By the time Dick Theraway bought it, Miller's Antique Shop already
had an alarming reputation for very strange occurrences and even
stranger people. Dick was the shop's third owner. First there
had been Shannon Miller. He was the unpleasant fellow for whom
the shop was named. He got caught selling forged postage stamps
to bulk mailers. They put him on federal probation.
Julia vonZollen, the forger's niece, took over after that. She was the one who started the ghostly clamor. Mrs. vonZollen was married to the electrical engineer who worked in the Department of Revenue building. They had one son, but he was married, living in Middletown. Mrs. vonZollen didn't really have to work. The shop was more like a hobby than a business, but she earned a few hundred dollars a week and had time to sell (and buy) on Internet auctions. Julia kept the Miller name for her shop. It was on the main street in Highspire, not far from where, during the nineteenth century, barges had been built for the Union Canal that followed along the river bank. With such a good location, she spruced up the facade with cherry paint. She added decorations to attract attention. There was always a florid display in the front window, but she wasn't good with organization, so the shop was often more like a warehouse than a store. It was large and she kept it crowded. It certainly wasn't very impressive. Like most semi-pro antique handlers, Julia's interests were random. Mostly, she offered old china, glassware and bric-a-brac. After a while she became interested in prints, especially antique prints of women in stylish clothing that depicted their era. One Saturday in April when she really should have been in the shop making some sales, Mrs. vonZollen found herself walking down Bridge Street. She happened upon a house auction. Auctions, particularly house auctions were always the best place to find inexpensive inventory for her shop. This was a strange auction, indeed. There was only a single bidder standing alone on the front walk. On the porch was only a single auctioneer. He had no staff, clerks or runners. He was holding a small brown paper bag and seemed to be in the process of auctioning it. "What's in the bag?" Mrs. vonZollen shouted as she stepped up onto the walk to join the bidding. "Pictures," the auctioneer replied in a deep cadence. "Valuable pictures." With that unsatisfactory description and without ever displaying the "pictures," the auctioneer proceeded asking for bids. Not really intending to do so, Julia bid on the lot. She offered two dollars. Then the man who'd been there all along bid against her. Mrs. vonZollen didn't really want the pictures. She had no idea what she was bidding on. For no good reason she raised her bid. It was like an uncontrollable compulsion. The bidding went back and forth until the other bidder nodded "yes" to $1000. Mrs. vonZollen shouted "a thousand one!" And the auctioneer announced, "sold!" She no sooner handed her check to the auctioneer and received her little brown bag than it was allover. Nothing else was offered for sale. The other bidder strolled away and the auctioneer climbed into a van reading "Mead Sales House, Very Special Antiques, Cumberland." It was as if the whole auction was for just the one item and just for her benefit. Her check was never cashed which wasn't strange since she'd forgotten to sign it. Alone on the front walk Mrs. vonZollen examined her purchase. It wasn't prints. It wasn't even jewelry, her second most favorite auction find. In the bag were eight daguerreotypes. Each was in a small lidded case. The cases were badly worn, some of the hinges were broken, but the daguerreotypes themselves were in perfect condition, surrounded by little gold frames. Daguerreotype was the very first practical photographic process. A French eccentric, Louis Daguerre, displayed his astonishing first work and published a booklet on how to make photos during the end of 1839. Instantly, daring experimenters all over the world were using Daguerre's technique to produce photos of amazing detail. The daguerreotype process made a very fragile image on a thin sheet of copper. Each picture was unique. There was no negative and no duplicates. Usually several different poses were made on each copper plate before the plate was cut into individual images. The process fell out of use within about twenty or twenty five years. By the time of the Civil War the far cheaper tintypes were popular. For ordinary people, Daguerreotypes were prohibitively expensive. They cost a dollar or more apiece. A sitting with several pictures could easily cost 7 to 10 dollars. That was at a time when, in some areas, an acre of land might cost $10 and a laborer earned half a buck for a ten or twelve hour day of backbreaking toil. As a result, daguerreotypes were limited to the more affluent classes of society. Each picture was treasured as a valuable family heirloom, but the images were so fragile that the merest brush with a finger would ruin the surface. And they faded in sunlight. The pictures Mrs. vonZollen had bought had been made about 1860. They were worth at least four times what she'd paid, but she still felt disappointed, almost cheated. She felt uncomfortable about the whole thing, especially about how unnatural the auction had been. Had the entire episode been contrived just