The Kingdom of Ohio (18 page)

“Mr. Edison.” The financier inclined his head. “Enjoying yourself this evening, I hope?”

Edison sat silently while Tate tapped out Morgan's question on his shoulder, staring at one of the painted elephants and trying vaguely to calculate the cost of its manufacture. Quarries for the raw clay, factories to make the raw paint, transport of materials, labor expenses, packing and unpacking costs for the voyage across some ocean to this house . . .

Tate finished his Morse-code translation of Morgan's question and the inventor looked up, smiling. “Of course, Mr. Morgan. Mrs. Morgan. Wasn't for your kind hospitality I'd just be alone at the lab.”

“Tell me,” the financier continued, “are you working on any new experiments at the moment?”

The secretary relayed Morgan's words in Morse, adding his own postscript of
Think commercial application!

Edison swallowed the lecture on his new bifurcated ratcheting screwdriver that he'd been preparing to deliver, casting his mind over the dozen-odd projects under way at Menlo Park. “Well, for one, been playing with those new roentgen rays.”

“The device for seeing through men's bodies?” Fanny, Morgan's wife, joined the conversation for the first time. “Does it actually work?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

Fanny winced and Edison realized with a surge of annoyance that, as usual, he was talking too loudly. Trying to quiet his voice, he continued. “They do. Been experimenting with a new kind of screen that I'm calling a fluoroscope. It'll give much more detailed pictures than previous models. Might have some interesting business possibilities. Medical applications, whatnot.”

Morgan shook his head. “These rays may be an interesting toy for scientists, but hardly of practical significance.”

Edison wrestled down the objection on his lips. It was all so much easier, he thought, before everything had become tangled up in worries about money and business. When his time had still been his own, without obligations to various consortia, contractual commitments, the interests of financial backers, and an army of assistants to manage: that long-gone era when it was just the inventor alone in his workshop, penniless and free to do as he chose.

“And who is this gentleman?” Morgan gestured at the young reporter. “I have met Mr. Tate, but I do not think we have been introduced, sir.”

“Oh, him? This here's George Lathrop. Says that he's planning to write some stories about me.”

“How fascinating. What kind of stories?” Fanny asked, sounding bored. Edison had met Morgan's second wife only once before—she seldom appeared with him at social functions, and it was common knowledge that whatever affection may once have existed between them had long since faded into mere courtesy.

The inventor blinked away an initial plan for a device for detecting emotions—call it the sensograph, measure the heart rate and so forth; although with the world being how it is, nobody would want such a thing—as Tate finished relaying Fanny's words.

“Well—” Edison shook his head, grinning at the strangeness of the world, “they ran the first story in the Hearst papers last month. ‘Edison Conquers Mars,' I think it was called. Ray guns, time machines, all that. Nearly busted a rib when I saw it.” He glanced at Morgan, expecting a laugh, but the old walrus was silent, brow furrowed.

“I wonder if you could tell me, sir,” the financier said at length, “your honest assessment of the possibility of such a thing being achieved. Of travel through time, I mean—apart from in the pages of penny fictions . . . ?”

The inventor tugged at a lock of his hair uncertainly. Until this moment he had never seriously considered the subject, but Morgan was clearly expecting an answer. And really, Edison, thought, who knows the limits of human ingenuity? It turns out that it's possible to inscribe sound waves in wax and make dead matter remember living speech. Wires can be strung across the ocean, allowing conversations between continents. Men can fly and tread beneath the sea. This is an age of great discoveries, the morning of the Century of Man: when regarding himself in the mirror, Man found himself to be more like a god than he had ever before imagined.

A valet glided into the room, offering an assortment of crustacean cakes in a
sauce hollandaise
on a silver platter. The inventor popped one into his mouth and chewed thoughtfully, briefly investigating the anatomy of the arthropod with his tongue, before answering.

