Time Travelers Never Die (31 page)

“No, Dad. As a matter of fact, I
don’t
know what I’ve done. Maybe you should explain it to me.”

“Sit,” he said. “It took you a long time. Coming after me.”

“I didn’t know where to look. All you told me was ‘Galileo.’ ”

“Oh.” He smiled. “Did I do that?”

“Yes.” It was almost a shriek. “You’ve been here—what?—thirty years?” The question hung in the air.

“And you were in Alexandria.”

His lips curved into a wistful smile. “I went there first, right after you left the house.” He stopped. Had to think. “Or maybe it was Cicero first.”

“Cicero?”

“During the period when they were trying to stop Caesar.” He shook his head. “No, I went to the Library first. I made several trips that night before I came here.”

“Dad, I wish we’d known where you were. We could have—”

Let it go. “It hasn’t been a bad life.”

“I’m sure.” Shel cast a contemptuous look around the interior. No power. No phone. No TV.

“Look, I’m glad to see you, son. You know that. And I’m sorry if I seem ungrateful.”

“What happened?” asked Shel. “Why didn’t you come back?”

“I’d have gone back had I been able. My God, it feels strange to have you here.”

“Dad—”

“You and Dave can stay awhile, right? Spend some time with me. There’s a lot to see. But when you go home—”

“Yes . . . ?”

Michael hesitated. “When you go home, I want you to take the instruments apart. Get rid of them.”

“You’re going back with me, Dad.”

“Adrian, no. I’m happy here.”

“What?”

“I’ve been here a long time. This is my home. I’ve a good life here. Much better than I ever had working at Swifton.”

“Dad, that’s crazy. This place is primitive.”

“Not really. You’re right, in a way. Civilization’s just getting started. But this is where it’s happening.”

“Come on, Dad. You’re talking like a crazy man. The truth is, we’ve just come from your grave site.”

It was an accusation. A heavy silence settled on the room. Michael sighed. “I’m sorry to hear it. It’s one of the temptations with the converter, isn’t it? You can always move forward and find out what happens tomorrow. That’s not necessarily a good thing.”

“Dad—”

“Don’t give me any details. Please.”

“Dad, I want to get you out of here.”

“It feels so strange to be speaking your kind of English again.”

“Why did you do it? Why’d you stay here? You promised you’d come back. And call me. You remember that?”

“I remember.”

“So what happened?”

“There was an accident.”

“How? Did the converter break? Power pack run down? What?”

He looked tired. Looked as if thinking about it wore on him. “Adrian, it’s designed to find a solid surface, reasonably horizontal, so you don’t materialize, say, thirty feet off the ground.”

“And . . . ?

“When I came here, it was December—”

“You came for the supernova.”

“You know about that?”

“Yes.”

“Very good. Anyway, I came out on a frozen pond. On the surface. I found myself standing on ice.”

“And . . . ?”

“This is Italy, son. Ice tends to be thin. I fell through into the water. Could have drowned. Anyhow, the converter got wet. The power pack died. And I’ve been here since.”

Shel was getting annoyed. And scared. “All right. But it’s over now. I can’t believe you’d really want to stay here.”

“But I do.” His words carried conviction. “How’s everything back home? How’s Jerry?”

“Jerry’s fine. Nothing’s changed. What would you expect? It’s only been a few months since you left.”

“Ah, that’s right. It’s not easy to keep track of the details.”

“To say the least, Dad.”

“Does Jerry know?”

“No.”

“Okay. Leave things as they are.”

“That’s hard on him, Dad.”

“I know. But I don’t see an alternative.” He cleared his throat. “We were never that close anyway. He won’t miss me.”

The house looked okay. The walls appeared to be walnut; the bookcase was carved and polished, the furniture comfortable. “You seem to have done reasonably well for yourself.”

“Life is good. I could have used a dentist a couple of times. But other than that, yes, I’ve been content here.”

“Dad—”

“Adrian, I’m on the edge of the Enlightenment. And I know who the players are.”

“But people
always
know who the players are.”

“No, they don’t. It usually takes a couple of generations to figure that out. Contemporaries only know the authority figures and the loudmouths. And the people born into power. But it takes perspective to know who’s carrying the load. Nobody here has a clue who Johannes Kepler is. All they know about Galileo is that he’s a teacher who got in trouble with the Inquisition. I doubt anyone’s heard of Francis Bacon. Even in Britain, nobody really knows him. He’s just a guy with a funny name.”

“How’ve you managed to live?” asked Shel.

“In the beginning, I became a field hand. I worked in shops. Been a waiter. When I came here, Santo Pietro took me in. Eventually, I founded a company that promoted the use of table utensils.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Twenty years ago, they didn’t have them. People ate with knives and their fingers.” He smiled. “Ah, the good old days.”

“And,” said Shel, “you got into the transportation business.”

“You know about that, too? Good, you’ve done your homework.”

“Dave found it.”

“I see. There’s a lesson to be learned, Adrian.”

“Which is?”

“Time is flexible. Or did we talk about this before?”

“We did.”

“Okay. Stay away from paradoxes. Otherwise, it appears you can influence history. Become part of it.”

“How do you define a paradox?”

He considered the question. “Where you make an event known to have occurred impossible.” He laughed. It was a hearty, good-h umored reaction. The guy was seriously happy. “What you do becomes part of history. Your part in it, in a sense, was always there. I’ve always been a factor in this era. And yes, I made my money in the development of stage lines among central Italian cities. What you must do is avoid shooting your ten-year-old grandfather.” Shel and Dave smiled. “I mean it,” he said. “Avoid the irreparable act.”

