Time and Again

by Jack Finney

  Messinger turned to me, smiling easily, pleasantly; I saw Fessenden watching him, and it occurred to me that he envied Messinger. "Well, Mr. Morley—is 'Si' all right?"

  "Of course."

  "Good. And please call me Jack. We've been busy, too, Si. While you were gone. Doing the same job you were: investigating Mr. Andrew Carmody, though not at quite such close quarters. I've been in Washington, on leave and with a secretary provided. A very capable one, though"—he grinned at Esterhazy—"you might have found one just a shade better-looking. We've been cozily alone together in the National Archives, literally down in the basement, rummaging through papers of both Cleveland administrations, the rest of my team in other sections of the Archives. And Carmody really was a Cleveland adviser, one of many, in the years following your visit, Si. He began to involve himself in politics beginning in the spring of 1882 when Cleveland was governor of New York. And from occasional notes of Cleveland's, from the minutes of several meetings, and from references in two letters of Cleveland's, I've learned that he became something of a friend of his during Cleveland's first term. How that came about I don't know; there was nothing on that, not surprisingly. His influence then was zero, so far as I've been able to learn. But Carmody—or as we now know he really was, Pickering—fostered the friendship, and it reached its height, such as it was, during Cleveland's second term. The references we found in the Archives show clearly that Cleveland sometimes listened to Carmody—as of course the records call him, and as I might as well continue to call him. His influence was never large, and never important, except in one instance, and the evidence I found on that is conclusive. Cleveland entered office the second time with a war over Cuba building up with Spam, and being whooped up by several newspaper interests. Cleveland hoped to avoid the war, and a pretty good solution was offered him by a number of people; namely, that he offer to buy Cuba from Spain. This much is well known, a matter of clear record; you can find references to it in any complete account of Cleveland's second term. There was precedent for the plan—in our purchases of the Louisiana Territory from France and of Alaska from Russia. And there was evidence that Spain would welcome a chance to avoid a war they knew they couldn't hope to win. But here, I discover, is Pickering-Carmody's place in history: It was his advice that turned Cleveland against the notion. I don't know what he said; the little I found on it is partly technical and pretty sketchy. But it's certain; no mistake about that. And that's it. His sole role in history of any importance is a negative one, a small one, a footnote he might not care to brag about if he were around to do so. After Cleveland's second term we don't hear of him again so far as I was able to learn."

  He stopped, and I sat nodding for a few moments, thinking about what he'd said; I was interested. I said, "Well, I'm glad I was able to contribute the new knowledge, unimportant though it is now, that Carmody was actually Pickering. Personally I'm a little pleased at the thought of old Jake Pickering actually in the White House advising Cleveland."

  Esterhazy said, "We're pleased with your contribution, too; damn pleased. We hoped for something like it, and you delivered. It's a contribution far more important than you know. Rube?"

  Rube turned to me, swinging a leg over an arm of his chair so he could sit facing me more comfortably, smiling that good smile that made you glad he was your friend and made you want to be on his side. He said, "Si, you're bright. You can understand that this project has to yield practical results. It's great that it can contribute to scholarly knowledge, but that isn't enough. You can't spend millions, can't take valuable people off other work, to add a little footnote to history about someone nobody ever heard of anyway. Your success—and how remarkable a thing that is I don't think there are words for—has made the next phase of this project possible. That next phase is an advance on the experiment. As careful and cautious as those that preceded it. And it is potentially of enormous benefit—"

  "—incalculable benefit," Esterhazy interjected.

  Rube nodded. "—of incalculable benefit to the United States. It has been considered and unanimously passed by this board, and then cleared in Washington with the highest authorities; we were on a scramble phone with Washington for nearly an hour this morning."

