Nothing But Time (3 page)

“I can’t…
yet
,” he verbally stumbled
and
Kate
’s heart skipped
with
trepidation
.  “But I can and will.  I had hoped to have the problem solved before you got here but I haven’t quite mastered it yet.”

Kate’s heart sank before she suddenly though
t
to ask, “How long have you been here? 
How long have you been trying to figure it out?”

“Well, I did have to wait for you, you know…” he replied testily.

“How long?” she bit out having taken all of
David
’s
superiority
that she could hold.

“
Three
hundred
forty
-nine days, four hours and…” he checked his watch, “thirty-eight minutes.  Give or take.
  It surprised me at first that it wasn’t still December when I arrived as it was in our time but rather
May
and the spring air–
”

“You’ve been here for
almost a year
?”
Kate
drew back in shock
, her mouth gaping like a landed fish for a few moments as she digested that bit of information
.
  “How is that possible?”

“
It’s rather interesting really.  As I mentioned
,
delay
in entry was exponen
tial upon arrival. 
E
very
sixtieth of a
second of
delay
on entrance to the singularity
at
our end amounted to a difference
of approximately
one
day
on exit
.  This was
obvious
from the arrival of the machine and I calculated
,
give
n
the rate of pull from the
vortex
and your position in the room
,
that you would be no more than five to six
seconds after me
,
which brought me here tonight!” he
finished
triumphantly.

“
So you came here to
night,
t
his
single
night
, to get me?”

“Well, actually I did arrive earlier in the week in case my calculations were off
and planned to stay the week as well
,” he admitted.  “Couldn’t have you standing around wondering what had happened, eh?” 
David
chuckled merrily at his own wit.

“Oh, yea
h
,”
Kate
wrinkled her nose
,
feeling an unaccustomed nastiness welling up inside of her.  It was one thing to be stuck in the past, but quite another to be stuck there with someone who considered it all a
good
thing
.  “I feel
sooo
much better
knowing
that
you screwed up and sent me back in time
rather than
stand
ing
around
wondering about it
.  What a relief!  So what now, Einstein?  When do we go back home?”

“Now, Kate, you’re being a bit snippy, don’t you think?” he
complained in petulant
tones.

“Under the circumstances, I
think I
’m allowed a few moments of snippiness, don’t you think?” she
snapped back
.  A wave of panic washed over Kate as reality settled in.  She didn’t
want to be featured on a Reality Channel episode of
When Science Experiments Go Wrong
.  Dr. David Fergusson had sent them into the past.  Quick arithmetic put the year at 187
6
or so
and Kate was not an old-fashioned girl. 
David
needed to get them out.  NOW!  “When?
  When can you get me home?
”

“I’m working on it.  It shouldn’t be long,” he assured her with his hands spread in a pleading fashion.  “I am sorry,
Kate
!  I didn’t intend for this to happen and once I solve the power problem, we’ll be off.”

“Do I even want to know what the power problem is?”

“
Electricity
isn’t
a common power source
in this time, you know,” he
wagg
l
ed
a lecturing finger at her.  “
Parts are hard to come by and, b
ecause of that
,
I’ve had to fabricate the torn
power
cabling myself – which isn’t easy, by the way – that is
, of course,
after I fixed the computer monitor.  T
he
cabling available cannot stand the power.  We are talking about the raw underlying power
universe…”

“At a sub-quantum level, I know,” Kate finished for him.  “
Yes. 
You mentioned that.”

David sniffed haughtily at her lack of appreciation.  “
Each
time I’ve tried to run it, I
’ve
melt
ed
my cables
. 
Nevertheless,
I’m almost there!  I swear!  Another week, maybe two
…or so.
”

“Then
,
what now?” she asked
,
her heart sinking as his time estimates grew.  Whether he admitted it or not, they were clearly stuck here
.  “What do I do until then?”

“Well,
first, you need to put this on.
”
H
e walked over to
the carriage and
pulled a bag from the b
oot
.  “
We
’ll
need to take the train into London to reach my house and we c
an’t have you being seen dressed as you are
, can we?
”
 
David
waved a hand
indicating Kate’s
jeans and trendy blouse that exposed one shoulder.  “
Such attire will only upset the natives, you see? 
So,
if you’ll just put that on, I have a coat for you as well.
  Though it is May, the nights are still nippy.
”

Kate
reached in the bag and pulled out a
long,
blue dress, followed by mounds of other frilly items she couldn’t identify.  “You’re kidding
,
right?”

