Transfer Station

              TRANSFER STATION

Seconds after the ball hit bottom and Dana and Leslie Stayman had shared their new year’s kiss, they heard the shotgun blast of Willie Wilkes. A native of West Virginia and colleague of Dana at Towson College for three decades, Willie had purchased the home three houses down and inherited the shot gun the owner left behind.

“Well there goes Willie; it’s official, time to turn in. You coming?”

“I’ll be right up; I just want to check my email.”

Stayman entered his library, a room he had designed himself with his large desk in the middle and shelves of books covering all four walls from floor to ceiling. He tapped into his computer and the first email there was a notice from Scholastica.edu, a website he regretted ever signing onto after it continued to send him every reference to articles on T.S.Eliot ever published. This one piqued his curiosity, however, and so he clicked on an announcement, both surprising and heartwarming. 

“Leslie, you still down here?”

“I’m just starting up now.”

“Come, there’s something on the computer I want you to see.”

As they had done for fifty years, Dana called; Leslie came. She stood behind him reading aloud what was on the screen.

“’The name Dana Stayman has been mentioned two hundred and twelve times in our list of scholarly articles.’ Two hundred and twelve? That’s good, no?”

“It’s fantastic for someone with only two published articles and one book; the other citations must be to works referring to my modest scholarship.”

”You going to check them out?”

“That requires platinum membership. I doubt I’ll get enough value for my money,” replied the child of the great depression. 

Leslie was several years younger than Dana.

“I’ll treat.” 

Soon a list of articles mentioning the name of Dana Stayman appeared on the screen.

    “Oh, Dana, that’s impressive.”

“There’s my article on “The Ladies of the Waste Land.” He browsed further. 

“But here’s a reference to an article, which is definitely not mine.”

“’As Dana Stayman of Johns Hopkins University suggests in “Eliot and the Via Negativa,” Eliot was clearly influenced by medieval mysticism.’” 

“Maybe they copied the title of your article incorrectly?”

“And placed me at Johns Hopkins?”

“That’s uncanny. You must look this other Dana Stayman up.”

“I will, but I want to find out more about what he’s written. First, I’ll print out the list.”

 “Very good, Dana, I’m very proud of you, but I’m going up now. You coming?”

“Not for a while. I want to read a bit of what’s been said about this other Dana Stayman.”

As Leslie left, the printer stopped printing after only three pages had been turned out. Not only had the year 2001 run out of time, but his printer, out of paper. He looked at the last page and discovered it was one of three recipes Leslie had asked him to print for her. He must have forgotten to click the print icon. He searched the drawers but could not find more paper.  No problem; he’d write down a few of the citations still on the computer and start with those at the Library of Congress following their visit next day to their daughter’s home in Washington D. D. for their annual New Year’s Day dinner. 

Ever since MARC introduced a senior citizen discount rate, the Staymans had chosen “to ride the rail” down to D. C. rather than contend with auto traffic there. They easily found a parking space and boarded their car, where the few passengers there allowed each of have a whole seat. The horse farms outside eventually gave way to row homes which signaled the approach to Transfer Station. Expecting to see the single-story, red brick station, Stayman was confused by the appearance of a two story gabled station. His view was quickly obscured by the arrival of a train heading north and stopping on a parallel track.

When their train halted, Leslie gestured to Dana she would be right back. Dana looked out his window at a window of the train opposite. He was shocked to see staring at him from behind clouded glass, in almost the same emotional state as he, an image of himself, but with longer hair. 

Dana rose, marched down the aisle, stepped to the platform, and headed for the car opposite. Before he could reach it, that train began to pull away. At the rail of the caboose suddenly appeared a woman waving at him. She gradually grew smaller before she, train, and track merged with the parallel track before all disappeared beyond the horizon. 

Was it possible the woman waving on the caboose the female counterpart of Johns Hopkins heading back home? He glanced to his right and was relieved to see the single story red brick station. He returned to his car and seat, where, across from him, Leslie was already sitting. 

“Did you see the train opposite us?”

“Yes, on my way to you know where.”

“Did you notice anyone sitting at a window?”

“I wasn’t really paying much attention. Why?”

Not certain of what he had witnessed, Dana took evasive action.

“I thought I recognized someone on the other train.”

“Anyone we know?”

“I’m not sure, at least, not yet.”

The next morning his son-in-law dropped Stayman off before the marble and granite façade of the Thomas Jefferson, Beaux-Arts style Library of Congress. Dana paused to pay homage to the busts of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Washington Irving, Benjamin Franklin, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. As a graduate student, Stayman had always wondered why Herman Melville had not made the cut; the older Stayman, who had since read Pierre, no longer wondered.

Inside, below the high dome above him and before the Romanesque arches rising in tiers up the wall behind, Stayman sat at one of the tables forming one of three circles orbiting the central desk. He had already requested a journal.

    When he was summoned to collect it, he immediately turned to the page cited, but was disappointed. He closed the book, finger marking the page, and handed the clerk the list he had jotted down.

