The Hidden Memory of Objects

by Danielle Mages Amato

  Who are you, anyway? I asked him silently. A cardboard cutout of elementary-school patriotism? Destroyer of the American nation, a villain to be stopped at any cost? A great man? Or just the excuse for a million-dollar industry of artifacts and textbooks and cheap souvenirs?

  It depended on who was telling the story.

  As if to drive that fact home, a few feet away from Lincoln’s statue, I watched a video about his friendship with Frederick Douglass, the former slave who had fought hard for emancipation. Despite the respect he had for Lincoln, after Lincoln’s death, Douglass still said, “You, my white fellow citizens . . . are the children of Abraham Lincoln. We are at best only his stepchildren.”

  I checked my watch and walked over to the derringer. The entire wall where the gun was mounted was covered with an enlargement of a famous drawing of Lincoln’s assassination. Booth stood behind Lincoln’s chair. In one hand, he held a wicked-looking knife; in the other, the gun, which was still smoking. His heavy eyebrows met evilly in the middle, and his mustache formed a dark frown above his mouth. He looked like a sinister, comic-book version of the man I had seen in my vision. Lincoln sat in front of him, his expression slightly surprised, as though he had only just realized he’d been shot and was becoming mildly alarmed about it.

  “They say that, actually, he was laughing.” I turned to see Dr. Brightman, wearing his sunglasses, his gloved hands clasped in front of him. “The play he was watching the night he was assassinated—it was a comedy.” He came and stood beside me. “But then, you saw that when we touched the fragment of Clara Harris’s dress.”

  Clara was there in the drawing too, her face like a doll’s, pretty and puzzled. No screaming. No blood. At least, not yet.

  Eric’s face flashed into my mind. “So what’s your origin story?” I asked. “I mean, how did you figure out that you could do . . . whatever it is we do?”

  Dr. Brightman didn’t answer. He simply stared at the derringer, floating in its transparent box. “My wife and son,” he said at last. “They were killed. In an automobile accident. Three years ago.”

  I nodded, afraid to interrupt him.

  “After the accident, I avoided everything that reminded me of them. I thought that would make it easier. But one day, I found myself in my son’s room. I picked up a stuffed giraffe. My son’s favorite; he used to carry it everywhere.” His bitter smile made me shiver. “And I tore it to pieces. Eviscerated it. And then there he was, standing next to me. I found that the more I touched his things, the more I got to see him. As he used to be. I began to see my wife, as well.”

  “Was it . . . terrifying?”

  “At first it was a joy. And then it became a curse.” He leaned against the wall beside the derringer. Booth’s face loomed behind him, frightening in its intensity. “I lived for the moments when I got to see them again. But before long, I started to wonder what was worse. Never seeing them again . . . or being forced to see them every single day—but never holding them. Never talking to them. And never knowing when it would stop.”

  I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “Did you understand what was happening?”

  He shook his head. “I thought I was losing my mind. But then I went back to work, and some of the Lincoln artifacts had the same effect. The more violent the history of the object, the stronger my response. The bloodiest objects, the ones associated with the assassination, they produced the most pain. But they also, I guess you could say, blinded me temporarily. For a little while, after I touched them, I didn’t see any visions. I loved my wife and son, but to be honest, not seeing them was a relief. If I could take a little bit of pain, I could have a little bit of peace.”

  I stared at him, transfixed. “Then what happened?”

  He reached up with one gloved finger to tap the sunglasses he wore. “It backfired. Instead of staying blind, I started seeing more. And more. And more.”

  “You said you’d met others . . . like us. That didn’t happen to them?”

  He shook his head, his smile knife edged. “I don’t think so. But then, I don’t believe they were handling blood artifacts on a regular basis.”

  “What do those glasses do, exactly?”

  He took them off, and it was both comforting and uncomfortable to meet his gaze. He held them out so I could take a closer look. “They’re something I had built for myself. The camera feeds directly to the screen in the glasses. They’re like virtual reality goggles, but I’m seeing what’s around me, in real time. I find that if I’m not looking at an object directly, I don’t get a vision from it.”

