chambersandfogg

[chambersandfogg]

June 2nd, 1935

Los Angeles is a remarkable city, and one that continues to surprise me. New York is always on the cutting edge and the Exhibition in Chicago certainly had its marvels but every time I come back to the City of Angels after traveling, I feel I am stepping into the future. Everyone here seems to be living in the age of tomorrow, and I will confess to having trouble keeping up from time to time. 

Just the other night, I was at dinner with a jovial group of acquaintances and the conversation turned to the subject of science. And one gentleman (I’m embarrassed to admit I’ve now forgotten his last name, his first being easy to remember given it is my own) began to speak of “rocket science”. Apparently, there are people who not only believe it possible, but are actively working on building a path to the stars. Imagine! A rocket going into the heavens, away from this world, entirely away. 

I suppose I shouldn’t be too shocked by the concept. After all, I grew up taking a horse and carriage everywhere, and now I own and drive myself in an automobile. Why, I even met a fellow the other month who has actually flown in an airplane. For leisure! This commercial flight business is really kicking up these days. I know it is probably only a matter of time until I make the cross-country journey through the air, but at the moment it feels hard to fathom. 

And all these, things that I would’ve witnessed in the course of one mortal life. What wonders will I see in the life I’ve been given?

I should write to Charles and ask him about this so-called rocket science. It seems so much like fiction to me, but perhaps its more feasible than I think. I know chemistry is an entirely different beast from whatever kind of engineering this is, but he may have insight. Then again, he was never one for frivolity and he may consider the mere idea of rocket ships to be such. 

Still, it’s probably worth a letter. Unbelievably, I think it’s been a two full weeks since we last exchanged letters—the telephone really is a remarkable invention and I do so love to hear his voice, but I’m still not quite accustomed to that form of communication as a primary mode of staying in touch. Perhaps that will change as the years and technology march on but, for now, I far prefer the written word.  

[from the personal diary of J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

1934 MAY 4   AM 12   07

JOHN—

THE SONG IS THE SHIP WILL CARRY ME HOME ENTIRE VERSES ARE COMING BACK TO ME WILL CALL YOU ON THE TELEPHONE WHEN I ARRIVE HOME WHICH MAY BE BEFORE YOU RECEIVE THIS BUT I HAD TO ENSURE I DIDN’T FORGET THE NAME LEST I CONTINUE TO BE VEXED BY THE SENSATION OF NEAR REMEMBRANCE

1934 MAY 4   AM 12   09

JOHN—

SONG BEGINS THE SHIP THAT CARRIES ME HOME TO LOVE AND SWEET INNISFALL DO NOT LET ME FORGET THE WINE IS STILL MUDDLING MY MIND

1934 MAY 4   AM 12   10

JOHN—

PERHAPS IT HAS BEEN RECORDED IN THE LAST FEW DECADES WE SHOULD TRY TO HUNT IT DOWN

1934 MAY 4   AM 12   12

JOHN—

YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE LET ME DRINK SO MUCH

1934 MAY 4   AM 12   13

JOHN—

IF YOU RECEIVE THESE BEFORE I CALL DO NOT GO TO BED UNTIL I DO YOU MUST HEAR THE WORDS SO THAT IT DOESN’T ESCAPE US AGAIN

[a series of telegrams received by J. S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

April 16th, 1933 

Well, that was a smashing success. Such a success, I’m still feeling woozy this evening, though it’s been nearly an entire day since I last imbibed. Immortality does not protect one from the dreaded morning head. 

And all this malaise and head-pounding caused by just beer and wine! It seemed appropriate to limit the party’s libations to those less potent alcohols given that is what the President has decreed legal to sell, but I suppose I’ve become accustomed enough to bathtub gin that the sweeter stuff went straight to my blood.

The pain of today was well-earned and well worth it - nearly fifteen years we’ve languished under this oppressive prohibition and now, finally, we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Why, the first state ratified the amendment just the other day! I expect that California will be swift to follow. It isn’t as though myself nor anyone I know has actually stopped the consumption of liquor since the eighteenth was put in place, but it’s the principle of the thing. It will be a relief to no longer be breaking the law (in this at least; my identity continues to be a fraud). Not that I have such great respect for the law—at least, not all of them—but it does add undue stress to one’s life to break so many so brazenly so often. 

Even Charles was in excellent spirits at the news (pun very much intended). When I had first proposed a celebration in honor of the President’s announcement last month, he was immediately all aboard. Despite the fact that I encouraged him to partake in the burgeoning commercial flight business (as I have yet to do so), he refused to go up in the air, too afraid of falling right out of it.  But he made quick work of his train journey from Washington, D.C. and has been staying with me for the last week. I can’t recall when we last spent such frivolous time together and it has been extremely rejuvenating. Perhaps it is seeing each other in the Los Angeles sunshine, but I daresay we both appear lighter and younger than we have in decades. 

He’s become more of a social butterfly since I last saw him—perhaps all that politicking in D.C. has been good for him. Every one of my guests found him terribly fascinating (as he is) and were deeply curious once they discovered we’ve known each other for the bulk of our lives. I suppose I have some kind of mystique amongst my cohort here in LA and they were all eager to take advantage of Charles’ presence by peppering him with questions about what I was like as a younger man. Questions he was more than happy to answer, even if he had to bend the truth here and there. Seems that Charles’ penchant for teasing me outweighs any guilt he feels at lying to people. 

