WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:06.960 For most of my life, I have known the Great 2 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:09.640 Station from beneath as well as above, learned its moods, 3 00:00:09.640 --> 00:00:12.599 its microclimates, and the secrets that come alive after closing. 4 00:00:13.240 --> 00:00:15.679 Even now, with my uniform folded away and my badge 5 00:00:15.759 --> 00:00:17.440 kept in a drawer at home, I spend my days 6 00:00:17.480 --> 00:00:19.879 lingering in its holes and tunnels, like an old cat 7 00:00:19.960 --> 00:00:22.879 nosing around its childhood home. I suppose its habit more 8 00:00:22.879 --> 00:00:25.440 than nostalgia, though perhaps there is little difference between the 9 00:00:25.440 --> 00:00:28.760 two after thirty seven years. That morning I was leading 10 00:00:28.760 --> 00:00:31.079 a mess besodd school to it through the underplatform vaults, 11 00:00:31.079 --> 00:00:34.119 grand stone galleries with pipes strumming above the children's heads, 12 00:00:34.200 --> 00:00:37.799 echoing stat trailing behind. Some kids pressed against my side, 13 00:00:37.880 --> 00:00:40.640 o deceaf with impatience, all under the vigilant eyes of 14 00:00:40.640 --> 00:00:43.520 their teacher, with a clipward and perpetual frown. The official 15 00:00:43.560 --> 00:00:46.320 story is that these toes teach civic pride and urban archaeology. 16 00:00:47.000 --> 00:00:49.439 In truth, we mostly let them feel hushed and important 17 00:00:49.439 --> 00:00:52.240 forgetting to see the hidden city. I give my practice 18 00:00:52.280 --> 00:00:54.960 speech about the telegraph room. The old signal controls the 19 00:00:54.960 --> 00:00:58.240 ghostly echo of the night trains roll in overhead. I 20 00:00:58.280 --> 00:01:01.359 compliment the attentive ones teas the noisy ones and walked 21 00:01:01.359 --> 00:01:03.960 them past exposed brick arches grown soft at the corners, 22 00:01:03.960 --> 00:01:07.040 with the sentry of dust. Just beyond the old luggage room, 23 00:01:07.040 --> 00:01:09.519 a cold sealed off cells, men and rusted hooks. Eye 24 00:01:09.519 --> 00:01:12.640 stopped mid sentence. There were I expected to see a 25 00:01:12.640 --> 00:01:15.040 continuation of the service wall, and the scorched outline of 26 00:01:15.079 --> 00:01:17.799 a fuse box was a passageway I did not recognize. 27 00:01:18.359 --> 00:01:21.040 The arch was narrow all hand may brick a little 28 00:01:21.120 --> 00:01:24.640 lower than regulation. With a lone lamp flickering overhead, it's 29 00:01:24.719 --> 00:01:27.719 light hummed electric can somehow intimate, as though it illuminated 30 00:01:27.760 --> 00:01:30.079 only what it wished to be seen. The air there 31 00:01:30.079 --> 00:01:32.439 smelled sharp like old metal, a trace of dried herbs 32 00:01:32.599 --> 00:01:35.280 and dust disturbed for the first time in years. Does 33 00:01:35.319 --> 00:01:37.400 that go to the old boiler room? Ask a girl 34 00:01:37.439 --> 00:01:40.680 near the front, pointing. Several of the children crane forward, 35 00:01:40.719 --> 00:01:45.120 heel squeaking, others hesitated, drawn by unfamiliar but checking for permission. 36 00:01:45.719 --> 00:01:48.879 Mess Perso shot me a look, one eyebrow raised. We're 37 00:01:48.920 --> 00:01:51.319 not going in there, she said, her voice both warning 38 00:01:51.359 --> 00:01:55.359 and invitation. Mister Gorbiks likes to try and spook new visitors. 39 00:01:55.959 --> 00:01:58.680 I almost laughed, almost played along with her, but a 40 00:01:58.719 --> 00:02:02.040 strange shudder played across my mind. I've waked these underways 41 00:02:02.079 --> 00:02:04.200 since youth, kept on official maps in my head to 42 00:02:04.280 --> 00:02:07.560 check blueprints, even explored every unlabeled vent during midnight shift 43 00:02:07.599 --> 00:02:10.199 changes in I kintuck to days. Yet I could swear 44 00:02:10.240 --> 00:02:12.639 there was no corridor there, not once in all those years. 