The Seer of Shadows

by Avi

  “They won’t think me a sneak thief, will they?”

  He grinned. “Are you?”

  “No!”

  “Well, then . . .”

  I spent a restless night, tense about the fraud we were about to put into effect. What if I were discovered? What if I did poorly? I kept thinking, too, about Mrs. Von Macht. With the painted image of that angelic girl in my mind, I tried to understand how the sorrowful mother must feel. That we were taking advantage of her irrational beliefs added to my discomfort.

  Then there was Pegg and her words. A complete contradiction! She did act strange. But the cruel notions Mr. Middleditch expressed were so counter to the ideals my family taught me that I preferred to believe Pegg. The truth was, I was beginning to really dislike Mr. Middleditch. Yet if Pegg spoke true . . . what did it mean?

  In the end I put my thoughts to the fact that I was about to take my first pictures. There, at last, was something good.

  But my unease would not leave me.

  TEN

  THE NEXT AFTERNOON—Saturday—proved pleasantly cool: another beautiful autumn day, air fresh and bright, the city stench and smoke in retreat, Fifth Avenue trees primed with orange, yellow, and red. True, all would soon be brittle and gray—more dust added to the city’s grime—but New York City’s beauty was there for the seeing.

  From somewhere Mr. Middleditch had secured an overcoat that he instructed me to wear. Purposefully large, it was meant to conceal the camera which hung around my neck. As we jogged along in Mrs. Von Macht’s carriage, the camera kept banging my chest, an annoying reminder of my unpleasant task.

  Mr. Middleditch, sensing my edginess, patted me on the knee while whispering into my ear, “You want to help Mrs. Von Macht become happier, don’t you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do your task and she will.”

  “With a trick for the gullible?” I muttered.

  He laughed. “All life is a trick.” Then, with a nod toward the carriage driver and a finger to his lips, he shook his head by way of warning.

  I dared say no more.

  Arriving, we hauled up Mr. Middleditch’s camera. As I labored, my secret camera kept bumping, bumping.

  Pegg, as before, let us in. “Madam is expecting you,” she said.

  Once again I sensed she was avoiding looking at me.

  I followed Mr. Middleditch into the front parlor. The soft light from a candelabrum cast a warm glow over the whole room. Thick curtains were pulled over the tall front windows so as to bar any outside light. A small fire was smoldering, making the room overly warm—and me in that coat.

  Walls were papered lavishly, covered by an array of pictures, chromo prints, Currier and Ives lithographs, silhouettes, and mirrors, all elaborately framed. But I saw not one image of the girl, a reminder that Pegg might have spoken true.

  There were a few stuffed chairs, plus a mohair-covered sofa bulging with plump, tasseled pillows. In one corner stood a round marble-topped table upon which were arranged a variety of knickknacks plus a large vase sprouting dried flowers and ferns. There was a small piano and a bookcase filled with leather-bound volumes. Upon a little writing desk sat an elegant three-pronged candlestick. Silver too, I supposed. The wooden furniture was elaborately carved with scrolls and brackets. Everything—walls, floor, and furniture—was dark red, brown, or tan. The room’s feel was bloated wealth.

  Seated in the middle of it all was Mrs. Von Macht. She did not appear as solemn as when I’d first seen her. Rather, I noticed a certain energy that made me think she was excited by what we were doing.

  Behind her stood a portly, sharp-eyed man, with pointed beard, and a severe—I might even say angry—face. He was dressed in black with a high, stiff, white collar and dark cravat. A variety of gold chains and seals draped over his bulging waistcoat. He struck me as a commanding being, not someone with whom I should like to tangle. He fairly glowered at us as we entered the room.

  “Ah, Mr. Middleditch,” said the woman. “So pleased you’ve come. May I introduce you to my husband, Mr. Von Macht?”

  Mr. Von Macht gave a curt nod and, with no softening in his bearing, allowed nothing by way of welcome to escape his pursed lips. His introduction was followed by a moment of tense silence.

