by Tim Neilson
“Oh, Tina,” James said in surprise as he emerged from the gate. Suddenly he remembered.
“I’m sorry,” he stammered, “I just forgot. You see I was ...”
“Come on,” Tina commanded abruptly, and strode off rapidly in the direction of the hotel.
She’s angry at me, thought James. And she’s got every right to be. All I had to do was stay still for an hour or so. He did feel, though, that Tina being judgemental about someone else’s reckless behaviour very much called to mind the idiom of the pot calling the kettle black.
Anyway, she’ll get over it soon. But Anna will probably kill me, he thought nervously.
Anna was in fact surprisingly tolerant. Everyone’s entitled to the occasional mistake, she thought. And when James told her about the discovery he and Claudia had made, she had things to think about other than James’s waywardness.
“So Crick didn’t drop it in 1959,” she asked.
“If we’re right, he probably didn’t,” James confirmed.
“What’s ‘probably’ about it?” Anna asked. “Remember the letter that Cam found? It said something like Crick agreeing that Burnet was right.”
“Yes,” objected James, “but even if we’re right and they were talking about subatomic time travel, Crick might have just meant that it was impractical to pursue that idea, not that he meant to keep going.”
“Well, there’s only one way to find out,” Anna insisted.
James agreed, but couldn’t help pointing out they’d probably not seen the last of those who’d taken violent exception to their activities. In the light of that risk they had to consider whether it was fair to Cam to reactivate their search. Anna agreed they would have to ask him before taking any fresh steps. They decided to call in on him that evening and break the news. They would need to discuss exactly what fresh steps they proposed to take.
At that point, they faced up to the difficulties of resuming their task, but reviewing their recollections of all the archives they’d looked at, they realised there wouldn’t be a huge amount of new work. In most cases, they’d found the relevant files weren’t in strict chronological order, so rather than stopping their search when they reached papers dated 1960, they’d reviewed all the available material. This meant, in those cases, there was no need to go back. If there’d been anything at those places that showed Crick continuing with the project after Burnet’s comments, they would have seen it already. Luckily, it meant there were only comparatively few places to search again, all of which were in Cambridge, where they’d felt confident the documents were in chronological order, and where they hadn’t looked beyond the end of 1959.
“One person could probably do it all in a day, two at most,” James explained in response to a question from Tina.
“The real problem is that we know that we’ve been identified, and the people following us know what we’ve been doing,” Anna pointed out. “When we go back to those places and start looking, they may spot us and they’ll then know we’re still trying. Then they may start with more of what they did to Cam.”
“We haven’t seen them in Cambridge,” Tina objected. “We should be OK as long as we keep a good lookout.”
“Yes, we haven’t seen them, but they’ve obviously been around, given what they did to Cam. It wouldn’t be hard for them to work out what we’re up to if they do see us going around places with archives. Even if we think we aren’t under surveillance when we go there … yes, I know, Tina, but remember that we didn’t spot those suits until they saw us at the bus stop … and anyway once James and I are in those places looking, if someone shows up after we’ve gone in and sees us working it will be too late to do anything about it.”
Tina couldn’t think of an answer, except to say that she’d deal with any threat that emerged. Anna had considerable respect for her sister’s talents, but she knew ‘female superhero despatches multiple strong adult male assailants’ was comic book stuff.
Anna strongly suspected, though she hadn’t been told, the episode in the car near the Lister Institute had involved Tina doing something that would put their four antagonists firmly on guard. If so, there’d be no element of surprise available to Tina. Also, as she said to her sister, they had no way of knowing that those four men would be the only troublemakers. If Derwent & Graham were willing to go to the lengths they had, she pointed out, it was unlikely the cost of hiring a few more hit men would deter them.
“We’ll put it to Cam,” she assured Tina. “We just have to be honest about the risks.”
Cam was very reluctant to let the quest resume.
“I’m not so worried about them coming after me,” he said. “Well ...” he explained, feeling that he should be a bit more accurate, “I am, but that wouldn’t be enough for me to want to stop you. But as you say, there’s a fair chance you’ll be seen, and there isn’t much of a chance there’s anything worth finding.”
“It’s difficult to decide which way to play it,” James said. “We can’t do anything to change the chances of finding something. Is there any way we can lengthen the odds of the enemy finding out what we’re doing?”
They sat silent for a while. No one wanted to call it off, but Anna, James and Tina all felt that they had to offer Cam some improved proposal to overcome his reticence.
“Alright,” Anna announced. “We won’t go back,” she told them, holding up a hand to quell the immediate protests – intense from Tina, and slightly less so from James who, in truth, felt a sense of guilty relief that the danger might be averted. “We’ll still get the job done, though.”
She pulled out her phone, checked the time, did some quick calculations about time zones, and started dialling.
“Uncle Joe? It’s Anna … Still over here … Oh, very good, yes … Have the boys had any more trouble at James’s? ... Good … Are any of them with you? ... Matteo? ... Can I speak to him thanks? ... Yes, see you as soon as we get back … A bit over a week … Bye … Matteo? ... Yes, quite a lot … Shut up, Tina will tell you all about it when we get back. I need you to do something … Look, just get a pen and paper. And don’t say anything about this to Mum or Dad or your parents, I don’t want them to worry.”