45 00:02:13.360 --> 00:02:14.879 I made light of it, told the group it was 46 00:02:14.919 --> 00:02:17.159 probably a dead end for storage I left over from 47 00:02:17.159 --> 00:02:20.879 summer innovation. No one remembered inside, though my eyes lingered 48 00:02:20.960 --> 00:02:23.240 just a little longer than I meant. The echoes in 49 00:02:23.280 --> 00:02:26.319 the passage sounded dampened, stretched, different from the clean rikoshet 50 00:02:26.360 --> 00:02:29.000 of the lodger hall. Some kids called out a scatter 51 00:02:29.039 --> 00:02:31.840 of jokes about treasure, sleepwalking porters or ghost trains, but 52 00:02:31.879 --> 00:02:34.639 the group moved on. I led a mess forsaw take over, 53 00:02:34.719 --> 00:02:37.919 herding the stragglers. My mind, however, stuck on that art 54 00:02:37.919 --> 00:02:40.759 tore like a sliver in the palm. With practice politeness, 55 00:02:40.879 --> 00:02:43.039 I noted a spot, made a mental morckage, just passed 56 00:02:43.039 --> 00:02:44.879 the line to pipe in the faded air raids sign 57 00:02:44.919 --> 00:02:48.439 on the wall. I promised myself I'd return quietly. It's 58 00:02:48.439 --> 00:02:50.919 a peculiar thing to be tripped by an unexpected passage 59 00:02:50.919 --> 00:02:53.080 in a place you know by ha. Even as we 60 00:02:53.159 --> 00:02:55.000 finished the tour and shed our hard hats under the 61 00:02:55.039 --> 00:02:57.479 high stained glass dome, the matter needled at me. How 62 00:02:57.520 --> 00:02:59.639 had I missed a whole corridor, and so obvious at 63 00:02:59.680 --> 00:03:01.759 that when no blueprint or memory could account for it 64 00:03:02.400 --> 00:03:04.719 in my station, where memory and place were always meant 65 00:03:04.759 --> 00:03:07.960 to be one, and the same. Retirement people claim makes 66 00:03:08.000 --> 00:03:09.919 a world shrink, But for those of a superb routine, 67 00:03:09.960 --> 00:03:11.719 it can make the familiar strange. If we let it 68 00:03:12.319 --> 00:03:15.400 after lunch and the canteens after rushlull. The question lingered 69 00:03:15.400 --> 00:03:17.400 in the taste of overcook lentils and among the casual 70 00:03:17.400 --> 00:03:19.599 shouts from the domino table. Was the fault in me 71 00:03:19.800 --> 00:03:22.840 or in the station itself? If the station's public faces, 72 00:03:22.879 --> 00:03:26.280 all grand ironwork, frescoes and marble grandeur, its spowels hold 73 00:03:26.280 --> 00:03:29.000 its true life unseen but vital, My own life has 74 00:03:29.039 --> 00:03:31.960 been lived somewhere between those two currents, part practical, part mythic, 75 00:03:32.120 --> 00:03:35.120 always grounded in that men's layered world. I built my 76 00:03:35.159 --> 00:03:38.280 identity in his halls. I was the conductor who kept 77 00:03:38.280 --> 00:03:40.599 schedules in his head. Who could send a message through 78 00:03:40.639 --> 00:03:43.000 three different channels if the phone line failed, Who could 79 00:03:43.039 --> 00:03:45.719 navigate blackout or snowstorm without ever consulting the post to 80 00:03:45.800 --> 00:03:49.280 maps even after stepping down. I was the old hand, 81 00:03:49.360 --> 00:03:51.639 the one who'd seen the last steam runs, who might 82 00:03:51.680 --> 00:03:53.439 recall the story of the cat that rode freight to 83 00:03:53.479 --> 00:03:55.639 the docks each winter, or the time the smuggled goods 84 00:03:55.639 --> 00:03:59.400 and platform seven sealing broad customs Scrambling these days with 85 00:03:59.439 --> 00:04:01.960 a badger place by a folding wooden cane. My routines 86 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:04.960 were unheard morning coffees with marked at the ticket clok 87 00:04:04.960 --> 00:04:07.840 whose tongue were shop of the mine could ever be occasional, 88 00:04:07.879 --> 00:04:09.719 helped to slip a home as regular into an out 89 00:04:09.719 --> 00:04:11.479 of the way corner during the worst of the rain. 90 00:04:12.039 --> 00:04:14.960 Trading stories were Thomas, the baby faced security guard who 91 00:04:14.960 --> 00:04:17.439 styled himself a detective but still looked like a student 92 00:04:17.519 --> 00:04:20.800 in right gear, a friendly rivalry with old Johnners, head 93 00:04:20.839 --> 00:04:23.360 of cleaning for thirty years, who claimed he'd once mopped 94 00:04:23.439 --> 00:04:25.480 up after an excelled Prime minister and could recite the 95 00:04:25.480 --> 00:04:28.800 colors of every loss scarf in winter. The cast had shifted, 96 00:04:28.879 --> 00:04:31.319 but the plays and its mixture of gentleness and hard 97 00:04:31.319 --> 00:04:34.600 won order remained. If you walked long enough in the station, 98 00:04:34.879 --> 00:04:37.879 its true shape revealed itself. Families waited for the night 99 00:04:37.879 --> 00:04:41.240 train to the border, hands tight on heavy luggage. Porters 100 00:04:41.240 --> 00:04:43.959 dozed in odd corners, boots on upturned bins, dreaming of 101 00:04:44.000 --> 00:04:46.480 meals left waiting at home. In the grunda of the 102 00:04:46.519 --> 00:04:49.040 main hall, late day sunset, the glass of blaze with 103 00:04:49.079 --> 00:04:51.759 color outside. The wind pressed against the old copper doors, 104 00:04:52.120 --> 00:04:55.120 whistling low, as if the place itself sighed between journeys. 