“Why, I'd estimate it to be possible. After all, it could maybe take a hundred years before the secret of time travel is discovered. But when it is . . .” He paused, enjoying the rapt attention of his audience as the financier and his wife, secretary and reporter, all leaned toward him.

“Well, then,” Edison continued, “couldn't our visitors from the future travel back in time to the present with their device? Thus guaranteeing, if you see my point, the eventual arrival of a time machine if such a thing was ever invented. In fact, I'll tell you, I wouldn't be too surprised if travelers from the future arrived in Central Park tomorrow.”

He peered at Morgan, wondering what the walrus—calculating, subtle walrus—was thinking. In general, scientifically illiterate men like Morgan bored Edison. At certain moments he even despised Morgan for being a money man, born rich and pampered. But he also knew that soirees like this had to be endured in exchange for the things that Morgan could provide: the favors and funding necessary to power his invention factory. And whatever else might be the case, Edison reflected, the walrus wasn't afraid to think big—to think about changing the world.

The financier leaned back on the sofa and sipped his sherry. “And tell me, Mr. Edison, how would you locate these time travelers if they arrived?”

A decade ago a question like this would have sent the inventor scrambling for a book and slide rule, but since then countless newspaper interviews have accustomed him to answering with quips and certainties plucked from thin air. Tate finished tapping out the question on his shoulder, and Edison shrugged. “Seems to me—if you want to catch a bigger mouse, build a bigger mousetrap.”

The financier frowned. “What do you mean, sir?”

“Well . . .” Edison drew a deep breath, closing his eyes.

For years he had been telling people that genius was ninety-nine percent perspiration—but privately he knew it was the other one percent, the inspiration, that made all the difference. And maybe it was the thought of the mining experiments he had started in the New Jersey hills, or his recent work on the kinetoscope—the mechanical challenge of framing a single fixed point of reference among a blur of still photographs, to make an image from the past return to life—or maybe it was simply the weight of Morgan's silent stare. But sitting in the financier's parlor, a sudden half-formed insight, and with it a tingle of long-absent wonder, came to Thomas Edison.

He met Morgan's gaze. “I hear,” he said, struggling to modulate his unheard voice, “that down at Tammany Hall there's talk of building a new underground railroad.”

For a moment the financier's eyes widened and it seemed as if he was going to ask something further—but then stopped himself, glancing around as if the thick folds of the velvet curtains over the window, or one of the tall gilt cabinets, might contain some hidden threat. Through the doorway, the tinkle of glasses and the sound of laughter.

“I do not wish to discuss such things now, Mr. Edison,” Morgan said. “But come by my offices, someday. I would enjoy the opportunity to speak with you further, at your earliest possible convenience.”

The inventor realized that he was being dismissed and stood. “Certainly. Mr. Morgan, Mrs. Morgan.” He turned away, followed by his secretary and the reporter, wondering if Morgan actually believed what he'd said—whether he believed it himself, for that matter. Probably not, he decided. Just a bit of fun, a kind of parlor game. Still, thinking of the intensity that had appeared on the financier's face, Edison couldn't help feeling a thrill of unsettled excitement as he made his way across the living room toward the buffet.

 

 

 

 

NOW, four years later, Edison recalls that conversation as he enters the financier's office and seats himself before the expanse of Morgan's desk. Briefly he pictures those moments, and the countless conversations he has had with the financier and his associates since then, like a current passing through a maze of electrical circuits. Each word a tiny fluctuation in amperage, individually insignificant but together causing unpredictable cascading voltage effects, aberrations in the behavior of the machine—

Effects that, Edison still suspects, may be an exercise in craziness. The planning of the subway tunnels as a point of safe anchorage, leading to a few known exits that can be monitored for any incursion. The endless scheming—all of it is speculative in a way that causes deep misgivings in Edison's practical nature. He toys with a loose bit of thread trailing from the chair's upholstery and tries to meet the financier's gaze.

“Well, Mr. Edison. I expect you have some news for me . . . ?”