  “Do you have to wear them all the time?”

  He settled them back onto his face. “It gets a little inconvenient to see the history of almost every object that you touch. Every door handle. Every pen. Every chair in every office.”

  “But you wear gloves,” I said.

  “They worked for a little while. But soon they weren’t enough. Especially for the strongest memories. Before I had these glasses made, I stumbled across other people’s terrible memories everywhere I went: in the Metro, at the grocery store, on the street. The only way to prevent it was to walk around with my eyes closed. Not exactly conducive to leading a normal life, or to keeping my job at the Smithsonian. Which I lost rather quickly.” He shrugged, his expression harsh. “It’s a cruel punishment in many ways. But no worse than I deserve. You see, that night my family was killed? I was the one driving the car.”

  With his sunglasses on, Dr. Brightman was almost impossible to read. His description sounded agonizing, but his face was blank. “What about . . . people? I mean, do you get visions when you touch people?”

  “No,” he said. “But then, I’ve had very little occasion to test that theory.”

  My heart twisted sympathetically in my chest, but still, his expression betrayed nothing.

  He stepped closer to the derringer, suspended in its almost invisible case. “Now this”—he gestured to the gun—“is my Holy Grail. The ultimate blood artifact. I always believed that if I touched this derringer, the memories it holds would be strong enough to turn off my visions for good.” He turned toward me. “That is, if I survived the experience.”

  “Why the derringer? Aren’t there bloodier artifacts out there?”

  Dr. Brightman tapped a finger on the plexiglass. “This gun is as important as any object in American history,” he said. “It drove North and South further apart, fueled the terrors of Radical Reconstruction, and turned Lincoln into an American martyr.” He smiled. “But you’re right, there are bloodier artifacts in this city. Trust me, I’ve handled a lot of them. This one, though”—he rested a hand on the case—“is personal. It didn’t just shape a nation. It shaped me. All my research, my whole life’s work, has centered around Booth, this gun, and the one bullet that it fired.”

  I examined the derringer with fresh eyes, mentally comparing it to the photographs I’d seen in Dr. Brightman’s book. I walked around the side of the clear box so I could look down the barrel of the gun.

  I was so absorbed in my study that I jumped a foot when I heard a woman’s voice call out behind us. “Megan Brown?”

  Genevieve Herndon strode toward us across the exhibit floor. Her forehead creased with suspicion as she looked back and forth between me and Dr. Brightman.

  I’d been caught.

  “What a surprise to find you here today, Megan. Don’t you have school?” Mrs. Herndon’s eyes grew cold as she addressed Dr. Brightman. “David.”

  Dr. Brightman’s voice was smooth and sharp. “Always a pleasure, Genevieve.”

  Mrs. Herndon smiled at him without warmth, then turned to me. “Megan, may I speak with you?”

  “Sure,” I said, anxiety creeping up into my chest.

  “I’ll be right here,” Dr. Brightman said as I followed Mrs. Herndon’s retreating back.

  She paused beside a re-creation of war-torn Richmond and rubbed at a muscle in her neck. Something in her posture reminded me of Emma smoking outside scho
ol, the line of her arm curving up and away from her body. “I know this might sound strange, coming from someone you hardly know,” she said. “But I value your mother very much, and I know what she’s been through. And I hope someone would do the same thing for my child.” She paused and looked me in the eye. “Stay away from that man.”

  My thoughts stumbled to a halt. “What?”

  “He’s been a colleague of mine for years.” Her lips narrowed to a thin line. “There was even a time when I considered him a friend. Both him and his wife. But . . .” She paused, thinking before she spoke. “He’s changed. There’s a darkness about him.” She shook her head impatiently. “Of course, I work at an assassination site, so I’m okay with a little darkness. But sometimes . . . people get stuck there. They’re happy to live in the darkness.”

  Her sticky-sweet concern sent a bolt of spite straight through me. “Bad things happen. The darkness is real. Maybe we can’t all brush it off so easily.”

