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"What is it, Grace?" Ginny asked. Interest filled her eyes. "What's this about?"

"It's about the envelope that Joel gave you Friday night, the one I was not supposed to open before Christmas," Grace said. She paused to catch her breath. "I found it in your desk when I looked for a pen this morning."

"Did you open it?"

"I did. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry, but I succumbed to curiosity."

"There's no need to apologize, Grace. Joel left the card for you. He just didn't want you to open it right away."

"You're right. He didn't, and now I know why. He explained it all in a letter."

"Why?" Edith asked.

"I'll tell you why. Because he left me, that's why. He left me for good."

"Oh, Grace. I'm so sorry," Ginny said. "Did he at least give you a reason? There has to be more to this. There has to. I can't believe Joel would leave without telling you why."

Grace snorted.

"Oh, he told me why, all right. He was very clear about that."

"I don't understand," Ginny said.

"He went home."

"To Montana?"

"No. He went a little farther than that, or at least he's going to."

"You'll have to be more clear, Grace. I still don't understand."

Grace closed her eyes and gathered herself once more.

"OK. I'll just say it. Joel may be headed to Montana, Ginny, but he's not
from
Montana. He's from Seattle . . . and the year 2000."

Edith dropped her teacup on the floor.

"I beg your pardon," Ginny said.

"He's a time traveler, Ginny. He's from the year 2000 and plans to return to that year tomorrow."

"That's preposterous. Time travel is impossible."

"That's what I thought at first. But then I saw the coin."

"What coin?" Edith asked.

Edith had not bothered to pick up the broken porcelain on her hardwood floor. She instead stared at Grace as if her niece were an alien from a distant planet.

"The coin in Katie's purse," Grace said.

Grace glanced at Katie and nodded.

Katie retrieved the golden American dollar from a small black purse and handed it to Grace. A familiar-looking eagle spread its wings on the backside. A not-so-familiar-looking mother and infant child adorned the front side, alongside the year of the second millennium. Grace took the coin and passed it along to Ginny.

"Joel included this coin with the card and the letter, which I left behind at the house. Have you seen anything like it?"

"No. I haven't."

"Let me see it," Edith said.

Edith extended an arm and took the coin from Ginny.

"It looks authentic."

"I'm sure it is," Grace said. "It may be the only thing about Joel Smith that
is
authentic. He lied to us about a lot of things – important things. He also withheld knowledge about some of us, including knowledge I'm reluctant to share."

"Such as?"

Grace consulted her conscience again as she put her hands together and brought them to her mouth. She knew she had to tell Ginny some things. But did she have to tell her everything? Was it fair? Was it cruel? She decided to proceed slowly.

"Such as his relationship with someone in this room."

Grace walked to Ginny and put a hand on her shoulder.

"I don't know if Joel's story is true, Ginny. I don't. I know only that it would explain a lot of things, such as his winning bets, his mood the past few weeks, and his decision to leave this weekend. But if his story is true, then you are more than just his friend."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean you're his grandmother."

Ginny sank in her chair and stared blankly into space for several seconds. Her face was the picture of shock and confusion. A moment later, she turned to Grace and shook her head.

"I refuse to believe it," she said, with a hint of anger. "I refuse to believe any of it. Time travel is impossible. It is a creation of literature, not science. Joel simply got cold feet. Men do that, you know. He'll be back. I'm sure of it. He loves you."

Grace looked at her oldest friend and smiled at her through tears.

"I know he does. It's the one thing about him I do not doubt. But I'm afraid I can't count on him coming to his senses soon. It's the reason I must go to the airport tonight. There is an eastbound flight that leaves at eight forty and arrives in Helena at one thirty in the morning."

"You can't be serious, Grace," Edith said.

"I'm very serious. I love him and can't live without him." Grace looked at her aunt as though searching her soul. "I
won't
live without him."

Grace stepped away from Ginny, moved to the middle of the room, and turned to face all of them. It was time to address the three as a group now and not as individuals.

