Time-Travel Duo

by James Paddock

  She checked once more for traffic, watched the RV disappear around the bend behind the other two vehicles—they all appeared to be running together—and then turned south toward Columbia Falls. Her mission today was a bookstore because she was bored to death. She had lost any desire to go back to Glacier Park, even though she did have a good time with Mary and Richard on Lake McDonald the day before. She had returned to Grizzly Ranch comfortably tired and after dinner and storytelling, fell into bed for her most restful night in a week. She even slept through the morning walk with Mary and Richard. Today she wanted time alone. After the bookstore she’d hit a grocery store to restock.

  For a second she thought about Patrick, and then made a promise to herself that she would not go to the Wal-Mart sports section, nor Wal-Mart at all, and that she would not call him.

  Barely a minute after Annie turned south, Robert tapped the brakes of the new Yukon and began slowing, looking for the turn he was shown in the dark the night before. He checked his odometer. It was 1.5 miles after Grizzly Road.

  “Right there,” Charles said, pointing to a narrow dirt and grass track heading off at an angle into a stand of forest fire blackened trees. “This doesn’t look so good in the daylight.”

  Robert didn’t say anything; he was too busy trying to determine if the stark white trailer would be visible. He’d wanted to be farther off the highway, but to find something near the river on such short notice ended up being more difficult than he had anticipated, nearly impossible. Fortunately he had lucked onto a realtor who had something that, for the most part, met their needs. The owner, who was trying to sell it for the second time after previous buyers defaulted, agreed to a lease, though Robert had to sweeten it a bit.

  The area certainly was ugly, but not all the trees were dead, and there was a tremendous amount of new growth. He took the turn and then looked back. George Smoot, who was driving the rig towing the lab, his wife riding shotgun, had stopped just short of the turn as he had said he would. He wanted to walk the half-mile bulldozed track to make sure it wasn’t too soft or narrow and that there was a place where he could get turned around after dropping the trailer. Robert had assured him that it was plenty firm and that there was plenty of room, but now in the light of day, he was becoming worried.

  Both George and Brenda climbed down from their rig. George carried a five-foot pole, which he swept in a huge circle while Brenda nodded. Robert couldn’t hear what was being said, but it seemed positive. Then they started walking the track. George used the pole to tap the ground. Leaving the RV up on the road, Howard and Thomas fell in behind George and Brenda.

  “What are we going to do if they determine that they can’t get it in here?” Charles asked.

  “I don’t know.” Robert puffed his cheeks, blew out a breath and steered the Yukon into the mix of live and dead ponderosa pines and oaks. He started to cough, but then the urge went away. He had noticed that his coughing was markedly less since arriving in Kalispell, but he was tired. He wondered what that meant.

  He broke from the trees into an area that had already been cleared and leveled, and parked next to what had been the beginning of a house. The foundation had been poured and a bare skeleton of a structure erected before the forest fires of 2003 swept down out of Glacier Park and jumped the river. Now it was only several dozen charred two by fours and several stacks of charred materials off to the side. They climbed out of the Yukon and looked back from where they came.

  “Can’t see the highway, so I guess it’ll work,” Robert said.

  “Do you think he can get in here with it?”

  “As long as he doesn’t find any soft spots, I don’t see why not.”

  While waiting for George and Brenda they walked around, dragging to the side any deadfall they found, Charles big pieces, Robert very small pieces. The buyers who defaulted on the loan after the fire, had initially done a good job of cleanup. When George and Brenda arrived, accompanied by Howard and Thomas, George strode straight over to the foundation.

  “You didn’t tell me this was here.”

  “Oh!” Robert said. “I didn’t think it was a problem.”

  “It’s not, for two reasons. This tells me a sizable truck came in here to pour concrete. Second, this foundation is the perfect spot to park your trailer. We’ll have to clear it, but I don’t see that as being a big problem. I can pull straight across and then disconnect. You won’t have to worry about leveling.” He pulled a tape measure from his belt and walked around measuring heights of PVC pipes sticking out of the concrete. “I can pull right through here. Will only have to cut down these two groups. I’ve got tools in the truck.”

  The pipes were in four groups. Robert figured they were two bathrooms, the kitchen and the laundry room. They were all twisted out of shape from the heat of the fire.

  “Why don’t you guys start clearing anything you can move?” George continued. He pointed with his pole. “Those two fallen trees on the backside have to go. I’ve got some line. We can drag them away with your Yukon.”

  And so the day went. It was just after 3:00 when George pulled the rig across the foundation. Brenda provided hand signals while all others, sweaty and dirty, stood to the side and watched. At 3:30 George pulled his truck away from the trailer and climbed out.

  “There you gentlemen are. All your worries about making it here in one piece were for naught. Whatever you’re up to I hope it all goes well.”

  Howard pointed his thumb at the river. “Should be some good fishing.”

  “Yeah, and my great-grandmother likes to hunt polar bear, and a bunch of MIT Doctorates like to spend a month’s salary hooking a few rainbow trout.” He grinned. “I Googled you guys. I don’t think I really want to know what’s in that trailer so I guess we’ll be off. Got a load waiting for us in Seattle.” He extended his hand to Robert. “Give us as much notice as you can when you’re ready to haul this thing back to civilization.”

