So Cold the River

relative, let’s go ahead and leave him off the film.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t be asking him for any interviews.”

“Have you spent any time with the bottle yet?” Alyssa asked.

“Spent time with it?”

“Yes. Or, you know, tried to find anything out about it.”

“No,” Eric said slowly, “not yet.”

He’d spent some time with it, certainly, but that level of research wasn’t something he wanted to disclose.

“It seemed to upset him when I brought it to the hospital,” he said.

“What? You went to the hospital?”

“Yeah. I didn’t get your message until Thursday night. I went down to see him that evening, tried to talk with him. He got upset when I showed him the bottle, so I left.”

There was a moment of silence and then she said, “Eric… the doctors told us he hasn’t spoken a word since Monday. He hasn’t been able to communicate with family, and the doctors don’t think he will. He’s very close to the end now. The mind is already gone, but the body is hanging on.”

“Well, he talked to me. Showed a little of that sense of humor, too, tried to play a trick on me.”

But even as he said it, he felt a cold shroud settle around him.

“A trick? I can’t believe that. And you have it on video?”

“Yes,” he said. Tried to say.

“What was that?”

“Yes,” he said. “I should have it on video.”

“That will be very special to us. I just can’t believe it. Thursday night, you said? That was three days after he stopped speaking.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said. “Hate to cut you off, Alyssa, but I’m going to have to go. I’ve got… one of my sources is calling. So I’ll need to let you—”

“Of course, take it. Keep me updated, and enjoy your stay down there.”

“I’m going to try real hard to do that,” he said and disconnected. Below him the tour guide droned on. The kids in the group looked to be around sixteen, the classic bored-with-everything age, yet they were quiet, staring around almost in awe. Eric understood that. It was the kind of place that could grab your attention and hold it.

He stood up slowly and went into the room and got the camera out. It used miniature DVDs, and he’d put in a fresh one before he set out on foot the previous day. The DVD he’d removed from the camera then had been the one from his visit to Campbell Bradford. Now he took the West Baden DVD out and replaced it with the Bradford disc. He took a long, deep breath and looked up at the ceiling.

“He talked, and it’s going to be on here,” he said. “It is going to be on here.”

He pressed play.

There was Campbell Bradford in the hospital bed. His face looked as Eric remembered—haggard, weary, fading. None of the spark in his eyes yet, but that had taken a moment. Eric turned up the audio volume, heard his own voice.

You going to talk to me?

On the screen, Campbell Bradford blinked slowly and took a hissed breath.

Are you going to talk to me tonight?

This was where he’d responded, right? Eric had dropped his eye to the viewfinder after asking that question, and Bradford had spoken for the first time.

But now as he watched, nothing happened. Bradford stayed silent. Okay, maybe Eric had the wrong spot. Maybe he’d talked for a while before the old man embarked on his game.

His own voice continued:

Great. Where would you like to start? What would you like to tell me?

Oh, shit. He was responding to Bradford now, wasn’t he? Had to be. On the screen, though, the old man hadn’t said a word, hadn’t lifted his head or moved his lips.

Can I ask you something off topic?

Pause. No response from Bradford.

Are you going to talk to me only when I’m looking through the camera?

In his memory, clear as anything, Eric recalled the old man smiling here. On the screen, his mouth didn’t so much as twitch.

That is one wicked sense of humor.

“No, no, no,” Eric said. “He was talking. He was talking.”

But he wasn’t talking. Hadn’t said a word, hadn’t moved a muscle. And there in the background was Eric, gibbering along, carrying on a conversation with no one, sounding like… a crazy person.

“I’m not crazy,” he said. “I’m not. You were talking, old man, you were talking and I’m sure of it, and I don’t know why this piece-of-shit camera won’t show it!”

He was half shouting now but through clenched teeth, and he got to his feet with the camera in his hands, his eyes still locked on the display. He could see himself on the screen now, the green bottle in his hand. This was when Campbell had gotten upset. When he’d moved, grabbed Eric’s arm, and started to talk about the river.

What?

Well, I thought it was plenty cold. When I touched—

Eric’s voice cut off on the audio then, and he remembered Campbell had interrupted him, but it didn’t play that way. Instead, it sounded like he’d just cut himself off in midsentence. The man in the hospital bed had not moved or spoken.

What, then? What are you talking about?

“He talked about the river,” Eric said. “The cold river.”

But talk he did not. Only Eric spoke. Responding, according to the camera, to utter silence.

What river are you talking about?

What river? I don’t understand what you’re talking about, sir.

Mr. Bradford? I’m sorry I brought the bottle.

Mr. Bradford, I was hoping to talk to you about your life. If you don’t want to talk about West Baden or your childhood, that’s fine with me. Let’s talk about your career, then. Your kids.

All Eric’s voice. Not a single whispered word from Campbell Bradford. The video went blank then, the recording over, and Eric was left standing there in the hotel room with the camera in his hands, staring at a blue screen.

Crazy, a voice whispered in Eric’s mind, you’re going insane. Truly, literally, out of your mind. Seeing things that aren’t there is one thing, but you had a conversation that wasn’t there, buddy. That’s the sort of thing that only happens to—

“I didn’t imagine shit,” Eric said. “Didn’t imagine a single damn thing. It was all real, and I don’t know why this thing won’t show it.”

He rewound, played part of it again, saw the same thing he’d seen before, and now his heart was thundering.

“Bullshit,” he said. “It happened, and the camera was on. So why didn’t you record it, you piece of shit? Why didn’t you record it!”

The video played on, no voice but Eric’s audible.

“Fuck you,” he told the camera, his voice shaking. “It’s you. It’s your fault.”

That had to be it—the camera. The thing was… not broken, but what? Evil, that was it. This camera was evil. Because Eric knew he’d had a conversation with Campbell Bradford, knew it as surely as he knew his own name, and he knew he’d seen the train and spinning leaves last night, and yet those things had not been recorded and that left no other option but that this shitty camera was corrupt, malevolent, evil…

He lifted it above his head and smashed it on the edge of the desk. A crack appeared on the casing but the rest of the camera stayed intact. Well-built, sturdy. Thanks, Paul. He lifted it and smashed it again. And again.

By now he was shouting, not words so much as guttural oaths as he lifted and smashed, lifted and smashed, lifted and smashed.