by Peter Hey
Jane squeezed her eyes shut. The last thing she needed was another mystery to pester and nag at her thoughts and keep her awake.
She rolled over again and then rolled back. She sat up in bed and reached for the light switch. This at least was a problem that was easily put to bed. She leant across to turn off the laptop, but then stared at the faint red LED above its screen trying to remember why it was there. And then it came to her.
The camera was on.
Collodion and albumen
Monsieur Rivard, always Monsieur never Mister, was a chemist by training. He had learnt the process for producing wet collodion negatives in Paris and right until his death argued for their superiority in terms of tone and subtlety over the new dry-plate technology. Clients would arrive at his studio, he would greet them and discuss their requirements, and then he would have his assistant arrange and pose the sitters under the north-facing glazed roof while he himself repaired to his darkroom. He would ensure the blank glass plates were thoroughly clean before carefully coating them in a syrupy solution called collodion. Judging when it had set, but not dried, he would then immerse them in a bath of silver nitrate. Suitably sensitised to light, they had to be used whilst still wet. The Monsieur would emerge, check the composition and expose the plates in the large wooden camera which he had imported from France. He would then bow and disappear behind the scenes to develop and fix the images, again before the plates had time to dry out.
In Thomas Ramsden, he had seen a man with artistic sensitivity, literate and numerate enough to help with the administration of a small business and also with the intelligence and patience to learn the complex techniques and alchemist wizardry of photography. As the aging Rivard weakened and failed through a painful tumour in his stomach, he increasingly relied on his assistant, until the younger man was running the studio whilst its owner was confined to his rooms above. On Rivard’s death he left everything to Thomas. The Frenchman had devoted his life to science and art. There had been no time for family or lasting friendships.
That had been the highpoint of Thomas’s fortune and happiness. For the first time in his life he was a man of means, a man worthy of respect, with a beautiful wife and an angelic child. But the cracks were always there, the edifice waiting to crumble. He was harbouring a shameful secret and his wife’s postnatal malaise meant her moods could swing from grateful contentment to bitter, resentful despair.
And then, in a moment of selfish, lunatic weakness, Thomas had ruined everything. His daughter was motherless and the blood was on her father’s hands. Zenith had become nadir. Now his only solace was in his work. He allowed it to consume him.
The gelatine dry plates were manufactured by George Eastman’s patented machinery in the city of Rochester in upstate New York. As well as having faster exposure times, they allowed the landscape photographer to work in the field without lugging a portable tented darkroom as well as a bulky camera and tripod. He – it was almost always a he – could go back to his studio at leisure and there carry out the chemical transformation that made the plates into negatives from which multiple paper pictures could be printed. The processing steps remained complex, however, requiring equipment, skill and judgement, thus keeping them in the realm of the professional and only the most dedicated of amateurs. Eastman was still working on the technology that would become his Kodak camera and make photography accessible to a far-wider marketplace.
Thomas had returned after the studio had closed and gone straight to his darkroom, excited to confirm the success of his endeavours. Working methodically under a dim red light, he moved the thin sheets of glass between trays of different solutions, developing, stopping, fixing and then washing. He stacked the results to dry and nervously inspected them through a lens. He was well used to looking at negative images and his mind could visualise black where there was white and the shades of grey between. Apart from the smoky haze over the heart of the city, the pictures were pin sharp. He was delighted with their scope and detail. There was the north-south line of the widened Fourth Avenue, train tracks now hidden beneath the ventilation ducts in its central mall. To the west was the vast expanse of Central Park, isolated mansions and hotels starting to sprout along its borders. North west, the seemingly endless chequerboard of rectangular lots was still largely empty, waiting to be levelled, occasional farmhouses being the main signs of occupation. North east, the elevated railroad lines running down Third and Second Avenues were clearly visible along with speculative apartment buildings, factories, wooden shanties, rocky outcrops and yet more farmland. In the distance, the Harlem flowed into the East River like a spill of ink and beyond sat Ward’s Island. Under magnification, the grand architecture of its institutions was clearly visible. Thomas found himself transfixed by the grey dots of the hospital windows. They drew him in until he could look no more, his energy and drive drained away. The process of transferring the images to his sheets of shiny, egg-white albumen paper would have to wait until the next day.
Thomas opened the darkroom door and was surprised to see his wife standing in the narrow hallway that led to the front of the studio. He could tell she was angry. For once, he knew he had given her cause.
‘Ester, I’m sorry. I was engrossed in a study. I forgot. I should have come up to see you earlier.’
‘Vorgot!’ Her English was vastly improved and she had learnt to soften her German accent with clients and others she was trying to impress. She did not bother when in private conversation with her husband.
‘Vorgot!’ she repeated. ‘Thank Gott young Georg can work your stupid camera. The Goldstamms were angry enough you weren’t here. Filthy Jews! Frau Goldstamm had spent hours dressing up that ugly daughter of theirs. She looked like a… Hochzeitstorte... a wedding cake!’
‘I found Georg’s plate in the darkroom.’ Thomas felt his throat dry as he prepared to deliver bad news. ‘There are a few small flaws. And I’m still not convinced he has the eye. The pose does not flatter the girl.’