  She reached out to me, her face full of pity, but I stepped away. “All right, then.” She curled her hand back into her chest. “You’re not . . . spending time with him, are you?” Her head tilted, and I could tell from her expression that she was worried about more than just my mental health.

  “No,” I said roughly. “We’re just talking. Okay?”

  Before she could answer, I turned my back on her and returned to Dr. Brightman. My body hummed with resentment, and I couldn’t stand to be cooped up in this museum another second. “You wanted to meet with me about something. Whatever that is, can we talk about it somewhere else?

  “Yes. I have a car outside.”

  “I’ll meet you there.” I forced myself to smile at Mrs. Herndon as I walked past her and out of the museum.

  On Tenth Street, Dr. Brightman made a phone call, and his car pulled up in front of the theater. It came with an actual driver, who opened the back door for us. His suit must have been custom-made; it fit his heavily muscled arms and shoulders to perfection. Thick black tattoos, barely visible against his dark skin, curled down his neck and disappeared under the collar of his shirt. He gave me a friendly wink as I got into the car. Dr. Brightman handed him a piece of paper, and he entered an address into an old-school GPS system mounted on the dashboard.

  “Are we going to look at an artifact?” I asked.

  “Yes. An extremely unusual one.”

  “Is it, like, murder-a-blah-blah?”

  “Murderabilia?” He smiled. “Oh, I sincerely hope so.”

  Well, crapdogs, I thought. Maybe Emma’s mom was right. “Isn’t that a little . . . dark? Don’t you ever want to focus on the good stuff?”

  “Which do you think sounds more profitable?” he asked. “The exhibit of artifacts from the Crime Museum, just blocks from here, where the morbid multitudes can visit serial killer Ted Bundy’s death car? Or your hypothetical National Museum of Good Stuff?”

  I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. “Where exactly are we going?”

  “A self-storage facility in Bladensburg, Maryland.” He saw the look on my face and chuckled. “Don’t worry.” He gestured to the driver. “I always bring Mr. Wendell along. Just in case.”

  In case of what? I thought, but did not say.

  Instead, I stared out the window for a while, watching the homes and businesses blur past, before I spoke again. “You’re a historian and everything, right? It might be a strange request, to touch the gun that shot Abraham Lincoln. But couldn’t you arrange it?”

  Dr. Brightman snorted. “You may have noticed that Genevieve Herndon is not my biggest fan. And to touch it without gloves?” He shook his head. “Almost impossible. But I’ll find a way.”

  I thought back to the gun, unable to let go of something that had been nagging at me. “It looks different.”

  “Different from what?”

  “Different from the photos in your book.” I reached into my bag and produced Tyler’s copy of Disasters in the Sun, flipping through it until I found the page I wanted. “Look. It’s really clear in this picture from the 1950s. The pattern of wood grain on the handle—it’s not quite the same.”

  Dr. Brightman squinted at the photograph. “I’m sorry to burst your bubble, but the FBI’s best scientists authenticated that gun, back in the late nineties. Any changes you see are the result of restoration.”

  “Why would the FBI do that? Authenticate the gun?”

  He sighed. “Because of a hoax. A man came forward and said he had stolen the original derringer, way back in the sixties. The park service was so concerned about the rumor that they took the derringer to the FBI, who tested it and declared that it was genuine.”

  “Restoration. Huh.” I closed the book. “I guess I thought artifacts like that were sacred. That you couldn’t fix them up, or whatever. It seems wrong.”

  We pulled into the driveway of a run-down self-storage facility not far from the Maryland state line. A man stood in front of an open unit toward the back of the property, waiting for us: a white guy in a worn plaid shirt and baggy sweatpants. His gray hair was muddled with brown, and it fell in greasy waves, as though he hadn’t taken a shower that morning. Or the morning before that.

  “You were so eager to meet today,” Dr. Brightman said. “We’re lucky our friend here was available on short notice.”

  “What do you need me to do again?” I asked.

