rear flanks and the buttocks.

  The men stood before Joseph, looking down at his body.

  And then they laughed.

  “A lot of good in this one,” the auctioneer said.

  “He’ll do,” one of the men said. “Do you know the age?”

  “Twenty-two or twenty-three,” the auctioneer replied. “Certainly no older than twenty-five.”

  Back out in the rotunda, one of the fancy girls stood upon the block. She had been dressed for sale in luxurious greens and golds. Gold earrings had been attached to her ears.

  “Now gentlemen,” the auctioneer boomed, “who will show interest in this lovely light beauty. As you can see she is smooth of skin, supple of form… and marvelously full-chested. A young, light-skinned beauty …”

  Th
ere was a row of women waiting. It would be some time before the auctioneer came around to Joseph.

  The men had laughed, and Joseph had not known what it had meant. Laughter was not usually part of this scene. There had been no laughter for him since the death of Mr. Winter … kind old Winter, whose daughter had sent Joseph away. She had always been afraid of him, since the day he had arrived. He had never given her any reason to fear him. She had feared him for the sake of being afraid.

  And here he was now. His turn was coming up. The men had laughed at him, and he did not understand.

  The woman on the auction block was holding back her cries. A young assistant, ebony-skinned, held up one of her arms for better viewing.

  Then a crash sounded from somewhere within the rotunda. A dropped mirror? One of the windows? The splintering echoed throughout the chamber.

  But Joseph was in the street again now. He was back in the street with—

  Moody was grasping his arm. The levee crowd’s steady progression had degenerated into disorder. In front of the hotel, all traffic had stopped. A small wagon full of windowpanes had hit a curb and toppled over.

  “We must move,” Moody said, trying to pull Joseph aside.

  But Joseph remained transfixed on the building. The hotel had taken its hold.

  All around Joseph the crowd swayed and roared, for the accident had caused a great disturbance. The wagon was blocking St. Louis Street as well as the entrance to the hotel. Boots and shoes were trampling through the debris. On one corner, an old black woman was selling paper-wrapped pralines, and laughing.

  Moody moved Joseph away from the commotion—into an alleyway, across from the hotel. It was an airless, narrow passage, barely wide enough for a carriage. Many of its storefronts had been abandoned, and dirty rags hung in its windows. Joseph knew this place too—it was the old Passage de la Bourse, where merchants had exchanged all manner of property in the old days.

  They had marched him through that alley that same morning, before the auction. There were others there—for sale. The bidding took place out in the open.

  Joseph stopped. The air in the alleyway was stifling.