St. John’s Wood, England

May
1876

“This is ridiculous,”
Kate
complained almost five hour
s
later
. 
After a long night waiting for the train and more than two hours on the train into London, she was simply exhausted.  Though
David
had told her it was only just after ten in the evening, to Kate’s internal clock, it was a handful of hours following their dinner in Oxford
,
w
hich had ended
well
past eight p.m.
more than a hundred years apart from where she was now.

If Kate had any remaining doubts about David’s claims,
her time in the train depot and during the journey had given her more visual evidence than anyone might need to be thoroughly convinced.  There had been dozens of people aboard that train all dressed in clothing similar to hers and
David
’
s.  If that hadn’t been enough, the wail of the train’s whistle and the first chug and
jolt of the engine had driven it
home.

Kate hovered for a long while between shock and anger
settling somewhere around pure angst
.  She’d not been very nice to
David
since her arrival – and, well, perhaps since the moment he’d insisted on showing her his lab – but she felt that she was handling it all quite well.  Better than most, even.  She hadn’t fainted, hadn’t harangued him at the top of her lungs and hadn’t ye
t resorted to physical violence, though she felt she might get there soon.
  A few choice words and a bitter tone should be easily dismissed given the gravity of the situation she’d found herself in.

Yes, she was taking it all very well so far, Kate thought.

She
sat in silence for most of the
train
trip, swallowing against the unusual rocking motion. 
S
he would have given anything for some Dramamine.  The light-rail in the Cities
, as Minneapolis and St. Paul were commonly referred to,
might not have been the smoothest ride but it was a swaying cradle in comparison. 
The upside of the upsetting ride was that it kept her mind from dwelling too hard on the reality of her situation.

But now the ride was over and, with a lack of cabs available at the West Hampstead train depot so late in the evening, she and
David
were walking the final
half-mile
or so. 
Childish complaints hovered at her lips and
, in her fatigue,
Kate couldn’t stop them from slipping out.  “Are we almost there?
”

“
I’ve told you I’m sorry there was no hansom cab available
,”
David
replied sourly.  “My house is not much further so please cease your grumbling.”

“I’m tired,
David
,” she shot back
as they trudged along
.  “And hungry.  And supremely pissed off so give me a break, will you?
  I think I’ve handled
all of this pretty well so far.
”

Kate
knew
David
thought she was being unreasonable and bad-tempered about everything, but, in truth, she felt unreasonable and bad-tempered.  How could anyone be expected to act graciously in the face of such a revelation? 
He’d moved her through time, for
Pete’s sake
! 
Did he truly think she should be able to consider it all nothing more than
some great
adventure?
  It wasn’t an adventure!  It was a nightmare! 
David
had had the past
eleven
months to come to terms with it all and Kate suspected he hadn’t been all sunshine and roses in the beginning either!

Shaking her head, Kate
looked around the neighborhood they were passing through.
It was all pretty nice in general.  Some street
s were more upscale than others.  One street might be lined with modest, red brick homes or double-fronted homes with matching bow front windows then the next would reveal larger, more ornate homes
in
a variety of size
s
and style
s
.  Despite the diverse economic range suggested from street to street,
overall
the area seemed to be one o
f the middle upper class.  Homes where the
owners
were certainly
comfortable if not well-to-do.

“How could you afford a house h
ere,
David
?” she asked curiously, trying to keep her mind off the larger predicament.

“Quite nice, isn’t it
?” he said with a
superior
smile.  “Did you know that in our time a simple flat in one of these homes might sell for over a million pounds?  A single family home like that one,” he gestured to one as they passed, “might sell for three or four million.”

“Well, I’ll assume that they
aren’t that much now, but still,” she glanced up at him.  “How did you afford it?  These look pretty spendy
even now
.”

“
It wasn’t easy.  I wasn’t able to purch
a
se it until just recently, in fact. 
Not surprisingly, there isn’t much
work right now for a
quantum
physicist but I’ve found work as a tutor here and there
to pay the bills.  I’ve also become something of an inventor and
made
some
profitable
investments from time to time
.
”
H
is
self-satisfied
tone reared Kate’s curiosity
.

“What do you mean?”

“Let’s just say that knowing how things are going to go has proven beneficial
.
”
H
e shrugged modestly though his whole attitude reeked of self-satisfaction.  “My
compulsory
university courses in history have paid off well.”

