Home Theatre, page 17
As he made his rounds of the factory, Jack found himself lingering near the places where the hands tended to gather to talk. He obscured himself around corners, in the spaces beneath the flights of stairs, behind stacked crates of products and parts, on the off-chance he might catch a guilty word. Jack recognised his paranoia, but in the absence of any facts other than the voice itself, there was no clear path to the truth. This pleased him, in a way. Uncovering an explanation would have undermined the homely fantasy that had provided him with a contentment greater than any one-night indulgence had been able to offer in a long time. In his heart, Jack didn’t hope to discover the culprit of a hoax amongst the hands. Instead, he hoped to persuade himself that no such culprit existed.
The idea stayed with Jack—most often as he ate his meals alone at home, or during his walks to and from the factory—that the voice really was being transmitted from the future. A future in which men like Jack were free of the repercussions that held them below the waterline of their own time. Was it completely implausible that the device the voice claimed to possess was genuine? Even during Jack’s few decades on earth, new concepts and technologies had radically changed the ways in which people understood and interacted with the fabric of reality. Sir Ernest Rutherford had devised a new type of radio receiver and then split the atom and touched the ghost of matter. Capital Radios was a figure in this march of progress too—manufacturing small marvels, each of them overseen by Jack. Why not say that a machine capable of sending a person, or at least their voice, into the past—into Jack’s present—would eventually, inevitably, arrive?
Whatever the truth, Jack mentioned the voice to nobody. It was another secret he kept locked inside his ribcage, fitted neatly against the other secret he’d kept for half his life.
In response to Merchant’s impatient enquiries late in the week, Jack assured him that the issue would be resolved before customer orders were due to be fulfilled. There was no concern about the quality of the technology or the engineering, and production was all on track. Jack added that he was sure he would find his answers here, in the earthly realm. But by the time Friday evening arrived—a full week and one day since Gregory’s incident—Jack was no closer to resolving the mystery. At shutdown, he again sent his leading hands off to the Open Arms without him. He told them—lying before he even knew he was doing it—that he was determined to reach a firm conclusion. He would at least, he thought, find some way to convince Gregory that his life was not at risk, to encourage the boy back to health.
I think we’re nearly set . . . Don’t worry. You’ll see me again soon, Ash. You’ll hardly notice that I’m gone.
A sudden burst of static fizzed from the radio. The console hadn’t done this before. It was always Jack who, each night, infatuated but exhausted, had turned the volume knob counterclockwise until the console slid into silence. Now, it was the voice that turned away, replaced by that rough and nugatory noise. Jack reached for the tuning knob and sent the needle searching—back and forth, back and forth, back and forth—but the signal was lost. The impassable distance between Jack and that familiar voice grew somehow greater. Jack had the sense of a long and narrow bridge collapsing, of a dream dematerialising. The voice’s sudden withdrawal caused Jack to feel acutely his own incapacity to communicate, to reach out and respond through the radio itself. Of course, he could jury-rig the radio’s speaker to act as a microphone, but there would still be no ability to transmit . . . And who would he be transmitting to? For all the references the voice had made to Jack’s reality—though these had in fact been few compared to the wealth of other, daily matters—in the end, it was just another unreal sound pouring out of the ether. A spectral quavering of pitch and volume, machine parts and air resonating, mimicking life. In truth, it was a dead voice, like any other that spilled from the radio, even if a living human being was at its source.
Jack sat gazing at the carved details of the radio’s cabinetry, at the shapes inside the orchestra pit positioned beneath the rise of the stage, in which slits of grill cloth concealed the twin speakers. At the stage’s broad arch, bordered along its top and sides with folds of gathering drapes. At the bright emerald frequency band, embedded and backlit behind glass, hovering above all like a divine catwalk. No human figures occupied the stage, though Jack had imagined people moving in the wood’s flowing grain.
