Odette Speex: Time Traitors Book 1 (25 page)

Chapter 28

Gabriel walked swiftly
up Southhampton toward Covent Garden. His mind still reeled from the revelations of the last half hour. He needed to find Caroline. She had been to the ballet. It was sure to be over. The crowd, depending on social station, by now dispersed to the various fashionable salons or neighboring taverns and pubs.

Gabriel had yet to reach the piazza when a tightening in his chest stopped him in his tracks. He had left her! He had turned his back on her in disbelief and left! The cogs in his brain snapped back into place, and he knew with a certainty that Odette would never have done the same. She would have stayed. Through whatever fear and disbelief she may have felt, she would have stayed and faced it with him.

“Ho! Gabe!” Simon, quite out of breath, came up beside him. “I’ve been calling after you for over half a block now.” He smiled mildly, his fair hair worked loose from the ribbon and falling into his face. He gathered it back again and tied it neatly at the nape of his neck. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?” He looked up into his friend’s face and checked his next words.

Simon and Gabriel had seen each other through many of life’s tribulations. Of the same age, they had met at grammar school in Hampstead. This institution had been established by the local nobility as a public village school in the mid-seventeenth century. Like many of its ilk, it adhered closely to a classical curriculum, an outdated and restrictive course of study its wealthy benefactors saw little need to change. Simon and Gabriel, both eager to learn philosophy and the emerging natural sciences, had organized the students to petition for these subjects as well as the modern languages. For their trouble, they were expelled.

Simon remembered the look on Gabriel’s face as the headmaster told them to collect their supplies and leave the premises. It had been one of utter confusion and outrage. Gabriel Wright believed in reason. Even as a young boy. It never occurred to him that the teachers and trustees would not see the merits of their argument. How could the grammatical intricacies of Latin or Greek prepare them for a rapidly changing society, one that required at least some understanding of math, science, and philosophy?

That same look was staring back at Simon now. And he had an uneasy feeling that this one would not be as easily displaced as hiring a tutor for the boys had replaced the bewilderment of expulsion with the love of learning and, above all, reason.

“What is it, Gabe? What has happened?” Simon asked with some trepidation.

Gabriel refocused his eyes and shook his head. “I hardly know.”

In search of a quiet spot, Simon quickly steered him into a dank, poorly lit tavern. It was of the most seedy type and patronized by a rather motley clientele. At this time of night it was sparsely populated. But in a few short hours it would be overflowing with prostitutes and petty criminals expending their hard-earned cash on gin and ale. As it was, they received only a few distrustful and suspicious glances as they made their way to a dirty table in the darkest corner of the room.

To the serving girl’s disgust he ordered tea as he waited for Gabriel to collect himself. It wasn’t until after she had deposited two chipped cups and a pot of surprisingly hot tea on the table that Gabriel felt capable of expressing his thoughts.

“I’ve just come from Odette’s,” he said with a barely suppressed groan and pressed the palms of his hands against his eyes. Removing them, he looked at Simon and asked disjointedly, “Simon, as a scientist, do you… um… think it is possible to visit the past?”

Simon blinked and stared blankly back at him. He had guessed that Gabriel’s odd behavior had something to do with Odette, but this question seemed completely disconnected from that particular subject. “I beg your pardon.”

“Travel to the past from the present, physically travel years into the past?” Gabriel repeated irritably, knowing how crazy he sounded. “For instance, if you wanted to stop the sacking of the library in Alexandria or the death of the Princes in the Tower—is that possible?”

“So, you are asking two questions,” Simon replied deliberately, furrowing his brow. “Whether one can travel to the past and, once there, change it?”

“Exactly.”

“Well. No,” Simon stated flatly. “I don’t think I’ve ever encountered an occasion where it has even been contemplated. Newton theorizes that time is absolute. It exists outside of external influences and passes regardless of how the world changes.”

“So?”

“So—no! It cannot be done!” Simon practically threw his arms in the air. “I believe time moves forward. The past is past. It is like a brick wall behind us. One cannot move back in time and history cannot be changed!”

Gabriel sighed miserably and looked down at his hands.

“But then…” Simon scrunched up his face and looked suddenly doubtful. “If time is absolute and exists outside other influences… I guess it’s possible it can run backward as well as forward. But changing what has already occurred? That would create paradox within paradox.” He shook his head impatiently. “This question is for greater minds than mine.”

“Or for lunatics,” Gabriel whispered under his breath.

“What lunatics?” Simon insisted. “Why this interest in the nature of time and what has it to do with Odette?”

Gabriel looked up sharply. “Who said anything about Odette?”