It is a burden I’m willing to carry. With every story he told of my antics, his smile would widen, his laugh would grow more robust, and a glittering spark would make its way into his eyes. I think there’s probably all manner of ridiculous things I would do to be responsible for that.

[from the personal diary of J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

March 23rd, 1932

My fortunes continue to improve in the most ordinary ways. Though the tides of time have not swept the market back out to clearer waters, I find myself fretting less about it on this particular week. 

The cherry blossoms are beginning to bloom and they become no less glorious the more years I witness their resurgence. I had the pleasure of accompanying Miss Eudora Hale and her aunt on a walk to enjoy their splendors and found the whole outing invigorating. Fresh air and ambulating is always a balm for the body and soul, but it was the conversation I found most renewing. 

I made Miss Hale’s acquaintance some months ago and have, in all honesty, avoided much contact since, despite finding our first meeting quite diverting. It is only recently that I have been reminded that it isn’t the eighties anymore, and I’m allowed enjoy the company of a young woman without the suffocating expectation of a proposal. I, of course, must still be careful as to not lead her to the wrong conclusions in regards to her understanding of my affections, but I expect she views me more as an elder brother than anything else. 

It has been many years since I formed a friendship beyond one of circumstance or convenience. So long, in fact, that I hadn’t known to miss the unique pleasures of having the opportunity to learn someone’s mind. Miss Hale is bright and charming, with a wit sharp enough to cut even the sturdiest of men. Though we met at a gathering of scientists—the occupation of her father—she is more interested in the arts. She has many opinions to share in regards to sculpture and paintings, and is incredibly well-read for someone so young. But her real love is live performance. 

She was delighted to hear that I had known a man who worked in the theater once (a man of my own creation—a blend of Fogg’s experiences and my own) and has very generously indulged me as I walk down memory lane. It’s wonderful to see her eyes grow wide as I describe the illusionist arts of the last century (explained to me by this dear, old friend who has since passed, of course) and the burst of new theater I experienced while living in New York. 

Regaling Miss Hale with stories from my life—especially a part of it that feels so very long ago—has been a vital reminder that I have, in fact, lived a very interesting one. It is easy to get stuck in the doldrums of my never-ending existence, and while wallowing in the past is certainly not a cure-all for that feeling, a visit every now and then is bolstering for the spirit, I think. My life has shifted so dramatically since the World’s Fair, both for the better and the worse, and I daresay it will shift again and again and again. 

It is heartening to think that, though the cherry blossoms will be gone in a few short weeks, they’ll return again next year. Living things are most remarkable in their state of change. 

[from the personal diary of C. X. Chambers]

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[chambersandfogg]

February 14th, 1931

Dear Charles,

A happy Valentine’s Day to you, my friend! I hope you’ll forgive the bit of kitsch enclosed, for I have no one else to whom I could possibly send a valentine without it being interpreted as some kind of serious overture. But when I saw this fellow, I simply had to share him. A peculiar card, isn’t it? Poor attempts at feline humor aside, the cat in question is somewhat off-putting, I’d say. Those mad eyes, sharp claws; the strange lack of front legs. And the text just adds to the threatening air. I got a real kick out of it and thought you might too. 

Did you make any plans for the evening? I am, of all things, going to the picture house to see the new “Dracula” film. Perhaps not the most romantic outing, but the chatter from the New York premiere is grand. And I will be accompanying a quite spectacular new actress whom I met just a few weeks ago. If I’m being entirely honest, I write “spectacular” not to describe her talent—she is certainly not the next Clara Bow—but her looks, which more than make up the difference. Perhaps you’ll find that terribly shallow, but I’m learning that the film industry relies heavily on its stars being rather nice to look at. After all, the audience is so much closer to them than they are to a performer on a stage. 

But the medium does have its other benefits—it is much easier to create a sense of illusion and wonder when you can manipulate the final product so completely. Not that I am looking to adapt my old act into a picture, but one does marvel at the possibilities. In any case, I’m looking forward to see what they do with the bizarre fruits of Bram Stoker’s imagination. 

Thank goodness we don’t have to drink blood to remain immortal. Dracula really did get the bad end of the deal. Then again, he was able to pass on his strange disease to others—though he did it quite badly. If we had that capability, would you take advantage of it? Would you create for yourself a forever valentine? The idea is tempting, though only Lord knows who it would be. It certainly won’t be this actress, fine as she is to gaze upon. 

I will write again to tell you of my thoughts about the film, by which point you may have seen it as well. I personally am in the habit of going to see pictures the day they come into theaters  and perhaps you are too. How would I know when you never tell me anything beyond the contents of your work? Though I suppose I can’t complain too much when you’ve secured the eminently capable Mister Weston, Esquire. Do let me know if he requires any further information from me to secure our entry into new life. 

I hope the mysterious work you’re doing in Washington is yielding the results you hope. I continue to enjoy the Western part of this country immensely and will remain here for some time, as,

Your friend,

John Fogg

[a letter received by C.X. Chambers, with the following card enclosed]

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[chambersandfogg]

April 2nd, 1930

Dear John, 

Thank you for your March 29 letter, and for the restatement of your invitation to California. I believe you, when you say that even such dire times as these seem somewhat less so in the face of sun and an ocean breeze. But I can’t tear myself away from the Eastern coast just yet. I think I may finally have a way to make true in roads in D.C. I’m not under any delusions that I’ll get Hoover’s ear, but I have to try. 