  “Mr. Middleditch, sir,” the man finally said, “please be advised that I don’t approve of what my wife is doing. I am merely permitting her this one self-indulgence. You will do what’s necessary and then remove yourself.”

  He might well have added, “Or I will remove you.” I, for one, didn’t doubt he could.

  I glanced at Mrs. Von Macht. Though the smile on her face remained fixed, her eyes hinted at what I thought was fear.

  “Well, then,” offered Mr. Middleditch, cheerful as ever. “I suppose we should proceed?”

  “You will excuse me, sir,” Mr. Von Macht said. “I have business to attend.”

  As the man moved to go, Mrs. Von Macht bestowed a look of unmistakable anger upon her husband’s back. “You’ll not,” she said, “forget the dinner party tonight, Frederick. The Belmonts.”

  “Of course not,” the man replied without looking at her, and promptly left the room. No one spoke or moved until the front door shut, sufficiently loudly to suggest he wished to give notice of his departure.

  Mrs. Von Macht—her face composed with effort—said, “Mr. Middleditch, I fear my husband considers my project frivolous. The pain of our daughter’s loss is too much for him.”

  “Ah!”

  “He therefore dismisses my desire as that of an emotional, superstitious woman.” She gazed down at her hands, as if to gather strength. When she looked up, the smile on her lips was forced. “Now then, Mr. Middleditch,” she said, “please instruct me as to what needs to be done.”

  Mr. Middleditch turned to me. “Horace, prepare the plates. I will set up the camera.”

  Mrs. Von Macht looked to the servant girl, who had remained in the background. “Pegg, show Mr. Middleditch’s boy to the scullery.”

  “Yes, madam.”

  I followed the girl out of the room. As I went, I heard Mr. Middleditch say, “Now, Mrs. Von Macht, we wish your daughter to see how beautiful you are.”

  ELEVEN

  “WOULD YOU LIKE ME to take your coat, sir?” Pegg said to me as we went along.

  Though feeling a touch of panic, I managed to say, “No, thank you. I’m feeling chilly.”

  She darted a questioning look but continued on without saying anything. Halfway down the steps she suddenly stopped, turned, and with one hand on the banister, as if to steady herself, looked right at me.

  “Please, sir,” she said softly, “I wish to apologize for what I said yesterday.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said, wanting her to tell me more. “I won’t repeat what you said. And please don’t call me sir.”

  “Thank you,” she murmured, and turned away.

  “But Pegg,” I said, “what made you say what you did? What makes you trust me?”

  She hesitated, and without looking at me said, “I am black, but I never need a mirror to know it. I see it in other people’s eyes. I had only to see how you looked at me to know you respected me.”

  “Of course I do.”

  “I don’t see many who do,” she murmured, and continued down.

  At the foot of the steps, she waited for me. “May I call you Horace?” she said, her deep, intense eyes on me.

  “I would like that.”

  I expected her to move on. Instead, she remained where she was, quite silent. But then, as if coming to a decision, she whispered, “Horace, you need to understand. If Mrs. Von Macht heard one word of what I said, I’d be given notice.”

  “Why?”

  “I told you, Master and Mistress will brook no resistance.”

  “To what?”

  “To their cruel ways.”

  “I see,” I said, though in fact I did not.

  “Didn’t you observe how hard Mr. Von Macht is?” Pegg went on
. “He insists the house be run with perfection. Mrs. Von Macht is the same. There’s no end to the faults they can find. They don’t keep servants long. You mustn’t think it’s a house I’d choose to live in.”

  “But you are here,” I felt obliged to say.

  “I’ve nowhere else to go,” she said, her voice shaking.

  “Oh?”

  “I’m an orphan,” she said.

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Master and Mistress keep me here only because if I were to be sent off, they’re fearful of what I might say.”

  “What would you say?”

  “The things I know.”

  “Which are?”

  I waited for her to say more and she seemed on the edge of doing so. Instead, she abruptly turned and approached the door of the scullery.

