American Elsewhere - By Robert Jackson Bennett Page 0,51

asks Mrs. Benjamin.

“I don’t know exactly… I guess sometime in the seventies.”

“Hmm,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “My memory goes back far, but… not all the way back. So I could be wrong. She could have lived here before I ever came.”

“I also have documents from Coburn saying she worked there,” says Mona. “Is there any remnant of their operation still in the area that I can go to? Any government agency? I just need to find something about her.”

“Coburn…” says Mrs. Benjamin, a little contemptuous. “That damn lab. Who knows what their papers say? I wouldn’t trust anything I heard about up there. All of their facilities were located up on the mesa, and those were gutted and abandoned when the lab was shut down.”

Mona makes a mental note of this. Because she intends to go up to that mountain, and damn soon. “What was it they did up there?” she asked. “I read they did government research, and something about… quantum states.”

Mrs. Benjamin stares off into the distance for a while. “They did nothing that was worth doing,” she says finally. “They should have put more effort into commercial prospects. Usable ideas. Rather than conceptual research. It did not end well.”

“Because they never came up with anything,” says Mona.

“Hm?” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Who told you that?”

“Mr. Parson. He’s the man who runs the—”

“I know Mr. Parson,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “We’re well acquainted. And Coburn, well… they only ever did one thing.” She thinks for a moment. Then she asks, “Here—would you like to see a magic trick?”

“A what?”

“A magic trick. The party bored me stiff, dear, so a trick should be entertaining. Come inside. I’ll show you.”

“I thought you said you were going to help me,” says Mona as she follows Mrs. Benjamin into her house.

“I am,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Just indulge me, please.”

She sits Mona down on the couch while she wanders off to the back. The inside of Mrs. Benjamin’s house is much less attractive than the exterior: everything is done in awful flowery wallpaper, except the living room, which has a bright red pattern depicting a foxhunt. There are also several stuffed owls, which Mona assumes were brought home from work. Somewhere there must be a room full of clocks, for she can hear a constant chorus of ticking. Everything smells of bad potpourri.

“Here we are,” trills Mrs. Benjamin as she returns. She sets a wooden case down on the coffee table in front of Mona, and stops. Her smile vanishes, and she looks up at Mona with a dark expression. She opens the case. Inside is a silver hand mirror. “An ancient swami gave me these mirrors,” she says in a theatrically hushed tone. At first Mona is confused, for she can see only one mirror, but then she looks again and sees there are actually two, stacked on top of each other. “They came from far away, in the Orient.”

“They did?” asks Mona.

Mrs. Benjamin’s solemn demeanor breaks. “Of course not, silly girl,” she says. “It’s all part of the trick.” She resumes glowering. “He gave them to me, and told me they were entrusted with ancient…” Her expression wavers. “Wait, I already said ‘ancient,’ didn’t I? Oh, forget this part… let’s get to the fun stuff.” She takes out the mirrors and hands them to Mona. “Here. Take them.”

“I have to hold them?”

“Yes, obviously,” and Mrs. Benjamin sounds genuinely impatient now. “Take them. Hurry up.”

Mona takes one mirror in each hand. They are surprisingly light, and almost paper-thin. She expected something gaudy and decadent—this is a magic trick, after all—but these mirrors have almost no ornamentation. They are silver surfaces and silver handles, and nothing more.

“The mirrors are actually halves of one,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Like one mirror was split down the middle, shaved in two. The thing is, when the mirror was split, it never noticed. It still thinks it’s whole, even though it’s not. But this confusion has given it some interesting consequences. Let me tell you how the mirror trick works.

“First, hold one mirror in front of you at an angle so it reflects an object nearby. Say, this ashtray.” She points to a horrible brass tchotchke on the coffee table. “Then slide the other mirror behind this one, so they touch and are whole.”

Mona stays still, waiting for more. “Well, go on,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Hurry up.”

“Oh,” says Mona. “You want me to… oh, okay.” She angles the first mirror so that it is reflecting the ashtray. “Is this okay?”

“So long