105 00:04:55.560 --> 00:04:58.399 Yet underneath past the platforms in cold dust, was a 106 00:04:58.480 --> 00:05:01.879 kingdom of tunnel' junctions, intenans, rooms sealed, doors inherited and 107 00:05:01.879 --> 00:05:05.600 half abandoned. I prided myself on never getting loss, never 108 00:05:05.639 --> 00:05:08.439 being surprised by a turn or a stair. In retirement, 109 00:05:08.480 --> 00:05:11.439 I returned for the comfort of that certainty. Wondering after hours, 110 00:05:11.519 --> 00:05:13.920 pausing to watch the lone shift workers. Quint at his phone, 111 00:05:14.000 --> 00:05:16.839 waiting out a particularly fierce thunderstorm on her for garden benches. 112 00:05:16.839 --> 00:05:19.519 I jotted old stories in my note book. When Marty 113 00:05:19.639 --> 00:05:21.519 returned from her break, I met her at the West 114 00:05:21.680 --> 00:05:23.720 Entry to catch up on gossip. The trickle of light trains, 115 00:05:23.759 --> 00:05:27.000 quarrels between porters, the sog of cafeteria renovations juned before 116 00:05:27.040 --> 00:05:30.600 they began. He still haunting our underworld, she teased, sliding 117 00:05:30.600 --> 00:05:33.120 her coin box shut with a practice snap, trying to 118 00:05:33.199 --> 00:05:35.000 keep an eye on things. Never know what might fall 119 00:05:35.000 --> 00:05:39.720 through the cracks. You miss something, Her laughter echoed, only 120 00:05:39.759 --> 00:05:42.120 if you finally learned to nap on duty. With a 121 00:05:42.120 --> 00:05:45.240 casual tone, I approached the subject of the corridor. Did 122 00:05:45.240 --> 00:05:47.600 she recall any passage between the old luggage room and 123 00:05:47.639 --> 00:05:50.959 the foundations, Only the stub to the parcel office, She said, 124 00:05:51.480 --> 00:05:54.439 we store broken umbrella stands there years ago. You sure 125 00:05:54.480 --> 00:05:57.439 you aren't seeing things? Memory plays tricks. Those basements, they 126 00:05:57.519 --> 00:06:00.000 change more than you think. I pressed a little more, 127 00:06:00.000 --> 00:06:02.480 describing the brookwrook, the odd land, the strange sense of 128 00:06:02.480 --> 00:06:05.480 space that just sounds like the old male run place 129 00:06:05.519 --> 00:06:08.879 was mazed before the last renovation. Tiny doors, dead ends everywhere, 130 00:06:08.920 --> 00:06:11.279 Half the building's patched with stuff from god knows. When 131 00:06:11.399 --> 00:06:14.079 go back tomorrow, we'll see it's just another storage hall. 132 00:06:14.680 --> 00:06:17.680 But she washed me measuring. She'd have called me out, 133 00:06:17.680 --> 00:06:19.439 as she thought I was inventing it for drama, But 134 00:06:19.519 --> 00:06:22.680 she didn't. Just dismissed it for now, Thomas, hearing our 135 00:06:22.720 --> 00:06:25.920 exchange piped up. If you want, I can check the cameras, 136 00:06:26.040 --> 00:06:28.319 but we're lucky to get anything but spiderwebs and rats 137 00:06:28.360 --> 00:06:31.360 down there. Every second bulbs a ghost, and every story's 138 00:06:31.360 --> 00:06:33.959 a mystery. Chimed in John O's from the coffee line. 139 00:06:34.360 --> 00:06:37.839 That's how the place stays interesting. I smiled along, feigning 140 00:06:37.879 --> 00:06:40.879 the camaraderie. But beneath my mind pays like a caged cat. 141 00:06:41.639 --> 00:06:44.399 Later that afternoon, when the shadows lengthened and the commuter 142 00:06:44.439 --> 00:06:46.759 rushed round out small oddities, I returned to the sub 143 00:06:46.839 --> 00:06:49.680 levels alone, cane in hand, steps muffled by the coal 144 00:06:49.720 --> 00:06:53.279 and oleum. I carried a pencil and notebook. I'd map 145 00:06:53.360 --> 00:06:55.560 these passages as a hobby. Now I would check again, 146 00:06:55.720 --> 00:06:58.800 see if my mind was plain tricks. There, just past 147 00:06:58.839 --> 00:07:01.920 the luggage rooms barred gate was the archery. The lamp 148 00:07:01.959 --> 00:07:05.519 now glowed steady brass, not flickering, A faint, dry colness 149 00:07:05.560 --> 00:07:07.680 pressed from within, as if the corridor drew breath, a 150 00:07:07.680 --> 00:07:10.839 subtle current enough to require a deliberate step inside. I 151 00:07:10.920 --> 00:07:14.199 counted my paces and scanned each side. Pipes here hung 152 00:07:14.240 --> 00:07:16.439 at an odd angle, as if spliced in after the 153 00:07:16.480 --> 00:07:19.519 wall was finished. The pattern of tiles was wrong, green 154 00:07:19.560 --> 00:07:22.879 squares where they should be marooned diamonds, Two bare walls, 155 00:07:22.959 --> 00:07:25.199 then a jog left a shallow alcove beg enough for 156 00:07:25.240 --> 00:07:28.399 an adult tuck away, each brick marked by certain ultark scribblings. 