Robert lowered the pistol.
“Let me — go, you cur!” Cousin Jane gasped. She still had a grip on her umbrella; but without the use of her arms, she could only tap Mr. Sweeney on the leg with it by waggling her wrist.
“With pleasure — Madame,” Mr. Sweeney panted. “But only — when we — reach — the parlor. Backward—march!”
He tried to pull her backwards. It might have worked with Victoria, but Cousin Jane was too heavy. “Wretch!” she cried. “Let go!” and she flung her whole weight forward.
The locked forms swayed, and went down in a slow arc, Mr. Sweeney on the bottom, Cousin Jane on top, through the elevator door. The impact of their bodies on the floor made the elevator jangle and bounce in its shaft.
The wainscotting sighed, and began to rumble shut.
“Hey!” Mr. Shaw shouted. “Stop it! Get it!”
He and Susan lunged for the elevator on hands and knees. Susan was closer, but even so she was almost too late. The door nipped her hand in its rubber-edged bite; then the safety device wheezed, and the door recoiled.
“Hold it open!” Mr. Shaw panted. He struggled to his feet and skidded toward the elevator.
Cousin Jane rolled away from Mr. Sweeney’s prostrate form, sat up, and replaced her pince-nez. “Outrageous!” she hissed through clenched teeth. “I’ll make them pay for this!”
Susan threw herself against the folded-back door. It bunted against her palms, protesting: wheeze-grumf, wheeze-grumf.
“Miss Clamp!” Mr. Shaw cried. “Get out of there!”
“Scoundrel!” she shouted. “Leave this house at once! And take your gutter-brat with you!”
“You don’t understand! You have to get out!” And Mr. Shaw reached forward to pull her clear.
“Don’t touch me!” she spat. Her umbrella whistled through the air and struck him squarely in the face. With a cry he staggered back, and fell.
“Daddy!” Susan screamed. She scrabbled over the floor toward him.
The door began to trundle shut again.
Mr. Sweeney struggled to his feet, gasping for air, and lurched toward the narrowing exit.
Cousin Jane roared, “Don’t you dare close this door!” and began to pound a deafening tattoo on it with her umbrella.
“Back!” Robert cried, leveling the revolver.
Mr. Sweeney, supporting his weight with his right hand, which had unknowingly come to rest on the control buttons, paused groggily for an instant — a fatal instant.
The wainscotting closed, plunging the hallway into darkness, and the resonant bang bang bang of Cousin Jane’s umbrella faded away into silence.
For a long time nothing could be heard but the ticking of the grandfather clock and the sounds of heavy breathing. The smell of gunsmoke still hung in the air.
“Are you all right, Daddy?” Susan quavered.
“Think so … Whew, what a clout! Is she gone?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, lord …”
In a low, shaking voice Mrs. Walker said, “Have we all gone mad, Mr. Shaw?”
“Oh no, oh no! It’s all explainable, sort of.” They could hear him struggling into a sitting position. “Mrs. Walker … I guess this is going to sound irrelevant. Please forgive me. Did your cousin have a middle name?”
“Yes: Hildegarde.”
“Ah! Hmm …”
“Where has she gone, Mr. Shaw?”
“Well, ah, it’s hard to explain, Mrs. Walker. She’s gone very far away. I don’t believe any harm will come to her, but she won’t come back. Ever. I’m sorry.”
“Oh.” Mrs. Walker was silent for a while, and then said in a very low voice, “Perhaps it is wicked of me, but — but if it is true that she will come to no harm, then I cannot bring myself to feel sorry that she won’t return.”
“Nor can I,” Victoria said shakily.
“Me neither!” Robert declared.
Click whirrr, said the clock, and its sweet melancholy chime announced that the new day was three-quarters of an hour old.
“Vicky, dear, you’re closest to the parlor. Will you please bring in a candle?”
“Yes, Mama.”
For a long time they listened to Victoria bumping around in the dark, and the skritch skritch of her shaking hands striking one match after another in the attempt to light a candle. At last she succeeded, and a soft orange glow came wavering back into the hallway, and they could all see each other again.
