Time Travelers Never Die (14 page)

More water washed over him.

The converter was dark. No response. No power. Damned thing. It had gotten wet. He tried to jam it back into a pocket and missed. It slipped away.

Not that it mattered.

He rode up the side of a wave and back down. Ahead, a light moved slowly from right to left. But it looked a thousand miles away. He turned, looked back, and almost screamed with pleasure: An endless band of lights cast their glow into the sky. A shoreline.

Thank God.

He got out of his shoes, salvaged the wallet from his jacket, and let the jacket float away. Forty-five minutes later, the current carried him in. He stumbled half-f rozen onto a beach.

Piers extended into the ocean on either side. An illuminated boardwalk ran along the edge of the shore. He staggered through the sand, found some wooden steps, stumbled up them, and collapsed.

 

 

THE
doctors pronounced him okay, except for a touch of hypothermia. He looked around and saw two of them, and a couple of cops, both women. He was in a hospital room. The police wanted to know what he’d been doing in the ocean. “My boat sank,” he said.

“We didn’t have any emergency calls tonight. Didn’t you have a radio?” The cop couldn’t believe anybody could be so dumb. She was a young woman, not especially attractive, but okay. Brown hair cut military style. If she could have smiled, she’d have looked a lot better.

“It wasn’t working.”

She closed her eyes and shook her head. Happens all the time. “Is anybody else out there? Were you alone?”

“I was alone.”

She was examining his driver’s license. “Where are you staying?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Where are you staying? You are staying in Atlantic City, right?”

“Um. One of the hotels.”

“Which one?”

“I forget.”

She turned back to the doctor. “You going to keep him here tonight?”

“We thought it would be a good idea. Until we’re sure he’s okay.”

She took the doctor aside and spoke quietly to him. He nodded a couple of times. If he gives you any trouble, Doc, let us know, okay? Then they both walked out.

 

 

IN
the morning, he called Dave. “I could use some help.”

“I seem to have had another one of those incidents.”

“More or less.”

“Atlantic City.”

“Pretty much.”

“I’ll tell you about it later. Can you pick me up?”

“Sure.”
He didn’t sound happy.

“I wound up in the ocean this time.”

“I don’t know.”

 

 

SHEL
was still in a state of near shock when his ride arrived at the hospital.

Dave tried to turn it into a joke, and they both laughed. But Shel’s heart wasn’t in it. They got into the car. “So how’d it happen?” Dave asked.

Shel told him.

“Where’s the converter?”

“In the ocean.”

“Probably the best place for it.” It was a cloudy, cold morning. “Am I taking you home? Or to your father’s place?”

“I don’t know.” He sighed. “My father’s place, I guess. That’s where the car is.”

He pulled out of his parking place and eased onto Pacific Street. But Shel was searching his pockets.

“What’s wrong, Shel?”

“I think the key was still in my jacket when I got rid of it.”

“What key?”

“The key to my dad’s house. I’m going to have to break the window again.” He grunted. “Looks like
my
keys went, too.”

They drove in silence for a while. Finally, Dave sighed. “How many converters do you have?”

“Now? I’ve two left.”

“Do you have any way of checking them? To make sure they don’t malfunction, too? I mean, suppose the thing had dumped you out in the middle of the Atlantic instead of close to shore?”

“I don’t think it was a malfunction.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think it was the cardiac principle.”

Dave took a long time to answer: “It’s hard to believe.”

“I can take a hint.”

“So what are you going to do about your father?”

 

 

SINCE
Shel had no keys, Dave delivered him instead to the town house. It was shortly after noon when they arrived. By then, Shel had been grumbling for an hour. “Going to have to figure out where he went. Find him
after
he left.” He got out of the car, glanced toward the front door, and led the way around back.

“You don’t have a spare key stashed anywhere, do you?” asked Dave. “Maybe in a flowerpot, or something?”

“No. My other set of keys is inside.” Shel picked up a rock and was about to break a windowpane when Dave raised a hand to stop him. “Hold on,” he said.

“Why?”

“I have an idea.”

“We could use one.”

Dave grinned. “You didn’t try the front door.”

“I always lock the front door.”

“Try it anyhow.”

“Okay,” he said. “Whatever you say.”

The front door was mostly chiseled glass with an angled frame. Shel turned the knob. And the door opened. “I’ll be damned.” He stared at Dave. “This is the second time this was supposed to be locked.”

“How about that?” said Dave.

“Good day to play the horses.”

“Shel, I need you to get me one of the converters. Preferably the one I had in New York and Italy, that I know works okay.”

“Why?”

“Just do it for me, please. And I’ll show you something.”

They went into Shel’s den. He retrieved a key from a cup that had the Phillies logo and used it to unlock his desk. Then he opened the bottom drawer and removed a converter. “What are you going to do?”

“Will you set it for me?”

“Okay.”

“You don’t think it’ll drop me in the ocean?”

“We’ll have to see.”

Dave looked at his watch. “It’s a quarter after twelve. I want to go back fifteen minutes.”

“Where? Here?” And a light went on for Shel. “My God. And it actually worked?”

“Apparently.”

“Brilliant, Dave.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ll take it from here.”

“Okay.”

Shel opened the lid, set the device for default, and pressed the button. Dave and the den faded. The den came back, without Dave. Shel shook his head, amazed at the possibilities of the device. He came out of the aura, walked into the entryway, and unlocked the glass door. Then he went back to the den and returned to his base time.

“Very good,” said Dave.

“How did you know?”

“I didn’t. But I made up my mind that when we got inside, we’d use one of the converters to go back and unlock the door.”

“No more broken windows.”

 

 

“SO
where,” asked Dave, “do we begin to look for him?”