“Sir . . . ?” The inventor inserts his ear trumpet: he remembered to bring it this time, and with its help, and by leaning close to the financier, some semblance of conversation is possible. Still better, Edison realizes, might be a device like a telephone speaker, worn over the ears—but before he can pursue this thought further, Morgan is repeating himself more loudly.

“
—
some news for me!”

Edison pauses, licking his lips. Not for the first time, he considers telling the financier that this whole adventure is a fool's errand. But that itself would be another kind of craziness, he reminds himself, not to mention bad business: upsetting a man who could ruin his career with an offhand remark. Besides which, since those magical years of the lightbulb and the phonograph—Edison thinks with a sense of uncharacteristic despair—none of his other projects have come to fruition. Alongside the failure of his experiments in mining, motion photography, and a dozen other directions, their lack of results on this effort is just one more dead end among many.

He clears his throat. “Well, yes, though it's far from conclusive—”

“I understand.”

“In fact, it's hardly anything.” Seeing Morgan's scowl, the inventor hurries ahead. “Only, there seems to be a woman the police arrested for attacking Tesla.” He smiles briefly at the thought. “Apparently she claims that she traveled through time.”

“Is that all?” The financier leans back in his chair, swiveling away from Edison.

“Well, yes. And that she claims to be a woman who died seven years ago.”

“I see,” Morgan rumbles. “So it is not certain.”

“No.” Edison shakes his head quickly. “Like I said, only a small thing. But enough that we should maybe . . .”

“Be cautious, yes,” the financier finishes for him, leaving the words that both of them are thinking unspoken—
that the time travelers may already be here. Anywhere. Given the benefit of perfect understanding, insinuated where they
know
with the certainty born of some future perspective, that they will not be found
. . .

Morgan closes his eyes, massaging his temples. “And the subway tunnels? Has there been anything . . . ?”

“No, nothing in the tunnels. But”—the inventor brightens, seizing at one of the few meager shreds of evidence that he hasn't been completely mistaken—“apparently she told the police a certain subway worker could vouch for her.”

“And do you believe we should pursue this matter?” Morgan presses.

“Oh, well . . .” Edison glances up at the walrus, common sense and self-preservation battling inside him. “I wouldn't know. Could be just a madwoman. Probably nothing, come to think of it.”

“Perhaps so.” Morgan rises. “Thank you for the news. I will make the necessary arrangements and keep you apprised of any further information.”

“Sir . . . ?”

“
—
of any further information!”

Edison stands, allows his hand to be solidly squeezed, then released. “I will, of course.”

“My secretary will show you out.” Morgan ushers the other man to the door. When Edison is gone, he turns back to the wide bank of windows overlooking the street.

“Damn,” he swears softly to himself—

And closes his eyes, thinking of what this latest news might mean. All his life, Morgan has understood the moral authority of wealth: the burden of responsibility for the public good that is conferred by his unique position. He has worked patiently to cultivate the garden of mankind's peace and prosperity: fertilizing here, encouraging there, judicious with his pruning shears when the need arises. But ever since damned Edison raised the possibility of time travel, the specter has haunted his nightmares. The vision of a world turned upside down, the orderly march of history and progress scattered to the wind, undermining the roots of everything he has struggled to accomplish.

More than once, he has tried to convince himself that these are needless fears, that the inventor's theories are nothing more than idle speculation. But although he does not have much faith in the wild daydreams of scientists—having been unimpressed by phrenology, psychophysics, mediumship, and similar cutting-edge intellectual fads—he knows by a hollow feeling in the pit of his formidable stomach that, on this subject at least, damned Edison is right. It is a gamble against the future: not a question of
when
a device that travels through time will be invented, but of whether it will ever be invented at all. And if there is one thing Morgan has learned, it is to avoid betting against the future. Which is why, more and more often, he finds himself unable to sleep, kept awake by the image of time turning back on itself, the serpent swallowing its own tail, of everything he has worked for unraveled and undone before it even began . . .