  Esterhazy had his forearms lying on the desk top, hands clasped together in what looked like a relaxed position. But now he leaned far forward over the desk top toward me, and when he spoke I turned to him and saw that his hands were so tightly clenched the fingertips were white. He couldn't keep himself from interrupting Rube. "We want you to go back one more time. Then if that's what you want, your resignation will be instantly accepted, and with great thanks by a grateful government, I can promise you. When the time comes—not in our lifetime, I think, but eventually—when the time comes that this is no longer secret, you will have a place of distinction and honor in your country's history. Your findings, Si, have made this next step possible, and now we want you to use those findings. You're to go back, and do just one thing: You are to reveal 'Carmody's' secret. You're to expose him as what he really is; namely, a clerk named Pickering—responsible for Carmody's death, responsible for the World Building fire. You won't have proof, of course; he won't be imprisoned, tried, or even charged. But he'll be discredited. As he deserves. Can you do that, Si?" I was slow, baffled. "But... why? What for?" Esterhazy grinned with the pleasure of explaining. "Don't you see? This is the logical next step, Si, a very small and very carefully controlled experiment... in slightly altering the course of past events. We've avoided doing that till now, scrupulously avoided it, as well as we possibly could, and rightly so. Until we learned from experience that the accidental risk of altering the course of past events is negligible. And that even when it does happen, the actual effect seems trivial. Now it's time for the next slow advance, a slight and very careful change of events in the past... for the benefit of our own time and country. Think about it! We can prevent Carmody—or Pickering, as we know him to be now—from becoming an adviser, minor though he was, to Cleveland. And there is obvious reason to think that this may actually result in a change in the course of our history. If Cuba became a permanent American possession in the 1890's ..." He grinned. "Well, I don't have to spell out the benefit of that. The name Castro will remain what it was, unheard of. The man himself remaining whatever he was, a worker in the sugar fields, I suppose, forever unknown. That's the next step, Si, if it works, a clear immediate benefit—and, even more important, a guide to even greater ones. My God ..." His voice dropped in awe. "To correct mistakes of the past which have adversely affected the present for us—what an incredible opportunity."

  We sat in absolute silence then. I was stunned. I was, and I knew it, an ordinary person who long after he was grown retained the childhood assumption that the people who largely control our lives are somehow better informed than, and have judgment superior to, the rest of us; that they are more intelligent. Not until Vietnam did I finally realize that some of the most important decisions of all time can be made by men knowing really no more than, and who are not more intelligent than, most of the rest of us. That it was even possible that my own opinions and judgment could be as good as and maybe better than a politician's who made a decision of profound consequence. Some of that childhood awe and acceptance of authority remained, and while I was sitting before Esterhazy's desk—the room silent, everyone watching me, waiting—it seemed presumptuous that ordinary Simon Morley should question the judgment of this board. And of the men in Washington who agreed with it. Yet I knew I had to. And was going to.

  I stumbled, though. I spoke badly and in confusion. I even began with what I suppose was the least important aspect of the entire decision. I said, "Go back and deliberately discredit Jake? Destroy his life? I, ah ... does anyone have the right to do that?"

  "The man's long dead, Si," Esterhazy said gently, as though to a simpleton he didn't want to offend. "We're what counts now."

  "He won't be dead where I'll be seeing him."

  "Well, yes. B
ut, Si, a lot of men make far greater sacrifices than he will. For the good of the country."

  "But he wouldn't even be consulted about it!"

  "Neither are they; they're drafted into the army."

  "Well, maybe they should be asked, too."

  He genuinely didn't understand. "What do you mean?"

  "Maybe it's wrong to force a man to join an army and kill other people against his own wishes."

  They just looked at me. What I was saying was really incomprehensible to them, and I realized I'd been arguing the wrong point. I said, "Colonel, Rube, Mr. Fessenden and Professor Messinger—listen. Would it be—right to alter past events? I mean who knows it's a good thing to do? Who can be sure of it, I mean."

  "Why, dammit, we can be sure!" Esterhazy said. "Do you deny that it would be one hell of a lot better if Cuba were long since a U.S. possession instead of a Communist country ninety miles from our mainland?"