“What did you do?”  A
dreadful
feeling was gnawing at
Kate
’s gut though it might just be hunger pangs.

“Nothing anyone in my place would not.”

“Since I doubt anyone’s
yet
been in your place, why don’t you tell me?”

“Nothing of importance!”
David
protested
defensively
.  “Just speeding up the invention of a couple
of
minor items.”

“Define ‘minor’,” she insisted
, feeling as if just one more bit of ugliness had been dropped in her lap. 
Apparently
,
Kate wasn’t as good with surprises as she’d always thought she was
.  “I hope we’re not talking about the telephone here.”

“Of course not,” came his offended response.  “Just a couple things
I needed to operate the siphon and computer
, electric welding
, cathode ray tube…that sort of thing.”

Kate just shook her head, dumbfounded. 
“You just ruined someone’s whole life
.”

“Let’s not be dramatic about it, shall we?”
he grumbled some more, clearly displeased with her lack of enthusiasm for his efforts.  “I hardly see anyone beyond my students and their parents.  I’ve kept it all very
low-key
.”

“Well, I hope you’re not warping some poor kid’s mind with tales of t
he future,
David
!  You’ll probably
get the kid sent off to an insane asylum or something,” she grouched
,
wondering what she had ever liked enough in David
Fergusson
to date him
before remembering that she hadn’t really.  She had given in to
one of the
old
est means of persuasion.  Peer p
ressure
.  “You just can’t change the past,
David
!  It’s against every ethical standard ever written.”

“Now you’re really being over dramatic,
Kate
,” he returned
testily
.  “
Who's
to say this isn’t the way that things are meant to be?  The coincidence is simply too much to bear.
Oh!
I must tell you who one of my students is!”

Oh God!
 
“
Who?”

“He’s a boy by the name of Bertie.  About ten years old and very bright.  His father works as a gardener for
some
rich chap
in town
,”
David
babbled on.  “But guess who I think he really is?
 
I’ll give you a hint.  His name is Bertie…Wells!”

Kate
stopped in her tracks and
gaped at him for a full minute while the ramifications of his words sunk in. 
“
Have you gone completely insane?
” she screeched.  “
Are you telling me that…
that
you think
this
Bertie is H.G. Wells?  My God,
David
!  Have you
completely
lost your mind?  You can’t just come back in time and tell people about the future!
  Haven’t you ever heard of the
Prime D
irective
?”

“The what?”

“The
Prime D
irective.  You know, from
Star Trek
?  That
whole policy
of
noninterference
?”

“That was only on the telly
.  It isn’t as if it’s a law or some such.”

“Well, it should be!  You could really mess with these people,
David
.  Think of what you’ve done to that poor kid in there!”

“Inspired him to write novels about the future?”

“OH! MY! GOD!”
Kate
screeched
,
clenching her hair in
her
fist
s
and pressing them to her temples
as she turned and stomped on
.  “You’ve been here almost a year,
David
!  How many people have you told?  I’m surprised they haven’t locked you up
in the loony bin yet! 
We can’t stay here! 
You have to take me
home NOW!”

“Will you keep your voice down?” he hissed at her.  “You
’re being hysterical and you
’ll wake the neighbors.  Besides, we’re here.” 
David
gestured to a nea
t red bricked Victorian –
Kate felt a jolt of hysterical humor shoot through her when she realized they probably didn’t call them that here.  The house sat behind a
n
ornate fence of brick and iron and had a charming
white-painted
portico over the front door.  The door was flanked
symmetrically
by two
wide
windows with three
matching
windows across the second story.  The one in the center was surrounded by a small balcony with a wrought iron railing.

It was neat and tidy, everything she might have expected from
David
.  Reluctantly, Kate had to admit she was impressed… or would have been,
had she
approved of his methods. 
David
pulled a key from his pocket and unlocked the door before stepping back with a gesture for her to
precede
him.

“Come, I’ll show you
around
.”

Kate
stared at him
dumbly for a moment.
  “
No,
David
, we need to talk about this!”

“No we don’t,”
he answered
,
turning into the room to his right, leaving her to follow or not
.  “I did what I had to do to survive here and, let me tell you,
it’
s
been no picnic.  So I
deprived some unknown inventor his moment of
notoriety and inspired a child
with tales of the futur
e.  So what?  I did it for you,
too, you know?”

“What are you talking about?”