Chronica Page 9

  "We'll get there soon enough, the old-fashioned way," Astor responded, genially. "I'm no expert, but it strikes me that traveling in those Chairs incurs a lot more risk to everyone than even riding in a one of Ford's quadricycles! Have you seen it?"

  "I try to steer clear these days of anyone associated with Thomas Edison," Tesla replied, stiffly.

  "Of course," Astor replied. He turned to Sierra and Max. "But surely the two of you would agree on the inadvisability of time travel except when absolutely necessary."

  Sierra nodded. She and Max were still trying to absorb all they had learned in the past few days, in particular the discovery that at least some people more or less famous from this part of history had knowledge of time travel – in Astor and Tesla's cases, not only knowledge but actual experience in the Chairs.

  Although Appleton, trustworthy as always, had presumably not divulged a thing, apparently his publication of the Aristotle texts Sierra had rescued from the doomed Library of Alexandria, as well as his attempt to find a translator for the Chronica, had brought into being a group of people back here all too conversant in time travel. Some were already known to Sierra and Max, like Astor and Tesla. Others likely were not.

  For all Sierra knew, these people might have learned about the Millennium Club and its room with the Chairs even if Sierra had not saved a single scroll from the flames. Appleton had told her that Thomas, after all, had contacted Appleton before the venerable publisher had met Sierra. But it seemed a safe bet that Sierra and Max's expedition in Alexandria was for some reason what had brought most of this out. She regretted not having checked her history in 2062 AD more carefully before rushing back here with Max. Joe Biden elected President in 2008 might well be the least of the changes in history, with these scientists and financiers knowing about time travel back here.

  William Arms Fisher, Dvořák's student and now conductor at the Conservatory, took the stage and indicated that the performance of the symphony was about to begin. It occurred to Sierra, as it occasionally did, that music was a kind of psychological time travel itself. When you heard it, you could be instantly transported to the last significant time you heard it – a trigger of how you felt at the time, whom you were with, even the smallest details of that moment. The auditory nerve had tendrils in the deepest memory centers of the brain.

  She squeezed Max's hand. She had no association of the New World Symphony with Max or anyone else in her life, other than that time in the office with Thomas. She wondered if Astor or Tesla or anyone else here did – the symphony, after all, was less than three years old, not much time to build up deep associations. She and Max had looked up Dvořák, Tesla, and Astor when they had finally arrived at the uptown library yesterday – they found nothing of apparent significance to anything they were doing here.

  But the nearness of the New World Symphony's creation in 1893 to where she and Max were right now made her realize something about time travel which was easily overlooked: you could gain as much from a leap a few years forward or back as you could from one far forward or way back in time. A small leap forward was precisely what she had had in mind about Mark Twain.

  The mellifluous, beautifully sad harmonic of the symphony began.

  ***

  The symphony ended with the crescendo of every horn, string, and woodwind in the orchestra. Then a heartbeat of silence . . . and everyone in the audience rose and applauded.

  Sierra, grasping Max's hand again, found she had been crying. This was the first symphony she had heard in its entirety since she was a child.

  Astor, who had been seated next to Sierra and was now standing with her, leaned over and spoke softly in her ear. "Do you know why I invited you here?" he asked.

  Sierra, still moved by the music and not wanting to speak, shook her head no.

  "I wanted you to meet someone," Astor said.

  "Who?" Sierra managed, and looked around.

  "You," Astor replied.

  Sierra whirled around—

  "No, no," Astor assured her. "I didn't mean it literally – though given who you are, I can well see why you would think that. Apologies," he said sincerely, "I didn't mean to startle you." He lowered his voice. "What I was saying was, with all of this traveling you have been doing, you need to take a bit of time to reflect on who you are, what you really want. There is a very good book by Sigmund Freud, a Viennese physician--"

  Max, who had been listening to all of this, interrupted. "We know who he is. Sierra doesn't need a psychoanalyst!"

  Tesla, who had been staring off into the distance, but also apparently listening, joined the conversation. "Freud thinks we all do," he said, with a touch of derision, though about Freud or what Max had said, was not clear. "Should we repair for coffee? I know a perfect place!"

  "I've always loved that word," Sierra said, and the four left the concert hall.

  ***

  All four ordered alcohol in the café. Astor raised his glass in a toast. "These 1890s are the grandest time in human history, would you agree?"

  "I have not traveled enough to other times to render an informed judgment," Tesla replied, "and, in truth, neither have you," he said to Astor, but met his glass with a loud clink.

  Sierra and Max did the same but said nothing.

  "I've seen enough of other times, past and future, to know," Astor insisted, after a long sip of his single malt scotch. "The two of you should think about settling down here, after all of this unpleasant business with Mr. Heron is finished."

  "It may never be finished," Sierra said.

  "Tell me more about Heron," