‘And you, Meister?’
‘Back to Four-Oh,’ I say, looking up at the watching cameras. And jump. Because this is something I really need to think through.
345
Sat there in the Tree-lit darkness of Hecht’s rooms, I mull things over. Reichenau is the key to all of this. Wherever he is, that’s the centre of their operations against us. And Kolya? Kolya, I think, is playing a deeper, subtler game. What that is I don’t know. Not yet anyway.
But Reichenau …
I laugh. It’s obvious. Of course it is. We’ve the six pendants that we found in Kolya’s house back in 1952 California. They’re there in Four-Oh’s safe. If anything’s the answer then they surely are. Because they must, in some way, be connected to his platform. Connected by some code or password or …
Gehlen would know.
Or maybe I could jump back, to where we found the pendants in the drawer of his desk, go back a month or so before I last went in and see what else I can find.
Yet even as I think it, I know they won’t let me. They’ll say it’s too dangerous for the Meister to go in alone. But that’s not a problem. I can have an agent do it all for me. Be my eyes and ears. Delegate it for once.
And even as I think that there’s a knocking at the door.
‘Yes?’
It’s Ernst. ‘He’s back,’ he says. ‘The agent you sent. He says—’
Only I don’t get to hear what he says, because right then Gehlen summons me. His voice echoes in the air of the room, telling me I must come at once. And, telling Ernst I’ll not be long, I leave him there and make my way …
…stepping through nowhere, into that cold, refrigerated space few ever get to visit, the curved walls rimed with ice, the inside the purest sapphire blue, shot with patches of vivid, pulsing red and orange and emerald green. This is the genewart: that gaseous presence that controls Four-Oh, its blurred interior containing the artificial intelligence that once was Hans Gehlen, inventor of time travel and the greatest scientist our world has ever known – long dead, but here resurrected. In a fashion.
‘Ah, Otto …’ the voice says, deep and mellow, like an organ note sounding in the air. ‘I have a task for you.’
I am surprised. I have never known Gehlen to ask for anything. Then again, this might have been a regular thing when Hecht was still alive. I put my hand out, holding it a palm’s width from the wall’s cold surface, feeling how intense that coldness is.
‘A task?’
‘We’ve been falling behind.’
I haven’t a clue what Gehlen means by that, but keep my silence, waiting for him to elucidate.
‘The future weaponry …’
‘What of it?’
‘I have an idea … how to cope with it.’
‘Go on,’ I say, intrigued by the notion of it thinking these things through. Is this the only thing it’s been thinking of?
‘The technology we’ve been encountering lately. The new stuff from the future. The answer’s simple. We have the new pendant foci now, so why not use them? We can move people about in Time, without needing to put foci in their chests. So let’s do that.’
There’s the briefest moment where I don’t follow him. People? What kind of people does Gehlen mean?
‘Scientists,’ he says, as if he’s heard my thoughts. ‘Great men. Let’s convoke a conference of all of the greatest scientists there have been and have them brainstorm some answers for us.’
I stare for a moment at the pulsing pool of colour that confronts me, and then I grin. ‘Okay. Give me a wish-list and I’ll see what we can do.’
‘It’s on your desk already,’ Gehlen says, his pulsing presence drifting up until it floats there just beneath my hand, its intense light bathing my body in brilliant colours. ‘Six names. I’m certain Master Schnorr will find them for you.’
And that’s it. I watch it drift away, merging with the blue until there’s nothing but blueness.
Great men … And I laugh, wondering who would be on that list.
346
Ernst is waiting for me when I return. He holds a sheet of paper out to me and frowns.
‘Is this what I think it is?’
I take it from him, reading the listed names, then laugh. ‘You want to arrange it, Ernst?’
‘Shouldn’t we debate this … in the veche?’
‘You think we should?’
He hesitates, clearly in two minds, then shrugs. ‘I don’t know … what you’re suggesting is the kidnap of some of the greatest men there have ever been. Removing them from their natural place in the timestream. Have you considered what that might entail? The potential damage it might do?’
‘Not if we’re careful.’
‘Careful?’
I’ve already thought this through, in that brief time it took for me to return.
‘It’s simple. We take them out of the timestream for … well, it doesn’t really matter how long if they’re going to be based here in Four-Oh … but then, when everything’s been resolved and they’ve served their usefulness, we put them back in again … only this time a moment before we took each of them out originally. That way they’d recall nothing of what happened to them. None of the new stuff that they’ll have brainstormed into existence. You see, Ernst? That way there’d be no sullying of the timestream. All would be almost exactly as it was.’
‘Even so …’ Ernst begins.
But I’m not going to waste any more time discussing the matter.
‘Look … If I give you the pendants, can you organise that for me? I’ll give you a written order if you want …’
Ernst knows I’m close to being condescending here. But I am Meister, after all, and I really can’t see why we should have to debate every last little thing.
‘Otto, I—’
‘Our agent,’ I say, changing the subject. ‘The one we sent into California in fifty-two. What did he say? You were just about to tell me when Gehlen summoned me.’
‘Oh … Just that he thinks you ought to look at things yourself.’
‘He does, does he?’
