Four Past Midnight - Stephen King [366]
'No, I guess I don't,' Pop said, but after running through the entire list of Mad Hatters, a list which had seemed so promising at first, he was beginning to. In fact, he was beginning to see a whole host of problems the Polaroid Sun presented for the serious collector. As for Emory Chaffee ... God knew what Emory thought, exactly.
'There are most certainly such things as ghost photographs,' Chaffee said in a rich, pedantic voice that made Pop want to strangle him. 'But these are not ghost photographs. They -'
'They're sure as hell not normal photographs!'
'My point exactly,' Chaffee said, frowning slightly. 'But what sort of photographs are they? One can hardly say, can one? One can only display a perfectly normal camera that photographs a dog which is apparently preparing to leap. And once it leaps, it will be gone from the frame of the picture. At that point, one of three things may happen. The camera may start taking normal pictures, which is to say, pictures of the things it is aimed at; it may take no more pictures at all, its one purpose, to photograph - to document ' one might even say - that dog, completed; or it may simply go on taking pictures of that white fence and the ill-tended lawn behind it.' He paused and added, 'I suppose someone might walk by at some point, forty photographs down the line - or four hundred - but unless the photographer raised his angle, which he doesn't seem to have done in any of these, one would only see the passerby from the waist down. More or less.' And, echoing Kevin's father without even knowing who Kevin's father was, he added: 'Pardon me for saying so, Mr Merrill, but you've shown me something I thought I'd never see: an inexplicable and almost irrefutable paranormal occurrence that is really quite boring.'
This amazing but apparently sincere remark forced Pop to disregard whatever Chaffee might think about his sanity and ask again: 'It really is only a dog, as far as you can see?'
'Of course,' Chaffee said, looking mildly surprised. 'A stray mongrel that looks exceedingly bad-tempered.'
He sighed.
'And it wouldn't be taken seriously, of course. What I mean is it wouldn't be taken seriously by people who don't know you personally, Mr Merrill. People who aren't familiar with your honesty and reliability in these matters. It looks like a trick, you see? And not even a very good one. Something on the order of a child's Magic Eight-Ball.'
Two weeks ago, Pop would have argued strenuously against such an idea. But that was before he had been not walked but actually propelled from that bastard McCarty's house.
'Well, if that's your final word,' Pop said, getting up and taking the camera by the strap.
'I'm very sorry you made a trip to such little purpose,' Chaffee said ... and then his horrid grin burst forth again, all rubbery lips and huge teeth shining with spit. 'I was about to make myself a Spam sandwich when you drove in. Would you care to join me, Mr Merrill? I make quite a nice one, if I do say so myself. I add a little horseradish and Bermuda onion - that's my secret - and then I -'
'I'll pass,' Pop said heavily. As in the Pus Sisters' parlor, all he really wanted right now was to get out of here and put miles between himself and this grinning idiot. Pop had a definite allergy to places where he had gambled and lost. just lately there seemed to be a lot of those. Too goddam many. 'I already had m'dinner, is what I mean to say. Got to be getting back.'
Chaffee laughed fruitily. 'The lot of the toiler in the vineyards is busy but yields great bounty,' he said.
Not just lately, Pop thought. Just lately it ain't yielded no fucking bounty at all.
'It's a livin anyway,' Pop replied, and was eventually allowed out of the house, which was damp and chill (what it must be like to live in such a place come February, Pop couldn't imagine) and had that mousy, mildewed smell that might be rotting