157 00:07:29.040 --> 00:07:31.199 A water stain on the ceiling described an arc like 158 00:07:31.199 --> 00:07:34.600 the track of a swinging lantern. Further on a doorway, 159 00:07:35.279 --> 00:07:37.240 not a storage caused it not right in this place 160 00:07:37.959 --> 00:07:40.000 it was held with a slab of ancient smoke blackened 161 00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:42.079 oak hinges so old they looked weight around the edges, 162 00:07:42.160 --> 00:07:44.759 as if soaked in oil. I drew the corridor on 163 00:07:44.800 --> 00:07:47.439 paper as I walked to catching the strange curve, nording 164 00:07:47.519 --> 00:07:49.920 number and placement of pipes, the absurdly high windows of 165 00:07:49.920 --> 00:07:52.759 frosted glass that let in no light from anywhere. Then 166 00:07:52.800 --> 00:07:55.639 the way curve right, again, becoming narrower. I passed a 167 00:07:55.680 --> 00:07:57.759 second arch lower than the first. How could this be 168 00:07:57.920 --> 00:07:59.959 when the blueprint call for nothing but a straight service 169 00:08:00.079 --> 00:08:03.079 path backed by concrete. I tapped on the wall, hollowed 170 00:08:03.120 --> 00:08:06.160 then solid, turned to leave, take the way back. Measured 171 00:08:06.160 --> 00:08:09.319 The steps five minutes later were traced the same route. 172 00:08:09.319 --> 00:08:11.839 Now I counted three alcoves, not two, and a brass 173 00:08:11.839 --> 00:08:13.800 sign above one door I could have sworn was absent. 174 00:08:13.839 --> 00:08:17.759 Before my heart thudded, not with fear, but sharper, almost 175 00:08:17.759 --> 00:08:21.000 delighted in knees. The corridor played tricks, but it was real, physical, 176 00:08:21.160 --> 00:08:23.920 not dream or memory. I ran a gloved hand along 177 00:08:23.959 --> 00:08:26.160 the walls, felt the rough brick chip in recent years 178 00:08:26.160 --> 00:08:29.120 over smoother old or stone. Resolved not to give into 179 00:08:29.160 --> 00:08:31.920 Fancy Orn's booken dread. I found Martyr, who was finishing 180 00:08:31.920 --> 00:08:34.720 her tally of ticket stubs. I brought her to the spot, 181 00:08:34.759 --> 00:08:37.000 told her how I wanted her opinion on the structural oddity. 182 00:08:37.600 --> 00:08:40.679 She followed with professional impatience, arms cross. She was clicking 183 00:08:40.720 --> 00:08:43.480 through the gloom. When we reached the arch, she squinted it, 184 00:08:43.519 --> 00:08:46.399 then entered. This is just the old male corridor, he 185 00:08:46.480 --> 00:08:49.440 said so before to her there was nothing odd. Storage 186 00:08:49.440 --> 00:08:51.960 bin stacked at odd angles, a dusty lenk of rope. 187 00:08:52.399 --> 00:08:55.120 She stopped at a small alcove and shrubbed. I don't 188 00:08:55.159 --> 00:08:56.799 know why you're making a fuss. You want to hunt 189 00:08:56.840 --> 00:08:59.360 for rats, do it on your own time, I pointed 190 00:08:59.399 --> 00:09:01.200 out and consisted, and sees how the doors were different, 191 00:09:01.240 --> 00:09:03.639 the walls too long by several meters compared to the map. 192 00:09:04.120 --> 00:09:06.159 She looked at me, then at the walls, then at 193 00:09:06.200 --> 00:09:09.919 her phone, untroubled. It's a basement. Old basements never massed 194 00:09:09.919 --> 00:09:13.519 to plans. She moved on. But the corridor as I 195 00:09:13.559 --> 00:09:16.159 walked it alone before and after, did not stay the same. 196 00:09:16.720 --> 00:09:19.879 The alignment shifted as sometimes step whiter, sometimes bearing new 197 00:09:19.919 --> 00:09:23.919 marks I didn't recall. I grew quietly obsessed. I drafted 198 00:09:23.960 --> 00:09:26.360 sketches after every visit, compared them for since, tried to 199 00:09:26.399 --> 00:09:29.840 overlay them with old renovation files. I questioned my memory 200 00:09:29.919 --> 00:09:33.240 tested it were cordy measurements, checking features from different entries. 