to get her to buy these pictures? Glancing up she realized that two young boys were peeking at her from behind the curtains of the front window. She wanted to ask them about the auction, but nobody would answer the door. When she looked again, the front room of the house was deserted, stripped of everything. Maybe the children had been ghosts. She was destined to see more. It was the photos that started the ghosts, or maybe the photos were the ghosts. At her shop she examined her buy. She didn't get to the shop until after dark. Somehow, she seemed to get confused and lose her way every time she turned a corner. From markings and information found in the bag, Julia figured that all eight of the pictures were from the same family, the Staufens, apparently meat merchants. All the daguerreotypes seemed to have been made in Philadelphia by a photographer named Oliver H. Gilbert. Mrs. vonZollen had heard of the Gilbert family. They had a reputation for eerie seances, mysticism and even witchcraft. During the 1860 one of the Gilbert women was scandalized with a charge that she'd used charms to swindle a large sum of money from a New Jersey politician. A book had been written about the incident. The pictures were unusual for their time. A couple showed women and two others were of children. For many families, neither women or children were considered valuable or important enough to be immortalized with photographs. The largest of the photos showed an elderly couple, probably the great-grandparents. It seems to have been made about 1856 meaning that the couple had been born during the 1700s, soon after the Revolutionary War. They sat starkly, sternly, unsmiling almost glaring down through the years into history. Another of the pictures had been made about the same year. It was of Hanna, the great-grandmother. She was posed alone and didn't look happy. Perhaps she was in pain. During the 1850s, a sixty-something year-old woman was likely to suffer from numerous ills. There were three photos of men, likely the grandfather, the father and an uncle. They weren't marked with names. Those pictures had been taken a few years after the first ones, say about 1860 or 1861. Like the others, they were stern. The pictures of the two girl children, a toddler and an eight year-old, were taken about the same time. The older girl was apparently Emma Staufen and the toddler was perhaps named Caroline. She wore a costly diamond pin on her collar and smiled slyly. The last picture was of a good looking teen-age boy about 17. No name was on the case. Chances are he grew up to enter the Civil War. Maybe he lived. Julia estimated that each photos was worth between $500 and $750. They had appreciated in value about 4.5% a year since they'd been made. That's only about as much as the inflation rate. Julia would have to do more research, but she figured she could make a nice profit on the collection. Unsuspecting, she put them away in a desk drawer before going home. Mrs. vonZollen couldn't imagine how they got in, but when she unlocked her shop in the morning, an elderly couple was sitting on the plank-bottom bench opposite the entrance. These were real, flesh and blood people. They weren't ectoplasmic or transparent or spooky. All the same, they were ghosts. They were the same people who were in the large daguerreotype she'd bought the previous day. They were even wearing the same clothes. And the man, who said he was Rudolph Jacob Staufen, was complaining in a loud German accent that he was hungry. He wanted sausage for breakfast, but Mrs. Staufen wasn't paying much attention. To Julia, a hot dog after a hundred and fifty years didn't seem unreasonable. Julia recognized a heavy handed practical joke when she was victimized by one. Before calling the police or her husband, she played along for a while. She questioned the intruders. The old woman said she was Theresa Staufen and that she'd been born in Nassau in Germany. She had a heavy accent, claimed to be part of a noble family and 62 years old. She'd been born in 1794. She complained of arthritis in her hips and asked if Julia had a "powder" to help her. Theresa was obviously fascinated by the china and bric-a-brac around the shop, especially a tureen painted with vegetables. She handled many articles and commented to her husband about them. An intricate old quilt seemed to make her very pleased. When asked, Rudolph, the old man, produced a few coins from a purse he carried in his pocket. A tiny half-dime was dated 1848. The other change had dates from the 1850s. He called his wife "Mrs. Staufen" and insisted that she find some sausage and potatoes for breakfast. He became so insistent that Julia drove the couple down the street to the Sheet's drive-in for hot dogs. Rudolph didn't accept that they were real meat. He was likely right. He satisfied his hunger with a slice of soggy pizza. He'd never had anything like it before, but decided it was pretty good. Mrs. vonZollen was stuck paying the clerk. She bough soup for the old woman and herself. It was way too salty. On their way out, Rudolph picked up an overpriced bag of pretzels. He was distressed that they were hard and there was no mustard. Rudolph mustn't have been easy to live with. The couple didn't seem surprised by the modern world or by technical things. It was as if they'd been in the