  Robert handed George an envelope with the final payment in cash, plus five extra one hundred dollar bills, and then the four of them watched as the truck disappeared through the mixture of black and green trees.

  “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m ready to inhale some grub,” Charles said. “I haven’t worked that hard in . . . well, ever.”

  “Me too,” Thomas said and fell in next to Charles.

  “You coming?” Howard asked Robert.

  “In a minute.” When the three had entered the RV Robert shuffled over to the steps that Charles, Tom, Howard and George had manhandled into place below the lab door. His intention was to go inside and check that everything rode okay, but the top step was as far as he got. He eased down and leaned against the trailer. Although the coughing had decreased somewhat, his energy was gone, and now the pain was worse than it had ever been. And he was tired of hiding it, doubted if he was successful at hiding it. He was sure that they suspected something but not one had said a word when he announced that he was catching a cold.

  You’re catching your death!

  It was his mother’s words that suddenly popped into his head. He would have laughed at the ironic truth if not for the fear of the chest-burning cough.

  Chapter 32

  June 12, 2007

  When Annie walked into Borders Books she had no idea what she was looking for, only that she wanted something to occupy her mind. It was after nearly twenty minutes of browsing up and down aisle after aisle that her eyes fell onto the title, Cosmos. She spotted the Sky & Telescope’s Pocket Sky Atlas by Roger W. Sinnott, and then a field guide for constellations with stories about the Greek myths. She slid them both out and then two more, but what she really needed was a book for dummies. Just as she thought it she spotted Astronomy For Dummies by Stephen P. Maran. She snatched it from the shelf, dropping two of the five books she was already holding. She hugged the remaining ones against her chest and bent to pick up the two lying on the floor.

  Tony’s going to laugh at me. The Book Queen, he’ll say.
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  She froze for a second, halfway out of her squat. Tony is never going to laugh at me again. Tony’s laughing days are gone. Tears welled in her eyes. As she straightened, her chest began to tighten and her breathing became hard, and suddenly, she had to sit down. She started looking up aisles until she spotted a seating area. She rushed to it and dropped into the only overstuffed chair available, oblivious to the looks, curious and irritated, from the three others in the little reading nook Borders provided for customers. She closed her eyes and, knowing the foolishness of trying to think of something besides Tony, let the memories flood through her.

  “We need a cart.” Tony followed behind Annie as she plucked at books and handed them to him.

  “Barnes & Noble doesn’t have carts.”

  “Only because they didn’t know the Book Queen was coming.”

  She stuck her tongue out at him.

  “Be careful. You might get that thing stuck in my throat.”

  She sucked her tongue back in. “Not in here.”

  “The Book Queen and her First Gentleman should be able to do anything they want in the queen’s royal book chamber.”

  She snorted. “This Book Queen declares all fiddle faddle off limits in the queen’s royal book chamber.”

  “Fiddle faddle? What about hanky panky?”

  “No Hanky panky.”

  “A little smoochy goosy?” Suddenly from among the books he was trying to balance a hand snaked out and squeezed her breast.

  She jumped back. “Hey! No smoochy goosy. No hanky panky and no fiddle faddle.”

  “The queen is no fun at all.”

  “The queen is lots of fun, but later.”

  “The Royal Gentleman takes that as a royal promise.”

  “There is only one royal promise, and that is not it.”

  “Really! Refresh my memory. What is the royal promise?”

  Sitting with her eyes closed as though a little child who believes that if she cannot see those around her, they cannot see her, she smiled.

  I, Elizabeth Annabelle Waring, take you, Anthony Benjamin Caschetta, as my friend and love, beside me and apart from me, in laughter and in tears, in conflict and tranquility, asking that you be no other than yourself, loving what I know of you, trusting what I do not know yet, in all the ways that life may find us. This is my promise.

  And then her smile flipped upside down and her tears began.

  I broke the Royal Promise.

  When Annie opened her eyes two of the other three people had gone. Only an old woman remained, deeply engrossed in something Annie could not see. She cleared her cheeks with her sleeves and looked down at the pile of books in her lap. She thought about the library in her father’s office at home. Bookshelves covered every wall, floor to ceiling, broken only by the door and one window looking out over the front lawn. For as long as she could remember, even for the eight months she had not lived there, from the time she had become a bride to the time she had become a widow, one entire wall was hers. It was filled with volumes on atomic physics, plasma physics, quantum physics, quantitative spectroscopy, light water reactors, nuclear chain reactors, steam turbines, nuclear fusion, nuclear fission, and on and on. There were shelves dedicated to research papers by Einstein, Kerr, Schwarzschild, Minkowski, Feynman, Gödel, Lorentz, Hawking, and many more, not to mention her father’s, her grandfather’s, her mother’s, and her own. When she was sixteen she had categorized material having to do with her mother’s time travel, including the Waring Triple Jump Deviation, the Waring Four Dimensional Tube Theory, and the Hair Nuclear Tri-Generation. The last one sprouted the “Tri-Gen,” the method developed by her father based on her grandfather’s theory that allowed for an extremely high power output with a very small radioactive source. It created the energy necessary for the quantum jump from 1987 back to 1943.