“You did. You have just come from there and are clearly upset. What has happened?”

Gabriel looked at him anxiously. He figured it was a good sign that Simon had actually thought about the question of time travel instead of laughing it off or worse. Simon Keller was Gabriel’s oldest friend. He had never failed to give him good advice or, lacking that, a sympathetic ear.

So, in the space of an hour, Odette’s story was told yet again. This time by Gabriel and he, like her, left nothing out. Simon listened in silence, only once during the recitation whispering speculatively under his breath, “Temporal Inter-dimensional Flux?”

When Gabriel had finished, the pot of tea stood empty, and the tavern had filled to capacity. The raucous crowd stood in stark contrast to the silence that stretched between the two men.

Finally Simon said, “I think we need to find Lady Caroline.”

Gabriel had not realized he’d been holding his breath until it came out in a gust of relief. Simon, the scientist and man of God, was making no judgments until he had gathered what evidence he could.

“Just so,” Gabriel agreed. “I was on my way to find her when—”

He stopped short, regret and anxiety twisting his stomach. He stood up hurriedly and knocked over the bench he had been sitting on. “I need to go back! I need to see Odette!”

Simon stood as well and grasped Gabriel’s arm. The gin-induced state of most of the tavern’s patrons was such that only one or two of those closest to them even acknowledged the tense scene unfolding in the darkest corner of the room.

“What do you hope to gain by confronting her again?” Simon asked anxiously.

“You misunderstand me,” Gabriel protested. “I want to comfort her. I want to reassure her. I turned my back and left, Simon! I didn’t even grant her the courtesy you have given me by listening.”

“The fact that you have related her story to me in great detail belies that statement.”

Gabriel laughed bitterly. “Certainly I heard her. But I was worried about being played for a fool, angry that I had given in to my baser…” He stopped, unable to continue. Helpless to put into words his deepest fears and desires.

Simon looked at him and wondered how a man with such gifts could let himself be defined by a history he had no part in making. He sent up a silent, yet fervent prayer of thanks for his own humble beginnings and the happy home that still provided him with love and solace.

“Gabe, by now her household will have returned from the ballet. You may not have an opportunity to speak with her privately,” he said reasonably. “If there is a believable explanation for any of this, it lies with Lady Caroline. She will know what to do.”

Gabriel reluctantly agreed and bent down to set the bench aright. His features were resolute, but a curtain of depression had descended over his face and turned down the corners of his mouth.

Simon saw this and, as their steps turned once again toward Covent Garden, clapped his friend on the back. “One thing is for sure, Gabe, Odette is no lunatic.”

Gabriel looked at him, his expression lightening. “How could you know?”

“I don’t know, I
feel
,” Simon replied. “There is something about her,” he continued contemplatively, “something… oh… something fresh, modern.”

“Modern?”

“Maybe it is her dancing or lack of conventions and affectations. And, while her story sounds outlandish, it is not chaotic enough to be crazy. It doesn’t reflect a disturbed mind.”

“Is that why you are taking this time travel story seriously?”

“Partly, yes.”

“And the other part.”

“You love her, and I am your friend,” Simon replied simply.

Gabriel felt a sudden rise in his spirits. There are few wounds that the balm of friendship cannot heal.

*

Something had gone terribly wrong. That was obvious from Speex’ shocking appearance a few months ago, and then his sister’s arrival only weeks after his equally unexpected disappearance.

The man shook his head broodingly, barely disturbing the carefully coiffed wig. All of this, even before his plan had been executed. Of course, he knew better. The paradox of time travel was that nothing was absolute. He knew from their very presence that his plan had gone forward, and that either Drake had betrayed him or Speex had escaped—perhaps both.

Through his society connections, he had effectively discredited Odell. Really, it was almost too easy to have him branded a madman. If it wasn’t for that meddlesome lawyer… he waved his hand in an impatient gesture. It didn’t matter, he had him now. As originally planned, Odell was rendered captive. But the sister was proving more difficult to manage.

Both Odell and Drake were worthless as witnesses to the future. They were on the original timeline, Drake moving forward with the plan as if it had never happened before. The only one with any answers was the girl. His first panicked reaction was to kill her. He shook his head again, this time at his own stupidity. He would kill her eventually, but not before he had answers. Getting them though was proving difficult.

He personally could not get close to the girl. It was Cara’s presence that both revealed Odette’s true identity and kept him at arms’ length. It was unlikely Cara would recognize him as he was now. Still he had to be careful. He had attended the ballet only once to watch Odette dance. Afterwards he carefully avoided her company. At the moment, she and her friends were focused entirely on Drake. If by chance they were suspicious of another’s involvement, he was confident his name would not be high on their list of suspects.