‘With a face like that she is beyond flattery! You and your artist’s eye...’ Ester looked up at the ceiling in exasperation. ‘How many times must I tell you? You may know your chemicals and your paper and your plates, but this is business. And Georg will make a fine businessman. So much better than you. He charmed the little Fräulein, and her gross mother. The picture will be fine. I’ll make sure it’s paid for.’
‘But what about our reputation as a fine studio, a producer of quality prints that people will be proud to display on their walls and on their mantelpieces?’ Thomas’s pleas had the empty conviction of a guilty man already judged and sentenced.
‘You should have thought of your reputation when you chose not to be here for your appointment. What was this so-called study you tell me you were engrossed in?’
Thomas relaxed slightly. ‘I honestly think it is something of importance. It is what the new dry plates were invented for. Mr Bauer let me take my equipment onto the roof of his new home—'
‘Mr Bauer who owns the brewery?’ Ester sounded interested.
‘The same. He let me photograph from his roof.’
‘I don’t understand this word “let”. Mr Bauer is a wealthy man. He is paying you to photograph his roof? Isn’t he?’
‘Not immediately.’ The enthusiasm was growing in Thomas’s voice. ‘But when he sees what I have produced, I’m sure he might want to. It will be a work of historic importance – the march of progress, the old city and the new.’
‘The march of progress?’
‘Yes, Ester. Please listen. Let me explain. I placed my tripod on Mr Bauer’s roof. You’ve seen his house.’ Thomas raised a bent hand above his head as if demonstrating the height of a towering child. ‘It is on a hill and the tallest building on that part of the East Side. I rotated my camera through the arc of a circle until I had captured the whole panorama – eight images, north, south, east, west and the points in between. I have just developed the plates. They’ve come out really well. You can see Fourth Ave
nue sweeping up, the railroad emerging at 96th Street. Central Park and its reservoir are over to the west. To the north—'
Ester’s patience had expired. ‘To the north is ugliness! It is vacant blocks, a handful of proper buildings, those wooden shacks jammed with dirty Irish and Italian peasants. It’s a construction site.’
‘That’s the point, Ester. In a few short years, the city will have swelled northwards. We’ll have block upon block of high tenement buildings, all the same. Sure, there’ll be grand houses by the park and along the boulevards, but we’ll have lost what lies beneath, and how we got there. It’s a moment in—'
‘No!’ Ester slapped her hand against her skirts to signal she had heard enough. ’Don’t talk to me of years! We bought the new portable camera equipment because you told me if would free you to work outside the studio. You could take the scenic views of New York. Portraits only sell to the sitters. A picture of Castle Garden, or the new bridge, or the cathedral is of interest to many people. They send them home to say, “Look at my fine new city.” This is good money for us. It is good business. No-one wants to see an ugly, muddy, unfinished mess!’
Thomas’s head dropped. ‘To Monsieur Rivard, photography was much more than business. Painting is dead, he would say, we are the new artists. Our work will last like that of the great masters. He saw I had talent – that’s why he employed me. That’s why we now have the studio. That huge piece of luck gives us the lifestyle we now enjoy.’
Ester wagged a finger to signal her disagreement. ‘I give us this lifestyle! I run this business. I make sure the bills are paid. And I raise your daughter while you make your pretty pictures.’
‘How is little Sarah today?’ A sadness had entered Thomas’s voice. ‘She had a cold, I think?’
‘That is my concern. I am her mother now. Since you killed—'
‘Ester!’ It was Thomas’s turn to rise in anger. ‘I forbid you! God knows who might hear. What if Sarah were to be listening.’
Ester moved closer as if challenging her husband to hit out at her. ‘Never forget I know who you are Thomas Ramsden, or Ram’s-arse or whatever it is you’re really called. Who you are and what you are. And what you have done.’
Thomas just stared, silently reminding himself he was in a hell of his own making, perhaps even of his own choice.
Ester smiled, her dominance confirmed. ‘I have decided we need to open a new studio, to expand. Georg will be the photographer. Another of my nephews is coming over, he too will learn. This new camera equipment is so easy, I could use it.’
‘When? When do you want the new studio?’
Ester shrugged. ‘Next year at the latest.’
Thomas looked away before responding. ‘I’ve been thinking about visiting England next year’
‘Home to England? Is that wise? There are those who might not welcome you.’
‘I must go.’ Thomas rubbed his brow as if he might push the idea back into the deeper recesses of his mind.
Ester hesitated, calculating. ‘Go if you want,’ she said eventually, ‘but I will need papers. Legal papers. Our customers, our suppliers must know that I am the one in charge. Those men must understand I am the one they must deal with. I have absolute authority. While you are away.’
A small face suddenly appeared from behind Ester’s wide skirts. ‘Mama, I heard Papa shouting. I don’t like it when he shouts.’
Thomas and Ester’s eyes met in a wordless exchange.
Her step-mother ran her fingers through the little girl’s hair. ‘Your father can be an angry man. But don’t worry, liebling, I won’t let him be angry with you.’
Thomas looked at the child’s beautiful face, half his own, half that of her poor, dead mother, and knew his daughter was lost to him.