Mrs. Walker still knelt by Maggie, and was chafing her wrists. Mr. Shaw sat leaning back on his arms, with a smile dawning on his face — the smile of a man who realizes that all obstacles have been removed from his path.
“By George!” he murmured. “By George!” He got to his feet, shuffling to keep his balance in the water slick. “Corporal,” he said, catching sight of Robert, “we’d better lay down our arms, don’t you think?” He took the revolver from Robert, uncocked it carefully, and laid it on the marble-topped table. “That gun might have been the end of me. Corporal — no, I think from now on we should say ‘Sergeant.’ Sergeant, you saved my life, I think. Thank you.”
Robert blinked solemnly and reddened as they shook hands.
“Vicky, Susie, you were both enormously courageous. Good work, and thank you!”
Susan and Victoria slopped and slid toward each other, and fell into each other’s arms, and began to laugh and cry at the same time.
“Great Caesar!” Robert muttered, trying to look dis- gusted, but swallowing hard.
“As for me — well, you may all take turns kicking me. How could I have concocted such an asinine plan?”
“Oh, it was a capital plan, sir! It’s just that the unexpected always happens during a battle.”
“Well, thank goodness you kids knew how to take advantage of the unexpected! Mrs. Walker, I owe you an explanation.”
“An explanation would be most welcome, Mr. Shaw.”
“Oh my, oh my! It’s such a long story!” Despite his soaking clothes and plastered-down hair and a raw contusion on his forehead, Susan had never seen him looking so handsome and happy. He glowed with excitement, like another candle. “I don’t think you’re going to believe it. I don’t think I’m going to believe it. You see, we—but before I tell you all that, I want to tell you something else. And then I’ll tell you why we — what we — oh, good night, where do I begin?”
“Begin with the elevator, sir!” Robert cried. “It goes through time, Mama! It travels to the future!”
“It really begins with Mr. Sweeney!” Victoria said. “It was Susan who unmasked him, Mama! We suspected he was a scoundrel, but she’s the one who really proved it!”
“It really begins with the witch,” Susan put in. “At least our part of it. You see, Mrs. Walker, we couldn’t even have come here if she hadn’t given me three trips —”
“But I had to go to the wishing well before she did that. And I had to go again, yesterday — no, day before yesterday —”
“And we had a treasure map, Mama, and it was from a newspaper in 1960!”
“And we found the treasure!”
“Only we lost it again.”
“But I know where his camp is, and I’ll bet it’s there! That’s why I was away so long, Mama, but I couldn’t tell you in front of Cousin Jane.”
“Goodness!” Mrs. Walker said, looking from one face to another. “The more you tell me, the less I understand. You seem to have been up to a great deal behind my back!”
“Oh, yes!” Mr. Shaw laughed. “It’s a regular conspiracy. Our children are deep-dyed plotters, Mrs. Walker. I didn’t know anything about it myself until they had it all settled among themselves what our fate was to be.”
“Our fate, Mr. Shaw?”
Victoria and Susan glanced at each other and began to giggle.
“Yes, our fate. Believe me, I resisted as long as I could. You may resist too, but it’ll be useless. You can’t win against these three!”
“I am more confused than ever, Mr. Sha
w.”
“Oh, I can understand it. I’m trying to un-confuse you as fast as I can. That’s why I started to say what I started to say a few minutes ago. I’ll say it again. I’m going to warn you, now, that I am going to say, later — I mean, so it won’t be so much of a shock then — later, that is — What I mean is, after all the explanations are explained, and everything, I’m going to ask you to marry me.”
Susan sucked in her breath and looked at Mrs. Walker.
But Mrs. Walker did not recoil, or faint, or scream. She said, “Oh.” Perhaps she flushed a little — it was hard to tell in candlelight. She kept her gaze steadily on Mr. Shaw. She said, “I think I’d better put on some water for tea. Vicky, will you take care of Maggie, please? Bobbie, we’ll need the smelling salts again — they’re in my room.” She stood up.
