The Seer of Shadows

by Avi

  Mr. Middleditch was remarkably unflustered. “I can only recall madam’s words when she first visited me at my studio,” he said, smooth as velvet. “Remember, madam? You had heard it said that souls, or ghosts—or I think you used the word ‘ectoplasm’—of the deceased linger. And that you, madam, felt your late daughter was restless. You did say something of the sort, did you not?”

  “I suppose I did,” the woman admitted under her husband’s withering glance.

  “Then perhaps,” suggested Mr. Middleditch, “your daughter hovers closer than you think. Perhaps my photograph has merely captured that . . . lingering.”

  “Is that the best you can do?” sneered Mr. Von Macht.

  “I suppose,” Mr. Middleditch said, “my camera—or I—could be . . . extra sensitive.”

  This was so smoothly offered that only silence ensued. Mr. Von Macht, his pointed beard and florid face giving him a devilish cast, did not seem to know what else to say or—happily—to do.

  As for Mrs. Von Macht, she simply gazed upon the photograph.

  At last Mr. Middleditch said, “Is there any reason why her soul should be restless?”

  Mr. Middleditch, having none of the knowledge I had, asked the question in complete innocence. The result: Mrs. Von Macht bolted up from the sofa and stood by the curtained window, her back to us. As for Mr. Von Macht, the color drained from his normally red face. He even lifted his walking stick so that I was sure he would strike Mr. Middleditch. Instead, he flung it away, smashing a piece of pottery.

  Mr. Middleditch, in his bulldog manner, apparently taking no notice of what he had provoked, went blithely on. “I have, perhaps, a suggestion.”

  “Which is?” Mr. Von Macht managed to say.

  “Allow me to take another photograph. With the same camera, of course. Perhaps the first was just an . . . aberration. A . . . mistake. An odd . . . configuration.”

  “And I suppose,” sneered Mr. Von Macht, “you would charge us for more photographs?”

  “It does, as madam has witnessed, take time, and—”

  “Yes, do it!” cried Mrs. Von Macht. “I must see another picture. I don’t care about cost. And the sooner, the better.” She went over to the sofa, picked up the picture Mr. Middleditch had first made, and tore it up into bits. “This has caused much pain.” She scattered the pieces.

  Even as she did so, I saw Eleanora’s mocking face behind her. It was all I could do not to cry out. For the face now had absolute clarity, as if it were truly there, a living presence. I dared not say a word.

  “I’m so sorry,” murmured Mr. Middleditch. “When shall we return?”

  “Never,” barked Mr. Von Macht.

  “Mr. Middleditch shall come back tomorrow,” said Mrs. Von Macht, as much to her husband as to the photographer.

  “Olivia!” the man cried. “Leave it alone!”

  “I must know if it’s her,” the woman replied.

  Mr. Von Macht looked around for his walking stick, snatched it, and shouted, “You are a fool!” That said, he whirled about and sped from the room, slamming the door behind him.

  Mrs. Von Macht stood so still, it was as if every part of her body were struggling for self-control.

  Mr. Middleditch went on as if these were normal events. “As you wish, madam. Tomorrow. My boy can make arrangements this very afternoon. “

  “It will have to be this evening,” Mrs. Von Macht spoke with effort. “I’m giving a tea at four.”

  “Whatever you desire,” said Mr. Middleditch. He turned to me. “Horace . . .” He gestured toward the door.

  I sprang to open it.

  Pegg was in the hallway. Whether she had heard anything of what transpired, I could not tell. Her face revealed nothing.

  She led the way out. At the door I said to her, “I’ll be coming back this evening. Mrs. Von Macht wishes another photographic session. I’ll need to set things up.”

  “I’ll be here to help you, sir,” Pegg returned without visible emotion. Her eyes, however, spoke of complete understanding. For the first time I saw real fright in her face.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  THOUGH THE VON MACHT CARRIAGE was waiting to take us home, Mr. Middleditch suggested that we walk. I knew why. The man was jubilant.