I regret having to reject your invitation to Los Angeles, but I have no regrets about rejecting your offer of money. I’m not so hard up as to need a hand out from you, though I do appreciate the gesture for what it is. Because yes, if you must know, most of my wealth was either given away or put into stocks. But I still have the Manhattan home. It’s on the market now and while it certainly will go under asking price if it goes at all, I’m sure the funds will be enough to get me through this difficult period. It can’t last forever. 

I did have the thought—one complicated by how far in the halls of power I’d like to get over the next year—that it might be time to start thinking about killing Charles Chambers. He’s in his sixties now, not too young for his passing to be conspicuous, and losing what I have in the finance department may have been a blessing in disguise when it comes to this particular conundrum. I can fade into obscurity quietly, amidst the chaos of the current turmoil. 

Killing Charles Chambers is one thing, but who will I be once reincarnated? I’m too old a dog to learn the trick of a new name but “Charles Xenophon” is hardly suited for flying under the radar.  Have you given any further thought to your future self? Do you imagine you’ll still try to pass yourself off as your own grandson? I do see the merits in that, in terms of making claims on your own estate, but what of the scandal? You have no marriages on record, so any child you had that could have produced a grandchild would have to be a bastard. People will talk. Though I suppose you always have liked people talking about you, no matter what they’re saying. 

What we need is a conspirator, John. Someone in the law profession who might be able to ease the way for us generation to generation. Then again, we’d run into the same problem of needing to convince a new person of our nature every sixty years or so. Perhaps a family law firm—a line of fathers and sons who can aid and abet us in committing some light fraud. I never thought I’d be a man to commit any crimes and yet your presence in my life has led to the contemplation of law-breaking on several counts. And when it comes to our continued existence in society, there really is no other option. 

Until such time, I remain, for now,

Your friend,

Charles Chambers

[a letter received by J. S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

December 15th, 1928

My dear Mr. Chambers:

Will you come to luncheon on Tuesday, January the first, at half-past noon? As you know, I am currently in residence at The Stevens Hotel here in Chicago and they have a top-rate restaurant.

It feels like an age since we saw each other—you’ll be able to recognize me by my dashing good looks and the dark green of my suit. I imagine I’ll be able to recognize you by the same, though I’m sure your suit will be gray, as it tends to be.

Cordially yours, J. S. Fogg

[a letter received by C.X. Chambers]

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[chambersandfogg]

March 31st, 1927

My dear Mr. Fogg,

I saw another film the other day—“Metropolis”, from Germany. By a filmmaker called Fritz Lang. Have you seen it? You frequent the picture house more than I do. It was quite unlike anything I’d ever seen before. I’m not sure if you’ve read any of the Amazing Stories magazine, but this scientifiction seems to be all the rage at the moment.

I’m not sure I could have dreamed of this particular scenario even ten years ago—watching a German film set in a bizarre, ultra-mechanized future. To think that what we were doing in the nineties felt so advanced, our World’s Fair show called a technical marvel, and now there are all these pictures making every fantasy and whim real. And, while I don’t keep up with the news of the film industry, but it seems that moving pictures with true sound are well on their way. It somewhat boggles the mind.

Equally as mind boggling is this large rash of films coming from Germany specifically. They’re all quite fascinating, at least the ones I’ve seen, and of course art is always being made everywhere, no matter the circumstance, but time and again over the last decade, I have been gripped by the fear that we pummeled Germany into oblivion so completely that they’d never recover. So many of their young men dead. So much of their country destroyed. Then again, I suppose it makes all the sense in the world that they’d have an awful lot to express and what better way to do it than through art?

Seeing the world the way that I have in recent years, there’s a bubbling sense of something about to happen. It’s hard to think how we could possibly advance faster or further than we already have, but people seem to think that we’ll soon be flying over the Atlantic as an everyday activity and seeing new pictures in the theater every week and that disease will be a thing of the past. It sounds like quite the future.

Will it all have been worth it, do you think? If we have flying automobiles and good health the world over and an ever-flowing fountain of art and science to keep our minds occupied…if we step into that utopian world, will it have been worth it? Tens of millions killed, millions more with their lives left in tatters and it all feels like a vaguely distant dream now. The world has simply moved on.

Perhaps that’s for the best. Perhaps it doesn’t serve anyone to ruminate on the past and stand in terrible awe at the cost of where we are now. Perhaps in all this advancement it is us, humankind, that is advancing the most, and we won’t need to remember the mistakes of our past in order to not repeat them.

My, I’ve gotten quite off topic here. I simply thought you might enjoy “Metropolis” or, at the very least, find it interesting, and I wanted to tell you that in case you hadn’t heard about it. If you do see it, please write me back and let me know your thoughts. And I will remain,

Sincerely yours,

C.X. Chambers.

[a letter received by J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

June 21st, 1926

Dear Charles,

Thank you for the kind birthday wishes. I did in fact have a very nice day, but I will admit that before I received your letter, I’d completely forgotten what day it was. What does a birthday even mean in our circumstance? If anything, September 4th is my true birthday. The day I was born again to live forever.

In any case, another year has indeed passed me by and I’m getting the distinct sense of deja vu. The theater is nearly ready to be reopened (and you can be rest assured it is as fireproof as a building can be) and I feel as if I’m repeating the same beats that my years have contained for the last near decade.

