What the Dead Want(7)

“What do you and Gretchen want for dinner?” his dad asked, pulling out a takeout menu for the sushi place up the street. And that was it.

Gretchen tried to send the text again, feeling the well of unease rising up her spine, and then suddenly the door creaked open and a thin but strong old woman with bright white hair and nearly black eyes came out, squinting into the daylight as if she’d been in a dark room for days.



THE CAPTURED SOUL: A PHOTOGRAPHIC EXHIBIT

BY MONA AXTON

In 2002, while appraising the photographs of a deceased collector in Mayville, NY, I came upon a box of cartes de visite dating from the year 1865. I knew right away that I had a most unusual find. These images bore the studio imprint of a Mr. Fritz von Shenck. In my three decades of photography appraisal and collection, I had never encountered the name of Mr. Shenck, nor was I able to ascertain the methods by which he had captured and developed the impressions on these cards.

It is well known that the period of early photographic experiments was one of great excitement. Given the newness of the medium, it was unclear what its boundaries might be. If the exact likeness of a living being could be secured to a piece of silver-plated copper, what else might the magical apparatus of the camera capture?

Mr. Shenck was clearly experimenting with the possibilities. I have consulted many experts, and they, like myself, do not believe these impressions to be either tintype or any wet-or dry-plate negatives with which we are familiar. For this reason, the use of double exposure is not possible. This is not to assert that there are not “tricks” involved in these remarkable photographs. However, these images appear to capture more than what can be seen with the naked, human eye.

It is my belief that this is an as yet insufficiently explored realm of photographic potential—that the boundary between the supernatural and the material world may well be traversed with the miraculous invention of the camera.





FIVE


GRETCHEN’S FIRST INSTINCT WAS TO TAKE THE WOMAN’S picture. But she made herself be polite and kept the camera hanging around her neck. Esther looked like she could be one hundred years old, maybe older.

“Aunt Esther?”

“None other,” the woman said. “Go ahead, sweets. Get it over with.”

“Excuse me?”

“Take the damn picture, don’t just stand there with your finger on the trigger. Shoot. If it was a good shot you shoulda taken it already. Too late now.”

Gretchen gave a startled laugh. She had indeed missed the shot she wanted. Esther on the porch of the sloping house, framed by the wild bramble of roses and thorns, her eyes as black as coal, her wise, tenacious face heavily lined.

Instead she took her hand off the camera and reached out to Aunt Esther, who shook it heartily with her own strong, knobby hand, then drew her in for a hug, Gretchen’s camera pressed clumsily between them. Esther smelled like cigarettes and juniper berries. She patted Gretchen on the back a few times, seemed genuinely happy and relieved that she was there.

When they took a step back and looked at each other, Gretchen had that same feeling she’d had when she’d first heard Esther’s voice, like an eerie echo of Mona. The woman looked like her mother. The familiar bone structure was there—the high forehead, the dark eyes and wide mouth, a long straight nose. Gretchen shared these features too. There was no doubt they were related.

“Welcome, sweets! And thank you for coming. You have no idea how badly you’re needed here.”

“It’s my pleasure,” Gretchen said, smiling.

“That’s a nice shade of lipstick you’ve got,” Esther said. She looked down at Gretchen’s Doc Martens, and then gave the girl’s foot a little tap with her own; when Gretchen looked down, she saw her aunt was wearing a weathered pair of combat boots. She was also wearing loose-fitting linen pants, a gray shirt, and a necklace with an antique magnifying glass on it.

“I like your necklace,” Gretchen said.

Her aunt looked at her like she was a complete idiot. “It’s not a necklace. I need this to see.” She held it up and it magnified her dark, intelligent eyes in a way that was ominous and also ridiculous.

Gretchen laughed, but she didn’t hesitate this time. She snapped the picture quickly while Esther still had a look of wily reproach on her face.

This made Esther laugh loudly. “Oh, this is gonna be fun!” she said.

Gretchen nodded and smiled. It felt like she was meeting some future version of her mother, if her mother hadn’t disappeared at forty-three.

“Come in, come in,” her aunt said, turning toward the door of the once-illustrious Axton mansion. As she opened it, Gretchen got the first glimpse of just how much work was ahead of her. Even in the front hall, the place was piled with papers and books, and the vibration from opening the thick front door caused a sheaf of old documents to flutter to the floor. It looked as though nothing had been thrown out in hundreds of years.

“Well, here it is,” Esther said. “Your new home.”



NOVEMBER 10, 1855

FROM: AXTON AND SONS COTTON EXPORTERS, INC.

44 NORTH WOODS LANE

MAYVILLE, NEW YORK USA

TO: MANCHESTER TEXTILES

714 REDHILL STREET

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND

Sirs,

It is with great pleasure that we acquire your account. We do assure you the unfortunate political climate of animosity between our respective states will in no way affect our business relationship.