twenty-first century all along. But then practical jokers wouldn't be surprised by cars and TV. The closest thing to surprise was Theresa Staufen's reaction to some of the wares in the antique shop. She was aghast at the price of a tea service - a year's wages! "Who are you really?" Mrs. vonZollen finally asked when they arrived back at her store. "Are you ghosts or what? It's just a prank, isn't it?" "Wherever you take the picture, you take us," the old woman smiled. "We're no bother, just visiting. Mister Staufen likes the company sometimes. I suppose we're like ghosts or something. It's that Oliver Gilber's doing. He said he'd immortalize us." The old couple returned to their seats on the plank-bottom bench opposite the door. To Julia's irritation, the bearded visitor insisted on puffing a pipe. It had a foul, musty odor like smoldering rug. They chatted between themselves a little, commenting on the shoppers who entered and left. Mrs. Staufen remarking about the high prices and the people's clothes. It was a disgrace. Occasionally they spoke to the customers, saying "hello" or "good bye," or asking after some relative that they shouldn't know existed. Rudolph asked about food a lot. A droopy slice of pizza hadn't satisfied him. He had a ponderous belly. Julia phoned Evan, her husband, the electrical engineer. "I need you to come right over to the shop," she explained. It's very important. Bring the video camera and pickup some food, burgers and fries." It wasn't easy to convince Evan to leave work. Finally she explained that she had what she thought were ghosts sitting on her plank-bottom bench greeting her customers and smoking a filthy rug. She wanted him to see them and expose the practical joke. That kind of explanation would pry loose almost any skeptic. When he got to his wife's shop, Evan was mightily aggravated. Those weren't ghosts. They were just old people resting their bones and playing at being neighborly. He took some video and set the camera on a tripod. It was the first time he's found a use for it. He was belligerent, but tried talking to the man. "Where are you from?" Evan demanded. Rudolph thought the young man was rude and disrespectful. He told him so. German grandfathers are not easily cowed and always demand respect. When Evan wanted him to put out his pipe, Rudolph suggested that Evan's parents had failed to teach him manners. The younger man replied that they were trespassers and frauds. He ordered them to leave at once or he'd call the police. Rudolph scoffed! Police, indeed! Why not the home guard? It would have been a boisterous argument, but the women intervened. "We're from 1856," Theresa explained as if that made it all clear. "We're only visiting, making a friendly call. I can see we aren't welcome. We'll just leave." Julia jumped in insisting that they were welcome. She offered to show Mrs. Staufen some antique jewelry. The German grandfather was much less sensitive than his wife. "Is that food?" he asked indicating the bags Evan had brought. "Are you too rude to feed a guest?" Without much satisfaction, Rudloph consumed a greasy burger, but there wasn't any beer. He passed on the fries. He wasn't convinced they were really potatoes. While the man fed himself, Evan took more video. When he looked away, the old man had vanished. Mrs. Staufen evaporated, too. The vonZollens didn't see them leave on hear the entrance bell. The video recording showed Rudolph belch, rub his belly and melt away. The vonZollens were satisfied that the whole business was an elaborate prank. They had a daguerreotype, but maybe it was a forgery or a fake...maybe not. It may have been made just to trick them. Why would anybody go to such extremes to pull a stunt? They watched the video recording several times. There was nothing unusual except for Rudolph Staufen, or whoever he was, doing a slow dissolve like a clumsy 1950s movie effect. Wherever he went, he took a half-empty coffee cup with him. The vonZollens decided to install a video surveillance system. If pranksters came back, they'd have a record. It would also deter burglars and shoplifters. Evan figured that their insurance rates would come down. Julia didn't know if she liked the idea of being watched all day long. She though it was good that they could see the shop on the Internet while they were at home. The thing was that a video eye was so much like a peeping tom that it made her uncomfortable. Nothing more happened until well into May. Frankly, Julia was disappointed. She liked antiques, even antique people. There was something intriguing, not at all frightening, about the old Staufen couple. She really hoped they'd return. Next time, she'd be more friendly. She even brought in microwave so she could heat something for the always famished Mr. Staufen. Just before closing time on a Wednesday afternoon, Julia heard a high-pitched child-like voice. There, under her desk was the toddler from one of the daguerreotypes. The little girl was dress just as she was in the picture, diamond pin, high button boots and all. There was nothing vaporous or ghostly about her. She was as real as flesh. Nonetheless, Julia knew she was a ghost. The child was playing with a doll she'd taken from Julia's inventory. Girl and doll were having a tea party using valuable china cups borrowed from a nearby display. The child