  “Oh, Horace!” he cried after we’d walked a few blocks. “Am I not an absolute genius?” He clapped me on the back.

  I, of course, had very different thoughts. I was thinking Mr. Middleditch had best be careful. Mr. Von Macht was clearly capable of violence, and his wife was greatly distraught. If either of them discovered Mr. Middleditch’s hoax, things might go very badly. And what, I wondered, would they do if they discovered that Eleanora’s ghost was real?

  Still, one thing Mr. Middleditch had said caused me to consider a last notion in respect to my responsibility in these events. It involved the camera. In search of an explanation for what was happening that did not implicate me, I needed to check it. After all, it had been the Stirn Concealed Vest Camera with which I’d taken all the pictures of Eleanora. Perhaps it was the camera, not me, that brought the girl back.

  I recalled that on the camera was a little brass plate that indicated where Mr. Middleditch had made his purchase. When we returned to our rooms, I went to it and looked at the address anew.

  JOHN STOCK & CO.

  PHOTOGRAPHIC MATERIALS

  NO. 2 RIVINGTON STREET

  NEAR THE BOWERY

  There being some hours before I had to return to the Von Macht house, I made up my mind to go.

  Mr. Middleditch was lounging in our front reception room, reading the Daily News.

  “Mr. Middleditch, sir,” I began. “I was thinking.”

  “Ah! Solemn Horace! You do too much of that,” he returned from behind the paper, laughing, as always, at his own joke.

  “We only had two plates for the spy camera. Don’t you think we should get more?”

  “Good idea.”

  “I’d be happy to fetch a few.”

  “Excellent. You’re full of industry, Horace.”

  He gave me some cash to purchase the plates, and I wrote down the name and address of the dealer.

  As it turned out, John Stock & Co. was a small shop, selling a variety of cameras and photographic apparatus, chemicals, papers, and equipment. The proprietor, Mr. Stock, a white-haired old man who spoke with a thick German accent, was perfectly friendly. Indeed, in the course of our conversation, when I told him my father was in the watch repair trade, he acted as if I were some kind of relation—the love of mechanical things, I suppose—and was even more welcoming.

  I purchased the circular plates, explaining I was apprenticed to Mr. Middleditch, the photographer. Then I asked Mr. Stock if anyone had ever reported anything unusual about the spy camera.

  “Unusual? In what way?”

  “Distortions. Odd focus. Anything not straightforward. Double images.”

  “Ja,” he said, “it’s awkward to use that camera in—what do you say—hiding. But no, absolutely nothing such as you speak. Do you have it with you?”

  I gave it to him and he examined it closely, inside and out.

  “In perfection,” Mr. Stock announced. “Same as others.”

  I had not expected a different answer. This is to say, my own logic insisted that in some extraordinary way, it was I, and only I, who was responsible for bringing Eleanora back.

  The notion filled me with horror—and fear for what might yet occur.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  EARLY THAT EVENING I took a carriage to the Von Machts’ house to bring our equipment. Though Mr. Middleditch was willing to pay the cab hire, he said—it was his laziness, I’m sure—that he could not be bothered to go.

  “You know what to do as well as I,” he allowed. “But I suggest you seek out that colored girl. She may be wobbly in her head, but she should be able to help you find some more images of that dead girl. I promise: They will be somewhere.”

  I gritted my teeth and just went.

>   It was dark when I reached the house and entered through the main door. Pegg unlocked it and led me right to the scullery. As soon as we got inside, we shut the door like two conspirators. Which I suppose we were.

  “Did you look at that cemetery picture?” was the first thing I asked. She nodded. “Was it Eleanora?”

  “I think so. Horace, why did you even go there?”

  I had already resolved to tell Pegg everything about Mr. Middleditch’s swindle for three reasons: First, I was embarrassed by his scheme and didn’t wish to be associated with it. Second, I was repulsed by his demeaning talk about Pegg. I had no doubt who was my true friend. Last, and perhaps most important, I needed greater understanding about what was happening regarding Eleanora’s ghost. So as I set out our equipment, I talked.

