John Sayles - A Moment in the Sun

“There is, of course, a simple human side to our story,” he says. “That of a mother’s love for her Son.”

The Rembrandt gives way to the final moving view, the Pietà staged before the same backdrop. The thieves still hang on either side, the Roman soldiers gone now, replaced by nascent Christians who watch in sorrow as Mary clutches His thorn-crowned head to her breast. Harry can’t help wishing they had moved the camera closer so that the Virgin’s face could be seen, wishes he could walk into the view to comfort her.

“A mother’s grief knows no bounds,” says the lecturer. “But we can take comfort, we can find solace, in this story. For the Lord God on high loved us so much,” and here the projectionist, for it must be his hand, causes the image on the screen to begin to glow and then brighten further to a blinding whiteness as the voices of the choir climb to an almost unbearable crescendo, “that He gave His only begotten Son that we might be saved!”

The electric house lights flash on then and there is stunned, then uproarious applause.

“What did you think?”

It is the man beside him, dark-haired, with an intense, hawklike face.

“Very powerful,” says Harry. “But it can’t be Oberammergau.”

The man smiles. “A ruse to deflect the protestations of clergymen,” he says, offering his hand. “Such as myself. Reverend Thomas Dixon.”

“Harold Manigault.” Harry shakes the preacher’s hand. “You had no objection?”

“On the contrary. I’ve hosted a similar production at my church down the street, though I must admit our moving views were not as — as sump tuous as these.”

“I wonder, though, if the spectacle does not overwhelm—”

“We are poised to enter a century of light , my friend.” He grips Harry’s arm and looks deep into his eyes. “This—” nodding toward the screen, “—this in the proper hands will move men’s souls. I detect that you are of my home section.”

“Wilmington.”

“Goldsboro, in the Piedmont,” smiles the reverend. “And I pastored in Raleigh for a year.” He leans close, lowering his voice conspiratorially as his eyes move over the departing audience. “Some rather propitious events have taken place in your lovely city.”

Harry looks around — the room is nearly empty of spectators but it feels close. “Un fo rtunate events—”

“I am something of a novelist, in addition to my efforts from the pulpit, and your Wilmington situation strikes me as one of those instances in which history does not need to be greatly modified to instruct us. There is a great lesson to be learned.”

“And what might that be?” Harry asks.

Dixon regards him with a hot gleam in his eye. “That corruption unaddressed will fester,” he says. “And that the leopard, no matter how one paints him, does not change his spots.”

Harry tries to approximate the carefree grin that Niles would use. “What a pity — I’ve been hoping to change my own.”

Dixon pats Harry’s arm as he would to comfort a child, and starts away with an indulgent smile on his lips. “Breeding will out, I’m afraid.” He pauses in the doorway and spreads his arms as if to indicate all of New York. “Where better to bring our struggle than to the belly of the beast?”

Harry is sitting alone when Teethadore, face raw from scrubbing, comes to join him.

“Did you get here for Salome’s dance?”

“I’m afraid I missed it.”

“Charming girl. Travels with a sister act, the Singing Simpsons, but she’s the only one who hasn’t had her knees glued together. Did you see me?”

“In this?” Harry finds it unsettling to think of the diminutive variety artist rubbing elbows with the Savior.

“Herod’s minion, Elder of Zion, St. Matthew, Pilate’s clerk, bad Samar-itan — I’m all over the thing. The days we spent on that rooftop—”

“And Christ—?”

“Splendid fellow. Long-suffering. He and those thieves were strung up there for hours, waiting for the clouds to open. I suppose you’ll want to examine the device?”

“Do you think that would be possible?”

Teethadore gives him the smile and a wink. “The operator is an old friend.”

A youngish man named Porter is blowing air from a bellows into the workings of the cinematograph as they enter.

“The hero of Santiago,” he observes.

“Merely his theatrical counterpart,” grins Teethadore. “I bring you a worshipper at the altar of celluloid.”

Harry nods but can barely take his eyes off the machine. It is even smaller than he imagined.

“This is the French model?”

“Greatly modified,” says Porter. “This can’t double as a camera.”

“The image was so smooth.”

“Thank you.” Porter gives the crank a whirl. “Two revolutions per second.”

Harry looks out through the small window toward the screen. “You watch the view as it’s projected—”

“Only the edge of the screen, I’m afraid. We’ve improved the pull-down claws quite a bit but she’ll still jump around on you. Nothing like that mess Biograph uses.”

“I witnessed some this morning.” Harry puts his hand on his stomach. “Still queasy.”

“Did you notice the odor?”

“There’s an odor?”

Porter pokes at Teethadore. “From this fellow’s acting. For whom, I believe, the term rank amateur was coined.”

“ Touché. Mr. Porter is a photographer as well. We have toiled together in the wilds of New Jersey.”

“Gramps Gets Hosed . You can catch it on the Bowery.”

The apparatus is dark metal and glossy wood, mounted on a sturdy tripod. Harry fights the urge to put his hands on it. This is closer to the thing, to the intricate, holy apparatus, than he has hoped to come—

“Mr. Porter,” he ventures, “if you were ever to hear of a place, of an opening within the—”

“Edison’s always looking for new lackeys,” says the projectionist, rewinding a strip of celluloid onto a spool. “I can give you a name.”

Harry holds the folded slip of paper with the name written on it in his hand, thrust safely into his jacket pocket, as he crosses back through the maze of waxen statuary. He pulls up short at the French Revolution, a young cleaning woman on her knees scrubbing what looks like vomitus from the floor.

“Oh my,” says Harry, stepping back from the spreading puddle of wash water. “Someone’s been ill.”

“We get one or two every day when the Missus loses her head,” says the girl. She is Irish, and when she glances up she has the brightest, clearest green eyes Harry has ever seen.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s none of yer fault, is it?”

“I meant — that you have to deal with it.”

She looks up at him again, cocking her head, then she indicates the bloodstain painted on the guillotine block and the floor around it.

“And wasn’t it a poor girl like meself had to mop up that mess after the killin was done?”

“You work here?”

“At the moment, yes.” She goes back to scrubbing.

“Have you seen the attraction in the Hall?”

“The death of Christ? No, I haven’t, as a fact. But I know the story well.”

Of course she would. Harry resists the impulse to hand her a dime, not knowing how the gesture would be received. “Have you ever seen a moving view?”

The young woman sits up on her knees. She has a breathtaking smile. “Ah, I love the fillums, I do, but I rarely have the money nor the time. They take my breath away.”

He feels a little dizzy and wonders if the hamburger was a miscalculation. “Do you think,” he asks, once she has turned her head back to her task, “you might like to attend a show with me some time?”