Bertha

What a monolithic masterpiece – one hundred pounds plus of World War Two era electronics, from an age when things were built to last. My fingertips traced the words Super Skyrider on its brushed metal panel. I felt their deep engravings and knew – this was destiny…

Heavy steel face plate. Analog dials that measured heavens knew what, their glass windows hazed over with the cataracts of time. Heavy black Bakelite knobs, switches, and control wheels.

Neither I nor the old timer selling it could divine its true purpose. Some kind of radio, nearest we could guess. He swore the dials lit up when he plugged it in. I was impressed - most sellers refused any guarantees on vintage electronics. This explained the over 320 devices, sitting around my house, that were dead on arrival.

She was a steal at fifty quid, laid out in tenners at the car boot sale. I strained my back while lifting her into the truck, and only then did a fitting name for her come to mind.

The drive home took hours. I did my best – dodging the unpaved road’s many potholes and ruts – no sense in giving her a bad impression. By late afternoon, I loaded her onto a wheelbarrow and carted her ‘cross the threshold, my spine crackling with pain. We entered the vast, cool, dimly lit parlor, where I introduced the newest member of our family.

“Everyone,” I said, with a grand, sweeping gesture, “meet Bertha!”

One could’ve heard a pin drop. I held my breath, as my companions - my racks full of vintage televisions, radios, typewriters, oscilloscopes, sewing machines beheld Bertha for the first time. I sensed no jealousy, no animosity. And that was the best validation of all.

I scrounged up a desk microphone from the basement. Found it on a shelf beside the boiler, near my labyrinthine stacks of books, magazines, newspapers, built into towers with aisles between them. I called this space The Archives. Everything I’d read for the past forty years – all those articles, novels, essays, anthologies.

Next came headphones, my favorite set from the 1960’s, with their green bubble-shaped ear cups. I donned them and wondered if I looked like some giant mantis, with two great insect eyes. Soon, Bertha rested front and center on my lab bench. I threaded her faded, kinked power cord behind the bench, then plugged her into the receptacle. No fuses blew – a good sign!

Now came the real test. I plugged in the mic and headphones, sat down, and crossed my fingers. Electronics, unlike people, are predictable, knowable quantities. What you see is what you get. If there’s a short circuit in the device, and you feel a shock when turning on the power, you will always get that shock. And vice versa.

I held my breath, gingerly flipped the power switch. No jolt of current through my fingers – I exhaled with relief. The large, faceted power lamp glowed like a hundred carat ruby. A low-level hum played through my headphones. All the meters radiated a rich orange color, their gauge needles twitching with activity. Bertha was alive!

After that, the hours flowed like minutes. I spun the large silver dial, engraved with hash marks and numbers, then flipped a selector called frequency band. I heard many kinds of static, interspersed with all manner of broadcasts. Distant, tinny-sounding music – all of it either classical or old big band tunes. Foreign-voiced speeches, some of them given before large, cheering audiences. And eventually, I heard none other than Winston Churchill give one of his famous fireside chats. I must have stumbled on a station that plays back historic radio addresses. How fascinating.

Tea was a rushed formality – leftover spag bol heated in my favorite microwave, a 1992 Litton, sitting on the waist-level shelf in my microwave rack, sandwiched between models by Sharp, Toshiba, and many others. I enjoyed my leftovers with a large glass of merlot while continuing to spin the dial.

Eventually, I switched the frequency band to SW and spun the dial gently back and forth. The background was a smooth, sonorous hiss, like waves breaking far off in the distance. I rotated the dial a squidge at a time.

At some point I heard a faint, sibilant pattern – more electric static than human. Another squidge, and the static gained solidity, personality. Another, and I was listening to a frightened man. He called out, again and again, in a trembling voice.

“Hello?” he said. “Is anyone out there? Can anyone hear me?”

I waited for someone, anyone to answer. Prayed that someone would, so I wouldn’t have to abandon my refuge of silence.

Only background hiss…So I reached tentatively for the mic. It took all my courage – just to press that big round talk button.

“I’m here. I can hear you,” I said, after an agonizing pause. I squinted my eyes and grimaced.