  I told Pegg all, right from the beginning, and she listened intently.

  When I’d finished, she was silent a long while. “Then the picture Mr. Middleditch gave Mrs. Von Macht was . . . false,” she said, her voice full of anger. “And you were willing to trick me, too.”

  “Yes . . . and no.”

  “How both?” she demanded.

  “The picture he made is false. But . . . Eleanora’s face in that picture is not the one he put in. Pegg, it’s real.”

  “How did it get there?”

  “I don’t know!”

  She held up the cemetery picture. “And this?”

  “I took that picture. But Pegg,” I pleaded, “believe me. I didn’t put Eleanora in it. She just . . . appeared. And there’s another thing. As I was leaving the Von Macht tomb, I saw . . . her.”

  “Saw her!” she cried.

  I described my sighting, how, in the brief burst of lightning, I was sure I’d seen her run by. “She was wearing a black dress.”

  “She was buried in a black dress,” said Pegg, her anger melting in remembrance. “I dressed her. It was her favorite. Her dancing dress.”

  “Pegg, forgive me, but . . . but are you quite certain she . . . died?”

  She didn’t flinch from the question. “I was holding her hand when she took her last breath.”

  “Pegg, you told me Eleanora talked to you.”

  She smiled sadly. “I knew her so well I’ve only to think about something and it’s as if I hear her voice speaking to me in my head.”

  “But not,” I asked with care, “as if anyone else—such as me—might hear?”

  “Of course not.” She sighed. “Oh, Horace, I do wish I could see her.”

  “But since she died, you’ve never seen her?”

  “Only in your pictures.”

  “Pegg,” I said, “I don’t understand how she’s come to be in them.”

  She was quiet for a moment. “I’ve thought about it a great deal,” she said. “Perhaps when you take your pictures—the more you take, the more you draw her forth.”

  That Pegg should say what I had only dared think made me tremble. “But . . . how could that be?” I asked.

  Again Pegg was still. But at length she said, “Before Mama died—in our happy days—Eleanora and I were given many books to read. One book I read told about ancient days when there were seers.”

  “Seers?”

  “Wise people who saw things no one else could. Maybe you’re like that.”

  “Pegg,” I protested, “I’m not wise.”

  “Did you take many pictures before?”

  “The first pictures I ever took were with that spy camera—those pictures of Eleanora.”

  “Horace, I think when you take pictures you become a seer. Your pictures draw Eleanora forth.”

  The notion seemed utterly fantastic. And yet— “If I have,” I said, almost afraid to speak, “as you say, drawn her forth, what do you think . . . she’ll do?”

  “She’ll take her revenge on Mr. and Mrs. Von Macht.”

  “In what . . . way?”

  “I think she will kill them.”

  There it was, the very thought I’d kept hidden from myself, even as I knew it was within me: Eleanora was bent on murdering the Von Machts. I had to swallow before I could say, “And I’m the one . . . who will have made it possible for her to do so. Is that . . . right?”

  The look Pegg bestowed upon me was not of awe, not of revulsion, but of pity. Tears were in her eyes. I shall be ever grateful to her for that. As for my question, she did not reply. No matter. I knew the answer for myself.

  “Pegg,” I whispered, “do you wish the Von Machts to be . . . killed?”

  She smeared her tears away and pondered my question a long while. “Horace,” she finally said, “when people burned down the colored orphanage . . .” She shuddered visibly. “Horace, I’ve seen so many killed. So much suffering. I’ll never forget it. I do want to see the Von Machts punished for what they’ve done. But no, not . . . murdered.”

  “But if Eleanora has come back and means to kill them,” I pleaded, “what are we to do?”

  A gong rang from somewhere in the house.

  She bolted up. “The Von Machts are back,” she whispered. “It’s later than I realized. You shouldn’t still be here.”

  “I was supposed to set things up,” I reminded her. “Anyway, I can wait a bit and then let myself out through the servants’ door.”