  I considered Pegg. Here she was, a poor girl, a servant, an orphan, yet she spoke as if she had been educated. While her rapid changes of mood were explained by her fear of the Von Machts, her mixture of fierceness, reluctance, and great emotion kept me off balance. I certainly did not think her, as Mr. Middleditch crudely put it, touched. Nor did I feel threatened by her in any way. But I will admit I had never met such a girl.

  “Did you bring the key?” she asked.

  I took it from my pocket and gave it to her. She unlocked the door, and after we stepped inside she closed it again firmly, then returned the key to me.

  “Pegg,” I said, trying to sound chatty, “what did you mean by saying the girl was not Mrs. Von Macht’s daughter?”

  Pegg, saying nothing, started to move away. This time, however, I reached out and turned her back about, not harshly, you understand, but with frustration. “I really need to know,” I said.

  To my surprise, her eyes were full of tears.

  “Pegg,” I said as kindly as I could, “I promise not to repeat what you say. I just want to understand.”

  A struggle seemed to be going on within her. In a small voice and with a far-off look she said, “Miss Eleanora was the daughter of Mrs. Von Macht’s sister. When Eleanora’s mother died of cholera, Mrs. Von Macht took Eleanora in. I came with her—as a servant. Mrs. Von Macht does not pay me.”

  “Slavery is gone,” I said.

  “I’m thirteen,” she replied. “And I wish to live.”

  “Then Eleanora was an adopted daughter,” I pressed. “An orphan like you.”

  Pegg suddenly shook her head. “I don’t wish to say more.”

  Frustrated, I looked about. The room appeared just as we had left it, suffused with soft yellow light. The dozen plates covered with paper—plus the round one—were lined up on the marble table, ready for the silver nitrate solution. A quick glance at the paper tabs, which would show me that there had been a disturbance, informed me that all was as I had left it.

  I looked around. Pegg was watching me. Deciding to risk another question, I said, “You said Eleanora died because the Von Machts neglected her greatly. That they wouldn’t get her a doctor. Just tell me about that.”

  When Pegg only pressed her lips together, I decided it would be best to leave the subject. In any case, I felt pressure to get on with my work. I turned to the plates.

  From our apparatus box I took out a two-inch-deep porcelain tray. I poured the silver nitrate bath into it and then quickly covered the tray with a solid lid. That done, I took out the wooden sleeves for the plates.

  Under Pegg’s watchful eyes I pulled back the paper from the first plate, and gasped. A jagged line with a gap of perhaps a quarter of an inch split the glass into two pieces.

  “It’s broken!” I cried, and turned upon the girl. “Did you come in here? Did you do this?”

  The force of my accusation made her step back and lift a hand, as if avoiding a blow. “I didn’t! I swear I didn’t. You have the only key.”

  “There must be more than one.”

  “I don’t know of another. There’s just me, Cook, Mrs. Quinn, and Morgan the carriage man. None of us are permitted to have keys. Master doesn’t allow it,” said Pegg. “No one dares disobey him. I’m sure no one came into the room. You just said all was in order.”

  In haste I examined the other plates—including my round one. They were all fine.

  “It must have been me,” I allowed. And indeed, plates were fragile. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have accused you. It’s only that this never happened before. Anyway, we have enough plates. Please go to Mr. Middleditch and ask him if he’s ready.”

  “Thank you,” said Pegg, glad, I thought, to escape.

  Just as she reached the door, I looked up and said, “Pegg, how can you be so sure the girl died of neglect?”

  “When she died,” she replied, “I was with her.”

  “Who else was there?”

  “No one,” she said, and fled.

  Not knowing what to make of that answer, I made myself concentrate on the plates.

  First, I prepared the hyposulfite of soda fixing solution, which would set the images. Next, I put out sheets of blotting paper. Third, I lay the round glass in the porcelain tray and gently moved it about for some three minutes. It took that long for the silver nitrate bits to stick to the collodion.

  That accomplished, I put the round plate on the blotting paper. The yellow light kept it from darkening. I followed the same steps with each of the other plates.

  By the time the last plate was readied, the round plate was damp as needed. Working quickly, I pulled out my spy camera, unscrewed the back, set the plate in, and closed it up. That, at least, was ready. Whether I was ready was quite another matter. I had been worried before I came. The girl—the troubling things she said—had only increased my tension. I desired nothing more than to be out of the house.