Did your world travels break you out of this never-ending cycle? Do you know what you’re going to do now? I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to Philadelphia when you were there. I would like to see you—it’s been years now, hasn't it? Perhaps I could tempt you out to Chicago—we’ve broken ground on the new theater here and I quite like the city these days. I think I’ll be here for the foreseeable.

It’s changed a great deal since we were here for the fair and I think you’d be charmed by it. We didn’t take enough advantage of what it has to offer when we were here, too focused on work I suppose, and I’m enjoying being more of a tourist now. I think by the end of the decade, every major city is likely to have a Fogg theater in it. If I have anything to say about it, that is.

But that’s just work, isn't it? And work, as lovely as it is to have the resources to support the arts and build myself a legacy, is leaving me a little hollow these days. Perhaps I’m simply not creatively inspired. But I fear it may be that I’ve personally stagnated.

I don’t make close friends anymore. What’s the point when they all age and drift off into their own lives while I stay rooted in place? And while you are counted as a good friend, Charles, you haven’t exactly been reliable these recent years. That isn’t a chastisement, simply a statement of fact. And I’m sure I’d hardly notice if I didn’t have all my social eggs in Charles Chambers’ basket.

All to say, it’s been many years since I’ve had a birthday party or a summer solstice bash and I’m thinking perhaps I should bring it back for next year. Perhaps here in Chicago.

If I threw a party, would you come?

J.S.F.

[a letter received by C.X. Chambers]

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[chambersandfogg]

HOTEL VANCOUVER MAR 05 1925

JACK SEND PROOF OF LIFE ASAP STOP NEWS OF FIRE AT THEATER CASUALTIES REPORTED NO OTHER INFO STOP MUST KNOW STATE OF SELF STOP BACK ON CONTINENT STOP CUTTING TRIP SHORT COMING BACK HOME STOP SEND TELEGRAPH TO CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY NO 36 EASTBOUND STOP

CXC

[a telegram received by J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

December 4th, 1924

My dear Mr. Chambers,

Where in the world are you today? Have you fled Europe yet? Not that the continent is a place that needs to be fled from these days, but if the papers are anything to go by, this year hasn’t exactly been uneventful over there. What a mess we all made of things. I still can’t claim to understand why you wanted to go back there in the first place, but I have been enjoying the postcards. And I will admit some envy over getting to see the Games of the Olympiad. Your letter about it only just arrived, postmarked from Czechoslovakia of all places. I can’t tell if you just failed to send it from France over the summer, or if you didn’t write it until well after.

You’re usually good about dating your letters. You’re usually very good about writing them. But you’ve been across the sea for a year now and I have a paltry stack of missives on my desk. Then again, you haven’t received many from me, though I refuse to take full responsibility for that. You’re a hard man to track down, Charles Chambers, and you haven’t left me an address to write back to in four months. Three whole letters, two postcards, and, I imagine, several countries ago. Which means this, like many others, will most likely go unsent by me and unread by you.

I suppose that provides me a venue in which to be more honest than I typically am. Not that I’ve ever held back my mind in your presence. One of us has to say what he’s truly thinking and it’s never going to be you. I’m not sure why I’m bothering with the ritual of writing to you at all, but I'm about to open a new show and usually I’d be sending you an invitation. That’s never been a guarantee that you’d come, but the hand would be outstretched as it always is.

I think I’m quite miffed with you. You left the country with hardly any word. Simply a letter from London, three weeks after you’d already vacated the city, saying that you were going wandering for an unknown amount of time. Not a particularly typical move of Charles Chambers. And even less characteristic is the lack of plan you seem to have. I don’t think you’d keep your next destination from me on purpose—or, at least, I can’t think of a reason why you wouldn’t want me to know where you’re going, to give me some indication of where to send correspondence—which means that you have little idea of your next stop on your Grand Tour. Why the aimless traveling, Charles? For what purpose are you circling the globe with no map?

It isn’t that I don’t have plenty to entertain me. The theater is booming and bustling, the money and interest pouring in faster than I can mount new productions. And I can hardly keep up with every new musical act that’s playing in the jazz clubs. The talent is astounding. I’ve even taken myself to a moving picture twice this year and still find the whole thing as charming as I did when we saw that one picture last year. My parties have gone from delightful affairs to gatherings of legend and sometimes I wonder if this is what we fought the war for. So that life could be only this from now on—art and music and laughter and sparkling champagne poured by bold women in sparkling dresses. I’m not sure if it’s a fair bargain, all told, but it is one of which I’m happy to be on the other side.

I won’t say that I miss your company. We both know that you’re hardly wonderful company on the best of days and I know you don’t hold the same joie de vivre for the frivolity of our present moment. But I don’t enjoy not knowing where you are. I feel off balance hearing from you so infrequently. I find myself wondering what it is you’re doing at random times throughout the day and wishing I could tell you how I’m spending my days.

The harsh reality is, Charles, that you are the person on this earth who knows me best. And that’s been the case for some years, but in your absence that fact has begun to sink into my mind in new and terrifying ways. I don’t want to be reliant on your understanding.

There isn’t any point to finishing this letter in its usual manner. It’s simply going to be shoved into a drawer along with the rest.

[a letter never sent by J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

October 2nd, 1923

I’m not entirely certain I like this decade. Granted, we are only three years into it, but if it continues on in the manner it’s been progressing so far, I think it will become one of my least favorite decades. Nothing can truly win out over the terror that was the teens, but I think I far preferred the nineties to now.

