Phase Shift (3 page)

"Who are the men in the picture?"

Stanley shrugs his shoulders. "I don't know.
The picture was in the box when I found it."

"And you say it was buried in your
backyard?"

"Uh huh," he says. He snorts out a laugh.
"How cool is that?"

Pretty cool, I have to admit, but only to
myself. I force myself to smile and put the picture back into the
box. No doubt about it, this box was buried, and for some time.
Though Stanley did a thorough job during its posthumous clean-up,
the thing is dull and weather-worn, and still smells of damp
earth.

"Who do you think buried it?" I ask, picking
up the turquoise, aluminum coin.

Again he shrugs. "Dunno," he says. "A
previous owner, maybe?"

The coin reads,
Prescott and
Prefect/Canadian National Exhibition 1949
. I read it aloud.

"Sounds like a law firm, you know? Like
those personal injury guys on the tube." He releases another
unselfconscious, snorting guffaw.

My mouth inadvertently forms another of
those thin-lipped smiles. "The previous owners of the property
maybe?"

"Dunno," he says, shrugging again.

My hands drop to the table. The coin feels
almost weightless in them. "What do you know about the history of
your house, Stanley?"

"I know it was the house I was born in," he
offers, proudly. "I think my parents bought it when they got
married."

"Which was when?"

"Fifty-five? Or was it fifty-four?
No...Fifty-five. It was fifty-five...I think."

"And how old is your house?"

"It's a century home, I know that. Built
sometime around the turn of the century." He shifts his position in
the thinly padded bridge chair beneath him. "The turn of the
twentieth century, that is." He snorts again, beaming, as if he has
just told the funniest joke in the world.

I try to look amused by his wit, but then
remember the coin. Grasping it in both hands, I raise it to eye
level. Skin oil often helps to clean away dirt encrusted from
long-buried metallic objects. The best source for oil of this kind
is stored in the folds of the nose, where the outer edge of the
nostril meets the face. I rub the side of my nose with my thumb and
then rub the coin between my oily thumb and forefinger. Not much
else is revealed so I try it again. Still nothing. "And so this box
might have been buried sometime after the date on the coin, but
before when you were born, sometime in the
mid-nineteen-hundreds."

"Nineteen-sixty," he says. I must look
puzzled, because he adds, "That's when I was born: nineteen-sixty,"
as clarification.

"But you don't know the men in the
photo?"

He frowns. "Nope."

"And the names Prescott and Prefect don't
ring any bells with you?"

He continues to frown and begins shaking his
head. "Uh-uh."

"So maybe it was buried between
nineteen-forty-nine and sometime in the nineteen-fifties when your
parents bought the house?"

Stanley shrugs.

"Interesting," I say, sounding more
distracted than interested. I drop the turquoise coin into the box,
pick up the silvered cigarette case, and admire the delicate
filigreed engravings on its exterior by tracing it with my finger.
The workmanship that must have gone into its manufacture...it's a
beautiful thing.

Inside the case is a paper liner the size of
the interior of the case. On the paper is what looks like a map of
the world, although the land masses don't jibe with the atlas in my
mind. There are fewer land masses on the map, and there is a gaping
inlet where California should be. Also, some island chains in the
Pacific seem to be missing. "Interesting," I say once more, this
time with feeling. I raise the open case to my face and breathe
deeply, expecting to smell stale tobacco, but sense dust and damp
earth instead. "Huh," I say. I close the case, return it to the
box, and turn my attention to the garage-door-remote-like
thing.

"Strange," I say in spite of myself. The
object is actually lighter than I had anticipated and I almost drop
it. On the back of it is a clip, like a belt clip on a cell phone
case. The object itself is circular, about two inches in diameter.
It’s made of a lightweight material like burnished aluminum or
chrome. On its face are two concentric circles, the inside one of
polished metal, no more than one-quarter of an inch in diameter. My
fingers pass over the smaller circle and I realize it is a button.
Curious, I depress the button. I'm not sure what I expect to happen
when I do, but I feel kind of disappointed when nothing does. No
bells. No beeps. No fireworks.

"What's this?" I ask Stanley.