201 00:09:33.279 --> 00:09:36.759 Each result resisted certainty. Others might have let the DUTs slide, 202 00:09:36.879 --> 00:09:38.480 accepted a trick of the mind, or called it a 203 00:09:38.480 --> 00:09:42.399 fault of age. I could not pride, perhaps, but also 204 00:09:42.480 --> 00:09:44.679 hunger to know what exactly this place was showing me. 205 00:09:45.320 --> 00:09:48.639 Every discrepancy left, its residue or stubborn echo demanding attention. 206 00:09:49.240 --> 00:09:51.320 That weekend, I laid out my sketches over a cup 207 00:09:51.320 --> 00:09:53.639 of tart tea in a cafe, and atomical diagrams of 208 00:09:53.679 --> 00:09:56.480 a beast that refused to sit still. One showed five 209 00:09:56.519 --> 00:09:59.840 doors across one stretch. Another had only three. Sometimes the 210 00:10:00.039 --> 00:10:02.639 wall's curve sometimes straight to geometry that couldn't fit the 211 00:10:02.720 --> 00:10:05.600 unyielding book of foundation above. I tried to ank in 212 00:10:05.679 --> 00:10:08.000 my memory with detail at chip tile, an iron ring 213 00:10:08.080 --> 00:10:10.279 set and cement, a strange pattern, like a child's drawing 214 00:10:10.279 --> 00:10:14.200 in faded paint. None held. The next visit something you 215 00:10:14.279 --> 00:10:17.200 always broke the pattern children from the last Troe stop 216 00:10:17.279 --> 00:10:19.559 me in the main hall on Monday. Did you ever 217 00:10:19.600 --> 00:10:22.559 find those paintings? One ass, wide eyed behind thick glasses. 218 00:10:23.159 --> 00:10:26.360 I hesitated, then pressed them for detail. There were pictures 219 00:10:26.360 --> 00:10:28.480 on the walls, people wearing those funny hats like for 220 00:10:28.519 --> 00:10:31.679 a parade, said another, and a golden clock that ticked 221 00:10:31.759 --> 00:10:34.960 really loud. A third Chianda in waving her hands for emphasis. 222 00:10:35.639 --> 00:10:39.200 I smiled at them, humor masking surprise. These details hadn't 223 00:10:39.200 --> 00:10:42.559 appear for me. Maybe you have sharper eyes than the 224 00:10:42.639 --> 00:10:46.000 rest of us. I resolved to press further. Over the 225 00:10:46.039 --> 00:10:48.759 next week, I returned to the corridor daily, sometimes with 226 00:10:48.759 --> 00:10:51.000 an accomplice, Thomas when he was free, John Os if 227 00:10:51.000 --> 00:10:53.720 his shift permitted, even Marta, who now started shaking her 228 00:10:53.720 --> 00:10:57.039 head before I spoke. Each time, the corridor answered differently. 229 00:10:57.559 --> 00:11:00.000 With Thomas, fresh from his own lunch and always looked 230 00:11:00.000 --> 00:11:02.919 looking for mystery. We entered at dusk. He shone his 231 00:11:02.960 --> 00:11:06.000 official flashlight over the tiles, pointing out appealing advertisement on 232 00:11:06.039 --> 00:11:08.000 the wall for a bank promotion, pale yellow and all 233 00:11:08.000 --> 00:11:11.399 but worn away. That's it, he asked. I've been here 234 00:11:11.440 --> 00:11:14.840 since before I start Granny's era. Maybe look for our print. 235 00:11:14.919 --> 00:11:17.720 Ugly as hell, Yet this add to me was new. 236 00:11:18.320 --> 00:11:20.759 I wrote its text in my notebook Securior feature in 237 00:11:20.840 --> 00:11:24.159 nineteen eighty three. No such sign had stood there yesterday 238 00:11:24.720 --> 00:11:27.240 we walked on. I asked him how many doors? He 239 00:11:27.279 --> 00:11:30.759 saw three, always three, the far ones locked, Bass says 240 00:11:30.799 --> 00:11:33.799 to ignore it. For me, there were four, one labeled 241 00:11:33.799 --> 00:11:35.879 with an indecipherable word I could sketch but not quite 242 00:11:35.919 --> 00:11:39.360 read aloud. He found nothing odd. Hall's boring. Next time, 243 00:11:39.440 --> 00:11:42.039 bring me some more. Haunted all John O's and his 244 00:11:42.080 --> 00:11:44.519 paints battered over alls. Sniffed the air at the entrances, 245 00:11:44.519 --> 00:11:47.879 if expecting to catch out a fugitive. Sometimes you go left, 246 00:11:47.919 --> 00:11:50.440 sometimes you go right. Whole place is full of short cuts, 247 00:11:50.480 --> 00:11:52.799 but they don't last the winter. He winked as if 248 00:11:52.840 --> 00:11:55.600 he saw my confusion as a private joke. All men's 249 00:11:55.600 --> 00:11:58.759 shricks not magic. A few visits later, I tried my 250 00:11:58.840 --> 00:12:01.559 phone snapping pictures of the oddest features the alcoves doors, 251 00:12:01.679 --> 00:12:04.600 especially the old clock on a shelf. Reviewing the images, 252 00:12:04.759 --> 00:12:07.840 I found mostly blowd rectangle's street light, the unmistakable bulge 253 00:12:07.840 --> 00:12:10.120 of a lens distorted or perhaps reflected from a surface 254 00:12:10.200 --> 00:12:13.159 just out of frame. Once a mural appeared shark tooth 255 00:12:13.159 --> 00:12:15.720 and bold, next time it was gone, the brick scrub rawer. 256 00:12:16.320 --> 00:12:19.240 I visited the main library, searching for order. Amid the ghosts. 257 00:12:19.919 --> 00:12:22.879 Early architectural blue prints confirmed were ever remembered in that 258 00:12:23.080 --> 00:12:27.000 entire wing. No such corridor ever appeared yet Hedden. In 259 00:12:27.039 --> 00:12:29.799 a stack of mid century renovation notes, I found reference 260 00:12:29.799 --> 00:12:33.360 to a connector hallway storage possible, no marked length, no 261 00:12:33.399 --> 00:12:36.679 inventory or basis for use. I tried to return control 262 00:12:36.720 --> 00:12:38.840 to routine, late meals with Marty, games of chess with 263 00:12:38.919 --> 00:12:42.000 John Nos between platform mans, low conversation in the warm thread, 264 00:12:42.000 --> 00:12:45.600 but conductor's lounge still every time I walked the passage, 265 00:12:45.679 --> 00:12:48.120 every conversation about it, every note on paper, the fied 266 00:12:48.200 --> 00:12:52.039 neat explanation, the children stories, persisted. Paintings of people in 267 00:12:52.080 --> 00:12:54.279 funny hats. Are rooms with doors that had names, but 268 00:12:54.320 --> 00:12:57.000 the names kept changing, the shelves with tiny ticking clocks, 269 00:12:57.120 --> 00:13:01.120 all beating together. Marda, on her own whim reported just 270 00:13:01.120 --> 00:13:03.120 a lost and found covered of coats left from three 271 00:13:03.159 --> 00:13:07.080 decade ago, terribly dull. Yet for me, every visit yielded difference. 272 00:13:07.279 --> 00:13:10.279 Sometimes the brass plate above a door shone, almost newly polished. 273 00:13:10.320 --> 00:13:13.840 Sometimes I found anti luggage labels patched thithers calcified by 274 00:13:13.879 --> 00:13:16.840 time or tow to train schedule, stative full lines, long demolished. 275 00:13:17.519 --> 00:13:19.840 Once a shelf lined with miniature clocks, all ticking in 276 00:13:19.919 --> 00:13:23.320 patient synchrony. They seemed neither particularly old nor new, each 277 00:13:23.360 --> 00:13:25.600 one set to its ownar, not a single dial which 278 00:13:25.600 --> 00:13:28.360 should have been local time. I regarded them in wonder, 279 00:13:28.440 --> 00:13:31.240 running a finger along their dusty crowns, half expecting them 280 00:13:31.240 --> 00:13:33.879 to vanish the moment I glanced away. I tried to 281 00:13:33.919 --> 00:13:37.919 photograph again, different angles, flash and no flash. Some images 282 00:13:37.919 --> 00:13:41.120 were simply black, others distorted by light, flared, and always 283 00:13:41.240 --> 00:13:44.240 features I had observed directly appeared shifted, doubled, or melted 284 00:13:44.240 --> 00:13:47.080 into the wall. Once with a spark of mischievous hope. 285 00:13:47.080 --> 00:13:48.840 I brought a friend from the portico, a man with 286 00:13:48.879 --> 00:13:51.919 no particular love for theiocane. Looks like a spillover from 287 00:13:51.919 --> 00:13:56.519 the storeroom, he declared to him. The corridor was plain, forsaic, unremarkable. 288 00:13:57.039 --> 00:13:59.200 When I pressed him about the clocks, he just laughed. 289 00:13:59.799 --> 00:14:02.240 Maybe try sleeping more. Night shifts will do you in. 290 00:14:02.840 --> 00:14:05.240 The pattern was clear now, but so was the contradiction. 291 00:14:05.840 --> 00:14:08.039 How could the saint space shift change mean so little 292 00:14:08.080 --> 00:14:10.720 to sum in so much to utters? How could features 293 00:14:10.720 --> 00:14:13.799 that seem so substantial murals, ticking clocks and familiar doors 294 00:14:13.840 --> 00:14:17.320 appear before some eyes and not others. My servanty faltered 295 00:14:17.519 --> 00:14:20.399 were placed not by fear, but by deep hungry curiosity. 296 00:14:21.000 --> 00:14:24.200 Who else knew more? Had any one tried, truly tried 297 00:14:24.240 --> 00:14:27.679 to catalog these shifting elements? Did these appearances answer to 298 00:14:27.759 --> 00:14:30.679 need to memory, to the passage of time itself? My 299 00:14:30.759 --> 00:14:33.399 investigation brought in as quickly as the station's roots, layers 300 00:14:33.399 --> 00:14:36.799 of past and present intertwined, impossible to keep apart. I 301 00:14:36.879 --> 00:14:40.000 compared my detailed sketches with martyrs of hand notes, thomases 302 00:14:40.000 --> 00:14:43.799 and affected jokes, even the children's stray utterances. What each 303 00:14:43.840 --> 00:14:47.320 of us describe what each wantsaw doors, murals, advertisements, clocks. 304 00:14:47.360 --> 00:14:50.600 They never quite matched. Sometimes my notes overlap with one 305 00:14:50.639 --> 00:14:53.039 child's description, only for the feature to go missing on 306 00:14:53.080 --> 00:14:56.279 the next visit. Perhaps I began to consider it wasn't 307 00:14:56.320 --> 00:14:58.240 the courridor alone that shifted, but the very way it 308 00:14:58.320 --> 00:15:01.200 answered each visitor. The familiar blends with the not quite forgotten, 309 00:15:01.200 --> 00:15:03.720 every side as much memory as stone and iron. I 310 00:15:03.799 --> 00:15:05.840 hesitated to name it aloud. How could one explain to 311 00:15:05.879 --> 00:15:08.799 careful routine bank colleagues that the passage might reflect not 312 00:15:08.879 --> 00:15:12.039 just lost blueprints or old renovations, but the interior life 313 00:15:12.039 --> 00:15:14.799 of every soul that wandered it. Yet, on a late 314 00:15:14.879 --> 00:15:17.600 night visit, passing again through the familiar narrowing halls, I 315 00:15:17.600 --> 00:15:20.159 found a small side room, half veiled behind a curtain 316 00:15:20.200 --> 00:15:23.600 of soil, vivid that I couldn't recall having seen before. Inside, 317 00:15:23.759 --> 00:15:25.759 light glowed from a single shade of damp, gentle and 318 00:15:25.799 --> 00:15:28.840 welcoming on her work tables at three objects, a platform 319 00:15:28.879 --> 00:15:31.559 ticket freighted, neoligible but burying the date of my first 320 00:15:31.559 --> 00:15:34.559 solo night shift thirty three years prior. Battered conductor's cap 321 00:15:34.639 --> 00:15:36.679 sized for a younger man, but unmistakably mind by the 322 00:15:36.720 --> 00:15:39.159 frayed lining and the initial stitch discreetly in the band, 323 00:15:39.320 --> 00:15:41.759 and a pocket watch crusted with years of dust, per 324 00:15:41.759 --> 00:15:44.919 closing with the stiffness that rang painfully familiar. I pressed 325 00:15:44.960 --> 00:15:47.440 the edge half expecting to see my own family monogram, 326 00:15:47.480 --> 00:15:50.039 and there it was, delicate scriped, a relic of my grandfather's. 327 00:15:50.480 --> 00:15:53.720 My hand tremble, not from fear, but gn all object 328 00:15:53.720 --> 00:15:56.360 of memory intertwined the corridor gave back moments I thought 329 00:15:56.360 --> 00:15:58.639 lost on remarkable in the world, but precise, some weighty 330 00:15:58.639 --> 00:16:01.480 for me. After that night, I no longer believe the 331 00:16:01.480 --> 00:16:04.720 phenomenon was only a misunderstanding or mismeasure, nor a mere 332 00:16:04.759 --> 00:16:08.000 accident of failed architecture. No, something more was at work, 333 00:16:08.120 --> 00:16:10.480 a place tailored or at least receptive to those who 334 00:16:10.480 --> 00:16:14.559 passed through. My curiosity deep and restless, I asked Marda 335 00:16:14.639 --> 00:16:17.840 gently about the capture shrugged. All porters had those. Maybe 336 00:16:17.879 --> 00:16:20.600 you remember it because you want to, I asked Thomas 337 00:16:20.639 --> 00:16:23.240 if he'd ever seen a mural that wasn't their unprevious walks. 338 00:16:23.919 --> 00:16:27.080 He paused, and certainly, I mean not really, But you're 339 00:16:27.120 --> 00:16:30.039 the one always notices in the details. Still the seed 340 00:16:30.080 --> 00:16:33.679 was planted. What tied the corridor shifting form to its visitors? 341 00:16:34.320 --> 00:16:37.360 Why did these objects emerge only for particular eyes and hands? 342 00:16:38.000 --> 00:16:40.360 Could memories be layered into the very stone, made to 343 00:16:40.399 --> 00:16:44.080 surface when needed, or did we in searching leaf traces 344 00:16:44.080 --> 00:16:47.080 that others, perhaps ourselves, years later, could find and lose again? 345 00:16:47.120 --> 00:16:50.240 In turn, old Johnos became more candid when I pressed. 