Jack shifted his gaze and peered with his mind’s eye beyond the console’s ornate exterior. He envisaged the guts of the machine. Not the internal components as he knew them to be, but as the men and women of the factory perhaps imagined they had become—and perhaps as they really were. He saw clouds of a sickly green smoke veined with bolts of orange lightning. He saw a small demon perched on a stool the same as his. The demon’s fiery, double-horned face stared at Jack from the space beyond the portal of the carved stage. Its leathery, ophidian lips, from which had surely spilled the words that held Jack captive, were now pursed in a smirk behind a bulbous microphone.
Jack switched the radio off. The static ceased and the emerald backlight of the frequency band dimmed and went out. In his mind, he replayed the radio’s last words: You’ll hardly notice that I’m gone. Jack stood and tugged the chain that controlled the room’s bare bulb. The light slowly burned down, and as darkness filled the room, the abstracted shapes of the shelves stacked with Peter’s traded radios—mostly kitchen-table receivers—reminded Jack of the irregular stones of a castle’s walls.
Then, his eyesight adjusting, Jack noticed against the rigid pattern of the rear shelves the organic silhouette of a man.
‘Is someone there?’ that dark form said.
Jack moaned and sat heavily on the stool as the last threads of light vanished from his sight, and he toppled backwards.
The sound of the radio played in Jack’s ear. You’re all right, you’re all right. I didn’t mean to scare you. I didn’t mean for this to happen at all. Jack felt a radiant warmth against his face and neck. A comforting embrace around his chest. Amber light shone brightly in the few patches where his vision wasn’t obscured. He was being lifted, propped to sit upright against the door. The embrace loosened and, as the warm body withdrew, light again filled Jack’s eyes. A man was sitting before him.
‘It’s chilly in here. Are you cold?’ the man said, his voice a perfect match to the one from the radio.
Jack nodded and the man looked around. He saw the sheet on the ground that Peter had used to cover the console, and then he eyed the shelves. He rose, picked up another sheet from a small stack, unfolded it and wrapped it around Jack. It was enough to slow Jack’s shivering.
The man sat down. ‘How’s the head?’
‘You’re not the demon I was beginning to imagine,’ Jack said.
‘A demon? No, I’m just an ordinary man.’
‘An ordinary man can’t do what you’ve done.’ Jack’s head throbbed.
‘I’m not going to hurt you,’ the man said. ‘But we should address this situation.’
‘Yes . . . How did you get in here?’
‘A tricky question.’
Jack noticed a long scar running at an angle down the man’s forearm. He wondered at it, but did not feel threatened. There was something detached but sympathetic about him, like a houselight burning in a distant window.
‘Are we the only ones here?’ the man asked.
‘Yes.’
The man stood and, keeping an eye on Jack, checked the room, poking into the corners, cocking his ear for sounds. He had something fitted against his back, strapped across one shoulder. It was cylindrical with a taper at the top, made of polished metal.
‘What year is this?’ the man said. ‘I don’t see a newspaper or calendar handy.’
‘The year?’ The fog in Jack’s head was clearing, though the throbbing maintained a slow beat. ‘1939.’
‘Great. Thank you.’
‘I recognise your voice,’ Jack said, as the man sat down again.
‘Sorry?’
‘You were on the radio.’
The man ran his eyes along the shelves, and Jack pointed at the prototype. The man briefly looked back at the Home Theatre console.
‘It’s a beaut,’ the man said. ‘You’re going to make a killing out of those.’
‘A killing?’ Jack noted the alarm in his own voice.
‘A fortune, I mean. You heard me speaking through that?’
‘A few things.’
‘What things?’
Jack considered everything he had heard and the one thing he hadn’t. ‘You spoke of Gregory’s death.’
‘Gregory.’ The man paused. ‘He’s a young guy, working here in the factory?’
Jack said nothing.
‘Last name of Ford, is that right?’