I suppose that’s a privilege that comes with my…nature? Predicament? Blessing? Curse? I’m still unsure how to feel about my everlasting life. But having a defined ranking of favorite decades seems a good a use of my unique perspective as any.

All to say, the twenties so far are much too boisterous and loud for my taste. It feels I’m invited to some party or new club every weekend. It’s jarring how much frivolity has overtaken the city and every social circle I’ve become acquainted with in the past few years. This is never quite as obvious as John Fogg’s summer solstice party, which I’ve attended the last two years. It is always nice to see him, I suppose, but I don’t much care for the crowd he runs with.

To be honest, I don’t know how he stands it either. Just last year, the man had some kind of fit when his guests broke an entire tray of champagne coupes. I’ve seen it before in men who have experienced combat: shell shock. John seemed disinclined to discuss it in the following days and then this summer, the party was similarly loud and destructive and he seemed perfectly fine. But it makes my stomach turn—the excess, the thoughtless joy. It isn’t that I resent seeing people amuse themselves, but it seems to be at the expense of remembering what brought us all here. Then again, perhaps it is only me who refuses to forget. Perhaps they’re right to grab happiness however and whenever they can, knowing how fragile it is. But every time I have just a tad too much to drink, I see the faces of the men who died by my poisonous innovations, I see John’s pale, wide-eyed face in his quiet library, a raucous gathering happening just outside the room. I far prefer the quieter days spent at his estate in the days following the solstice, when the two of us can converse openly about our strange lives and enjoy the comfortable companionship that is inherent in sharing a space with someone you know so well.

John has invited me to another fête—a Halloween party of all things. I don’t have plans to go, but I still need to send him my regrets. In fact, I’ll likely be sending him more than that—I know I should share the news that I’m leaving New York. Perhaps I can give him my address in London, but I don’t think I’m going to stay there very long either. For the first time in my life, I’m feeling a real traveler’s bug. I feel cooped up here in the States and if we’re all throwing responsibility and common sense out the window, I may as well do some of that myself and travel the world. It won’t be the quiet company of a friend, but it won’t be the loud and tinny noise of America either. I think it’s time for me to experience something entirely new.

[from the personal diary of C. X. Chambers]

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[chambersandfogg]

June 24th, 1922

It was days ago now, but I’m only just recovered from my third annual summer solstice fête. As always, it was a rip roaring success, worth the morning head that followed. Despite the absurd temperance laws in place now, New York has continued to flourish as the place to have a good time and the life of a theater owner and producer has introduced me to all sorts of people.

Actors, writers, musicians, film stars, and, of course, New York’s wealthiest families—those are the people who filled my Long Island home. Even Houdini himself has become a regular attendee, something I delight in. I longed for so many years to be noticed by him for my work as a magician but, despite meeting him a few times, I know I never made any kind of impact. I know this because he can now come to my house and drink my liquor and talk to me of his work without any spark of recognition in his eyes. I am ten years his senior and yet now, for all intents and purposes, twenty years younger. He treats me as such—telling me of his shows and travels, reminiscing about the turn of the century as if I truly was just a boy when we entered the nineteen hundreds.

There is something thrilling in pulling the wool over a great illusionist and skeptic’s eyes. There were some in attendance who should have recognized me as Fogg, but they seem to accept my new name and history with no question. It is a jolly crowd, full of the brightest minds of a generation, but they still see what they want to see. In any case, I am enjoying playing the part of the newly rich Jack Sinclair, even if it means that none of my guests ever truly know who I am.

The one guest who does know me—and the one I was most surprised to see walk into the garden—is Charles Chambers. He has been invited each year and, until now, never graced us with his presence. I don’t know what changed that he decided to come this year, but given the last time we saw each other was at the opening of “Pick a Posy” in the fall, I was pleased he came. As he almost always does, he disappeared into the night after sharing a drink with me at the opening night party and, while we’ve written, he remains as distant and unknowable as ever.

So you can imagine my shock when he agreed to stay the week here on the estate. He’s out walking the grounds as I write and I don’t know what it is he seeks out there, but he’s spent hours outdoors every single day since he arrived. A few other guests lingered for a day or two and the staff is here of course, but as of this morning, the only two occupants of the house are Charles and myself.

I find that I’m oddly nervous in his presence now that he is the only one remaining. I would not have anticipated the urge to entertain the man but, then again, we’ve hardly spent more than a day together since we worked on our World’s Fair act all those decades ago. I have no idea what kind of host he expects me to be or even how long he plans on staying—he said a week but I haven’t heard any noise about his travel plans. I would be happy if he stayed out the month here, perhaps into the Independence Day festivities. But for a man who is so constant and stoic, he has a tendency to be unpredictable.

He appears well. His work debunking the worst charlatans of the world is clearly invigorating and fulfilling him in the way my producing work does for me. It is heartening, that both of us have found new vocations that inspire us. If we are truly to be this way for the rest of time, I have to think it is vitally important that we continue to find endeavors that keep us engaged and occupied. My years of laying about after the war gave me great insight into the sorrow an idle mind can bring.

The rummiest thing happened at the party in fact—Scott and Dorothy, who had never met before but got on like a house on fire, were stacking coupes to pour champagne into when the whole thing came toppling over with a great big crash. And for a moment, I could have sworn that I was back on the front. I clearly had had too much to drink already by that point in the evening, because the whole room around me went foggy and indistinct and the old pain in my leg flared as if I had just received the injury.

