Forty One
Forty One
This was to have been a big account of Jacky and Oliver's champagne brunch, with pictures of the main miscreants there1 , but technical problems preclude it2 3 . Since this would have made this issue the shortest Beer Cats on record, I will instead branch out into... well, read on and see.
-- and back
to the here and now. The air still crackled with the afterglow; it
wasn't yet too late to jump back in to the flux. I looked around,
checking for obvious signs while I could. The clock on the
mantelpiece was still there. That was a good sign, but I knew by now
not to judge too much by first appearances. I looked more closely,
still fearful that this would be a wrong turn. There, near the base,
on the left hand side - a small chip from when it had once fallen.
Just the way it should be. The letter I'd addressed to myself was
wedged underneath. I relaxed a little; unless fate was being
extremely cruel, everything seemed to be OK. I let the field die
away, and fell into a chair.
"What kept
you?"
I looked over
to the other chair. Ralph was sitting casually smoking a cigarette.
"Why, what time is it?" "You mean, apart from 'time you fixed that
clock'? It's about, oh, three thirty, or so", he drawled. "But hey,
that's not important is it? I mean, it worked, didn't it?"
"I -, It -, er
-, I mean -", I stammered. Everything came rushing back at once, and
mere words were insufficient.
"Yo, take it
easy man. I can wait."
Ten minutes
later the memories had stopped crashing round my mind. "It was
fantastic! I mean, it was just like that film. you know, that one
they always show -"
"The Zapruder
film?"
"- yeah, that's
the one. Well anyway, I was there! I saw the whole thing!"
"So? Who did
kill Kennedy, then?"
"Difficult to
tell. I mean, what with all the screaming from the crowd, and the
panic, and then the police and the special agents moving in, it all
became a bit of a blur." Images flooded back: pushing, jostling;
people had lost rationality, and fear and panic became palpable.
Sirens cut through the fog of confusion. Voices urging calm became
increasingly agitated. Stand back sir. Keep behind the line. More
screams. More unreality. People running; others standing. Crying.
Numb.
Ralph
interrupted my reverie. "What about the grassy knoll? Who was
there?"
I shook my head
slowly. "Gee, I never got the chance to look. There were too many
people there. It was too crowded. Maybe that's the way it's meant to
be. After all, if I did find out the real truth, who would I turn
to?" "Well, there's a whole bunch of newspapers would buy it off you
for starters. But only if you had something to tell them. So why not
go back again?"
I stared
incredulously. "I can't believe what I'm hearing! It's not like
taking a stroll down to the corner shop, or anything like that! It's
only one of the biggest inventions ever, and already you're
blasé!" I jumped out of the chair, and gesticulated wildly at
Ralph. "I've only gone and invented a time machine, for pity's sake!"
My anger peaked, and I let my arms fall down by my side. In a more
normal voice, I continued, "Besides, there are a few difficulties."
Ralph looked about to speak, so I preempted him. "Firstly", I said,
counting off points on my fingers, "there is the small matter of
recharging the machine. I haven't even looked yet to see how much it
took. It could have been a one off trip."
"While you were
still disoriented, I checked the machine. It took a lot of energy,
all right, but not so much that it's worth buying shares in the
electricity company. Sure, you may have a bill fit for a castle, but
I wouldn't lose sleep over it; it's a couple of months before they'll
send out the bill." I wasn't sure whether or not he was being
sarcastic with the last remark, so I let it pass. "It might need a
couple of tweaks here and there, but it'll work again.", he said
confidently.
"Hmm. I'm glad
someone's confident." I still felt a touch overwhelmed by the
experience. Perhaps it was time lag, or something. "Secondly,
programming the coordinates was a bit tricky first time round, what
with all the allowances for the time dilation caused by the Earth's
movement through space. You try and work out Doppler shifts!"
Actually, the program was pretty simple really. Someone in NASA or
JPL had come up with the equations of motion, and all I had done was
to plug in the values. However, I didn't want to let Ralph sit there
with one of his 'relax man' looks, so I wanted to get him just a
little worked up.
"That's OK too.
The fuse had blown when you came back, but the battery kept the data
intact. I checked the program, and it's not that tricky; the orbital
mechanics formula has a few more terms from the one I know, but then
I only did the basics. Plug in the numbers and go." There was just a
hint of smugness in his voice. I tried not to let it show that he had
rumbled me. "You might want to get more precise values the next time,
though", he said casually. "Aha! So there is something that worries
you." I seized this slight chink in his laid back attitude, hoping
for something - anything - that would stop him being so casual about
the whole thing. "Well, if you're that concerned, then you get the
figures!" I was getting worked up again; I'm sure Ralph acted that
way deliberately. "Sure. I'll speak to some of my friends who work in
the labs. They'll know." Ralph shrugged his shoulders. "It's not
hard. So what's the problem?"