was talking to the doll and making strange blowing sounds. "What are you doing," Mrs. vonZollen asked trying not to startle the tot. "We're learning how to whistle," the child replied boldly. "The baby can't do it. Girls aren't supposed to whistle, but I think it's fun. My papa lets me whistle if I want to." "Is he with you?" Julia asked, "him or your mother?" While talking, she got out her cell and phoned her husband. She wanted him and the video again. It wasn't easy to talk him into coming. The fact that it was a child this time instead of the cantankerous white-bearded grouch, finally convinced him. "Nobody came with me," the girl said almost wistfully. "It's okay. You're my company. We just came to play." Retrieving a half-eaten bag of stale Oreos from a desk drawer, Julia offered one to the child. The crumbs made a mess down the front of the girl's brocaded bodice. "You're Caroline, aren't you?" Mrs. vonZollen asked remembering the name on the old photo. Between loud munches, the child shook her head no. "That's silly!" she said. "There's no Caroline. My name is Gretta Staufen. I live on Broad Street. I can count, too." Julia interrupted the recitation of numbers, "but it says Caroline on the picture. Are you sure you're not Caroline? Are you pretending?" "I should know who I am," Gretta answered. "Maybe Caroline is the one who got the picture. I can count." She resumed her recitation. As the three year-old showed off her counting skills a late customer came into the shop. He was a regular who was always shopping for carnival glass. "Who's your little friend, today?" he wanted to know stooping down to look under the desk. Julia made a big mistake. It started a lot of trouble. She told the fellow, "I think she's a ghost named Gretta." "Are you a ghost," the customer asked with a grin at the girl. "You don't look like a ghost to me. That's a pretty dress." Startled, the child wouldn't say a word. As Julia and the customer watched, the child faded and disappeared, Oreo crumbs and all. The customer gasped. "Nice trick," he managed to say before he rushed out. He started spreading the story almost at once. They should have expected the child's reaction. Little girls aren't allowed to talk to strangers, especially not strange men. They might steal her and sell her down the river to New Orleans. New Orleans was so bad that the Lutheran minister mentioned it whenever he visited their house. New Orleans and shameless women, Gretta knew that both were bad. Evan, Julia's husband, wasn't happy that he'd been called away from work. He was particularly annoyed when he found that the ghostly child had run out before he got there. When they studied the shop's new surveillance video, however, he was mystified. In fact, he started to think that maybe there really was something supernatural going on. The recordings showed that the child had been in the shop for some time before Julia discovered her. She sort of appeared near some old clothing hanging in a rear alcove. After amusing herself with disco and sixties fashions, the child found the old rag doll. Cuddling it like an infant, she carried the doll under the desk. It made a cozy little play house. A moment later the toddler was out scavenging tea cups for a party. Julia found her a few minutes later. The vonZollens carefully compared the video to the antique daguerreotype. There could be no doubt. They were the same little girl, though, of course, the video was in color. The child was exactly the same age. If it was some kind of a prank, a three year-old would be expected to change even in only a few months. The vonZollens began to realize that the apparitions were directly connected with the daguerreotypes. They weren't exactly ghosts. They were more like supernatural residents, recorded with the picture, immortalized with the instant of time remembered by the emulsion. In fact, that's pretty much what old lady Theresa had claimed. The specters were somehow part of the picture. Julia could understand it. Looking at old pictures sort of brought them alive. It was as if the sitters and their worlds were conveyed across history. Oliver Gilbert's camera seemed to record not just the appearance of the person, but the person himself. It turned out that ghosts, at least ghost stories were good for business, but they were also annoyingly intrusive. Gradually more and more customers came to Miller's Antique Shop. Some mornings there were two or three people, mostly curious women, waiting to get in. While some bought things, most wanted to talk about the ghost. They'd heard the rumors of the disappearing toddler. Thank goodness, they didn't know about Theresa and her grumpy husband. Julia played down the stories. She tried to deny that there was a ghost in the shop. She didn't exactly lie because they weren't really ghosts, more like "visitors" as she liked to call them. Her strategy didn't succeed. The stories simply ballooned and got wilder. At one point a customer asked her about the ghost of the little girl who'd been murdered in the attic. The only things that could have made it more lurid was if sex were involved. America is obsessed with sex. Now, if the ghost had been raped, that would have brought CNN. About a month later a journalist was around asking questions. She wanted to do a magazine story about the haunting for a Halloween