“Bloody hell! Hello!” he said in reply. I could hear his relief. “Where are you? In Norwich?”

Now I’d done it. How many times I’d fled a casual, one-sided conversation – someone talking about the weather or a sports game to while away the minutes. But this fellow really sounded scared. I wondered if he was hurt.

“I’m in Spalding, in Lincolnshire,” I said, “Small town compared to Norwich.” With each new word, the next came more easily.

“I’m on the outskirts of Norwich. Another bloody raid, a half hour ago. One landed just down my street. Missed all the buildings, thank God!”

“A raid? What happened? Terrorists?” My stomach clenched as I feared another attack by Al Qaeda, like the 2005 London bombings.

“The Germans, who else?” came his reply, and I was more puzzled than ever. Then I wondered about all that I’d heard from Bertha thus far. Especially the inspiring words from Churchill. I’d heard no modern music, no news bulletins or speeches that I was sure came from the “modern era”.

“I’m a bit disheveled where I am, too. Can you please tell me today’s date?”

“The date? April 28th.”

It was November 10th, here, but the month and day weren’t good enough. He’d probably sign off after my next question, but I had to give it a go. To test my theory.

“And the year?”

There was a deafening pause, with only that gentle hiss to tide me over. I feared I’d scared him off. People are like that, you know. You say a few simple words – the wrong ones – and they’ll turn their backs on you for good.

“Nineteen forty-two?” came his reply. “You that out of it?” I heard a bit of mirth in his tone.

How was this possible, that I’d stumbled upon a radio that was also a time machine? I was still trying to pick my brain up off the floor when I realized I’d better say something, and soon. I was at a crossroad. If I came clean and told him the truth, that I was hailing from the year 2006, he’d label me a nutcase and sign off. This would be our secret – mine and Bertha’s.

“I’m getting up in years. Becoming quite forgetful.” Which wasn’t far from the truth. Since being downsized out of my job five years earlier, I’d definitely felt my mind slipping, year by year. Avoiding the company of others wasn’t helping. I was born the year after the war in Europe officially ended. Lived alone, in the house I grew up in – mine since my mother passed away.

After that, I let him do the talking. It was easier that way. His name was James, and he lived alone. His wife and two children were off in the country, living with his mother to escape the Blitz. His brother Edgar was currently stationed at RAF Duxford.

What a fear-stricken soul. What isolation he endured, living in his basement, wondering when the air raid sirens would howl to life. Norwich was in tatters, the electricity intermittent as repair crews worked night and day. I just sat there, transfixed. And listened. At some point, his battery ran low, so we signed off, and I marked down the radio's switch and dial settings.

Part of me wanted to continue exploring the SW frequencies, but what of James? Yes, I’d marked down the radio settings, but what if turning that dial one iota severed our line of communication forever? What if another raid hit and he called out again in fear?

I left Bertha turned on and removed the headphone jack, so the radio played through the unit’s built-in speaker. I hurried upstairs to grab some blankets and pillows and laid them on the basement floor, just a few feet from my lab bench.

With the lights off, I lay on my back and tried to calm my whirring mind. Only Bertha provided illumination – from her front control panel, and also the faint orange glow from her array of vacuum tubes, their light reflecting from the ceiling. Despite my excited state, the radio’s surf-like hiss lulled me to sleep.

In my scant five hours of sleep, I had nightmares. In one, I was stranded at night, in London during the Blitz. It was so lucid, felt so visceral, so real. In it, I crouched beside a brick store front, as the resonant thuds of bomb strikes rattled my ribs, shook the city around me. A deep hum suffused the atmosphere – the collective roar of a hundred bomber engines, interspersed with the thunder of anti-aircraft fire from British artillery. Smoke filled the air. I heard the crackle of flames as buildings collapsed around me.

Next morning, in my bleary state, I felt torn. Bertha, the time warp, and James were all I could think about, but what now? I thought of telling someone else what I’d discovered. Of recording conversations and broadcasts I picked up, so they could be analyzed for authenticity. Would James be on the radio again tonight? I’d forgotten to ask – or was last night’s conversation just a one-off, because of the bombing raid?

