Nightlight

by Michael Cadnum

  “An inside world.”

  “Precisely.”

  “And you are telling me that your family had many inside worlds.”

  She was impressed. He was paying attention. She continued, “But I am not seeking help for myself.”

  “You are worried about your son.”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Where is your son now?”

  She whispered: “I don’t know.”

  “You’re no longer in contact with him?”

  She blinked her eyes clear. “To put it very mildly.”

  “What makes you think something is wrong?”

  She couldn’t tell him about the dream. She couldn’t tell him about the locked boxes. She couldn’t tell him about the one other sort of help she knew well, the services of a locksmith.

  She couldn’t tell him how her father, dead for years, had seemed alive in this house, night after night.

  She couldn’t tell him the truth about Len.

  3

  When there is no light, the branches and the leaves of trees exude a light of their own. Through their skin. Through the membrane of nothingness that covers everything. Every twig. Every leaf.

  But the best places were these, where the secret, buried people waited. Their long wait made a light breathe from the earth. The light filled the trees. My eye would not be able to see the light. But the light was there, and I would trap it, as hands trap the moth.

  I climbed a wall, and balanced there, cradling the camera. I fell, and rolled, and now I was among the waiting strangers.

  I had been hesitating to come here for years. But He kept calling. Come. Just for a visit. Take pictures of the place where I wait. My quiet kingdom. You know how much I love you.

  Even now I trembled. I wept as I used to weep. Please, I used to pray. Please leave me alone.

  But this was just a visit. See how the strangers lay in their great pleasure that I was among them now. My eyes could not see them where they rose from their secret places, and stood gazing at me.

  Please leave me alone, I wept.

  But they watched me. He has been waiting a long time, their silence said. See how He loves you.

  My hands were trembling, but I clung to the camera, the thing I knew could see them. The lens was more subtle than the eye. I told myself: I’ll take a few pictures, and then I can go. Just a few pictures.

  That’s right, He said, from His secret home, far across this field of stone monuments. This first visit you can take just a few pictures. Seal them up in your camera, and take them home. We have time. I have waited so long for you to visit me.

  Just a few pictures. Then I’ll be done, I thought. I had always preferred this sort of light. I was winning prizes for the way I could make starlight look. But no one knew why I had been learning to coax light out of places where the eye could not see.

  It was so I could crouch here, now, and aim the camera. Just three or four, and then I can go.

  The camera was a solid mechanism. It made its pleasing click. It was my usual wide-angle lens, and it was capturing the place, and all its secrets, there was no question of that.

  Come closer.

  I crept across the cold grass, but then stopped myself. This was enough. I had done enough. It was only a visit. Now you will leave me alone.

  I don’t like us being apart like this, He said, that voice from the secret place. Come closer.

  I closed my eyes. I did not move.

  Please. Please leave me alone.

  4

  Paul clipped his pen into his pocket, and shrugged into the gray tweed jacket he knew made him look anonymous. Waiters like bland customers, and tend to make the sort of cheerful mistakes they avoid in the face of memorable diners. Drinks arrive that had not been ordered, the steak shows up done too well, or bleeding raw, if the waiter forgot you as soon as he saw your face.

  His pants fit him well. He had not gained weight on this job, to his mild surprise. He had not developed an ulcer, either, which was more surprising. He ran a comb through his hair, and answered the phone absentmindedly, thinking it was the paper reminding him that they needed nine inches by tomorrow afternoon, one of those secretaries Ham hired and fired regularly, for mysterious reasons.

  “Is this Paul Wright?”

  He leaned against the wall. Someone about to beg to be reviewed, or, worse, to curse him for having said the worst possible things. He put professional distance into his voice. “Speaking.”

  “This is Mary. Your aunt.”

  He had mistaken the nervous, fluttery quality of the voice. He was delighted to hear from her. It had been so long since—and then he was quiet for a moment, remembering that it had been seven years since Uncle Phil’s funeral. Time, he said brightly, had simply flapped its wings.

