The Pier
A Victorian pier, and an obsession with an ever-changing past...
Once again, I find myself standing before the Mutoscope. Chipped red paint decorates its clamshell embossed sides and raised viewing port. The worn brass handle and coin slot bear the marks of a thousand hands, fumbling coins, turning, always turning. Above, the ornate frame holds the description of what I am about to see - The Lady at the Window.
I feel the waves twenty feet below me, beneath the worn boards supporting these relics from yesteryear. The pier groans slightly, perhaps mirroring my anticipation as I rub the copper coin between trembling fingers and raise it to the slot. I also sense the owner of this faded arcade secretly watching me from the booth at the entrance. He has observed me every day this week, that annoyingly knowing look on a face that was once plump but now appears ravaged by some wasting disease. He simply nodded when I entered, accepting the five-pound note I handed over in exchange for the tin pot of pennies, each stamped with Queen Victoria’s head. I must admit I am an addict, and he is my dealer.
The penny clatters into the machine, and I draw a deep breath of the musty air that battles with the salty tang from outside. I slowly lower my face to the viewing port, and there she is, my desire, my longing burned onto paper in sepia tones. Every time I turn the handle to give her life, I hope for more, and each time, there seems to be more—a new movement of her arms, a breeze that lifts the curtain in a way it hadn’t before, a turn of her head that nearly reveals her profile and makes my heart leap into my throat.
The room is lit by gas lamps dimmed to a dull glow, casting shadows in the corners. She stands before a large window, which is wide open. It is dusk, and a slim crescent moon, though I could swear it was nearly full yesterday, hangs in the sky among ragged clouds with an aubergine hue. Beneath, a dark sea reflects the pale light, and a shape extends above it. A pier, oddly familiar.
She moves, resting slender hands on the window’s ledge, leaning forward slightly as if searching for something out there. Her long dress is cinched at the waist with a corset, and I get the impression that I could easily encircle it with both hands. There will be a few quiet moments like this, and then she will stand upright again, lifting a hand to brush back a stray lock of hair. I wish I could reach in and sweep back that hair for her. Stroke her cheek.
My breath catches. There is that movement again, that turn of the head. But this time, she moves across the window, and for a moment, her profile stands outlined. Perfection. Then she has moved into the shadow, but I am sure she has turned towards me. Could that be the glint of the reflected gas lamps in her eyes?
I hear that dreadful click as time once more runs out and the viewing port goes dark. Not wishing to tear my eyes away, I fumble coins from the pot and push them into the brass slot. There is no need to look; I have done this… how many times before? And I am back in the room.
Does she look at me when she turns in the shadow? Or is there someone else in the room? I feel a pang of jealousy. Ridiculous, I know, but since chancing upon this leftover of a bygone era, perched upon its stilts in the cold grey sea, nothing has been quite sane.
Is there now a sense of menace emanating from this other watcher? Is she perhaps afraid of whoever it is that occupies the space beyond my vision? I would stand in that room and comfort her, protect her from this other. When did I become so macho, so patriarchal? Maybe it is I she fears? No, that I could not bear…
This image of a long-dead woman in a machine powered by turning a handle has taken over my waking and sleeping thoughts. The arcade owner warned me, I seem to recall, that sometimes these machines have a strange effect on those who look into them. Some viewers see more than others and are drawn back constantly, convinced that there is more in the rotating cassette of static images than there should be.
My searching fingers find no more coins in the pot, and I push myself upright, stiff from stooping for so long. I look back towards the booth at the entrance, ready to pay for more of the tarnished pennies, but the owner is already pulling down shutters, and I know that I must leave.
Placing the tin pot back on the counter, I sigh and glance back into the shadows of the arcade before turning towards the door, which he holds open for me.
He nods. ‘Tomorrow?’ It’s more of a recognition of my fate than a question.
‘Tomorrow,’ I reply and step out into the freezing wind that has picked up, bringing the promise of rain with it.
The length of the pier extends before me. Weather-stained boards reaching out like a finger pointing towards reality, sanity. Pale-green-painted wrought-iron scrollwork decorates the railings and lamps that mark its edges. I push my hands into my pockets, hunching against the cold, and begin the long walk through pools of light, like some condemned man, across that distance above the waves that now crash against the pillars.
Above me, a slender crescent of moon peeks through ragged clouds tinged with a distinct purple.