by James C. Clar
In the annals of Oneida County there appears an entry dated February, 1901: Fire at the Grand Hotel. Loss considerable. A clerk’s sentence, thin as a matchstick. Yet I have found that some lines, when struck, ignite. From this one I have imagined the following episode. Whether it be history, parable, or some hybrid creature of smoke and memory, I cannot say. I submit only that each generation risks betrayal by the miracles it inherits too quickly. Modern technology, like its primordial precursor, fire, need only be misunderstood once.
The name of my story’s protagonist is uncertain. I will call him Elias Ransom, only because that name appears twice in the guest registry of the wedding that drew him to the city.
Elias came from the North Country, that antique and reticent province where winter lingers like a creditor and innovation arrives with the hesitancy of an unwelcome guest. In his village, darkness was dispelled by candles and kerosene lamps. Although held at bay, Night there was never truly defeated.
By contrast, Utica proclaimed its modernity with noise and flame. Streetcars clanged their passage like armored insects, and the buildings climbed upward not out of faith or ingenuity but out of hubris.
Elias arrived in the afternoon, and found himself lodged at the Grand Hotel. The structure’s rather pretentious name belied its modest three stories. A young bellman in a collar starched to the stiffness of authority greeted him.
“Wedding guests are on the second floor, sir,” he said. Elias followed, feeling as though he had entered not a hotel but a mechanism, something wound tight and humming.
In the room, the bellman turned a small brass knob. Light leapt forth, not kindled, not coaxed, but summoned. Elias nodded, barely concealing his confusion. The bellman lingered, hand extended, in expectation.
“Will there be anything else?”
“No, thank you,” Elias replied. Unsure what to do about the bellman’s hand, he reached out and shook it.
Alone, Elias studied the lights. No wicks, no visible fuel. The flames hovered inside glass globes like captive ghosts. He accepted this as one accepts a rumor: provisionally, and with unease. Finally, he reasoned it to be a municipal improvement of the kerosene lamp.
That evening he attended the wedding. Elias celebrated with determination, as though by indulging fully he might prove himself equal to this new world. Returning to his room afterward, he prepared for bed. When he reached for the lamps, he did what long habit dictated. He approached each one and blew. The spectral flames vanished. Satisfied, Elias crawled under the covers and slept.
The gas that gave life to the lamps, however, refused to slumber.
Hours later Elias awoke, disoriented. He reached for his pipe; the familiar briar worn smooth by years of use. He struck a match.
Witnesses claimed to have heard a sound like thunder waging epic battle with itself. The walls split asunder and the windows surrendered their glass to the street. However briefly, the Grand Hotel achieved the luminosity of a small sun.
Astonishingly, Elias Ransom was found alive beneath a collapsed beam.
“It’s nothing short of a miracle,” said the fireman who dragged him free. “Not a scratch on him. Still had his pipe, too.” The Grand Hotel was rebuilt with electric lights, which were deemed less fickle than gas. Elias lived another fifteen years. Those who knew him claimed he had acquired a peculiar habit: before extinguishing any light, he would pause, as if listening for something sinister beneath its glow. He never again slept anywhere but home, where the darkness, at least, behaved as expected.
James C. Clar is a writer and retired teacher. In addition to his contributions to Sudden Flash, his work has appeared most recently in Bright Flash Literary Review, Flash Digest, After/Thought Literary Journal, Freedom Fiction Journal and The Yard Crime Blog.
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