"In his letter Joel said that he entered a mine on December 8 and returned to his time. I have every reason to believe that the mine is near Helena, Montana, and that he will enter it sometime tomorrow. I have just hours to determine if he's telling the truth and, to do that, I have to find him fast. This is something I have to do."

"Do you need money?" Ginny asked. "I can give you whatever you need."

"I know you can," Grace said, "but I don't need anything. I have more than enough to cover my plane ticket and expenses. I'll take a cab to the airport. But thank you for offering."

"When can we expect you back?" Edith asked. "I'll worry if I don't know."

The unexpected question pushed Grace over the edge. She tried to hold back a new round of tears but failed miserably. The trickle had turned into a flow.

"That's the thing, Aunt Edith," Grace said, forcing a weak smile. "I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?"

"What I mean is that you may see me on Tuesday . . ."

Grace took a deep breath and glanced at Katie and Ginny before returning to Edith.

"Or you may never see me again."

CHAPTER 4: GRACE

As the child of American missionaries who had served in East Africa, the Philippines, and China, Grace Vandenberg was no stranger to travel. She had driven cars, plied the oceans in the great ships, and ridden trains, rickshaws, and elephants. But until she stepped inside a Douglas DC-3 at Boeing Field on December 7, 1941, she had never slipped what pilot-poet John Magee called "the surly bonds of Earth."

Grace held her stomach as the 21-seat craft climbed above the lights of Seattle and then lurched eastward toward the Cascade Mountains. She imagined a flight that lasted ten minutes and a receiving line that included a remorseful cowboy who had broken her heart. The flight brochure on her lap suggested something less poetic. The plane would take four hours to reach Montana's capital and likely be greeted by a weary ticket clerk and a mop-pushing janitor.

When the aircraft leveled out, Grace closed her eyes, relaxed, and tried to convince herself that leaving family and friends to chase a time traveler on a day her country had been drawn into a world war was the act of a rational woman.

The meeting at Aunt Edith's had not ended well. Both Edith and Ginny had tried to talk her out of boarding the plane. Both counseled against her making rash decisions – permanent decisions. As much as they apparently wanted to see Joel again, they wanted to see Grace even more.

Only Katie, dependable Katie, had understood. But then, she had read the letter. She had been in the kitchen when Grace's world had come crashing down. Months earlier, she alone had encouraged Grace to follow her heart and not her head when she had considered trading Paul McEwan for Joel Smith.

Grace let her mind drift back to May and a simpler life that already seemed decades away. She thought of the night Paul had taken her to one of the best restaurants in town and put a diamond ring on her finger barely five months into their relationship.

Paul had not wanted Grace to drift away after he graduated from the university's Naval ROTC program in June and headed to the Navy Supply Corps School in Boston. He had wanted to claim her before anyone else got a similar notion and return to a fiancée in August.

He had been uneasy about a separation – and for good reason. Eight weeks was a long time. As it turned out, Joel had needed only four weeks to convince Grace that life as the girlfriend of a free-spirited furniture salesman beat life as the wife of an ambitious Navy officer.

Grace peered through her window and stared at pure darkness. The plane was now above the clouds and far beyond any visible signs of human habitation. She couldn't imagine a more fitting sight. She was racing toward the great unknown, a perfect void, and a future that held far more uncertainty than promise.

Even before leaving Edith's house, Grace had known that her quest could have only three possible outcomes. She would find Joel and attempt to save their relationship. She would not find Joel and return to Seattle. Or she would take the greatest leap of her life and continue her search into the future.

She could not imagine the world after the war, much less the world of 2000. She promised herself that she would give a lot of thought to every move. Edith and Ginny were right about one thing: this was no time for hasty decisions.

As the plane flew through the December night, Grace revisited her decision to tell Ginny about Joel. Had she been right to tell her that he was her grandson? Should she have left well enough alone? Grace had always been a firm believer in the message of John 8:32. In most cases, the truth
will
set you free. But was this one of those cases? In telling Ginny what she believed to be true, had she set into motion events that might have dire consequences for others?