Chapter 14
A Change of Heart
There was a heavy mist, so thick that it seemed almost on the point of coalescing into droplets and falling to the ground as rain. It hung motionless in the stillness of the grey gloomy air.
Perhaps it was the atmospheric conditions that gave an eerie clarity to the hoarse yells and dull thuds that Daniel Page could hear to his right. He was traversing a long bank of earth that made do as a pathway for those seeking the shortest route between the Physics building and Ormond College. The noise he heard was coming from the University’s main sporting ground, immediately adjacent to his path. Evidently the College’s first eighteen were dealing satisfactorily with the day’s task, judging by the exultant demeanour of the red, gold and black clad horde swarming to the north west of the boundary fence. It was a spectacle he would normally have lingered to savour. However, he didn’t break stride as he headed for the back gate of the College. He had received important news, and he had lots to do.
Matteo had turned up unexpectedly at the Physics building, almost bursting with excitement. Daniel’s surprise at his unheralded visit had turned to consternation when Matteo earnestly explained he hadn’t been able to communicate with Daniel electronically because – and at this point Matteo glanced around furtively, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper – he’d received a message from Anna. Daniel knew immediately that the message would relate to their attempt to help Cam. His heart sank. He guessed he would be asked to perform some time-wasting onerous task when he had so much work to complete. He forced himself to accept the proffered envelope without showing any signs of reluctance, thanked Matteo for his trouble and waited for him to leave. Matteo hesitated, seemingly reluctant to depart before Daniel had read the note, but seeing Daniel didn’t make any further move, he
bade farewell and left.
We need you here as soon as possible. And I mean really as soon as possible. The unfamiliar handwriting fooled him for a second, until he realised that, of course, Anna must have dictated the note over the phone.
If you really can’t come, email Cam as soon as you get this. Don’t say anything about what we’ve been doing, just make it a social message but say what you’ll be doing for the next few days. If you can come, don’t try to contact us at all. Just get the first available flight.
Daniel’s first instinct had been to go to his computer and type a message to Cam detailing how he would be spending the next few days doing important work on a research paper on multi-dimensional energy transfer, but something stopped him. He read on.
Tina and I will be shopping in London tomorrow and James will leave more detailed instructions for you at the concierge’s desk at the Oxford and Cambridge Club in Pall Mall.
Daniel had grinned at that. He could envisage James arriving at the club around lunchtime, thereby evading the shopping excursion for at least an hour or so while sampling the club’s fine dining and bar facilities.
His grin faded, though, as he read the rest of the note. Anna had given a vivid description of everything that had happened to them. She admitted they didn’t know how they’d been tracked down, but thought it was likely it had resulted from surveillance of Cam’s emails picking up his first communication with Daniel, and Daniel passing that message on to James. She spelled out clearly that if they were right, Daniel could also be a potential target; she was asking him to take a considerable risk. She stressed, in her opinion, there was a better chance of doing the research unobserved if it were done by Daniel making a quick dash over than if they attempted to do it, seeing as they were the object of some unwelcome scrutiny in Britain. She explained she didn’t want to involve anyone new, because she, James or Cam would have to communicate with that person in some detail and they weren’t confident they could do so without being spotted.
Anna added that there was an element of ‘double bluff’ in asking for Daniel’s help. If he had been under surveillance his consistent lack of involvement – and Daniel had felt a twinge of guilt at that point – would have been noticed, and so he might escape any undue attention for long enough to get the job done.
Daniel’s mood changed as he read. First there was a surge of anger at the news of the attack on Cam, and even more intense anger that an attack on Anna might have been intended. He quickly resolved to fly over and get the job finished, no matter what. Once he reached his decision, he felt a strange sense of exhilaration. It was all complete foolishness, of course, travelling across the planet to look at a few papers that almost certainly wouldn’t contain anything. Also, he’d have to call in quite a few favours at very short notice. And the paper would have to be put on hold. But none of that mattered. Multi-dimensional space wouldn’t disappear while he was gone. His friends needed him.
An unconscious fury surged through Alex, making his movements much more forceful than necessary. Twice the instructor reminded him he was only training, not fighting for his life. Now the trainer called for a pause. Despite the low ambient temperature in the gym, Alex had worked up a sweat; as he wiped his face with a towel the cause of his anger resurfaced in his thoughts.
Storming rage hadn’t worked. Sulking, though he didn’t mentally describe it to himself that way, hadn’t worked. Even though he had made it clear how implacably opposed he was to her going away, Tina had still gone.
Since then he’d refrained from communicating with her, but carefully remained contactable by phone, email and social media, waiting for her to make a move to placate him. He hadn’t thought far enough ahead as to how he would react, but he took it for granted that she’d initiate a reconciliation. And yet there’d been no sign she’d even attempted to make contact.