346 00:16:50.840 --> 00:16:52.639 I used to see a hallway after a long night, 347 00:16:52.720 --> 00:16:55.480 hallways when bon tied or half missing home, when somewhere different, 348 00:16:55.559 --> 00:16:57.559 or maybe nowhere at all. Next shift, it was gone, 349 00:16:57.639 --> 00:16:59.919 just the air and the pipe's humming. The most or 350 00:17:00.240 --> 00:17:02.440 I gathered, the more each one folded into the next. 351 00:17:02.559 --> 00:17:05.119 Engineers recalling the faint chime of clocks when none should be, 352 00:17:05.279 --> 00:17:07.799 ticket clerks remembering a door that led once to a 353 00:17:07.880 --> 00:17:10.960 music room instead of the abandoned ricker's office. Porters were 354 00:17:10.960 --> 00:17:13.680 counting lost rooms found again for a single night before 355 00:17:13.680 --> 00:17:17.720 receding beyond use. Even Marta, after our latest argument, admitted 356 00:17:17.759 --> 00:17:19.720 reluctantly and only in the lull of a late train, 357 00:17:19.799 --> 00:17:22.279 that as a child she once wanted downstairs and encountered 358 00:17:22.279 --> 00:17:24.640 a room with hundreds of clocks, all chiming at once. 359 00:17:25.279 --> 00:17:27.640 She dismissed it as a bad dream or a memory 360 00:17:27.640 --> 00:17:30.359 folded around a story told by an older aunt. It 361 00:17:30.480 --> 00:17:33.079 was the daylight probably, or I was ill, she said, 362 00:17:33.200 --> 00:17:36.440 shaking her head. But I do remember the sound and 363 00:17:36.559 --> 00:17:39.519 always the station's blueprint sal Knew scribbled the margins, or 364 00:17:39.519 --> 00:17:41.680 officially type it old a different story. There was simply 365 00:17:41.720 --> 00:17:45.480 no permanence basematching the shifting echo full corridor. Yet in 366 00:17:45.559 --> 00:17:47.319 a locked store room I found about of books of 367 00:17:47.319 --> 00:17:50.240 old luggage tags, one still affixed with the handritten label 368 00:17:50.279 --> 00:17:53.440 Gorbi's plot from nine March nineteen sixty seven, the year 369 00:17:53.640 --> 00:17:56.000 began as a junior porter the same day as snowstorm 370 00:17:56.039 --> 00:18:00.039 delayed every outbound train, scattering plans and travelers alike. The 371 00:18:00.160 --> 00:18:02.480 question rose that I could neither voice nor suppress. Was 372 00:18:02.519 --> 00:18:05.160 the corridor a kind of living collective archive of vessel 373 00:18:05.160 --> 00:18:08.599 for lost stories, half remembered routines, regrets and relics drifting 374 00:18:08.640 --> 00:18:12.799 back in unexpected forms. Had the act of working, loving, longing, 375 00:18:12.960 --> 00:18:15.559 and passing through these tunnels over decades painted new rooms 376 00:18:15.559 --> 00:18:17.480 and doors on to the fabric of the station itself. 377 00:18:18.039 --> 00:18:20.759 What was the corridor always there, surfacing only when memory 378 00:18:20.759 --> 00:18:22.640 and place converged in just the right way for just 379 00:18:22.680 --> 00:18:25.319 the right person. As I scoured the stacks from mention 380 00:18:25.440 --> 00:18:28.599 of impossible hallways, gathering stories from every veteran I could find, 381 00:18:28.640 --> 00:18:32.240 the pattern expanded. Nearly everyone given the chance in private, 382 00:18:32.440 --> 00:18:34.599 confessed to an old shortcut or room whose use was 383 00:18:34.640 --> 00:18:37.640 never clear and never assigned. He admitted any belief, but 384 00:18:37.720 --> 00:18:41.559 the details accumulated, murals that changed vanis corners, locked doors 385 00:18:41.599 --> 00:18:43.960 that turned up open for a single day. I found 386 00:18:44.000 --> 00:18:46.319 Thomas one evening by the next stand, leafing through a 387 00:18:46.359 --> 00:18:49.039 small notebook where at over weeks he begun recording his 388 00:18:49.039 --> 00:18:52.160 own findings. At my suggestion, saw mural I swear, wasn't 389 00:18:52.160 --> 00:18:54.599 there before a train with everyone dressed up, sort of 390 00:18:54.640 --> 00:18:56.920 like an old holiday poster. Couldn't get a picture. It 391 00:18:57.000 --> 00:18:59.039 faded when I went back with my phone. Maybe it's 392 00:18:59.160 --> 00:19:02.759 just paying flakes. Even Marta, with her practice skepticism, emitted 393 00:19:02.799 --> 00:19:04.960 over a muck of sweet coffee and with visible reluctance 394 00:19:04.960 --> 00:19:06.960 that she sometimes felt a tug of memory in those 395 00:19:07.000 --> 00:19:10.000 walks fleeding, not quite reliable, but persistent none the less. 396 00:19:10.599 --> 00:19:12.680 That was when the rumors reached my irre fragment of 397 00:19:12.720 --> 00:19:15.920 conversation between two porters about an old clockmaker's shop, believe 398 00:19:16.000 --> 00:19:18.440 long closed. Hidden in a far annext of the maintenance 399 00:19:18.440 --> 00:19:21.599 waiting a workshop, some said, with clocks whose faces no 400 00:19:21.680 --> 00:19:24.000 longer matched local time, cared for by a woman whose 401 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:26.440