Grace didn't regret withholding the references to Tom. Joel may have known Tom's fate, but she didn't. She didn't know whether Tom would die in the war or return to Seattle safely and live many happy years with Virginia Gillette.

Even so, Grace had left nothing to chance. She had encouraged Ginny to visit Tom at Fort Lewis and to do so sooner rather than later. She did not know how much time they had left, but she figured it was probably not a lot. The attack on Pearl Harbor had changed everything. The future was not something anyone could take for granted.

Seeing nothing of interest beyond her window, Grace turned her attention toward the heavyset woman next to her. While most of the other fifteen passengers slept, the fortyish woman worked feverishly on a blue stocking cap she was no doubt knitting for a loved one.

"Is that a Christmas gift?"

"It will be if I finish in time," the woman said. "It's for my grandson in Spokane. He was born on Thanksgiving Day."

"It's lovely."

"Are you headed to Spokane too?"

"No. I'm going to Helena, Montana. It's the second stop."

"Then you must be returning home for Christmas."

"No," Grace said. "I'm trying to find my boyfriend."

"Is he lost?"

Grace smiled slightly.

"In a sense."

"Well, he must be very special to get you on a plane this time of night."

"He is."

Grace pondered the understatement of the century. Only someone as special as Joel Smith could have possibly motivated her to leave Seattle. Rational women did not leave the comfort of family and friends to pursue a certifiable liar into the future. Then again, she had been anything but rational since he had come into her life like a gentle Pacific breeze.

Grace had first felt that breeze on June 2 as she returned to her sorority with a dozen friends celebrating her twenty-first birthday. While waiting to cross a busy street in Seattle, she had noticed a handsome but disheveled young man sitting on a bench. She had stared at him like he was a lost puppy. He had stared at her like she was an answer to a prayer.

When the time had come to cross the street, she had offered him a gentle wave. He had responded by touching the brim of his hat. It wasn't much, but it had been more than enough to stir interest and a conversation when they were formally introduced at Tom Carter's graduation party twelve days later.

Joel had arrived in Seattle hungry and penniless on June 2, three days after hopping a train in Helena. But he had quickly turned his fortunes around when he saved Tom from a savage beating outside of a popular tavern. Grateful beyond measure, Tom had taken the stranger under his wing. The next day Joel had a place to stay in the Carters' Airstream trailer, regular meals, and a job selling sofas and mattresses at Melvin Carter's successful furniture store.

For weeks the tight-lipped newcomer had done his best to fit in. He had set sales records at the store and made fast friends in Tom, Ginny, Katie, Grace, and Linda McEwan, Paul's twin sister and the girls' housemate. The friends, for their part, had welcomed the handsome Montanan into their fold and encouraged him to reciprocate romantic overtures from Linda.

But Joel had zeroed in on someone else. Smitten with Grace from the start, he had jumped on an unexpected opportunity to take her to a baseball game and then used that and other dates to pry her from her absent fiancé. The baseball game had led to walks around the university and movies at a campus theater. By the end of July, Joel had won Grace's interest and affection. By the middle of August, he had won her, period.

Grace reminisced about their time together with fondness and regret. She fondly recalled Labor Day weekend in Seaside, Oregon, where Tom had proposed to Ginny, and Joel and Grace had discovered each other in many new ways. She smiled when she thought of Joel's playful visits to the university library, where she worked, and of their three nights together, when she had given herself to a man she could no longer live without. Joel Smith and Grace Vandenberg had crammed a lot of life and love into six months and Grace wanted to have a whole lot more.

Eight passengers, including the knitter, deplaned in Spokane. Six more joined a flight that would continue to points in Montana, North Dakota, and Minnesota before terminating in Chicago. One of three daily flights that connected the old Northwest with the new Northwest, the Starlighter was by far the least convenient. For Grace, however, it was a lifesaver. It had given her a fighting chance to save a love that was well worth saving.