Mr. Shaw offered his arm and said, “The floor is awfully slippery.”
She looked at him gravely for a moment. “Well, my children trust you implicitly, it seems. I believe I can, too.” She gave him a little smile, and laid her hand on his arm, and said, “The kitchen is that way. Lead on, Mr. Shaw.”
23. An Old Photograph Reviewed
Susan’s diary doesn’t end with her father helping Mrs. Walker along the slippery floor of the hallway. There is more. I’ll get back to it as soon as I’ve mentioned some other matters.
For instance, there is the question of what became of Mr. Sweeney. All I can do about that is to report my speculations and, in a moment, a wild surmise.
I assume that when the elevator stopped again after Mr. Bodoni sent it up from the basement, Mr. Sweeney escaped. He would have had to come within range of Cousin Jane’s umbrella to do so, and I’ll wager that she gave him a couple of good thwacks as he scrambled out. Perhaps he brushed against the basement button in passing, and thus sent the elevator on its final descent. Very likely he lurked about in the building for a while, wondering where he was. Eventually he must have wandered out into the street, to encounter all the surprises that the twentieth century had in store for him. I hope his philosophy was equal to the occasion … But then, the Sweeneys of this world usually land on their feet; and I conjecture that it didn’t take him long to discover that he could make use of his professional talents as well in this century as in the last.
Cousin Jane, I regret to say, came into the twentieth century a wealthy woman.
Although Mr. Shaw and Mrs. Walker were not sorry that she was gone, it did bother their consciences that she would be plunged into the twentieth century without any means of support. So after some careful thought, Mr. Shaw set up a small trust fund in a bank that he knew would be reliable — the Tri-City Guaranty and Trust Company — and deposited sealed instructions in their vaults. The envelope was to be opened on a certain Tuesday of March, 1960 — that is, three days after the Shaws had disappeared in the elevator. Mr. Shaw could not know, of course, that matters at this end would be delayed a year and a half. (More about that delay in a moment.) But the Special Notice did make him realize that for some reason Cousin Jane might be difficult to locate. So the instructions were that on the following day, the bank should look for Jane Hildegarde Clamp (carefully described as to physical appearance, dress, and state of mind) in the Ward Street apartment building; and that if she were not found, the bank should advertise for her whereabouts. That was why the Special Notice had been running in the papers for so long.
It fell to me to give the Tri-City Guaranty and Trust Company the information it had been seeking, and to claim my reward. Cousin Jane was rescued from the Ward Street police station, and put in possession of her trust fund. It was an impressive amount of money after eighty years of growth.
I have mentioned that I don’t subscribe to a newspaper, but I do look at them in the news-stands, and buy one when the occasion warrants; and as Cousin Jane’s new career was of the kind that journalists delight in, I was able to follow it in some detail. It did not take her long to decide that she disapproved of the twentieth century, and that her duty toward it was clear. With her fortune she established a foundation, the Mission for the Elevation of Contemporary Moral Tone. The Mission sent workers to remote tropical islands to bully the inhabitants into wearing more clothes and improving their table manners. It showered the Laboring Classes with moral instruction in the form of tracts and pamphlets — all of which ended up as litter in the streets. It strove mightily to suppress Infamous Literature, making a serious nuisance of itself among publishers and libraries and booksellers …
But Cousin Jane finally met her nemesis in the form of a gentleman whose dedication to moral tone seemed as relentless as her own. He became the Mission’s treasurer. Two months later he vanished with a large part of the Mission’s money. He was arrested at the Mexican border, and brought to trial, and given a stiff sentence; but the money was never recovered. Cousin Jane was forced to retire into a frugal private life, leaving contemporary moral tone to shift for itself. The ex-treasurer’s picture in the newspapers showed a fastidiously dressed and combed man with a beard. His name was reported to be Adelbert Swinderby; a name which suggests to me — But as I said, it is only a wild surmise on my part. I can’t prove anything.