“He brought a book home with him.”

“What book was that?”

“I’m trying to think. Something about the wind. It was by John Lewis.” He walked over and googled Lewis’s name.
Walking with the Wind.

“The civil rights era,” said Dave.

“Seems like odd reading for a physicist.”

“My dad was a lot more than a physicist.”

“He was
that
. He’s starting to sound like the ultimate Renaissance man.”

“Yes. But I don’t know that it helps us.”

“Shel, it might be where he went.”

“Where’s that?”

“John Lewis was the leader of the Selma march.”

“Selma—”

“It was the turning point in the civil rights era.”

Shel knew there’d been a demonstration of some sort in Selma. But he didn’t remember any details.

“Bloody Sunday,” said Dave. “The marchers got attacked by police. Without provocation.”

They exchanged glances. “You may be right,” said Shel.

I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land.

 

 

 

 

THEY
arrived on the side of a highway as a tractor-trailer thundered past. Dave landed upright, but the sudden blast of air knocked Shel off his feet. He went down, rolled over, and came up sitting in the grass. “Eventually,” he said, “I should be able to get the hang of this.”

It was 10:00 A.M., Sunday, March 7, 1965. Shel got up and watched a car race by in the opposite direction. Tractor-trailers haven’t changed much over a half century, he thought, but cars have. It was an oversized green convertible.

He took out a compass. “Northeast is
that
way.” He indicated the direction the truck had taken. “This is probably Route Twenty-two, which goes directly through Selma, then turns north.”

The air was cool. Windy. A few clouds were scattered across the sky.

“The day that started the revolution,” said Dave. At that moment, hundreds of people, tired of discrimination, tired of not being able to vote, tired of being pushed aside because their skin was the wrong color, were gathering at the Brown Chapel in Selma.

Shel nodded. “Maybe we should march with them.” He intended it as a joke, but Dave didn’t laugh. They’d watched the video record, had seen the troopers attack. That was enough. “Best for us,” he continued, “is to just hang around the church for a bit. Meet some of them. Feel what it’s like. And then get out of the way.”

“I guess.” Dave looked uncomfortable. But why not? They were on the cusp of one of the pivotal moments in American history, but a price was going to be paid.

“This is our chance to meet Rosa Parks,” said Shel. “And Hosea Williams.” They started walking. Uphill along the side of the road.

Dave had his hands in his pockets. “You know,” he said, “we talked about going to the Colosseum to watch the gladiators. This is worse. These people don’t get to defend themselves.”

Another car was approaching. One of those late-fi fties models with four headlights and a set of tailfins. They held out their thumbs, hoping for a ride. But the car swept past.

 

 

A
few minutes later, a pickup stopped. A couple of kids. “We’re going into town,” the driver said. “You can ride in back if you like. It’s about five miles.” He raised a Coke bottle and took a gulp. “Where you headed?” He looked barely old enough to have a license.

“Selma,” said Shel. “That
is
it up ahead, right?”

“Oh, yeah. Where in Selma you goin’?”

“The Brown Chapel. It’s just a few blocks off Broad Street.”

The driver made a face. “That’s not a white church, you know.”

“I know.”

“You guys part of
that
crowd? Maybe you ought to get down and walk.”

Shel showed him a ten. “We’d appreciate the transportation.”

The kid thought about it. Took the money. “Okay. Climb on.” They pulled away with a jerk. Mostly they drove past cotton fields and farms. After a few minutes, they saw occasional houses and gas stations. Street signs identified Highway 22 as West Dallas Avenue. A large well-kept golf course appeared, the Selma Country Club. And finally they were at the city limits.

Selma looked typically Southern, long streets shaded by maple trees, pleasant homes with manicured lawns, signboards urging passersby to get right with the Lord. On this day, Confederate flags flew everywhere.

The center of town was home mostly to stores and warehouses. People on the sidewalk turned and watched as they passed. A few waved to the kids in front.

Traffic got heavy, and the pickup pulled over to the curb. The kids looked at them and shook their heads. “This is as close as I want to get,” said the driver. “The church is over that way.” He pointed northwest.

They got down. The passenger made a sucking sound. “If I were you guys,” he said, “I’d stay out of it.” They pulled away, made a left at the next intersection, and disappeared.

“Appreciate the ride,” said Dave.

They walked a couple of blocks to Broad Street, which was the commercial heart of Selma, such as it was. There was a bank, the El Ran chero Café, a drugstore, and a movie theater. On this day, police were everywhere. East on Broad, the city extended a few more blocks, then opened out into a highway. That would be US 80, which the demonstrators planned to follow on their march to Montgomery, the state capital.

They crossed Broad Street and entered the black section, located on the north side. Streets were unpaved, houses lay in a general state of disintegration, and trash was scattered everywhere. They walked three or four blocks north, then turned west. A few minutes later, they were at the Brown Chapel.

It was an attractive Romanesque church with twin towers. Several hundred people, mostly black but with some whites, had gathered outside. They’d spilled onto a ball field and some basketball courts. A few angry-l ooking whites stood across the street, watching. They made obscene gestures at Shel and Dave as they passed. Shel thought he heard a rifle bolt slide forward.

“Don’t look at them,” Dave said. “Just keep walking.”

In the church grounds, a few people were showing others how to protect themselves if attacked. Cover vitals. Head down. No violence.

“I don’t see him,” said Shel.

There were a lot of kids with the demonstrators. Young ones. Seven, eight, nine years old. The news footage of the police assault had concentrated mainly on the leaders of the march, mostly adult males. Shel had seen a few women attacked, as well. And he’d known there’d been children. But somehow they hadn’t been the focus.