I’m grateful that Charles was there. Somehow he intuited that perhaps I’d gotten a tad too sozzled, and he was at my side in a moment, ushering me into the library with the rest of the party none the wiser. I’m not sure I would’ve been able to extricate myself, as in that moment I feared I would collapse. We didn’t speak much when he sat me down in my favorite armchair, but he poured us both a brandy and we sat in peaceful quiet for a while. It really was the strangest thing. I certainly flinch at loud noises here and there—nothing so extreme as shell shock I don’t think—but this was something else entirely. It’s burdened my mind these last few days.

I wonder if it would be worthwhile to speak to Charles about it. While not the most forthcoming man, he is a decently good listener and is, of course, the person on this earth who knows me the best. But there is a strange distance between us that I cannot seem to cross. We spoke a little at the party, and have dined every meal since, but outside of that it feels that he’s avoiding me. Which I cannot fathom, given that he’s chosen to stay.

While theater producing is certainly keeping me occupied for the time being, I suppose, when in doubt, I’ll always have the mystery of Charles Chambers to fall back on as an activity to fill my endless days.

[from the personal diary of J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

October 18th, 1921

My dear Mr. Fogg,

What wonderful news! Mister Ziegfeld is certainly unprepared for the competition you’re going to levy against him. Is the theater already fit for mounting productions? If I remember that building correctly, it has always housed a theater, yes? Though I’ve no doubt that you’ll wish to make your own modifications. Whenever it is ready and you premiere your first show, I’ll be in the audience opening night. Just send me the details the moment you have them.

I know you said you don’t have intentions toward making it a magic act, but before you give yourself over entirely to producing musical comedies, I’d urge you to consider a short run of your own. I know that Fogg the Fearless hasn’t performed in many years, nor would you—or should you—want to connect your face with his name at this juncture, but there’s nothing to say you couldn’t create a new stage persona. You were always a terribly talented magician, John, loathe though I am to admit it, and you would be astounded at what modern technology enables in illusion. I would very much like to see what you’d do with it.

That said, the old tricks are as prevalent as ever, and I do mean tricks. The world of entertainment—even the world of thought and discourse in some cases!—is full of mal-intented characters determined to convince his fellow man that spirits are real. While you’ve been busy re-entering the theatrical sphere as a producer with gold-lined pockets, I’ve also been dipping my toe back into our old profession, but this time on the side of the skeptic.

Perhaps you won’t be surprised to hear it. After all, we would get into long arguments all those years ago about the merits of belief versus cold hard facts, with myself always coming down on the side of ‘dullards and fun-killers’ as I believe you put it. Even after our little mishap, it took me many years to believe in anything even close to magic, as you well know. And this is not to say that I do believe in magic—I am as convinced as ever that what has happened to us is a matter of science we do not yet understand—but I do consider myself a more open-minded person. I would go on about how I owe that flexibility in gray matter to you, but I wouldn’t want to inflate your ego even further. I’m sure it is at risk of carrying your head up into the sky now that you own a building that occupies an entire city block of Manhattan.

All this to say, our peculiar circumstances and my willingness to be proven wrong aside, I no more believe in magic now than I did ten years ago. And, you would think, with science and progress moving forward as it does, that that would be true for the general populace world over. And yet the myths persist! Mediums, psychics, and fortune tellers abound. And they are as greedy and tricksome as ever. So, I have taken it upon myself to unmask them.

That’s right, I have made my fun-ruining an art and a job. I’m just getting started, but I’ve so far thoroughly enjoyed following in the footsteps of our colleague, Houdini. This is one area in which I do not mind that we’re both going after the same goal, as I think the endeavor is a pure and civic-minded one. I’ve attended countless séances and the like, and I do supremely hope that one day I shall bear witness to something I cannot explain away, but for now, I am getting great pleasure out of revealing the schemes and strategies these charlatans use to bamboozle those who are willing to pay to have some measure of comfort brought to their lives.

I do not know that I would be bothered so greatly by the falsehoods were they simply in the service of entertainment. But these people are preying on the tenderest emotions that human beings have—grief, hope, and love. A psychic cannot tell you with certainty that your future holds great things, even if it is heartening to hear so in low times. A medium cannot connect you with those whom you have lost, no matter how desperately you wish to speak to them again. If such a talent were real, I know I would pay no small sum to converse with my parents once more. It is only my experience in the art of illusion that prevents me from being taken in by this promise.

If you do include some magic in your new theater, I would implore you to leave out these more manipulative arts. I know that these kinds of gatherings are popular—I certainly get enough invitations to them—but I believe they are, at their core, cruel. And I have never known you to be cruel.

In any case, please write back what you do plan to mount on your new stage. I am eager to see it. Until that time, I am,

Sincerely Yours, CXC

[a letter received by J.S. Fogg]

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[chambersandfogg]

June 4th, 1920

My dear Mr. Chambers, 

Apologies first and foremost, or taking such a godawful-ly long time to return to return your letter of the fourteenth of April. Once again, you prove yourself to be an endlessly thoughtful and fastidious person. I feel in utter shambles next to you so often.  But with a  bright new shining decade at our disposal, I’m determined to be more organized. 

An auspicious start, isn’t it? Diving fully into the new decade halfway through its first year. But I’m only just back from my post-war jaunt around the globe—a trip well-earned, I’d say—and I’ve purchased an absolutely absurd estate on Long Island. More rooms and more land than I know what to do with, but I’m sure I’ll find ways of filling it all. After so many years being a respectable, responsible middle aged man, I think I’m due for some foolishness. 

