Callahan’s Folly — an excerpt
Mrs. Abernathy left Callahan alone in his temporary domain. At the western window, he watched the last of the evening light fade over Fortune Lake. The thin, early chill of the high country seeped through the glass. The water had deepened to indigo save for a single greenish glow deep off the far shore, as though a lantern had been left alight beneath the surface. No phosphorescence he had ever observed behaved like this, not the sea-fire that boiled in a ship's wake nor the foxfire of rotting timber.
"Extraordinary," he whispered.
He moved to his traveling desk, thumbed open the brass catches, and withdrew a leather-bound journal and pen. In his precise, scholarly hand he recorded the first entry in what would become a voluminous record of his time at Fortune Lake:
September 19th, 1890 - Bracken Ridge, Nevada
Arrived to find conditions even more intriguing than McKinnon suggested. The lake exhibits optical properties that demand investigation. Whatever lies beneath these waters has waited long enough for proper scientific inquiry.
The sense of anticipation is familiar, and oh! So welcome! That quickening of pulse that precedes good and fruitful work. The advantages of independent wealth become most apparent in moments like these. I am once again thankful to Grandfather for the liberty to pursue yet another fancy.
He set down the pen and returned to the window. The water was a black sheet that curiously resisted reflecting the emerging stars. After long minutes, a faint luminescent form rose to the surface and brightened, pulsing ever so slightly, and his breath took up the rhythm, fogging and clearing the pane in time with it as his eyes followed the shape across the lake. Too organized to be a current, and much too large to be a fish.
It sank and disappeared, and Callahan smiled. He had spotted his quarry, even if he could not yet name it. Tomorrow, he would begin his investigations with the rigor that had served him in Egypt, in Ireland, in Peru — in all the places where science tangled with mystery, and careful observation always revealed the truth.