“Would you read this line, please?”

“Stayman, Dana. ‘Eliot and the Via Negativa,’ Modern Poetry, Volume 11 (1991), 313-333.”

“Is this volume 11, 1991 edition of Modern Poetry?”

“It is.”

“Is this page 313?”

“Yes!”

“Do you see ‘Eliot and the Via Negativa’?”

“No.”

“Where the hell is it?”

 “Well, if you don’t know, Mr. Stayman, how should I?”

     He was disappointed there might be but one Dana Stayman in American academia. Some student interning at Scholastica.edu must have screwed up. Was it possible some intern had messed up the other references as much as he had this one? 

The morning was growing late. He told Leslie and Josie he would be back in time for Leslie and him to catch the mid-afternoon train back to Baltimore. He decided to call it a day and renew his investigation once he was in his library with a new ream of paper and return to the Library of Congress if he came up with anything substantial at home.

Having loaded the new paper the next day, Dana waited for the screen to light up. Once it did, he went directly pass three new listings on the email in-box to the Scholastica listing. When it appeared, he was confused, and so called Leslie to his side once more.

“Please read what’s on the screen.”

    “’Your name is mentioned 106 times in scholarly essays in Scholastica.edu files.’ 

So?”

    “Last time it was two hundred and twelve.”

    “You’re right! But isn’t the original email still

here?”

    “This is the only email from Scholastica.edu.”

He soon found the telephone number of Scholastica.edu online and called.

“Good afternoon. You’ve reached Scholastica.edu. My name is Lily; my identification code is A121A. How can I help you?”

“This is Dr. Dana Stayman, membership number, SC9889CS. You emailed me recently indicating my name had been cited 212 times in your files and to view them I’d have to upgrade to platinum. I upgraded and received 212 citations. Today, I cannot find the original email or the subsequent list. What happened to both?”

“Perhaps, Mr. Stayman you accidentally deleted both.”

“No!” he answered curtly. “I’m certain I didn’t for right after receiving the list, I exited your website and turned off my computer.”

“Are you certain the email and list were still on the computer when you signed off?”

“Yes, I’m certain, young lady.”

“I’m going to have to put you on hold for a few seconds while I check our records. Will you please stand by?”

“Yes.”

She was gone for more than a few seconds.

“Mr. Stayman, you still there?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve checked our files; we sent you an email at 4:30 P. M. on December 31 in which we indicated your name had been mentioned 106 times.”

“Is there no indication in your files of another email alluding to 212 citations?”

 “No, sir, there isn’t; and I did check and recheck.”

“What about my platinum membership? Even if it were only 106 mentions, shouldn’t I be able to view and download that list?”

“There’s no record of your ever having taken advantage of platinum, and consequently no list was sent to you.”

“Are you certain?”

“Yes, I checked -–.“

“Young lady, what is your name?”

“Lily, sir, and my identification code is A121A --”

Stayman abruptly hung up, dialed his credit card consumer service, and heard a voice which sounded very much like that of Lily.

“You have reached Financial Credit Consumer Services. Please listen carefully for our menu has changed. For your balance select one; for recent purchases select two –“

Dana pressed button two and was prepared to hear more options when instead he heard a deep, almost soothing voice.

“Good afternoon. My name’s Jerry, your customer service representative; how may I help you?”

“By confirming that on January 1, 2002, I made a credit payment to Scholastic.edu. I’m Dana Stayman; account 1234567887654321; expiration date, 1/1/2020; and three digit number 707.”

“Just a minute, sir”

The minute turned out to be in fact just a minute.

“Yes, sir, you made a payment of $49 to Scholastica. edu.”

He hung up and turned to Leslie.

“I did upgrade to platinum.”

“What now?  Another call to Lily?”

“No! First I’ll visit Johns Hopkins, see if their library has the journal the Library of Congress doesn’t have. If anybody should have a journal in which one of their professors is published, it should be theirs.”

 The stack room of the library contained five tiers of ornamental cast-iron balconies, which rose dramatically to the skylight 61 feet above the floor. Having searched the computer and the stacks for Columbia Studies, Dana had asked the elderly woman behind the main desk if she could help him locate it.

“I’m sorry, but we don’t have that journal.”

“But one of your professors has a paper published in it.”

“Which professor is that?”

“Professor Dana Stayman.”

“I’ve been here for fifty years; I don’t recall a professor Dana Stayman.”

Stayman resolved to return to the Library of Congress not only to look for two more articles from his hand written list but also to run across his double at Transfer Station. There, he waited hoping his alter ego was a creature of habit as he.  When he felt the first minor jolt, a sign his car was beginning to move forward, Dana quickly exited the train. He looked down the parallel track but saw no locomotive heading north. In the small MARC station he consulted train schedules but found no mention of a train arriving at Transfer Station at the time expected. He decided to check with the station master.

“The only train stopping here at that time was the Baltimore to Washington one.”

“Yes, I know, I was on that train and saw another one on the parallel track.”