  He was about to inquire how his cousin Len was doing, but her urgent voice interrupted him. “I need your help,” she said.

  “Of course,” he said. “Anything I can do.”

  “I can’t really tell you over the telephone,” she said.

  “I understand,” said Paul, although he didn’t. Anything could be said to anyone over the telephone. If the CIA wanted to be bored to death, that was its problem, Paul thought wryly.

  She invited him to visit her the next afternoon, an invitation Paul accepted with pleasure. He had always liked Aunt Mary, but he had remembered her as less mysterious, a straightforward woman who never minced words. She was plainly disturbed about something, but controlled her voice carefully. She was not on the edge of tears. She was on the edge of something worse. Paul could not guess what. Not hysteria. Not worry. Something worse than worry.

  She was afraid of something.

  Lise swore as she dragged herself into the Volkswagen. “I got Parker Super Quink on my new wool skirt.”

  “It’ll wash out,” Paul said, knowing it was exactly the wrong thing to say.

  She wanted commiseration, not advice. She folded her arms, and Paul fastened her seat belt for her, knowing the act would seem conciliatory. “I guess it will,” she said at last.

  “Tough day?”

  “Little things kept going wrong. Broken pencils. Dropped cups. Two cups, not—thank God—my favorite red one, but that nice gray one, the one you used this morning. Smashed to powder when I ran hot water on it.”

  “Must have been a secret flaw.”

  “Yes. It made a pinging noise, like a string plucked. And it was all over the sink. I was so rattled I snapped another cup off at the handle.” She laughed. “I had the handle in my fingers, but the cup itself waddled across the floor, slopping coffee all over.”

  The waiter sized them up immediately, and met the glance of the maitre d’, who smiled them into a prime table, near a window, through which Paul watched geraniums shiver in the rain.

  Standard East Bay Linen white table cloth, with a small, tufted hole near the tine of his salad fork. A fresh pink carnation in imitation Waterford. Wine list at only a forty-percent markup, the sign of a new restaurant begging business.

  “They’ve made us,” Paul said, flipping open the menu.

  “How do you know?”

  “Did you see the maitre d’ touch the busboy on the shoulder when he spoke to him just now? When was the last time you saw a maitre d’ touch a busboy? Panic has gripped the kitchen. It’s like a submarine spurting water in there. The chef is putting on a show of courage. The assistant manager is phoning the manager who is due in in half an hour anyway. He’ll call the owner. A command center is established by now. We’ll get our ice water in seconds.”

  The busboy, in his white baggy sleeves, spilled a drop of water no bigger than a nickel. The young man held his breath, and, Paul imagined, calculated bus fare to Tijuana. The maitre d’ strutted to greet two other customers, wearing a rictus of courtesy.

  “The waiter usually identifies himself by name. ‘Hi, I’m Al, your waitperson.’ But he won’t now, because he knows it makes me vomit. Or, so I’ve said. At this point, I’ve given up.”<
br />
  The waiter was smoother than the maitre d’. Crinkled his eyes and told them that the Soave was better than the Frascati. “It almost always is,” Paul said when he had vanished. “You know what’s grim for me is that it’s like eating on a stage in front of dozens of unkind eyes. If I drop Gorgonzola on my tie, they’ll put their heads together in the darkness and smirk. My father used to stuff the napkin in his T-shirt. Manners in my family was not sucking the goop out of the inside of our cream puff. This is a modest place. Middlebrow. In the loftier places I feel like a chimpanzee.”

  “You always act so suave.”

  “I wanted to interview Pete Rose. I dreamed of going to spring training and watching my boyhood heroes hit fungoes. A lot of kids hit imaginary home runs against the garage door. I used to keep score of imaginary baseball games. I like things to be commonsense and on paper. No guesswork. No opinions. Just events, recorded with an unbiased eye toward the truth. Christ, the waiter is consoling the maitre d’. They figure they’ve lost already. Maybe the chef has had a stroke. This is horrible. We should get up and leave.”

