PasTime Paper Antiques, the sign read; which Bagnell had seen out of the corner of his ever-ready-to-deceive-you eyes. It had not caught his attention at first because it was, actually, above eye-level on its own side of the street. He stared a moment. He crossed the street. In the window were such things as well-weathered marriage documents illuminated in color in the Pennsylvania Dutch fraktur style, with flowering trees never seen even in botanical gardens, on the boughs of which were distelfinks, birds unknown to ornithology. There were a pair of US Navy certificates identifying Chauncey Casey as Caulker and Clarence Casey asSailmaker, dated in the 1890s. There were a few posters in extravagant tints, and a small sedate notice, more inside. Bagnell noticed a selection of lacy valentines.
Bagnell noticed the Paper-Man in the very front part of the window.
An old-fashioned bell bobbed and dipped and rang as Bagnell swung the door widely open. An informally-neatly-dressed gentleman in perhaps his early forties appeared from behind an oriental screen. “If there were a time-travel machine,” the man said, quizzing his eyebrows, “I’d go back and murder whoever it was who cut something out of this copy of Godey’s Ladies’ Book, October 1842. Just imagine. Does this interest you? Yours for a dollar.” He thrust it forward, but Bagnell did not thrust a dollar at him.
“I’d like to see one of the daguerreotypes in the window,” Bagnell said. He realized that he was speaking very fast. He realized that he was breathing very fast. “The second one from the right.”
“Certainly. - Please help yourself,” the man gestured to two bowls on a little table, and went forward to the window. With great control, Bagnell did not go with him, did not even turn to watch him. He examined the bowls. One contained small candies; the other was full of business cards reading:
PasTime Paper Antiques
Number 7, Rowan Row
Mr Sydney, Proprietor
Mr Sydney, Proprietor, returned. He held in his hand what looked like a tiny book, and handed it to Bagnell, who at once unclasped the tiny hook and reopened it: it was the right one. It was the likeness of a young man in uniform, in no way remarkable, one might see him or his mates today drinking canned beer and watching television anywhere in town. Anywhere in the United States. “That is real leather and real brass, the casing, I mean, hardly to be found anymore anywhere; and the same goes for the satin facing the picture.”
Bagnell asked the price, and Mr Sydney slipped behind the screen and returned with a loose-leaf notebook which he now consulted. “Ah, yes. The collection of six daguerreotypes, I must tell you that they are actually ambrotypes, a slightly later process, but I follow your own usage which is my own as well; the collection of six daguerreotypes are for sale at $1,000, plus, alas, State sales tax of 3.7 percent. Sell only the single one? Oh I am afraid not. They are after all a collection, and I couldn’t sell just one. Not for less than $200, that is. And no, we don’t take credit cards or out-of-state checks. Sorry. These are after all collectors’ items, and a very good investment.” He proceeded to tell Bagnell about one such which had appreciated even as it sat in the window; adding, “Though if these are still here when the weather gets hotter, of course I will bring them inside because I am afraid of them fading.”
Curator Luke Larraby gave a grunt of surprise at seeing Bagnell again so soon, but he was not uncivil, and listened to him without interruption. He said, “Calm down, we’re not used to excitement here, in fact haven’t had any since the Yankee army passed through town, thank the Lord they didn’t even stop to burn it. Excitement, yes. I don’t feel I can discount the possibility that you are still in a state of excitement — even shock. It is a shocking sight, that photograph of mine — and those things I showed you. So. Oh of course I’ll go stroll by and take a look at the one you say is in. where? Rowan Row. Oh.” He looked at the card Bagnell gave him. “It would be one of the most remarkable coincidences if, actually, they were — Ho. Mr Sydney, yes. Know him. Done business with him,business, you get the point? Sydney is not running a junkyard. Now settle down. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Quit that fidgeting.”
Bagnell extended his stay at his motel, drove slowly back to the old Carolina Coast Museum, went up the blue slate steps, scooped and hollowed by the passing feet of a century. Larraby was there, and beckoned him in from inside his private office. “Aw right. Saw — it. What? Course it’s the same face! Outrageous coincidence! Against all known laws of probability. However. We must have a copy of Sydney’s ambro and work from there. No other choice. And it’s up to you to get him to let you make that copy. They’re not photographic negatives, you know that, of course. We’ll have to photograph it and produce our own negative. Enlarge it. Well — enlarge them both. Go over them with magnifying lens and fine-tooth comb. Haveyou got $200 cash on you, by the way? Ha. Thought not.”
Bagnell found himself breathing rapidly again. “Look here, Luke” — a silvery-tufted eyebrow shot up, but Larraby listened, — “this is absolutely the first time it’s been even possible to think of its being even possible to provide any element of prehistory of a Paper-Man, and you can’t let it go by and risk losing it forever.”
Larraby, still calm in his naturally-cool old-fashioned office, with sepia-tinted framed photographs of his predecessors on its walls; Larraby, still calm, said it was Bagnell’s fault for showing enthusiasm. “However. I understand your emotion. Still, why he wants $200, $200 for a daguerreotype of a nobody, for that price you ought to get one of Lola Montez naked — and I have not got that $200 in my budget.”
Bagnell gnawed his neat mustache. “Well, how much have you got that you can spend to borrow the picture, just borrow it and have it copied? I mean, you absorb the copying costs, and I’m sure I can manage a pro rata share of it — how much?”
The old curator sighed and canted his head and looked at his wall calendar. “Oh. $50? Tops.”
Mr Sydney was cautious. Mr Sydney smelled something. Bagnell offered to have it cleaned for him. “No charge.”
“Cleaned? It’s as clean as a whistle! Look at it. Beautiful condition. What — ”
“Okay. I’ll come clean with you.”
“Now we’re talking.”
“The Carolina Coast Museum — ”
“The Carolina Coast Mu — Oh, Lord, they don’t have a button! Nothing doing. Oh, well, what’s your offer?”
“An offer of $50 just to — ”
Mr Sydney’s shock was not assumed. “Fifty dollars! No no. Out of the — ”
“- just to borrow it for one week for purposes of comparison with another picture.”
This was unexpected. Mr Sydney seemed genuinely uncertain. “And what do I do if someone comes in off the Row and asks, ‘where’s the old snapshot of the boy in uniform, used to be in between Baby Phoebe and Grampa Jukes?’ “
“You say ‘It’s being cleaned. Would you like to put down a deposit? It will be cleaned for you. Free.’ “
It was immediately clear that Mr Sydney liked this image. He nodded. His mouth moved, evidently silently repeating the words. “You have a suggestion there. Not bad. Very well. I feel able to do it for you and the museum, but for $75. Impossible for less: risk factor.”