‘Yes.’ Perhaps this man knew everything already. At least, there seemed to be little point in maintaining denials. ‘You scared him terribly. He’s been off work the whole week since.’
‘I haven’t been feeling too good myself. Do you know if anybody else heard me saying things—over the radio?’
‘A handful of people, only regarding Gregory.’
The man stared down at Jack. ‘Uh-huh.’
‘I shut the radio away in here afterwards. There’s another console, but it’s not wired.’
‘It’s only yourself who’s been listening, otherwise?’
‘People thought you were a phantom of some kind.’
‘Is that so? Maybe we should let them keep thinking as much.’ The man pivoted around on the stool, his back to Jack. He ran a hand over the console’s top, then across the shaped details on the front of the cabinetry. ‘It’s a nice piece of craftwork. Curious that you heard me through it.’ He turned to face Jack again. ‘Sorry. I haven’t introduced myself—I’m Dylan.’
The man named Dylan reached out an open hand. Jack looked from his hand to his face. His features were kind, handsome. They bore the complex signatures of a mixed heritage. Yet, the bright green of the man’s eyes reminded Jack of Dot—and of Gregory.
Jack brought his hand up to shake Dylan’s. ‘Jack.’
‘What do you do here in the radio factory, Jack?’
‘I’m the foreman.’
‘A responsible position. You keep the place ticking over pretty well?’
‘If the workers are happy, the work gets done.’
‘Gregory’s a good worker?’
‘Yes.’
‘You take good care of him?’
‘He’ll always have a place in the factory.’
‘You know, I don’t think I said Gregory would die.’
Jack paused. ‘People heard you.’
‘I’m sure they heard something.’
‘They heard you speak of a dreadful incident—and a haunting. My workers aren’t liars. Gregory’s not a liar.’
‘Misunderstandings happen more readily than they should . . . There was only a story I knew, about an encounter Gregory had with a ghost. Though I’m not superstitious myself.’
Jack and the man regarded one another.
Then the man smiled, and Jack said, ‘You’ve really come from the future?’
‘Did I say that?’
Jack shook his head. ‘Not knowingly.’
‘Hm.’
‘Are there others who can—who can travel . . .’
‘It’s not like a taxi service, sorry.’ He tapped his wrists. ‘I have special technology inside me, in my blood. Your body has to be a part of the taxi, you see?’
The man unslung the object from around his shoulder. An ethereal blue light shone at the cylinder’s base.
‘It’s been on the blink. I’d say, from the sounds of things, that there’s been a causal loop.’ The man gave the cylinder a tap with his finger. ‘To prevent further leakages through time, I’ll try to stop things up at my end. But as a bit of insurance, if you could do something about that radio, I’d rest much easier . . . Look, you can’t breathe a word about any of this, okay? What you’ve heard over the radio, our time together tonight. I’m going to ignore the usual protocols here—they’re unpleasant. Instead, I’d rather have you on my side, helping keep Gregory safe.’
‘I hope to.’
The man frowned. ‘Sorry, I have to check this with you,’ he said. ‘I have to make sure. Did you hear anything else broadcast over that radio? I appreciate your honesty.’
‘Nothing much,’ Jack said, and a flush of shame kept him quiet a few moments. ‘Just you talking with someone, going about your business. In your home, I think. I couldn’t hear the other person.’
As Jack spoke, the man didn’t take his eyes off him. Then his features relaxed into a more open expression, a look of understanding.
‘You tuned in regularly to that?’ he said. ‘To my home life?’
Jack nodded. He glanced again at the scar running pinkly along the man’s forearm.
‘Hm. Uh-huh,’ the man said, as if deciding something. ‘Ashton is the other bloke’s name. He’s a good man. Saved my skin more than once.’
‘I gathered you care a great deal for each other. I found it interesting, and I . . . I liked hearing it. I wished I could talk back.’
‘We do care, rather a lot . . . It really meant something to you, hearing that?’
‘It did.’