  I shrugged uneasily. "No, it isn't that I deny it. The point is it doesn't matter what I think; because I might be wrong. Who can be sure Cuba will ever do us any harm? It's awfully tiny, and hasn't hurt us yet."

  "They tried, didn't they?" Esterhazy very nearly shouted.

  Gently, trying to calm things down, Fessenden said, "The missile crisis," as though politely reminding me of something that might have slipped my mind.

  I said, "Well, yeah. Though according to Robert Kennedy it was the military who tried to make JFK think the danger was greater than perhaps it might have been. But I don't want to bog down into a debate about Cuba. Whatever the truth there, I just don't think anyone has the godlike wisdom to actually rearrange the present by altering the past. It's going too far! My God, look what has already happened. The scientists make fantastic new discoveries which are immediately taken over by a group, almost a breed of men, who always know what's best for the rest of us. Science learns how to split the atom, and they immediately know that the best thing to do with that new knowledge is blow up Hiroshima!"

  "Don't you think it was?" Esterhazy said coldly. "Or should we have allowed hundreds of thousands of American troops to die on the shores of Japan?"

  "I don't know! Who does know? I think the most enormous kinds of decisions are being made by people who don't know either. Only in their own opinions do they know. They know it's right and necessary to poison the atmosphere with radioactivity. They know we should use our scientists' genetic discoveries to breed new and terrible kinds of disease. And that they don't even have to ask the consent of the ninety-nine and nine-tenths percent of the rest of us. And now that still another scientist, Dr. Danziger, has made this enormous discovery, he sits at home, squeezed out, unfit to decide what should be done with it. But you aren't. Once again you know that the best thing to do with his discovery is eliminate Castro Cuba. Well, how do you know? Who's given this new little breed of men who've polluted the entire environment and who may actually wipe out the human race—who gave them the power of God to control the lives and futures of the rest of us? Most of them we never heard of, and we sure as hell didn't elect them!" I sat looking from one to the other, then lowered my voice. "Even if you're right about Cuba, as you may be, look what it leads to. It leads directly to bigger and bigger changes, with a handful of military minds rewriting the past, present, and future according to their ideas of what's best for the rest of the entire human race. No, sir, gentlemen; I refuse."

  Esterhazy's nostrils were so rigidly flared in rage that the edges were white. His teeth clenched, he drew a long sighing breath, a prolonged inhalation through his nostrils, filling his lungs to explode at me. Rube saw it and before Esterhazy could speak he said, "Let me!" and I heard the ring of command, and understood in astonishment that it was an order—from Major Prien to Colonel Esterhazy—and I knew I hadn't begun to understand the real relationships here in the project. Esterhazy forced his lips tight together, obeying. Rube turned to me and spoke in a flat calm voice; not catering to me one bit, not out to mollify me at all, but simply explaining the facts, take it or leave it.

  He said, "We'll be sorry if you refuse; you're the best operative we have. Our recruiting has continued without letup, and it hasn't become one bit easier to find qualified people. But still... they can be found, and they have been. Furthermore, other portions of the project have continued; yours hasn't been the only one. The man who spent a few seconds in medieval Paris has done it again. Four days ago we reached Denver, 1901, for twenty minutes. We failed in North Dakota, failed at Vimy Ridge, failed in Montana. And we've had important trouble with the Winfield, Vermont, project. The man there succeeded. He made the transition twice, and never returned the second time. We don't know why; there is an obvious guess, but we don't know. Now, what am I driving at? I tell you frankly and honestly that we have serious difficulties and problems. I tell you that you may be the best operative by far that we will ever find. I tell you that we hope very much that you will reconsider. But I also tell you that if you do not—" He stopped, and sat looking at me, no smile at all in his eyes; then he finished the sentence, quietly and flatly: "—we'll simply get somebody else. And if the experiment cannot be made in New York City, 1882, with Jacob Pickering, then another will be made at some other place, some other time, and with somebody else. I'm not interested in arguing with you. Just understand this: It is going to be done."