  The worst possible thing happened. The maitre d’ approached them stiffly and showed his teeth, beginning the Speech of Greeting which always destroyed the last of Paul’s appetite, through all its variations in all the various accents he had heard attempt it. The maitre d’ extended the good wishes of the owner, and hoped that if anything were needed Mr. Wright would not hesitate to ask: It was the sole desire of the owner that they both enjoy this evening’s meal.

  Paul was relieved that no bribe of food or cash had been even hinted at. He responded that he was sure they would both enjoy their dinners, emphasizing the word both, so the staff might believe that an act of seduction was underway, not simply another column in the daily.

  Paul ordered the mista of chicken livers and hearts, knowing that any restaurant with such an odd dish must be proud of it. He encouraged Lise to sample the veal, promising that if she didn’t like it he would drop by Colonel Sanders’ on the way home.

  The dinner was excellent. Lise’s veal was in a caper sauce, with a delightful flavor more intense than the usual lemon sauce that was so common. The capers were surprisingly attractive, friendly pealike shapes, but not as wrinkled as peas, and smaller. Paul’s dish was delicious. It was hard to disguise the anatomy-lesson air of such a dish; he counted twelve hearts, and knew that they represented twelve separate lives. He acknowledged the presence of the livers, but it was the sauce that delighted him. It was a red wine sauce, and a demiglaze of beef had been added just before serving. He recognized the method as he tasted the first spoonful, and his admiration for the chef grew until he wanted to dash into the kitchen and shake his hand.

  “Ordinarily,” he said, “I visit a place two or three times before I review it, but I think I’ll write this one up tonight.”

  “Maybe they knew you were coming.”

  “No one knew. Not even you. I am very careful not to mention any of my plans.”

  “Like a spy.”

  “Actually, this job is very much like being a spy. A detective, at least. I remember—or try to remember—to be fair, always. To weigh everything carefully. Not to trust other people’s opinions. To ignore reputation and hearsay. To have no opinion until I have seen and tasted. What do you think of the wine?”

  “It’s having trouble standing up to all these flavors.”

  Paul was pleased that they shared the same opinion. “Exactly what I think. Although I sometimes think that the Italian philosophy about wine with food is that it doesn’t harmonize with the food so much as fit in with it. A chardonnay wants to bracket a food, wrap it in flavor, highs and lows, like a quartet. An Italian white, although thinnish by comparison, simply serves the food, on a plate, so to speak.”

  He nibbled at a pine nut tart, and tasted Lise’s kiwi fruit tart, bypassing the mousse which he knew was made by a shop in Oakland that serviced six restaurants with excellent but indigestible chocolate desserts. The espresso was brought to the table in a stovetop espresso maker, a homey touch that didn’t fit the pretensions of the restaurant, but Paul was expansive and forgiving and when the owner arrived, smoothing back his hair, gripping Paul’s hand like an arm wrestler, Paul could tell him truthfully that his restaurant was a success.

  The man nearly wept. “Was the veal to your satisfaction?”

  “Quite.”

  “The mista? The salads?”

  He had been given an order-by-order breakdown of the meal, no doubt wincing at little uncertainties. Paul reassured him. “Everything was excellent.”

  5

  Aunt Mary lived in a handsome brick fortress in Pacific Heights. The mortar between bricks was a brilliant mossy green, and a cupid turned to one side on a small fountain to share a joke with someone invisible. Water danced above the simpering, muscular infant, joining the rain as it fell over the stout legs. Paul used his own fist, rather than the knocker, and hurt his knuckles.

  Aunt Mary herself answered the door, although Paul had expected a tall, male servant. She squeezed his hand in greeting, and Paul realized how much he had always liked her.

  He followed her into a library, a room he had not seen since his boyhood. Fire curled around a log the size of a man’s torso in the fireplace, and the room was lined with what Paul supposed must be expensive books. Leather, some of it with a patina of age, some of it newish, and Paul could not guess where they still made books of that quality. Obviously chosen for their looks, rather than their contents, Paul guessed. His hand went out and selected a volume that looked especially weathered. It was in Latin, and the old pages turned with a crisp sound.