‘I’ll be honest, the future’s not all roses. But I think I can see why you might want to escape the present. I can’t do that for you, and you absolutely must alter or—preferably—destroy this radio . . .’ The man pressed a thoughtful finger to his lips. ‘But if you feel like you want to connect again, try writing me a letter. Address it to Dylan—Dear Dylan—nothing tricky. Then store the letters somewhere safe and, when you feel ready, seal them in a box and bury it . . . maybe in the south-east corner of the factory grounds? I’ll dig the box up when I get back, in the future, and I’ll read everything you’ve put down. I’ll read every word. Okay?’
Words flowing in one direction. Letters with no hope of a reply. Yet it was something, Jack reasoned. It was a chance for guiltless confession. A chance for true expression, a chance to be his real self. Would it not in fact be a new way of being, however slight, within a different kind of world, however remote in time? And although Jack and his audience would remain separated by that dark valley of time, hadn’t they already been rescued from the fate of abstraction, from remaining always obscured behind the mask of the radio waves, of words inked upon a page? I will know his face, Jack thought, and he will know mine. He will hear me and see me, and he will know me.
‘I will,’ Jack said. ‘Thank you.’
‘Good. I look forward to reading them, to learning about a new friend, if I can say that. Now’—Dylan smiled at Jack again—‘how about we chalk it up to a prank? Rather than a ghost, let people think it was all a put-on. Teenagers causing trouble. Steer away from any frightful notions, and restore Gregory’s confidence.’
‘You have a strong interest in Gregory’s wellbeing.’
‘We share a family lineage—he’s several great-greats removed, but the connection’s clear. It’s important to me that he stays fit, healthy and alive.’
A stillness fell over them, and Jack felt a familiar melancholy stir in his chest. He’d said goodbye to enough people who he’d wanted to remain close to but never could. Having made it here safely once, might not this man, Dylan, manage it again?
A faint scratching penetrated the silence, coming from just beyond the storage room.
Both men stiffened.
Then Jack shuffled around to peer through a narrow gap between two boards of the door. The splinters of light that escaped the room were not enough to dispel the dark. He stood and gathered his sheet about him, but already Dylan had tugged the slender chain for the overhead bulb. As the light faded, Dylan retreated carefully past the console to the rear of the room. Jack felt for the door and eased it open. Still draped in his sheet, he stumbled out into the corridor, groaning as he tripped over the box of chains, spilling them in a dull rattle across the floor.
There came more scratching from nearby.
‘Who is it?’ Jack said.
Something tugged on the edge of Jack’s sheet where it trailed behind him. He turned and saw dimly against the pale fabric the figure of a large rat scurrying away.
Jack sighed and returned to the storage room. ‘It was nothing,’ he announced into that darkened space. ‘Nothing at all.’ But there was no reply and Jack knew that he was already alone.
Being Neighbourly
I
PICK UP YOUR DOG POOP + 16 other top posts
Desperately seeking a handy person + 17 other top posts
Visiting black kitty – does it have a home? + 14 other top posts
Dubious characters lurking about + 10 other top posts
Adopt a streetlight! + 9 other top posts
Residential parking at an absolute premium + 12 other top posts
Physics Tutor needed + 19 other top posts
SERVICE UPDATE: What’s hot in your area?
II
Boxer dog missing, answers to Rudolf + 11 other top posts
How to get mould off curtains + 13 other top posts
Cat burglar caught ‘red pawed’ with woolly items + 8 other top posts
STOLEN Sony 250GB HDD/DVD & Sony 32" LED Smart TV + 12 other top posts
Community planting day this weekend! + 10 other top posts
Non-residents parking in residential parks + 12 other top posts
Hit and Run – all witnesses sought + 17 other top posts
SERVICE UPDATE: Your neighbours are talking.
III
Return of Rudolf on owner’s assurance to PICK UP POOP + 14 other top posts
On the scrounge for a fridge and oven + 19 other top posts