  She went to the scullery door only to hesitate. “Horace,” she whispered, “if I could just speak to Eleanora, I’d tell her that she should rest in peace. That I’m fine. That I will never stop loving her.”

  “Perhaps that would help,” I said. “Now go. I’ll lock the door behind you. We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

  She opened the door, only to pause at the threshold. “Horace!” she whispered, “I’m glad you’re my friend.” She darted back, gave me a hug, and then ran off.

  I was alone.

  TWENTY-SIX

  I RELOCKED THE DOOR and sat against the wall. I kept thinking about Pegg’s notion that I was what she called a seer. It was such an extraordinary idea, I found it difficult to accept. Instead, I reviewed all that had happened, trying to do so in the most logical, rational of ways.

  One: When I took the pictures, they contained images of the spirit world.

  Two: The very act of my taking pictures drew these spirits back to the real world.

  Three: The more pictures I took, the more real they became.

  Finally: When real enough, they became independent of me—which is to say, they became living ghosts.

  It was like the process of developing a photograph I have described:

  as if the shadow were coming from some mystic depth, emerging from another world, taking, little by little, bodily shape and form until that shadow becomes . . . real.

  Exactly what I’d done for Eleanora’s spirit!

  The facts of the matter were perfectly clear—though surely not normal. My picture taking had summoned a ghost, and not just any ghost, but one bent on murder!

  I could argue with myself—did argue!—that the Von Machts were frightful people who deserved punishment. But if Pegg—with all her suffering—chose compassion, could I choose anything less?

  By now the house had grown absolutely still. Enough time had passed. I needed to get out.

  I peered out the front window to make sure the carriage was not at the curb. It was not. I made my way, fumbling but quiet, out of the scullery and down the dark hallway to the front door and its handle.

  It was locked.

  For that door I had no key.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TAKEN BY SURPRISE, I RETREATED in haste to the scullery, shut the door, locked it, sat on the floor, and pulled my knees up, as if being small would keep me from being discovered.

  Not that anyone came. There was nothing but darkness, the quiet, and me, along with a slight whiff of my photographic chemicals hovering in the air. For a while I entertained the notion that Pegg would return. But there was no reason for her to do so. On the contrary, she had every reason to assume I had gone.

  So I continued to sit there in the
deep stillness.

  From time to time I heard a few noises from above, rather like steps, or so I supposed. These sounds did not last very long, and then the house folded back into silence.

  I kept telling myself I could not stay. It was too dangerous. Pegg and I were in a difficult enough situation. If I were to be found, it could only make things much worse.

  Then I remembered: When Mr. Middleditch and I first came to the house, Pegg had opened the main door using a key. She had set that key on a little table right by the door. Perhaps it was always kept there. But though that key was the only hope for escape, I knew I must not try for it as long as there was the slightest suggestion of anyone moving about upstairs.

  Finally, having heard nothing for what seemed a great while, I mustered my courage, opened the door carefully, stepped into the hall, and paused to listen. Nothing. I reached the steps and went up slowly, always looking about, always listening. Gradually, my eyes became accustomed to the gloom.

  I reached the first floor and stood at the back of the large hallway. Neither the gas chandelier nor the wall sconces were lit. Though I could not see the lofty ceilings, I sensed them. As for sound, all I heard was the grandfather clock tick-tocking, tick-tocking, tick-tocking.

  Far down the hallway I could make out, past the stairway, the front door. I could also just see the little side table. Whether the key was on it I could not tell.

  Knowing I must move to get out, I took a deep breath and commenced creeping down the hallway. The carpeted floors muffled my steps. Even so, I hadn’t gone more than a few steps before I had to stop. I was panting so, I felt faint. I forced myself to stand still and breathe deeply. All the while I listened. The house felt cold and hollow around me, much what I imagined it must feel like inside the Von Machts’ Green-Wood tomb.

  Regaining my composure, I continued to creep forward, my eyes focused not so much on the door but on that little table, hoping with real desperation that the key would be there.