I was running
out of spurious difficulties to tell Ralph, and so decided to come
clean. I fetched a couple of beers from the fridge, and sat down in
the chair. The time machine in the corner was still making pinging
noises like cooling metal. "Look, today wasn't the first time I tried
the time machine." Ralph raised one eyebrow. I'd caught his
attention, so carried on. "When I first started, it seemed as though
I was on a hiding to nothing, but the chance discovery changed all
that."
"I hate to
interrupt you in full flow, but you told me all this bit before your
-", he paused, thinking for a suitable word. "-jaunt. The theory
sounded OK, but then, hey, what do I know? I'm not that interested in
how you built it, or how it works; I'm just curious why you're so
reluctant to try it again."
"It's just
the... the sheer effort involved. After the first successful test --
on a peanut butter sandwich, if you must know -- I went through
myself."
"When did you
go to?" Ralph sounded animated for the first time that day.
I took a sip of
beer before starting. This was going to be a long one. "About three
years back; just before I moved here. That way I wouldn't be in any
danger of meeting myself -"
"What would
happen if you did?"
"I'm not sure.
I think the best way to avoid time paradoxes is not to go looking for
them. I don't want to disappear up my own existence just to give some
physicist the chance to be proved right about his theory. Anyway. I
went back, and felt a bit peckish, so I took a stroll down to the
pub. I was about to go in when I stopped to check my change; I didn't
really want to get barred from my local before it even became my
local! I looked down, and realised that I couldn't go in and buy
something."
"Why not?",
Ralph was no longer sitting back in the chair. "Were you missing some
vital piece of clothing or something?"
"Nearly. Out of
habit I looked at the dates on the coins. They were all this year or
last year. I didn't want to risk being accused of forging money, so
had to come back. Hungry.
"After that, I
realised that I needed to check all the details before going
anywhere. I would go along to a coin dealer, and buy coins and notes
that were old enough, then..." I tried to remember the word Ralph had
used. "...jaunt back. At first, it was exciting, being able to live
in a different time for an hour, a day. Once even a whole week. And
still return the same hour that I'd left. The further back I went,
the more my money bought; I lived it up some of the time. After a
while, it had lost its raw excitement, as I could only ever go back
to the same place. This place. You wouldn't believe just how little
has happened in this village in the past couple of hundred years."
"Apart from the occasional visitor dispensing largesse!" Ralph almost
laughed out loud. We both laughed for a bit, before Ralph said in his
usual voice, "So how did you get to see Kennedy, then? Did you lie
about that, or did you fake it?"
"Neither. I got
there. Here look." I fished out a couple of photographs from my
inside pocket. One showed the motorcade - just - mostly hidden by the
heads of the people in front. The other was a photograph of a
calendar; I'd just about managed to get 'November 1963' in focus.
Ralph looked at
them. "Yeah, these are real. They have to be. No one would try and
palm off such cruddy photographs if they were fake."
"Thanks. I
think." I took the photographs back, and put them down beside the
chair. "So, when I jaunted back to 1963 for your benefit, I'd already
stuffed my pockets with suitable money; I'd suspected that that was
when you'd want to know about, given your interest in all the
conspiracy theories going"
Ralph laughed.
"Hey, I've gotta keep an open mind. Seriously, though, you'd have
been stuffed if I'd suggested another time."
I nodded,
before carrying on. "I had enough money to buy a car, which I then
drove to London airport. Using my father's old passport, I bought a
ticket to Dallas, caught the plane, booked a room near Dealey plaza,
saw the motorcade, got caught up in the
hubbub, flew home, picked up the car, drove here, sold the car
and jaunted back. Quite frankly, I'm exhausted. That's why I don't
want another jaunt. Yet."
"So there will
be a next time?"
I yawned. "Oh
yes. You can come too, if you like. But not today." I never heard
Ralph's response, as I fell asleep in the armchair.
*Just when you thought that it had disappeared, it's back. Almost. Still, fanmail and critique will reach us at 19 Cordiner St, Mount Florida, Glasgow G44 4TY, while streams of electrons whizzing down the wire to BeerCats@calumny.demon.co.uk will also reach us. Hurry, hurry. Buy now... ©1997, apparently..