  Rube sat for several seconds, not moving, staring directly into my eyes. Then he allowed just a ghost of the old smile to appear. He said, "I agree with—not all, and not the most important part—but with a very great deal of what you said, and what you think. What you feel does you credit. But, Si, I can only repeat: With every possible precaution we are nevertheless going to do it. Now, take your time; sit and think; then tell us what you want to do. Whatever it is, it will be accepted instantly with no further argument or discussion."

  I sat there for several very long slow minutes; and I thought more intensely, I suppose, than I'd ever done before. Once Messinger started to speak, but Colonel Esterhazy's hand shot up, and he said, "Hold it!" I'd looked up, and Esterhazy sat back in his chair, deliberately relaxing, taking his time, to let me know I had all the time I wanted. Silence again, for a long time, then presently I looked up at them.

  I said, "All right; my conscience is clear. I did my best. I did my very utmost to persuade you of what I still feel is right. And if any record is to be made of these proceedings, I'd like the record to show that I did. But now—all right, Rube; there's no answer to what you say. If this is going to be done no matter what I think, feel, or do, then I want to be in on it. I started this, and rather than someone else finishing it, I want to. Because there's one thing I can do better than anyone else, and I ask now that I be allowed to. I'll do what you want because I know it, or something else like it, is going to be done anyway, but I ask you to let me be as easy as I possibly can on Jake Pickering. I came into his life unasked, and I've done him harm, though I think it was justified. But I don't care to destroy him. Let me do just enough so that he is discredited only in the immediate circle that matters to you. It will accomplish what you want just as much as wrecking the man completely. His future is grim enough; let's let him keep something, for crysake. If you'll agree to that, I'll do it. But then I resign."

  Everyone was pleased, Rube and Esterhazy agreeing immediately. We were all standing then, everyone shaking my hand, assuring me I wouldn't be sorry, that they weren't foolhardy, that they'd had to convince some very sober, responsible, and extremely important people in Washington that every safeguard would be taken. They'd be phoning Washington again now; when could I leave? I said I had to have a little time to take care of my own affairs; how about a week? And Rube said a week was fine. I asked about Oscar Rossoff then, and Martin Lastvogel; I liked them, and would have liked to see them. But Esterhazy told me Oscar had left the project; he had his own practice to take care of, and the time he'd agreed to stay was up, unfortunately. It was possible, of course, even probable, but I didn't believe it; the thought rose
up in my mind, though I knew I might be wrong, that Oscar had quit in protest against the course the project was taking. Martin was gone, too: back to teaching.

  Standing in the office, all of us chattering away, I'd managed a smile by now, and I made what amounted to a miniature three-sentence speech, I suppose. I said, "Well. We're all set now. I did my best to change your minds; I think I had to do that. But I have to admit... since you're going on with or without me, I'd one hell of a lot rather have it be with me." And they all grinned, and actually applauded with a quiet token clap or two.

  I'm not going to say too much about my visit with Kate. It was awkward, for one thing; she was waiting for a delivery and couldn't leave the shop, so we had to talk there for quite a while, occasionally interrupted when a customer would come in. Then I'd have to wander around the shop, waiting for the customer to get the hell out and trying not to show it.

  I told Kate about the "trip," of course—the project word for it that I'd gotten into the habit of using, too. And of course she was fascinated. The delivery arrived during the last of it, and Kate had to check through four cartons of carefully wrapped antique glassware, verifying the contents and condition before she signed for it. And then, finally—it wasn't closing time but late enough—Kate locked up, and we went upstairs.

  First thing she did upstairs after starting some coffee was to go to her bedroom and bring out her red-cardboard accordion folder. And while I finished my story we looked once more at the long blue envelope and the note inside it. When finally I finished talking, Kate read the last sentence aloud: " 'So, with this wretched souvenir of that Event before me, I now end the life which should have ended then.' " She looked up at me and nodded; the questions she'd wondered about most of her life were answered now. She said, "I've pictured it so often: The shot sounded, and the woman who lived as his wife came running."