To kick it all off—my triumphant return home, the sparkling nineteen-twenties, my extravagant purchase—I’ve decided to throw the party of this, and any, season. On June 21st, I’ll be hosting an enormous fête for the summer solstice, an occasion I’ve never given much thought to, but which is celebrated all around the world with great aplomb. There will be dancing and eating and libations, both legal and otherwise, and I do think it will be a rollicking good time.  

I would like to have you there. In truth, I’m not certain who will be on the guest list. It’s tricky, isn’t it? Just as you predicted, making and maintaining connection over the decades when we appear the way we do is quite difficult. And with the war and being away for so long after, my social circles have dwindled severely. I’m thinking of inviting my brothers and sister for God’s sake, so please come save my poor dulled soul. 

I know we haven’t seen each other in some time, but there would be something poetic, I think, in meeting again at the halfway point of the year.  I had toyed with the idea of hosting a New Year’s Eve party instead, but the holiday is now so wrapped up in time spent—

Say you’ll come. You can stay the weekend, the week, the month. Just say you’ll come. For now, I am, 

Humbly Yours, 

John

[a letter received by C.X. Chambers]

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[chambersandfogg]

May 30th, 1919

Somehow, I have found myself a fifty-five year old man. While I have had either the good fortune or the misfortune (all these years on and I’m still uncertain which it is) to avoid the ravages of age, my mind is that of a person who has been on this earth for five decades and seen a nearly world-ending war. One would think that these experiences would bring wisdom with them, but that remains to be seen. All I know I’ve gained is a kind of weariness that reminds me of being a boy, but now without any of those hardships.

To think of that boy now brings no small amount of relief, a bit of awe, and a certain measure of grief. My life is inarguably better than it was and yet, I have no sense of who I am really am. Perhaps it is the lack of possibility—when you are a young, the future stretches before you like an endless road. And then, over the years, you get set in your ways, your thinking, your very being. You become limited by your own experiences, perspectives, and, for most, your physical form.

I see it in my colleagues—those I still correspond with, too worried about the consequences of seeing any of them in person. They write of how they wish they could go adventuring as they always have but their heart or their bad leg won’t let them. Even John has sometimes spoken of how his leg and hip bother him, slow him down, though he talks of it as a mere inconvenience and nothing more. I try to be compassionate and understanding in my responses, though I always have to take special care writing him back on the subject, for every time I think of him immediately coming into mortal danger when arriving at the front, a kind of furious anger fills me, the likes of which I have not felt before. It embarrasses me, to still be so easily riled by the events of a war already being written about in history books, but everything with John always did provoke me faster than anything else.

I have yet to see him in person—travel still limited in the way that it is—but I fear he will try to hide from me the more serious ways in which his injuries affect him. He certainly went through a considerable amount of effort to hide the incident from me in the first place, always skating past my questions in his letters and having me write, not to the infirmary, but the neighboring town. In any event, the burns did not seem to slow him down too much during the war, considering he was right back out there far sooner than I would have preferred. I suppose I should just be grateful we’re both alive—I am grateful, deeply. But it irks me to think of him in pain or distress.

But all of that is old news at this point—I fear that he and I will discuss matters ad nauseam if we both refuse to move on. Neither one of us is very good at backing down from a fight.

Perhaps I am fixating on others’ troubles because I have so few of my own. I am certainly not resource limited. Especially since I began playing my luck on the stock market, the wealth that I have is practically unthinkable. It certainly would have been beyond the imagination of the boy who hawked newspapers on street corners to support his mother.

What would he think of me now? He would be glad, I think, to be out of the grips of poverty and equally astounded at that fact. But would he be disappointed in my fairly sedate life? Would he be horrified at my loneliness?

For all their struggles—learning a new language in adulthood, being so far from their homeland, even if there was nothing left for them in Ireland—for all the ways in which my parents were impoverished, they were never poor in company. Two people so in love they crossed the ocean with only the other to talk to; who had a child to enrich their life, not fill it; who made a warm and loving home out of a one-room tenement in the middle of a strange nation—these were not people who were lonely. It hurts to think of how they would have grown together as they aged, of the way their love would have deepened if father had never died. Perhaps mother would have been more inclined to travel, less afraid to stray too far from her husband’s grave for too long. Maybe her vibrancy and sharp mind would not have withered on the vine, the way I’ve no doubt father’s would have if she had been the one to an early grave. I never would have been company enough for either of them. No child could have filled that hole of grief.

Which is why I can never take a wife, nor have a child. It pains me—a sword in the soft spot of my chest—but there is nothing for it. Despite the fact that I’m sure I could find one—while I may not be much to look at, especially off stage, I am rich and, as far as anyone knows, of good stock and name. The myth of Charles Chambers has become so complete that no one remembers he appeared from thin air like one of his illusions. Charlie Coughlin, for them, was never alive.

So, yes, I could get a wife with ease—one who would, no doubt, be beautiful and clever and eager to start a family. Perhaps I could even contrive some kind of disguise to age with her, tell the children the truth when they are older. But I would have to watch them march off to the afterlife as well, and I’m not sure I could bear it. I’m not sure I could bear getting married—even without children—only to have to do it all over again with the same lies and secrets. When I fall in love—if I fell in love—I suspect it would be forever.