He paced the length of the long, opulent hallway. His high-heeled shoes clicked loudly on the polished marble floor. It had taken him several months to get used to them. Not actually walking in them, but the concept itself of wearing high heels. In his time, they were reserved almost exclusively for women. They still made him feel slightly effete, but the added height had its advantages.

He stopped before a portrait. It was the newest one in the gallery. It was of a young girl, only seventeen. Fair-haired and lovely, she was standing under a massive willow tree. Her blue eyes were bright with laughter. In commissioning the portrait, he had eschewed the formal style of the day. Instead of the elaborate powdered wig and court dress that was the norm, the girl wore her hair in waves down her back, intertwined with flowers and thin gold ribbon. Her dress was a simple gown of white silk. Her expression was lively and animated, just as she was. He carried a miniature bust of this exact portrait. He missed photographs.

Tilting his head to one side, he thought that there was really no resemblance between the two. Nevertheless, he was offended by Odette’s very existence. The fact that she could claim any connection whatsoever to his beloved child was an insult he would not long allow.

Dark like her bitch of a mother, she even moved the same way. He gave a little huff of disbelief.

My God, Odell must have been shocked when he encountered her!

He turned to retrace his steps and caught a hazy reflection of himself in the polished paneling between the paintings. Perhaps neither Odell nor Cara would recognize him. After all he had been here over twenty years, and time had taken its toll.

Chapter 29

Gabriel had never
been in this room before. A hidden recess off the library, its entrance was obscured by a cleverly designed partition and a number of large, leafy potted plants. The room was dark and shadowy, dimly lit by several haphazardly placed candlesticks. Large, elaborately woven tapestries of exotic landscapes and animals covered the walls.

In one corner sat a small statue. The golden figure was of a seated woman, richly draped and wearing an ornate headdress. Her hands were uplifted with palms facing outward. One hand was turned up and the other down. In the middle of each palm was a red jewel. Small silver bowls of incense burned on either side of the statue. Surprisingly, the fragrance was not heavy or overpowering. It hung delicately in the air and calmed his shattered nerves.

He sat with Simon on a low armless and cushioned sofa. Caroline sat cross-legged on the floor facing them. Aamod sat next to her. Her appearance was nothing short of startling. With dark brown hair in a loose braid down her back, she was dressed, or rather wrapped, in what looked like layers of brightly colored cotton material. Her bare feet peeped scandalously out from beneath the hem.

Most unsettling, however, was her demeanor. There was nothing coquettish or playful in her voice or words. She looked at them with serious, hooded eyes and spoke almost sternly, yet with a hint of sympathy.

“I know it is difficult to believe, but it is all true.”

He and Simon had arrived at an ungodly hour and had insisted that Mrs. Crawford announce them to Lady Caroline. She was about to turn them away when Gabriel finally convinced her to carry a message to her employer. Thus, they found themselves interrupting Caroline, and apparently Aamod, in some sort of Hindu ritual.

“It is impossible,” Simon stated firmly. He was more than a little in awe of Lady Caroline, but her certainty overcame his reticence in contradicting her. “There is nothing in the laws of physics to support your assertions.”

She nodded calmly. “You are right, but perhaps physics is not the only power at work here.”

Her words were mild, but he jerked back as if slapped. She had touched upon a raw spot in his heart. As a minister, his primary allegiance was to God and his congregation. But science had supplanted faith with knowledge and turned his mind from acceptance of the unknowable to contemplation of the unthinkable. Many nights he awoke in a cold sweat, fearful that his academic endeavors were driving a wedge between him and the god of his fathers. Was he so deeply enmeshed in science he could not see the hand of God at work?

Caroline’s perception was sharpened by empathy. “Simon, you fear too much the seeking. God is in everything, even your science.”

He looked around the room grim-faced and unusually stoic. “It does not appear to me that our god is the same.”

Her look turned pitying. “The first step, Simon, is to know
what
you seek.” Then with an impatient shake of her head, she said, “We cannot take time now to speak of theology. I can only assure you that neither Odette nor her brother are lunatics. I can also assure you that a resolution to this conflict is imminent, and it is not a foregone conclusion that it will be in our favor.”

Gabriel felt the tense presence of his friend beside him and understood all too well his conflicting emotions. But he had made his decision. His love for Odette could not override the duty he owed his family. He stood and touched Simon’s shoulder, who joined him.

“I am sorry, Caroline. I cannot be a party to this.”

She stood as well and pushed the beautiful cloth further up over one shoulder. Her face was tilted downward, but Gabriel could still see her disappointment.