Did people set appointed times to talk on the telephone? Or only when they met in person? When I still worked, of course we set times to confer on various matters, but that was work, not leisure.

I had a quick breakfast, then took off for the library. Once there, I logged in on one of their computers and did web searches on British WW2 history – specifically any that detailed the bombing raids during the Blitz. Two hours later, I finally found what I was looking for, concerning the city of Norwich. And from what I read, the worst German raid there would happen the day after April 28th. Today! I had to warn James. I had to convince him to flee the city and get as far away as possible.

Three hours later, I was camped out in front of Bertha. Snacks, bottles of lager, and a large pot of coffee sat on the lab bench. An old chamber pot lay on the floor, so I could stay near the radio. Headphones on, volume at maximum, I kept trying to raise James.

“James, this is Alex, from Spalding. James, if you can hear me, please answer!”

After ten minutes of that, I realized I probably sounded like a raving madman, shouting over and over with no one listening at the other end. So I downed a pint of lager and tried relaxational breathing. Then called out every minute or so, at a reduced volume.

I had no idea what the time offset was between me and James, across all those decades of history, but I hoped the Germans hadn’t yet arrived. If I could talk with him before the raid, perhaps I could come clean with him about the time warp, urge him to notify the authorities, to warn everyone of what was coming their way.

That wouldn’t work, of course. If I told James "I'm from your future", he’d recommend me to a lunatic asylum. I continued thinking on how to proceed. Finally, at eight o’clock PM my time, I heard him answer.

“Alex, hello, this is James. Just got on the radio and heard you. You okay? Sound kind of jittery.”

“Yes, James, I’m fine. Hey, I lost my watch. What time is it?”

“Nine o’clock. Got dark a while back. It’s quiet for now, but what a disaster here,” James said, his voice cracking a bit.

Good, I wasn’t too late. The Germans were still hours away. I spent the next half hour listening to James. Over eighty known dead in Norwich from last night’s raid. He’d taken in several friends whose homes were damaged, and they were all staying indoors – windows sealed and only a few candles lit. Shops, schools, and numerous homes in the older part of Norwich damaged, many of them reduced to ash or rubble. As he went on, I began to sweat, the tension building as I wondered what I should say, and when. Or rather, what could I say?

Like last night, I just listened. I was afraid to ask many questions, not knowing how it might dredge up the grief and trauma he’d already lived through. But I had to do something, and soon.

“My brother-in-law sitting upstairs thinks we should skip town. But –”

I saw my chance.

“Yes, James! You should all leave now. I really don’t mean to sound gloom and doom, but from what I know, the Germans tend to continue their raids on a particular area for a few days. You have a car and enough petrol to get out into the country?”

“It’s already after dark. No one’s really out there on the streets. The tank is half full, so yes.”

“All the better to go now then. Go while you still have time.”

“But I’m worried about burglars while we’re gone.”

“James, really – leave now, please! I just have a bad feeling about tonight.”

When he finally agreed to leave town, I felt relieved beyond words. Like an immense burden was no longer crushing down upon me, pinning me on the ground with a palpable, mortal fear. I knew James would get to see his wife and children again. That all of them would survive the Blitz.

James signed off so everyone there could pack a few things and leave in James’ Ford Anglia. Now all I could do was wait. I sat before Bertha, volume turned up. I thought about my mother, my religious upbringing, and for the first time in years, I prayed. I hoped I wouldn’t hear from him again tonight, because if I did, that meant they hadn’t left town. But all I heard was a gentle, calming hiss.

A half hour later, I smelled smoke – the acrid stink of burning wire insulation. Then sparks showered from the back end, and I lunged beneath my lab bench and yanked the plug. Once the smoke cleared, I searched through my boxes and boxes full of old replacement parts, but none would fit the sockets of the dead tubes, their glass exteriors now scorched black.

In the days and weeks that followed, I spent hours at the library, clicking away on one of their pc's, as I searched the internet shopping forums for the right tubes to resurrect Bertha. Nor did I find the right parts at several surplus electronics shops that I drove to.

Nowadays, Bertha rests in a far corner of the basement. Her meters no longer glow with that warm orange light. Her ruby colored power lamp remains cold and lifeless.