He laughs once, breathy and nasal before he
says, "I was hoping you could tell me."

"This was in the box with the other
things?"

"Yep," Stanley says, staring at me.

"This seems way more modern than the other
artifacts."

"I know," he gushes, "isn't it cool? That's
what they call an anachronism, isn't it? Something out of
time?"

It's an anachronism, all right. And the fact
Stanley knows it's called that makes his collection that much more
suspect.

"Stanley, on an archaeological site," I say,
trying not to sound too condescending in an effort to avoid another
Old Lady Weatherly scenario, "on an archaeological site when we
find artifacts together which don't seem to belong to the same time
period, we usually concede it’s because the site's been...disturbed
somehow. Was where you found this thing in your backyard at all
disturbed?"

"Oh, no!" he blurts, sounding every bit as
surprised at the accusation as he looks. "Ms. McBride, I assure you
the ground in my backyard is every bit as pristine as the day my
parents bought the property." His facial expression seems wounded.
"Besides," he offers, "I found it in the same box as the other
artifacts. How could a simple disturbance of the soil account for
that?"

"What about your friends, Stanley? Could one
of them be playing a practical joke on you? Lifting the sod, maybe,
in order to bury the box?" I chance a quick glance at my watch. Not
quite 8:30 yet. My watch is battery operated and doesn't tick. No
use holding it up to my ear to make sure it’s working.

"Look at me, Ms. McBride," he says,
matter-of-factly. "I'm a very lonely man. I get up in the morning,
go to work, and come home in the evening. I see no one but
strangers all day long. The only familiar face is the one I see in
the mirror every morning when I wake up, and every night before I
go to sleep. "Stanley looks down at his hands which he begins to
wring together. The man looks pitiful. If what he says is true, I
feel sorry for him. "I wish I had people who cared enough about me
to play such a joke."

"Look, Stanley," I say, "why don't you leave
it with me? Maybe I could find some time over the next little while
to do some research about your house, find out who the previous
owners were." Immediately after I say this I'm sorry.

"Absolutely. Keep the artifacts for as long
as you like."

"No, Stanley, I don't mean the artifacts.
Why don't you give me your phone number and—"

"But I want you to have them. Couldn't you
take another look at them tomorrow, maybe? In the light of day? See
if anyone you know can help you with my mystery. When you're done,
you could swing by my place to return them and check out where I
found them."

While Stanley's discovery certainly sounds
interesting, my offer to do the research for him was kind of
half-hearted, and self-serving. Should he take me up on the offer,
he might leave. I could say I did the research on his property and
found nothing. Consequently, I would be done with Stanley Hume
forever, this night would shortly draw to a close and I could go
home. If I accepted the artifacts however, it would mean the
evening would not end with the little hand on the eight and the big
hand on the six, but rather would linger on, long into the week,
consuming more of my time than I'm willing to give to this matter.
And for what? For nothing more than a practical joke? The more I
think about it, the more I'm sure this is the case.

For example, on occasion, the University
runs sites for volunteers in order to educate the public on the
precariousness of the archaeological record. It happens practically
every time. There’s always some yahoo who thinks it'd be funny to
screw with the archaeologist by tossing a penny into a unit and try
to convince the archaeologist he'd dug it up with the rest of the
artifacts. The fact of the matter is no archaeologist worth her
salt would ever fall for that. For one thing, the "joke" is just as
tired as Old Lady Weatherly's support hose. For another, depending
on how far the excavations had progressed, the penny would be an
anomaly and thrown out anyway because it would be the only thing
that didn't fit.

The truth is you don't get collections of
artifacts that are this divergent from each other, not without soil
disturbance or some kind of monkey business.

"I don't want your artifacts, Stanley."

Stanley looks as though I've just slapped
him in the face. "Please, Ms. McBride. I would consider your
agreeing to investigate an honour."

"Really, Stanley, I—" My protest is cut
short by chimes sounding over the P.A. system indicating the end of
the evening. At last.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," says a whiney voice
that could only belong to Runkleman, "the museum is now closing.
Please exit via the Rotunda doors and have a good evening. Thank
you for visiting the Royal Ontario Museum."