“Over a hundred years ago,” Aamod quietly intoned, “Galileo was tried by the Inquisition for advocating Copernican astronomy that the sun is the center of our solar system. A fact generally accepted by scientific minds today. Is it so hard to believe that two hundred years from now the laws of physics will have changed?”

“The laws of physics are immutable,” Simon insisted.

“Nothing is immutable,” Aamod replied.

“Even God?”

“Most especially God.”

“My decision has nothing to do with physics or God or anything more exalted than the safety of my mother and sister,” Gabriel protested. “Caroline, your position in society is secure. Even if people refuse to receive you, your money makes you virtually untouchable. I have to protect mother and Barbara.”

He straightened his shoulders and said more firmly, “And, at the center of all this is a revolution, Caroline. A revolution against the Crown. You say it has to win for our ideas to bear fruit, but how can we know for sure? Maybe all of this is true—time travel, changing history. I am convinced you believe it. Even so, I’d be abetting treason.” He shook his head decisively. “I am sorry.”

“What will you tell Odette?” Caroline asked the only thing able to shake his resolve.

He paled and his eyes revealed the full extent of his misery. “I don’t know. I’m to be late at the temple tomorrow. I could—”

“Come to my house,” Caroline insisted. “Odette is dining with me tomorrow night. I’ll send the coach picking her up to retrieve you at the Middle Temple. That way you will have some privacy to speak with her. If you do not wish to stay for dinner, it will convey you home.” A ghost of her mischievous smile wavered on her lips. “I can certainly understand where you might find it uncomfortable to eat after such a carriage ride.”

The plan was agreed upon. Caroline and Aamod stood together in the great hall as they bid farewell to the two young men. After the door had shut on their retreating backs, Caroline put her arms around the tall Indian. She rested her head on his chest.

“Englishmen,” she sighed with sad resignation.

*

Odell strained against his bindings, barely able to grasp the horror of the sight before him. Not that anything was typical of the scene just moments before. It had all happened so quickly.

Three men had stood in a small, dank, and windowless room. One was bound with a rope to a sturdy iron bedstead. The other two were arguing. Drake, he recognized. His handsome face alternating between anger and confusion.

“Good God, man! What are you talking about? Betrayal?” Drake’s voice rose to almost shouting, “I brought Speex here. The Temporatus. Everything you asked of me!”

The other man kept his voice low. He was in late middle age, perhaps in his early sixties. He was a tall, well-built man with his middle tending to fat. Thinning gray hair sat atop a large head with a face lined but still attractive in that soft, academic way some women loved.

“I’ve tried to explain this to you many times, Drake,” his voice a pretense of weary patience. “I told you that any deviation from my instructions would result in changes in the timeline and endanger my plans. I told you I would know if you did not follow them to the letter, if you betrayed me. And now I do.” With that he pulled a gun from the folds of his cape and calmly shot Drake through the heart.

The report was deafening in the small room. Odell struggled to regain his senses. Although the rope allowed him little leeway, he jumped up from the bed and crouched. He searched the room for some shield or weapon.

The man looked at him in bafflement, and then laughed when he realized his gun was still upraised. He lowered it and walked over to the motionless form sprawled on the floor. He reached down and pulled the crystal key from around Drake’s neck.

“A much sleeker design than my own, I must admit.” He shook his head thoughtfully and pulled a length of chain from beneath the high collar of his shirt. He stood comparing the two keys. “Although, you must have had another five years or so to perfect the technology.” He smiled tightly. “I used it when there were yet a few kinks to be worked out, for sure.”

Odell stared at him, his terror deepening as recognition stirred in his numb brain. “Professor Bradley?” he whispered through dry lips. “Arthur Bradley?”

“As I live and breathe, Speex!” The man threw his arms out in a dramatic gesture. “As I live and breathe!”

Odell glanced over at the dead man on the floor. He had never witnessed violent death before. There was hardly any blood to speak of. As if the bullet had cauterized the wound upon entry. He was sickened by the suddenness of it. Drake was a pompous bastard and a dangerous man. But to have one’s life snuffed out in an instant. He didn’t deserve that.

“Not to worry, Speex. I have no intention of killing you at the moment.”

Odell pulled himself together and stood up from his defensive crouch on the floor. He set his features in the impassive expression he had perfected at eighteen when he was expelled from his university post and blacklisted from his profession. A feat almost single-handedly accomplished by the man standing in front of him. Odell’s impressive intellect kicked abruptly back into gear and the puzzle pieces began to fall into place.

“You stole my technology,” he said matter-of-factly. “You stole my work and had me kicked out of the university as an unstable eccentric.”

“I did,” Arthur Bradley answered without a hint of remorse. “I did much more than that, but…” He waved his hand nonchalantly. “…that is a story for another time.”

“It was only five years ago,” Odell replied disbelievingly. “You… you…”

“Please, Speex, let me relieve you of your stammering confusion,” Bradley jeered. “My exit from our mutual timeline was rather hurried, and the machine was not entirely ready. I was unable to engineer the biological component, and as a result the machine was less precise.” He turned down the corners of his mouth as if this admission was distasteful to him. “I set the controls to land me in mid-twentieth century New York City and ended up in rural Yorkshire in 1735.”

He released a huff of laughter. “It was rather like a bad romance novel. I was found terribly wounded by the beautiful daughter of an impoverished nobleman—the smoldering wreckage of my machine nearby.” He made a turn about the room, charmed by the sound of his own voice. “It took me only a few years to establish myself. Some agricultural and husbandry advances here and there and I was able to help the man prosper. Naturally I won the hand of his fair daughter and, well, as they say, the rest is history. That was over twenty years ago. And now you see I’m a very wealthy and powerful man.”

A knock at the door interrupted this monologue. On Bradley’s word, two burly men entered. They picked up the body of Charles Drake and carried it out.

Bradley scrunched up his face in mock distress. “Nasty business with Drake. It’s a pity. He was useful. But events are moving fast, and I need the key now. I had thought to wait until the puzzle was more fully pieced together, but time is running out.”

Odell was confused but ventured, “I assume he was not the impoverished scion of a once noble family.”

Bradley laughed with great good humor. “No, no, just a poor boy I pulled from the bowels of Newgate Prison. I had him educated. Taught him everything he knows, oh…” He laughed again. “…
knew
. Trained him for the mission forward in time. He owed me everything, and yet he betrayed me.” Bradley seemed genuinely perplexed by this.

“He said he didn’t.”

“Oh, my boy. He didn’t know he had.”

Odell’s face suddenly stilled. “A time paradox.”

“Right again. As you predicted.” He smiled. “My boy, are you never wrong?”

Odell was frowning down at the floor. “But I am wrong. Little changes should have no impact on the timeline.” He looked up at Bradley. “There can be some alteration. But the time trajectory is just too long, other variables will always intervene to re-set the course. Even your agricultural innovations should have little impact. My guess is that few have adopted them, even in the vicinity of your father-in-law’s estate.”

Bradley shook his head in mock admiration. “Right again.”

“I never told Drake,” Odell said guiltily, even knowing that his story was a complete fabrication. “I never told him that whatever he did here was unlikely to change the course of his family’s history.”

“It’s not your fault, Speex,” Bradley responded sympathetically. “You needed his money to finish your work. I would have done the same.”

Odell was appalled. He was revolted at the very thought of being in any way similar to this man. His stomach clinched in something close to panic.

“Your plan,” he stated tersely.

“Ah, you’ve finally hit upon it. My grand plan! No, not a little thing, Speex. A very big thing. In fact, many big things.”

Odell stood rooted to the ground. He couldn’t have moved even if his limbs had been free. “What have you done?”

“Well, I haven’t done it yet or… no… wait! I
have
done it. But even the best laid plans go awry. And I have you and your sister to thank for giving me a heads up and a renewed chance at success.”

“My sister!” Odell glared at Bradley with haunted eyes and grimaced in anger. “That’s impossible, you bastard!

Days imprisoned had left Odell mentally and physically drained. Initially he was chained by the ankle to the bedstead which had allowed him some freedom of movement, and the ability to exercise. Only in the last two days had his imprisonment become more severe. His hands had been bound together, restricting his movements significantly. The overwhelming boredom of inactivity was also taking its toll. This, combined with sleepless nights, often left Odell questioning his sanity.

“And yet, she is here,” Arthur Bradley pronounced impatiently. “Don’t let emotion cloud your thinking, Speex. It doesn’t become you.”

Odell struggled for self-control, finally saying, “You interfered with history so drastically that it changed the outcome of the future. But why?” He stared down at his swollen hands and chafed wrists, thinking quickly. He looked up again with dawning understanding. “You want to go back,” he said with conviction, his eyes now focused intently on Bradley’s face. “You want to go back but can’t. At least, not to the world that is or was. So you needed to change it.

“That’s why you left to begin with, isn’t it?” Odell continued. “You didn’t just leave, you ran. You had to leave. And now you want to make it safe to go back again.” His sight grew vague. He whispered almost to himself, “But why not just implement the change yourself? Repair your machine and return with it?”