feature. It was while the reporter was actually there taking snapshots and grilling Mrs. vonZollen that Henry Louis made his first appearance. He simply walked up to the journalist saying that he was Henry Louis Staufen. Did she know where the railroad station was? He would have told her about the daguerreotypes and their associate specters, but Julia rushed him away into the storage room. Julia recognized him immediately. He was the teenager who appeared in one of the pictures. He still wore the same ill-fitting suit and vest and a necktie with a hand-me-down onyx pin. He told her his name and insisted that he was 16. He would be 17 soon. His interest was machines, especially steam locomotives. Mrs. vonZollen had nothing to show him. Where could she find a steam engine? She couldn't interest him in the computer or the cell phone. He wanted the thrusting power of gigantic pistons, the screams of billowing vapor and the whirling cogs of a driving locomotive. All very Freudian she thought. Steam engines were his abiding fascination. Julia explained that he had to stay out of sight until the reporter left. Reporters like to make scenes. She would just embarrass him. Teen-age boys dread embarrassment. When told that there was an emergency, the journalist reluctantly allowed herself to be eased out the door. Julia put up her "CLOSED" sign before she hurriedly phoned Evan to come see the new spook. Her husband told her that he was too busy to interrupt his work (as if any state employee is ever really busy. He said he'd come over after quitting time if the boy was still there. In the mean time, she should make sure to keep him on the surveillance cameras and question him to see what she could find out about the Staufens and their era. Once she started him talking, Henry Louis, as he preferred to be called, could hardly be shut up. He boasted that he and his friend, Justus Ward, were going to go to the Titusville oil field. They would make their fortunes selling supplies and meat to the oil men. He assured her hat he did very well in school, could cipher and even read a little Biblical Greek. He lived on Broad Street in Philadelphia and was stronger than any of the other fellows in the neighborhood. It made sense that he was from Philadelphia. It was the center of early American photography. While the art had spread very rapidly and exploded into the popular art form, Philadelphia was where many of the great photographers worked and where most real innovations were made. Mrs. vonZollen gave him a cup of coffee. It was bitter and black. He poured sugar into it until it was nauseatingly sweet and he added the powder that passed for milk. He liked granulated sugar. They didn't have that in Philadelphia in 1860. He didn't like the coffee lightener, though. It reminded him of the saltpeter his father used on meats. While trying to be sophisticated and sip his Styrofoam cup of coffee with Victorian grace, Henry Louis confided that, instead of Titusville, he and Justus might decide to go to the Oregon Territory or state. It had just been admitted to the Union, you know. That was a great place of opportunities for ambitious young men. They might also look for gold in Alaska or Canada. Gold prospecting always held a strong allure. Julia found out that Rudolph, the boy's great grandfather had recently died of a heart attack. His great grandmother hadn't gotten over it. Henry Louis thought it was silly how emotional and weepy women were. He was glad that he only liked steam engines. The young man was visibly unhappy that Julia had no steam engines around to admire. After an hour, he put down the half-drunk coffee and simply vanished. He appeared again from time to time, maybe two or three times a year. Each time it was like the first time. It was always like a new experience. He didn't remember previous visits and didn't recognize Julia or others that he'd met before. He didn't age. He didn't change. It was the same for all others in the daguerreotypes. In turn each one visited, well not the uncle. For some reason he never appeared. From others, Julia learned that his name was Ruffus. He'd quit the family business and wasn't very popular because he liked stage plays. The others each came and went, each spending a few hours visiting the twenty-first century. Each time, the vonZollens learned a little more about them and about the nineteenth century. Julia took the antique daguerreotypes home. They were safer there. She displayed them in a small custom-built case with special protective glass. After that, the visitors appeared at the vonZollen home. Rudolph was always hungry, Gretta always wanted to play with dolls and Emma, the eight year-old child wanted to help in the kitchen. Since Julia didn't do much in the kitchen, the child made cookies on most of her visits. For the others, the vonZollens tried to accommodate and welcome them. Evan even got used to old man Staufen. In fact, as he himself aged, the two became friendly. It was like a visit from a grandpa with Alzheimer's. Each time Rudolph appeared, it was like a new, unique appearance. Evan wondered if, in some far-distant epoch, he would materialize out of some digital vacation snapshot to haunt an as yet unborn antique dealer. Somehow, a dotmatrix Evan seemed unappealing.
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