An idea – perhaps unique in the history of his relationship with Tina – struck Alex. Maybe he should change his behaviour towards her. If so, what change should he make and how should he start? Perhaps in order to identify what to do, he needed to understand how the current situation looked to her.
It was an inopportune time to be pondering such things. He finished towelling off the sweat, walked back onto the mat and resumed his fighting stance. But he was too deep in thought to focus on the foot that crashed into his chest and sent him sprawling.
“She even wanted to do the rest of the research,” James informed Anna, “but I told her it was out of the question, what with her and me having been around together so much, even if we don’t know for certain we were being shadowed.” Anna agreed. Claudia was the very last person Anna would consider recruiting.
“I half think I should stop seeing her altogether,” James continued as Tina approached the breakfast table. She froze at what she had just heard, ducking out of view so she could hear more.
“But maybe keeping on the way we’ve been would be less dangerous for her than suddenly stopping seeing her altogether so soon after they’ve showed themselves openly to us.”
“Are you going to tell her ‘it’s too dangerous, it’s over’? Do you think there’s any chance whatsoever she’d agree to that?” Anna asked.
“No, you’re right,” James conceded. “And obviously she has as much right to a say as I do, even if I was confident that stopping was the safest choice. Which I’m not. Oh, hi, Tina.”
Anna and James dropped their conversation and started talking with Tina about what the three of them would do that day. Tina was tempted to urge James to break things off but was unsure whether that might just harden his resolve to continue. She decided to leave the issue for the time being, but to remain on the alert for an opportunity to steer him out of the relationship. With great subtlety, of course.
Chapter 15
Expectations
Daniel forced himself to stay alert. Jet lag was a luxury that would cost precious time – time during which his efforts might be discovered by either the suits or the men with the gold jewellery.
Luckily the main reading room of the University Library was comparatively well lit. The windows, designed in the 1930s, were larger than those in some of the older buildings in which Anna and James had conducted part of their enquiries. The light helped Daniel a little, but he still struggled against drowsiness.
He developed a routine: scan four or five pages, take a deep breath, stare out the window to subject himself to a strong contrast of perspective and light, then back to scanning … and repeat.
The routine began to take on a hypnotic quality, reducing its effectiveness, and increasing the risk that he would miss something important – like the page covered with some rough notes about unstable isotopes and antibodies …
He almost leapt out of his chair. There it was – ‘C-14’, the chemical symbol for an unstable isotope of carbon; and a reference to the half-life of the isotope; a note about the effect of the half-life on the ongoing effectiveness of an antibody that depended on C-14 for its usefulness; and, most importantly, a note about what impact the extra neutrons in C-14 might be expected to have on internal movements within the atom before they left the atom for good, leaving it as an unremarkable C-12 atom.
There was no express reference to particles moving backwards in time, but there was a scribbled reference to ‘capacity for multiple self-reconfigurations at the instant of contact’, which Daniel was convinced must have been written with time travel in mind.
Clearly the document was not a full exposition of what Crick was hypothesising. It was scrawled on the back of a typewritten page, which appeared to be the last part of the agenda for some meeting, containing such riveting subject matter as ‘any other business’ and ‘date of next meeting’. Daniel surmised that Crick might have been stuck in some dismal administrative proceeding, found his thoughts drifting, had some useful ideas, and tried to capture them on paper so that when he had an opportunity to pursue them he wouldn’t have the frustrating experience of being unable to rememb
er them properly.
It was perhaps impertinent, Daniel thought, for him to feel a sense of spiritual kinship with the great Nobel Prize winner. But he did. He could picture the scene quite easily. There would be some officious bureaucrat, or bored but diligent academic, seeking a seconder for some pettifogging resolution amending some trivial regulation, while the illustrious genius wished fervently that the meeting would end, perhaps wondering why important ideas seemed to occur at such inconvenient moments.
Daniel reluctantly put the note aside for the moment. Clearly James had been right. Crick had taken Burnet’s comments as a suggestion, not as discouragement. The note proved it. He would get copies so he, Anna and Cam could extract as much information as they could. But before doing that he would check the remaining material to see whether there was any further evidence of progress by Crick on the time-travel theorem.
He forced himself to examine the remaining documents with diligence. To his disappointment none of the papers in Crick’s handwriting referred again to the subject. However, his hopes leapt once more when he found a letter about using specific isotopes, which seemed to be a response to an enquiry by Crick.
The first part of the letter was a description of the inherent difficulty in separating different isotopes of an element, with reference to the production of enriched uranium. It read:
Given that different isotopes will, despite their different complement of neutrons, nevertheless chemically react very similarly, the techniques rely on the differing weights of the isotopes. C-14/C-12 separation by weight ought, in principle, to be easier to achieve than is currently being done with U-235 and U-238, but you would still need to identify some way of separating out a gaseous compound of the element, say CO2, and extracting those molecules in which the carbon atom is C-14.
That seemed promising, so far as it went. Daniel continued to read avidly. The letter described how several cycles were required in order to obtain uranium compounds in which U-235 was present in sufficiently high concentrations for the purposes of creating a nuclear reaction.