I have yet to discuss these matters with the one other person who understands, but how am I meant to write to John and ask his intentions toward marriage? I’m sure if he has eyes on someone, he’ll tell me when he means to propose. Or perhaps I will read about it in the papers like everyone else.

I know it is improper—immoral even, in some eyes—to think of such things, but even as a young man I thought that John was a striking—[the rest of the paragraph is crossed out so completely as to be unreadable]

It is best not to put it to paper, even here in the privacy of my diary. There is no point to such stray fantasies thoughts anyway.

I have forgotten father’s face. I had a photograph taken of mother and I before she passed but I can no longer conjure the feeling of her hand in mine nor the sound of her voice. Every friend or colleague I’ve ever known will someday fade from memory, or has already, vanishing like morning mist in the heat of the day.

Now, the face I see most clearly when I close my eyes is John’s. And his face, like my own, is ever unchanging.

[from the personal diary of C.X. Chambers]

[listen to New Year’s Day wherever you get your podcasts. to read the pre-1917 entries, join atypical artists and get access to the archive of 24 entries (5,000+ words), as well as ad-free episodes. to receive future monthly missives straight to your inbox, sign up for free here]

[chambersandfogg]

November 21st, 1918

They said we’d be home by Christmas and, against all odds, that may very well be true.

It’s over. We will not have to endure another endless winter in the mud and ice, watching our fellow soldiers’ toes turn black. I only suffered one such season, but I believe I may be done with both the cold and the outdoors for quite some time because of it.

I am not built for this. If I am being honest with myself, I don’t think anyone is built for this. There is something inhuman, unnatural, to this war. I understand that man has fought with man for as long as we’ve walked this earth, but this war is something beyond the realm of human conflict. It is as if we’ve been given the power of the gods and have decided to wage war with it despite being mere mortals ourselves.

They are calling it the Great War. Or the “war to end all wars”. I think the former lends it too much grandiosity and the latter is foolishly optimistic. We are all tired, worn out from the endless tension, the dwindling rations, the howling whistle of mortar shells before they explode, and I have no doubt that the other side feels just the same. And yet I also have no doubt that even this unending destruction has failed to sate the blood-lust that seems to run so deep in the veins of man. This war will not end wars; it has merely changed them.

There is no glory in battle. This is what I have discovered. It is not like the tales of knights and kings that I read as a boy. It is brutish and cruel, turning man into something less than he is. I feel diminished.

When it became clear that I had been given the great gift of, at the very least, an exceptionally long life, if not an unending one, I began to revel in the idea that I should get closer to experiencing every aspect of the human condition than any man has ever come before. And I set out immediately to make that true. I have traveled far and wide, have performed on the world’s great stages, have taken lovers on two continents, have read more books, attended more theatrical performances, eaten more delicious food and drank more expensive wine than I could have ever imagined. I have been to war. I have killed.

Not all human experience is made equal. This is at the very heart of the discovery I have made. Fighting in this terrible conflict, seeing the light go out of another man’s eyes, has put into stark relief just how blessed I have been in my life. I had an inkling of my own good fortune, of course. Lord knows my parents always made sure to tell me that I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth and that I would be a fool to spit it out. But my life had not been without its hardship. I spent decades toiling in a career that I was ready to give up on before the tides turned. I have had public failures and hundreds of arguments with my family. I have been lonely. But I hadn’t experienced true pain until this last year.

Charles has experienced pain in his life. Many times. The loss of his mother hit him terribly hard, and I suspect his childhood was difficult, though he has never told me all that much about it, despite my occasional prodding. He has always been the yardstick against which I measure my accomplishments, but in recent years he’s become a kind of mirror as well. After all, who else on this earth could understand me or the way that I experience the world?

Except he doesn’t understand me. And I don’t understand him, not really. I’m sorry to say that our arguments over my joining the war effort did not cease as the months marched on. I had gone to great lengths to conceal my injury from him while I was still under the watchful eye of the medics—he had no reason to discover that I was receiving his letters to the infirmary—but he uncovered the truth all the same. And it didn’t seem to matter that, by that point, I was back in the field with only a scarred thigh to show for it; he took every opportunity after that to chastise me for getting blown up and encourage me to abandon my compatriots and go home. Yet he refused to be reasoned with when I suggested he be the one to leave the war.

It angered me, that he could so clearly see how ill-equipped I was for the front. Especially considering that he was never in combat the way that I was. How should he know what it takes to drive a bayonet through a man when all his killing occurred in a lab?

I shouldn’t squabble over the ways in which the war has scarred us. And, to be fair to Charlie, I have no idea if he is still relatively unscathed. I know he’s alive, he wrote me on the eleventh, seemingly as soon as he had heard the news, though I only just now received the letter. But I have not seen him in the flesh since his leave in London in ’16. Despite being, I imagine, mere miles apart at times, the war never did bring our paths together. Just as he had wanted. But it does strike me as strange, that I have run into him unexpectedly so many times in my life, but the moment I make an effort to find him, he eludes me.

Perhaps that is precisely the problem. Perhaps whatever means he used to learn of my injury also alerted him to every instance I tried to learn his current whereabouts. Perhaps it wasn’t that I couldn’t find him, but that he didn’t want to be found.

[from the personal diary of J.S. Fogg]

[listen to New Year’s Day wherever you get your podcasts. to read the pre-1917 entries, join atypical artists and get access to the archive of 24 entries (5,000+ words), as well as ad-free episodes. to receive future monthly missives straight to your inbox, sign up for free here]