He had brought it on himself. It was part of his punishment.
The digital camera
The parade of shops nearest to Jane’s house had changed dramatically over the years. When she’d been a child, there had still been a traditional bakery, a butcher’s, a greengrocer’s, an ironmonger’s and a newsagent’s. The newsagent was still clinging on, but most of his custom seemed to come from selling cheap tins of booze to rather rough-looking men who hung around outside drinking and talking rather than paying pub prices. There were also two charity shops, an emporium selling odd bits of everything with cut-down prices reflecting their dubious quality, a nail bar, a tanning salon, an Indian restaurant and two cafés, one of which belonged to a vast chain imported from America. Recently, the old dry cleaner’s had been replaced by ‘Nottingham Tech and PC’, advertising ‘computer-laptop-mac-repairs, proprietor V Abar BSc (Eng)’. Jane had never been in but had walked past several times and seen the bespectacled Mr Abar working at a counter set right behind the shop window. He, clearly, was the business's main asset. From a distance, he could have been 20 or 40, and as well as his glasses he wore a tie and a bad haircut. It was a look that said ‘computer geek’ and, again, could have been a deliberate marketing ploy.
He’d seemed intrigued when Jane explained her concern and suggested she return that afternoon, when hopefully he would able to offer a diagnosis. As Jane re-entered the shop he greeted her with a gleam and a nod that said he’d got to the bottom of the problem and was very pleased with himself for doing so.
‘Ah, Ms Madden. It was a good job you brought this in to me. You’ve been well and truly hacked. As I told you, this is an old laptop. You’re vulnerable.’
‘I know, I know,’ replied Jane with only a hint of irritation. ‘You’re not the first… I’ve been meaning to replace it. Just haven’t got round to it yet.’
Mr Abar tapped the keyboard a few times. ‘We could upgrade the memory, but ultimately I don’t think the processor is up to the current version of the O S. Replacement is probably your only option. I could help with setting it up and copying all your data across?’
Jane wasn’t sure what O S stood for but got the drift. ‘Okay, thanks for the offer. You said I had definitely been hacked?’
‘Oh absolutely. Nasty, nasty, nasty. I ran a scan and found a keylogger—'
‘A keylogger?’
‘A program that records all your keystrokes, everything you type into the keyboard, and then sends it off to its master somewhere on the dark web.’
Jane’s mind quickly tried to assess if she’d recently typed anything that might expose her financially. ‘I use my phone for most things, like my banking app,’ she said hesitantly. ‘I use the laptop mainly for my work on family history. You know, research and stuff. I can’t imagine anyone would be interested in that.’
Mr Abar shrugged. ‘What about emails?’
‘Again, I usually check those on the phone, certainly when I’m out and about. But, you’re right, long emails I will type on the laptop. Though they’re mostly boring work stuff. Again, who’d care?’
‘Is your email account password protected, by which I mean – do you have to type your password every time you log in?’
Jane hesitated briefly, still distracted by her own thoughts. ‘Not on the phone. It goes straight in. But on the laptop, yes. The app thing stopped working and now I go in via a browser. It did ask to save the password once, but I didn’t do it for some reason.’
Mr Abar pointed a finger to indicate they’d identified an exposure. ‘So they could well have your password and be signing in on their own computer. That could be the gateway to all your other accounts, banking, shopping, et cetera. They could have reset the logins via your email.’ He raised his eyebrows as a shocking thought occurred to him. ‘Obviously, I’m assuming you don’t use the same password for everything?’
‘I’m not that stupid,’ said Jane scratchily. ‘How can I tell if someone’s been changing my other passwords?’
‘Have you been locked out of anything? Have you noticed an unusual activity in your email account? Or anywhere else?’
‘No and no. Oh God, what a mess!’
‘Don’t despair, Ms Madden. I’ve cle
aned up your laptop and reactivated the anti-virus and firewall. They’d been turned off as well. Change your email password immediately and then check your bank transactions and anything else financial. I’d change all those passwords too. And there’s a police website on which you can report potential fraud and cybercrime.’
‘What a mess!’ repeated Jane. ‘How did this key… key log program get on there?’
‘You probably downloaded it by accident from a malicious website or it came in on some dodgy spam.’
‘I’m normally good about that kind of thing, though to be honest I have had a few suspicious things in my inbox lately.’ Jane’s eyes became thoughtful. ‘Hang on. Is it possible someone who had physical access to the laptop could have bypassed the security and loaded it?’
‘On this old thing, sure. You don’t leave it lying around in public places do you?’
Jane shook her head. ‘My house was broken into recently. They took some stuff and promptly dumped it. They didn’t take this piece of junk.‘ Jane pointed accusingly at her computer. ‘But I did notice that it had been moved.’
Mr Abar stroked his glasses. ‘That would be a new one on me, but it’s possible they loaded the keylogger. Maybe they were part-time hackers and were trying to expand their housebreaking business. Or vice versa. Oh, and we’re forgetting something.’
Jane tilted her head as a silent question.
‘The reason you brought it in the first place, Ms Madden – the video camera coming on.’