  “P. Ovidii Nasonis,” he read silently. “Metamorphoseon.” He closed the book as one closing the door to a temple. He turned and realized he had neglected his aunt, who waited patiently by the fire.

  “I’m sorry. All these books—”

  “You found the Ovid. It was one of your Uncle Phil’s favorites. He translated parts of it, in an amateurish sort of way. He especially liked the part where Daphne turns into a laurel. He had a theory, and I agree with him, that transformations are inherently more fascinating to human beings than static entities. That we like dawn and sunset not simply because they are attractive to behold, but because they are thresholds.”

  Paul absorbed this, and accepted a glass of brandy. The liquor danced with the light from the fire, and Paul did not want to taste it, it was so beautiful. His aunt spoke about her late husband’s love for books, his fondness for music, and Paul understood why he had seen so little of his aunt and uncle. Their lives had been complete, and Paul was not highbrow, or even interesting.

  He thought this without malice. He was fond of his aunt, and enjoyed the sound of her voice. There was something in her tone, however, that told him that she was not at peace. There was something wrong, and he waited.

  She stopped, abruptly, as if coming to the end of a chapter. When she began again her voice was deeper, softer but more intense. “I need your help, Paul. Phil would have been able to advise me, but I am alone now. It’s a family matter—or at least I want it to remain that way. I have some modest standing socially, and I don’t want a scandal. Don’t misunderstand. I don’t fear scandal, but I would rather avoid it.”

  Paul smiled, mystified.

  “Len has disappeared.” His aunt looked away, overcome for a moment. When she could speak her voice was even quieter. “He rented a little cottage up in the wine country somewhere. I don’t know where, exactly. And I haven’t heard from him for two months. He was always very good about phoning once a week; we have always been a very close family. I have made a few inquiries through friends, but no one has seen him. And I would very much appreciate it if you would …” Her voice faded. “Please go up and see if you can find him, Paul. I’m afraid something terrible has happened.”

  “Have you called the police? Or the sheriff? Whoever it is up there.”

  “Len is such a private person he would die if
a sheriff poked his head into his studio. He would never forgive me. Besides, you know how newspapers are. One word of Len being missing and the Chronicle would have it on page one. Not that it’s big news, but that’s the Chronicle.”

  Neither of them had touched their drinks. Paul waited for something to be made clear. There was something peculiar in his aunt’s tone, something she was not discussing.

  “I will tell you why I am particularly disturbed. And why I don’t want to have this talked about all over town. Len has always been interested in painting, and photography. He has always been a whimsical young man. Gifted, but a dreamer. And I have encouraged him. If you have a talent, develop it, I have always felt. But lately, in the last year or so, he has developed a new interest. He has developed an interest in what you would have to call spiritualism.”

  Paul’s face betrayed confusion. She added, “Séances. Haunted houses. He became obsessed with the idea of attending meetings in supposedly haunted houses so he could photograph the ghosts. Well, it all sounds farfetched but harmless, but he carried it too far. He began spending nights in cemeteries. He showed me endless roles of film, special settings on the cameras to soak up as much light as possible. Naturally, some odd things showed up on the film.”

  “What sorts of things?”

  “Blurs. Nothing. Just things that you had trouble making sense of.” Her voice was sharp for a moment. “Len thought that every time he picked up a stray cat on his film he was seeing a spirit.”

  She sipped her brandy. “He finally found a place up north somewhere he said was a legitimate ‘place of haunting.’ That’s what he called them. Not ‘haunted houses.’ So he left to inhabit this ‘place of haunting,’ some two months ago. And I have not heard from him since. Of course, he may have sprained an ankle, I tell myself. I should call the sheriff, but I know that he is probably up there with his camera and sound equipment and would be furious with me if some yahoo deputy came clumping along. Len is a very intense person, and I have to respect him, but I can’t sit still any longer.”