  “When I touch an artifact like that, I can’t see anything specific. Nothing but pain and white light. I’m too sensitive.” He tapped his glasses. “I’m hoping you can get more detail than I can.”

  “You know, I haven’t seen any memories for days. Maybe it won’t work.”

  “I guess we’ll find out,” Dr. Brightman said as Mr. Wendell opened the car door.

  “You the authenticator guy?” asked the man.

  “I am indeed.”

  “Who’s that?” He nodded at me. I stepped closer to Mr. Wendell.

  “My assistant,” said Dr. Brightman. “I understand you have something for me?”

  The man walked into the storage unit and came out with a shoe box. He set it on the trunk of Dr. Brightman’s car, then opened it and reached inside. “Guy wrote a lot of letters. And drew some pictures, if you like that kind of thing. But the real jewel is this little baby.” He pulled out a deck of cards, held together with a disintegrating rubber band. He removed the band, set the deck down on the trunk, and fanned out the cards.

  I let out a soft hum. “Tarot cards.” The multicolored images of the traditional tarot deck stared back at me: a blindfolded woman with two crossed swords, a man walking off a cliff, the devil. Many of the cards had writing on them, blue ink in the white areas around the pictures. I looked at Dr. Brightman, puzzled.

  “Well,” he said, “go ahead.”

  I felt cold all over, looking at those cards. I had no idea what secrets they would hold. With great reluctance, I reached out one hand, laying it flat across as many cards as I could touch.

  With a deafening squeal, a blue sedan spun into the parking lot, the sun flashing off its windshield and into my eyes, dazzling them. The barrel of a gun peeked through the open driver’s window. I cried out and ducked my head, covering it with both arms, as a gunshot rang out.

  With a sickening thump, a man fell to the ground at my feet.

  At first I thought it was the owner of the tarot cards, but this man was younger, with a dark mustache—and blood pouring from a wound in his stomach.

  I screamed and screamed and screamed, curling into a ball, trying to make myself as small as possible.

  “Miss Brown. Miss Brown!” Dr. Brightman shook my shoulder gently. “You’re all right. Calm down.”

  Both men stood above me, unharmed. The simple act of tilting my head sent pain through my jaw and into my neck, and I winced, grabbing my head with both hands.

  “What did you see?” Dr. Brightman prodded.

  “A car . . . a man shooting from his car.” I spun around, looking for the body. “Oh, god, where is
the guy he shot? Is he okay?” The owner of the cards took a few steps backward, staring at me with a damn-shame-that-kid’s-crazy look on his face.

  Dr. Brightman addressed the man, all business. “Your object appears to be genuine. I’ll take it. Mr. Wendell, please handle the final details and put the items in the trunk.” Dr. Brightman helped me to my feet and got me into the backseat of the car. Then he went around to the other side and joined me.

  “What was that?” I rubbed my neck, my head still pounding.

  “A deck of cards that once belonged to the DC sniper, John Allen Muhammad. You may recall—or are you too young?”

  “I heard the stories.” In 2002, Muhammad and seventeen-year-old Lee Boyd Malvo had shot thirteen random people in the DC area with a long-range rifle. Ten of them died.

  “Muhammad left a tarot card behind at more than one of his shootings. Judging from the number of cards in that deck, it’s fortunate they caught him when they did.”

  “And you want to own that?”

  “I do not. But someone else most certainly will.”

  I leaned my head back against the seat, struggling to catch my breath. The sound of my own screams echoed in my ears. I thought of Clara Harris, the blood on her dress, the terror in her eyes. And I heard that bright, ringing laugh—Lincoln’s laugh. No matter what Dr. Brightman said, I wished there was a museum where we could keep that laugh, and not the gun.

  I squinted over at Dr. Brightman. “Whatever happened to Clara Harris?”

  “Ah, Clara.” He sighed and stared out the window for a moment at Mr. Wendell talking with the man in the plaid shirt. “Not a happy story. I do have a theory about her, though—and about the other two who were with Lincoln the night he was assassinated. Would you like to hear it?”

  “Okay,” I said, not entirely sure I did want to hear it.