Why did the witch wait so long before bringing me into the case? I don’t suppose I’ll ever know for certain, but my tentative solution is that the matter simply slipped her mind for a year and a half. She was vague and absent-minded—Susan and I both noticed that. I think of her as one day suddenly putting her skinny fingers to her mouth and exclaiming, “Oh, dear! I was going to do something about little what’s-her-name back in 1881, wasn’t I? How careless of me! Well, now, let — me — see …” Practically speaking, it didn’t matter that she was late, since the elevator could travel in time as flexibly as you or I can travel in space. Just as we can get to the Historical Association’s headquarters from any point in the city, so could the elevator take my message back to the Shaws from any point of time in the twentieth century.
As for my friend Charles, he was more skeptical than ever when I posted him on all the new developments; although he did admit that my “story,” as he persists in calling it, was a “good yarn.” But his disbelief no longer irritates me. If it pleases him to think that he is right, then it pleases me even more to know that he is wrong; so our friendship is unimpaired.
And lastly, the elevator.
Late Sunday night I went down into the basement to pay my final respects. I patted the poor old battered conveyance, and thanked it for all it had done, and asked for one final favor. The favor was granted; or at any rate, not denied. I borrowed a screwdriver from Mr. Bodoni’s workbench, and reverently took down the metal plate that says Capacity 1500 Lbs. It is one of my favorite keepsakes.
A crew of brisk and efficient men in green coveralls arrived Monday morning, and set to work. By the time they had finished on Wednesday afternoon, nothing was recognizable any more. The old arrows and dials had given way to lights that blinked the number of the floor. The new mechanism made very little sound — mostly a kind of discreet and well-lubricated zzzzz. It hurled you up or down with a speed that seemed to separate your stomach from the rest of your body. The interior of the car was grey and pastel blue, and there was a thick wall-to-wall carpet. A vent chilled you with a blast of conditioned air. Music, the kind you hear in dentists’ offices and supermarkets, poured without interruption from a concealed loudspeaker.
Mr. Bodoni was delighted. “Real class, hah?” he said to everyone he met, grinning around his dead cigar. All the tenants seemed to agree.
I guess I’m a crank. I’ve used the stairs ever since.
Susan’s diary goes on to record that early in the afternoon of the day after the Battle of Elevator Hall (as Sergeant Walker called it) everyone, including Maggie and Toby, fared forth on a treasure hunt. Maggie went because her second sight had been so triumphantly vindicated, and she was confident that her occult powers would enable her to find the gold, no matter how well it was hidden. Toby went because he was th
e kind of cat who becomes anxious when he sees all his people leaving the house at the same time. Sergeant Walker led the way to Mr. Sweeney’s camp, and Toby brought up the rear with a series of rushes and skulks and an occasional yowl.
It turned out that Maggie’s second sight was not up to this kind of work. They spent several fruitless hours poking through Mr. Sweeney’s things, and under logs, and in leaf drifts and thickets. Toby turned kittenish, and dashed among them sideways with his back up, and finally capped their vexation by scooting up a tree and getting stuck. Robert had to climb after him. While he was aloft he noticed what looked like rope-ends draped over the lip of a tall hollow stump. They were rope-ends, although from ground level they looked like pieces of frayed bark. Everyone took hold of a rope, and hauled, and heavy bundles came up from inside the stump … They tried to carry Toby home in triumph, but he would have none of it. Cats don’t understand that kind of ceremony.
The problem of evading Mr. Hollister’s garrulity became troublesome, and eventually the Shaws went to town and followed up an advertisement in the newspaper for rooms and board. Their prospective landlady had no sooner shown them around when she collapsed on a horsehair sofa in the parlor and burst into hysterical weeping. Bit by bit they learned that she had recently been bilked of her life’s savings. She could not bring herself to say how it had happened; but the name “Abernathy Swinnerton” came out between sobs and hiccups. Mr. Shaw and Susan exchanged glances over her head. They took the rooms at once, and Mr. Shaw made arrangements at his bank for full restitution.
All in Good Time Page 17