  But there were photographs to be taken. And for the first time in my life I would take them.

  TWELVE

  I PUT THE OTHER DAMP PLATES into their wooden sleeves, stacked them, and carried the lot upstairs. As I went, I looked about anew but still saw no other pictures of the girl. So far it seemed Pegg had spoken true.

  I knocked on the parlor door and received permission to enter. The room was somewhat altered. One of the chairs now stood before the black iron fireplace. Mrs. Von Macht was sitting in it, the look on her face holding something of a smile, if a controlled one. I could not decipher it.

  Mr. Middleditch had placed her in such a position that there would be an array of dried flowers behind and to one side of her. I had no doubt a ghostly image would fit in the empty space right at the woman’s shoulder. The three-pronged candlestick was also there.

  The large wooden camera box was on its tripod, its lens extended. At the rear of the camera, under the black cloth, Mr. Middleditch was framing and focusing Mrs. Von Macht by pushing and pulling the lens billows back and forth.

  Mr. Middleditch peeked out from under the cloth. “Ah, the plates.” He took them from me. “Now, Horace,” he said with a wink that only I could see, “be so good as to get the cleaning cloth.” There was no such thing as a “cleaning cloth.” I was being told to leave the room and take the secret pictures.

  Hoping I was not blushing with the lie, I muttered, “Yes, sir,” and stepped from the room into the hall. Each of Mr. Middleditch’s exposures—the time it took to catch the image on the plate—would take at least three minutes. He had eleven plates. In other words, I had thirty or so minutes to do my task.

  After making sure I was not being observed (I was most anxious about Pegg), I pushed the camera’s lens tube through a buttonhole of my coat. But since the painting was set about six feet above the floor, I had to angle the lens up. That required putting my hands into my coat so as to aim the camera. I did so, took a deep breath, and pushed the shutter lever. There was a tiny click.

  I had taken my very first picture.

  I can’t deny that in spite of my nervousness I was thrilled. Had I not—finally—become a photographer?

  I decided to take another photo because I
was not absolutely sure I had aimed the camera correctly. Besides, nobody was there to see what I was doing. And I really was excited by what I was doing.

  The shutter tripped a second time.

  With two pictures taken, the question was, Where next? Frankly, I still didn’t know whether to believe Pegg, and I wanted to accept what Mrs. Von Macht had said: “I have many painted images of her about my house.” Yet I had seen none in the room which Mrs. Von Macht and Mr. Middleditch now occupied, nor any on the lower floor. Going into the adjacent dining room would be much too perilous. That left the upper floors.

  Heart pounding, I stood at the bottom of the steps. After checking anew to make sure I was unobserved, I started up. Happily the thick carpeting muffled my steps.

  Along the stairwell walls there were other pictures, but none of the girl.

  The steps led me to a U-turn by way of a little landing. There was a small table upon which sat a vase holding flowers. Prints of Roman ruins adorned the wall.

  No images of Eleanora.

  I reached the second floor. I saw some gas light sconces on the wall, but with nothing lit it was quite dim. Such light as there was came from behind, through a large window that looked over the rear alleyway. Before me I could see three rooms: one at the front of the house and two leading off from a hallway. All had closed doors.

  More pictures on the wall: images of flowers, of landscapes, silhouettes of George Washington and General Tyler. None of Eleanora Von Macht.

  Mystified, perhaps wanting to prove Pegg wrong, I was more determined than ever to complete my search. I went to the first door and put my hand to the doorknob. Hardly wishing to come upon Mr. Von Macht, I leaned against the door and listened. Hearing nothing, I put pressure on the doorknob. It turned easily. With the greatest caution, I pushed the door open a crack and listened again. Still nothing. Edging the door open farther and holding my breath, I peeked in.

  The room was deserted. I saw a large oak desk and chair. Bookcases filled with business ledgers. Unlit lamps. My guess: Mr. Von Macht’s private study.

  With many pictures on the walls.