"Okay, then," Stanley says. He slaps his
thighs, stands and gathers his overcoat from the back of his chair,
"it's settled, then." He fumbles in his back pocket for his wallet
and then fumbles with his wallet until he withdraws a business card
with black embossed text on it. "My card. Call me when you're done
and you can come over and take a look-see at the yard."

Once more the chimes sound. Shortly
thereafter, Runkleman resumes his post directing human traffic out
of the building.

"Goodnight Ms. McBride. And thank you." He
nods curtly and holds out his hand, grinning like the cat that just
ate the canary. We shake hands briefly. He continues to smile as he
fastidiously adjusts his overcoat on his arm and then turns to
leave. Finally, I think, as I watch Stanley's back disappear into
the open elevator doors at the opposite end of the Lower Rotunda.
He waves briefly as the doors close.

What a bust this night has been. Palmer
promised an evening of intrigue and fun (as if a parade of
eccentrics and what essentially amounts to junk could ever pass for
fun). And now I'm saddled with the responsibility of caring for a
tin box chock full of some stranger's garbage. The one bright light
of the evening was being given the opportunity to catch up with
Serge during the lulls.

"A bunch of us are going to grab a drink at
the pub down the street. Care to join us?" Serge asks. He startles
me. I'm still focused on the doors to the elevator that swallowed
up Stanley Hume.

"Thanks, but no." As much as I'd like to.
"I'm zonked." It's the truth. I have a half-hour's subway ride
ahead of me and still have to review tomorrow's lecture notes.
"Besides, Palmer's waiting,” I tell him. Not that Palmer would
mind. He’s probably still tied up receiving his mystery delivery.
"Rain cheque?" Serge exaggerates a nod. "It was great to see you
again, Serge. Best wishes to the family." We shake hands, and I
head back toward the employee entrance in an effort to evade the
stragglers who will have to go home tonight without having their
artifacts identified.

The first thing that strikes me as I open the
door is the stench. The exact smell is hard to pinpoint, but it's
reminiscent of putrification mixed with something more noxious and
acrid, like vinegar or ammonia. I ran over an already dead skunk in
the middle of the road once, and was stuck smelling that exact
smell until it worked its way free of my tire treads. My eyes begin
to water. I feel a tickle at the back of my throat and have to
cough.

Palmer is sitting at the kitchen table
hunched over whatever it is he's working on.

"God, Palmer," I say, "what's that horrible
smell?"

"Molly? Meet Ringo. Shake hands." He thrusts
at me what appears to be a small, severed hand, minus the skin and
most of the flesh. Thick, sinewy cartilage envelops most of the
joints, holding what remains of the limb together. I gasp and
recoil at the sight.

"That's not very polite now, is it?" He
smiles proudly.

"What the hell is that?"

"This...is Ringo...well, part of him,
anyway. Named after the Beatle."

"That's disgusting, Palmer."

"Remember that delivery I had to take?"

"Yeah..." I say. My mind is occupied
calculating how many windows I'll have to open and for how long
before the house is properly aired out. Though what he is doing is
gross, it is mesmerizing, and I cannot take my eyes off the
child-sized appendage. I manage to tear my eyes away long enough to
make my way to the window over the sink and slide it open. Fresh
air at last. I drink it in.

"I got a call from the zoo this afternoon.
Poor Ringo died late last night. They performed the autopsy this
morning. Confirmed he died of old age. Quite sad, really. He was
their oldest chimp."

"And you have...his hand?"

"Yeah. Well, his forearm, actually."

"And you have it because...?" The tickle at
the back of my throat returns. I find a cold bottle of water in the
fridge, crack the seal and swallow almost half of it at once.

"I want my students to prepare him starting
tomorrow. I thought we might de-flesh him and mount him. Keep him
in the lab as a teaching tool."

"Uh-huh," I say, my attention taken by the
sight of my pasta pot on the stove.
Please, Palmer, please—not
my pasta pot
, I pray as I gather enough courage to peer inside.
Floating on the murky water is a layer of foamy scum mixed with
dark brown hair. That settles it. I need a new pot. Otherwise,
every time I cook a pot of spaghetti all I'm ever going to be able
to think about is chimpanzee stew.