Michael commented that his visitors must be hungry. But nobody was, so he simply had Albertino bring out some wine. “I can’t resist asking,” he said finally. “Where else have you been?”

THEY
stayed through the night. The beds were soft, and Shel was surprised to discover indoor plumbing, including a flush toilet and a shower. “They’re in common use,” said Michael, in the morning.

“You could use some air-conditioning.”

Michael glanced over at Dave, who was busily looking elsewhere. “You’re spoiled,” he said.

“I know.” Shel sat back. They’d just had a superb breakfast of bacon and eggs and the largest pieces of toast he’d ever seen. “Dad,” he said, “seriously, I’d like not to hear any more talk about happy times in the Renaissance. The cavalry’s here. I want you to come home with us.”

“I can’t do that, son.”

“You talked about a dentist. You could probably use a physical. In any case, you can’t stay here.”

“Why not?”

“Because this isn’t where you belong.”

“You said you saw my grave ahead somewhere.”

“It’s one more reason we want to get you out of here.”

“If I go back with you—”

“Yes?”

“Who’s in the grave?”

“I don’t know. Does it matter?”

“You want to talk about paradoxes. I’m not sure what would happen if you tried to take me back.” He refilled his glass. “Anyhow, I don’t
want
to go.”

“Dad—”

“I mean it. I like it here. You might find it hard to believe, but it’s a much more social climate than you have at home.”

“Dad, this is getting off track.”

“No, it isn’t. People here spend time together. They visit. They talk to one another. There’s always a party somewhere. Back in Philly, they all watch TV. Or sit at a computer. I don’t want to go back to that.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Do I look as if I’m kidding? Adrian, listen to me.” It seemed as if Dave were no longer in the room. “No matter what I do now, I’m near the end of my life. I’ve been here thirty years, give or take. Look at me. You can barely recognize me. How do we explain that to the people at the lab? To my customers? My neighbors?” He took a deep breath. “I don’t need all that. Let it go.”

“Dad, I can’t just walk away from you.”

“You’re going to have to.”

“No, I don’t.” He looked down at the converter. “I can go back to the year of the supernova. What was it? 1605?”

“Close. It was 1604.”

“Okay. And I’ll pick you up
there
. After the converter got wet. I suspect you’d welcome a rescue.”

“Yes, I would have. I’ll admit that was a bad time. But please do not do it. Don’t even think about it.”

“Why not?”

“Haven’t you been listening?”

“Hell with it. We do what we have to.”

“And if you do, you go back there and pick me up on the ice, assuming you’re able to do it at all, which I doubt, what do you think happens to
me
?”

“What do you mean?”

“
Me
, Adrian. The Michael Shelborne who’s spent a lifetime in Italy, who’s living the good life right now near Florence. What happens to
me
?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re proposing a scenario in which I never existed. You take me back in 1604, and
I’m
gone. My years here don’t exist anymore. Do me a favor. Just leave it alone.

“And stop feeling sorry for me. Listen, Adrian, I have talked politics with Ben Jonson and Connie Huygens. Played chess with Tom Hobbes. Gone horseback riding with Descartes. I showed up at a party one night and Claudio Monteverdi was playing the viol. I knew John Milton when he was a teenager. I’ve talked about the human condition with John Donne. I was in the Globe for the opening performance of
King Lear
. And I should add that Florence has some of the loveliest and most talented young women I’ve ever seen. And you want to take me away from them?”

“Okay, Dad. I get the point.”

“Good. And as long as you won’t take my advice and stay away from the damned things—” He got up, left the room, and came back with something wrapped in cloth. “You might as well have this, too.” It was
his
converter. “In case you need an extra.”

Shel took it reluctantly. “I’d rather leave it with you.”

“I’ve no use for it.”

“All right.”

“As far as I know, all it needs is a power source. But run a test. Make sure.”

Albertino brought wine to the table, and Dave offered a toast to Michael Shelborne, the world’s first time traveler.

They touched glasses and drank. “And never forget,” Michael said, “time travelers never die. No matter what you saw up ahead, about me, I’ll always be here.”

There is some awe mixed with the joy of our surprise, when this poet, who lived in some past world, two or three hundred years ago, says that which lies close to my own soul, that which I also had wellnigh thought and said.

 

 

 

 

IT
would be an overstatement to say that Aspasia and her plays were getting substantial attention from the mass media. Sophocles was not exactly a subject to boost ratings, but the mystery surrounding the appearance of plays thought lost for two thousand years did interest a couple of the cable news show hosts. Michelle Keller on
Perspective
observed that it sounded as if a real-life Indiana Jones was charging around out there somewhere, and Brett Coleman, a guest on
Down the Line
, commented that the world had been greatly enriched by the discovery, although he seemed to think that Achilles was a
Trojan
hero.

But if the world at large took little notice, the academic community became embroiled almost overnight in debates over the validity of the texts. Some argued that the style could not have been duplicated so effectively by someone perpetrating a hoax, while their opponents maintained that computer analysis was insufficient for the task of measuring genius. Most scholars came down in the middle: They would not weigh in until the source had been revealed and explanations offered.

Reputations, of course, were at stake. No one ever ruined his career by remaining skeptical, but anybody who buys into a new idea that turns out to be silly has a hard time walking away from it.

Shel and Dave made a few more visits to Alexandria, during which the third converter tested out. They collected more plays from Aristarchus, who always treated them as VIPs, and sent them to Aspasia. Dave was especially impressed when he watched her, during an interview with Keller, divert all credit “
to the person or persons who made the work available.
”