“That’s not possible, sir.”

“Were you here that day?”

“I was on duty.”

“Were you looking outside the whole time?”

“Probably not!”

“Then, it’s possible there was another train, and you simply did not see it.”

“I doubt that. Even if I didn’t see it, I sure as heck would’ve heard it.”

Dana politely took farewell of the manager, caught the next train heading south, and was at the Library of Congress within two hours.

The morning there proved to be as complete a waste of time as his stop in Transfer Station. The staff could not help him locate any more references to Dana Stayman of Johns Hopkins in the journals they had or other journals in which his double’s work appeared.  He decided to return home and confer with Leslie.

“Leslie, when we stopped at Transfer Station on our way down to Josie’s, I asked you if you had seen a train on the parallel track.”

“Yes, I remember.”

“Did you see a train?”

“Yes!”

“You sure; you’re not just humoring me?”

“Dana, we’re beyond my humoring you anymore.  I saw a train but I didn’t see any face of any of its passengers. Why do you ask?”

Dana momentarily considered the possibility this bizarre experience might be the result of some initial manifestation of dementia making him see things that were not there. If such were the case, he did not want to worry Leslie prematurely for what might be a misperception.

“Dana, does any of this have anything to do with those 212 mentions of your name in elitist Scholastica.edu?”

    God bless you, Leslie, thought Dana, for coming when I called and for remembering what you read.

“Yes, and I’ll explain shortly, but first I must ask another question. Do you believe in the possibility of a parallel universe?”

 “I don’t know. I’ve read theories about it but they seem to me merely pure speculation.”

“Ah, pure speculation! Very good, Leslie! Pure speculation, yes!”

“Dana, what’s this all about?”

“Some of the journals in which the name Dana Stayman occurs don’t even exist.”

“Does the other Dana Stayman exist?”

“I thought I saw her on that train on the other track at Transfer Station.”

“Her?”

“Yes, my double, the person on that train was a woman. She even waved to me from the caboose as it rolled eventually out of sight. But today there was no train at the same time as on New Year’s Day. The station master told me no train heading to Baltimore is scheduled for a stop there at that time.”

“This is getting a little too weird, Dana. You think all of this adds up to a parallel universe in which there’s another, female, you professing in an extra-terrestrial Johns Hopkins?”

“Yes, and she’s writing papers on the same subject as I.”

 “And this parallel universe is the duplicate of ours?” 

“Not quite a duplicate. The other Stayman has published more; her papers on the same subject have different titles; some occur in journals which do not exist here, and, and he is a she.”

“Is there, in that universe, then, a male Leslie Stayman?”

“There’s no other Leslie like you.”

“Thank you, Dana, but parallels never cross, do they?”

“I don’t know. While I was watching that other train move north it seemed it and the track gradually merged with the track on which our train stood.”

“But that’s just perspective.”

“Maybe perspective is a kind of insight! Maybe the alternate universe is not parallel; maybe it and ours exist as lines of a helix or the letter X, lines that, on one occasion at least, perhaps on New Year’s Day, 2002, intersect.”

“Have you any evidence to confirm such speculation?”

The momentary silence in the room was interrupted by the ringing at the front door. Dana rose to answer the call. He opened the door.

“Professor Dana Stayman?”

“Yes.”

“Howard Carter, FBI agent stationed in Baltimore. May I talk to you?”

“About what?”

“We’ve had three reports, which taken together have aroused my curiosity.”

Intuiting what he hoped might just be some confirmation of his suspicions, Dana welcomed the agent.

“Please, come in.”

    He led the agent into his library where Leslie waited.

“Leslie, this is Howard Carter of the FBI in Baltimore.”

“Mrs. Stayman.”

“Mr. Carter, what brings the FBI to our home?”

 “According to the station master at Transfer Station, you claimed to see a train there on New Year’s Day, which he assures us was not there.”

“Both my husband and I saw another train on the parallel track.”

 “The station master was certain you did not until he had another inquiry from someone else on the train you were on about this other, phantom train.”

Although elated by what he heard, Stayman proceeded cautiously.

“Go ahead; you mentioned three reports?”

 “We also received a call from Scholastica.edu. According to them, you insisted you received an email different from the one it sent you and you used your credit card to pay for an upgrade for which they have no record. Did you use your credit card and was it accepted?”

“Yes, I did, and it was.”

“Yes, we know. We’ve already contacted your credit card company and had that information confirmed. That’s the third report.”

“The email and the platinum list, unfortunately, are missing; I’ve searched everywhere on the hard drive for it.”

“They added you also claimed to have printed a page of that email.”

    “I tried to print the list but my machine printed only three pages which turned out to be recipes my wife asked me to print off a website.”

    “You read all three pages?”

    “No, just the first page.”

    “Which does your printer print first, the initial page it’s been commanded to print or the last?”

    Was it possible? He had read the last page off the printer, saw it was a recipe, assumed the other two were as well. Was it possible? He looked to the printer; the three pages were still in the tray.

                    THE END