‘He’s posting a report, but he thinks, as you’ve been in once before and know all the people involved …’
‘…I should be the one to take a better look?’
Ernst nods. ‘Otto, this business with the great men—’
‘Is an excellent idea, no? Gehlen himself has endorsed it. And, providing we’re careful, and I’m sure that in your hands we’ll be just that, it harms no one. So do it for me, eh? Let’s not prevaricate. Let’s even up the odds while we yet can. Get some of that future weaponry into our hands. Things our enemies don’t have. Let’s steal a march on them, yes?’
I can see that he wants to argue, but then he owes me several lives.
‘Okay,’ he says, sighing, knowing he ought to contest the matter more than he’s done. Only I am Otto, and he is Ernst, and our friendship means everything. And so we go, at once, to visit the safe and get things moving on both fronts, because I know that, whatever the outcome, it’s better to act than to endlessly sit on your hands.
And, a mere half an hour after my audience with Gehlen, I am up there on the platform once again, ready to jump …
347
… into the hallway of the Kolya house in Berkeley, California, in late January of 1952.
It all looks much the same as when I last was here, but at once I am aware of one important difference, of the noise, coming from the room in which I found the pendants and the map and the list of time coordinates.
I stand there, in the shadow beneath the stairs, listening through the wall, then watch as the door creaks open and various people – most of them men, but with the odd woman or two – emerge, one by one.
One in particular I know. It is the traitor Phillipe Krauss, a fellow Reisende, who sold his own brothers to the Russians, and whom, it seems, has been working for someone else all along.
As he closes the front door behind him, there is a sudden silence in
the house that suggests that all of the guests have gone. But who have they come to see? Who, if anyone, remains within that room?
I tiptoe across and take a peek inside. This is Kolya’s house, so it is Kolya I expect to see, seated at the desk, writing. Only it isn’t. It’s Reichenau, his massive, swollen head moving slowly, gently bobbing as he concentrates on each word.
I step back, out of sight again, then turn and, taking the opportunity, make my way upstairs, looking for signs of habitation.
It’s a big house. The second floor has eight rooms, and all but one are empty. This, it’s plain to see, is Reichenau’s room. Perhaps the very place he sleeps. Only if I was him, I’d change where I slept every night. Just to be sure.
I walk across, then kneel, rifling through his portmanteau, looking for something – anything – that might be of interest. I note at once that he must have his shirts specially made, and wonder whether that might not be one way of tracing him. It’s a small thing but significant.
Yes, but why not take him here? Take a dozen men in with us and take him when he’s sleeping.
Only that’s what we tried to do with Shafarevich, and look how successful we were there! No, we need to be more subtle. We need …
… to find out how he continually pre-empts us.
And how he triggers things.
As I go through his wardrobe, I am thinking about what I overheard earlier. About their plans for infiltrating both the Russian and German camps. Mention, too, of cusp moments in our history – Poltava among them. Evidence, all of it, that Reichenau is still meddling in Time, still playing the Game – even though we, for our part, have ceased to do so – still deliberately stirring up trouble between the Russians and the Germans.
I stop, my fingers closing on a small, cool object that’s in one of the man’s coats. I take it out and stare at it, recognising it at once. It’s the lazy eight, only this one is made of some kind of crystal, its deeply green coloration making it seem like something natural.
It was cool, I say, but suddenly it is warm, that warmth increasing until …
I throw it down on the carpet, where it glows intensely for a moment and then dulls.
There is a burn mark on the carpet now, the tiniest drift of smoke lifting from the glowing fibres.
What the fuck?
I don’t know what it is, or what its purpose is, but I sense very strongly that I should somehow get it back to Four-Oh. Or is that what he wants me to do?
I turn, looking about me, the sudden sense of being watched making my neck hairs stand on end. There’s the faintest burning smell …
Downstairs the telephone sounds. I hear the creak as Reichenau gets out of his chair, then listen as his heavy footsteps cross the room.
I go across and, holding on to the door-jamb, listen.
Abruptly the ringing stops. ‘Reichenau?’
I’m surprised. I’d have thought he’d use another name. But then again, he’d not be going outside much, not with that great pumpkin of a head.
He listens a while, then grunts. ‘I wouldn’t bother,’ he says. ‘I really wouldn’t bother. If he wants me he can come and get me. Until then …’
There’s more from the other person – nothing that I can hear – and then Reichenau puts the phone down.
I stand there, waiting for his footsteps, waiting for him to return to where he’d been sat, only I realise suddenly that he’s gone – jumped – and that I’m alone in the house.
I turn, looking at the strangely shaped jewel, then quickly cross the room and, gingerly picking the thing up, pocket it. And jump. Back to Four-Oh, the jewel burning a hole in the fabric of my coat.
348
Zarah rubs an antiseptic paste onto the burn on my upper thigh, then looks up at me and smiles.
‘What was that?’
‘I’m hoping to find out. I found it among Reichenau’s things.’
‘We went back in, you know …’
‘I know.’
And found nothing. The house deserted. As if no one had ever been there.
Zarah screws on the lid, then straightens up, even as I pull my trousers on again.