  It was also what Grandfather used for the quantum teleportation just a week ago to send me the satphone, she thought. They’ve got the Tri-Gen up and running. Have they tried to do anything besides teleportation? Grandfather said that was why they needed me, because I fit the size bill, and could walk the walk and talk the talk. If they want or need me so badly, where the hell are they? They certainly would not have given up that easy, not with the millions Grandfather has to have invested.

  And where do they keep their nuclear Tri-Gen plant? Certainly not on the campus. They’d have to explain every time they lit it off; not only to the university, but also to the federal government. There would be endless bureaucratic red tape just in security. So where are you guys hiding it? In your basement, Grandfather? Not likely seeing as you don’t have a basement. Grae’s basement? Bradshaw’s basementThey wouldn’t be crazy enough to put a nuclear power plant in someone’s basement.

  Knock it off, Annie. They’re doing what they’re doing and you’re not involved.

  She sorted through the books and decided not to overload herself right off. After all, this might just end up being a fleeting interest. She’d take three to start out with. She could always come back for more. With the dummies book, the sky atlas, and the pocket guide in hand, she went to the checkout.

  “Where would I buy a telescope?” she asked the cashier.

  “Actually, there is a brand new place. It just opened a month ago,” the cashier said, and then sketched out a map.

  “Tell me the difference between these two telescopes,” Annie said to the salesman in the store she was directed to in downtown Kalispell. His bright yellow tie made her wonder if he shouldn’t be selling used cars.

  “The NexStar 4 has a 4 inch lens,” he said. “The NexStar 8 has an 8 inch lens.”

  Annie waited for a deeper sales pitch. When the lens size seemed to be it, she picked up the two different pamphlets. “There has to be something besides a bigger piece of ground glass to justify another thousand dollars.”

  “You’d be able to see more stars with the 8 inch.”

  She lowered her head and looked at him across the top of her sunglasses. She wanted to ask how much the store paid him. It was becoming rather obvious why he wasn’t selling cars. He’d starve to death if he had to depend on commissions. “Tell you what; I’ll read the literature and if I have questions I’ll let you know.”

  “Sure,” he said.

  When he didn’t leave she added, “I’m sure you have something better to do than hover over me. I’ll find you if I want you.”

  “Oh!” The 5-watt bulb light up. “Sure.” He walked away.

  Annie breezed through the literature and had made her decision when another man approached her. “I should be able to answer any of your questions,” he said. This one wore a white short-sleeved shirt and a tasteful but conservative tie. His nametag said Greg Hawkins, Assistant Manager. She noted over his shoulder that the other guy was standing at the front of the store, staring out the window at the small parking lot; probably hoping another customer doesn’t come in, she thought.

  “What can you tell me about these?” she asked.

  He placed his hand on the one she was leaning toward. “The Celestron NexStar 8 SE is the top of the line in the NexStar series. You’ve probably already read that it is for the professional, but I like to say it is perfect for the advanced amateur. With the GPS system, an optional accessory I’m sorry to say, it figures out where you are.”

  “I already have a handheld GPS. Can I use that?”

  “Sure can. In that case you just input the coordinates and then pick out three bright objects, the moon can be one of them. You don’t have to know what any of them are. After that the computer will direct the scope through a self-alignment. It has a 40,000-object database plus you can input another 200 of your own. It is a little heavy if you want to pack it in somewhere, but you can purchase a real nice case for it. With case and power tank, which I highly recommend, I’d say you’re looking at about 40 pounds.”

  “I can hook my laptop right up to it, right?”

  “If you have a serial port. Unfortunately most new lapt
ops no longer have that because everything is going USB.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Then you’d need a Serial/USB adapter, which, if you purchase this model, I’ll throw in.”

  He continued on about the optics, aperture, focal length, resolution, and then software for her laptop, and some additional accessories if she was interested. She wasn’t. He then recommended books since he had surmised that she was a true beginner. She assured him that she was well stocked on the books. $2,444.90 later, and no sales tax in Montana she happily reminded herself, she drove out of the store parking lot with her new hobby resting in the backseat of her car. She couldn’t wait until the sun went down.

  After the campfire, marshmallow roast and storytelling, where she made polite chitchat with Mary, Richard and Ruth, agreed to a morning walk with Mary and Richard, and listened to Chuck’s guest storyteller from “down in the Bitterroot” which she later learned meant the Bitterroot Valley in Southwest Montana, and then after she was assured everyone had crawled back into their cabins for the night, Annie loaded her backpack with the fully charged power tank, her GPS, her laptop, and her book on Greek Myths. With the pack heavy on her back and her headlamp on her head she carried the case loaded with the telescope along the path to the river where she would be away from the yard lights of Grizzly Ranch. When she arrived at the log her muscles were screaming and she was thoroughly convinced that she should have purchased something lighter, actually wondered if she could take it back for an exchange.