‘They’re waiting for you, Otto. At Tannenberg. That idea you and Gehlen had. They want to talk to you about it.’
I almost swear. ‘I gave that to Ernst to deal with.’
‘And he came to us.’ She pauses, then, ‘You can’t do that, Otto. You can’t ignore us. You’re doing things the old way, and that’s not on. Not now that we’ve changed things. You’ve got to get everyone behind you before you change things like that. To take the Great Men out of history … Urd protect us, Otto. What if it went wrong?’
‘It won’t go wrong. Not if we’re careful.’
‘So Ernst said you said. But is it really worth the risk?’
‘I think so.’
She huffs, clearly frustrated with me, angered that I’ve not been playing by their rules. But what did they expect?
‘They’re waiting?’
‘At the farmhouse in Tannenberg. We can jump there.’
I hesitate.
‘Well?’ she asks. ‘Are you coming willingly or do I have to drag you?’
‘One thing,’ I say, ‘and then I’ll come.’
She stares at me a moment, trying to work out what I’m up to now, then shrugs and – in an instant – is gone.
I let out a long breath. ‘Urd help me …’
‘Otto? Are you in there?’
I turn to face the door as it hisses open, surprised by my visitor. ‘Master Schnorr … I was just about to pay you a visit.’
‘Oh yes, and why’s that?’
‘That bauble I brought back. The thing that burned me. Have we any idea what it is?’
He comes in, the door hissing shut behind him. ‘Not yet, Otto. But we shall. Odd that it’s shaped like that, no? That’s Reichenau’s symbol, isn’t it?’
‘It seems so.’
‘But look, that’s not why I’m here. I’m here to warn you.’
‘Warn me?’ I almost laugh. ‘My wife and children are gone – kidnapped – and I’ve a whole army of rebels out to kill me—’
Old Schnorr puts up a hand to halt my protests. ‘I know, I know, but … well … look for yourself.’
And he hands me a slender packet of photographs. Old-fashioned things, taken, one would have guessed, in the early years of photography. Only the subjects of these photos are scattered across the millennia.
‘Where in Odin’s name did you get these?’
‘They were left for you.’
‘And who was the messenger?’
‘We don’t know. One minute they weren’t there, the next …’
I look at them again. Like many of the shots that were in the album Reichenau had had, these photos are of me. With one important difference. Kolya.
Eight photos, each one showing me, side on, unaware that I’m being captured on film, each in a different place, at a different time. And, chillingly, Kolya, there in every one of them, looking on, the suggestion of a smile on his cruel lips.
I meet Schnorr’s eyes, frightened despite myself.
‘We think he’s closing in. This suggests you’ve been targeted by him.’
‘Then why not kill me and have done with it?’
Because he wants to remind me that he can … at any moment.
Old Schnorr looks down. ‘Was I wrong, Otto?’
‘Showing me these? No. But what do we do with them? I don’t know … burn them, maybe?’
‘Burn them?’
‘As I see it, it’s no more than a trick. A means of making us over-estimate the man. I mean, if he could do this for real, then why aren’t I dead already?’
‘Maybe …’
‘No, no maybes. If he could get that close that often, I’d be dead. I’ve seen the hatred in his eyes. He longs to kill me. So why not just kill me? Why play these games?’
‘Unless these predate the reason for his hatred? Unless …’<
br />
Only there isn’t an ‘unless’ that makes any sense. So this has to be a cheat. A way of fraying my nerves.
I notice Old Schnorr studying me, a deep concern in his face.
‘Tannenberg?’
His concern becomes a smile. ‘Tannenberg. But for Urd’s sake be patient with them, Otto. It’s hard enough making this change.’
349
‘It is agreed,’ the Russian woman, Alina Tupayeva, says, smiling at me, leaving me half-lowered into my seat.
I look about me, trying to make sense of what she’s said.
‘Agreed?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘We’ve talked it through and Gehlen’s right. We need an edge, and what better than the Great Men. Besides, Gehlen is right, we must have done something, otherwise we’d have been beaten already!’
That kind of makes sense, and besides, it gets me what I want.
‘So when’s it to start?’
‘It’s begun already,’ Ernst says. ‘Galileo Galilei is being debriefed as we speak, and teams are in the field, attempting to bring back Einstein.’
‘Oh,’ Zarah interrupts, ‘and we’ve recorded it all.’
‘Good …’
Only this meeting is clearly not meant to be, for right then Svetov appears in the air beside me, and, with apologies to the veche, takes me aside into the farmhouse.
Inside he closes the door, then turns to me, his face solemn. ‘Forgive me, Otto, only I am the bearer of bad news, I’m afraid. About Katerina …’
I groan, my legs going, fearing the worst.
Svetov reaches out to steady me. ‘We’ve sent in more than a dozen teams so far, each one of them following up some clue or other, and three times now we’ve come close. Very close. But each time we’ve tried to snatch them away he was in there before us.’
‘He?’
‘Kolya.’
‘Then they’re …?’
‘Alive, yes. At least … as far as we know.’
I look down, unable to speak, and the big Russian squeezes my arm gently again, as one might comfort a child.
For a moment there I’d thought them dead.
The Master of Time Page 9
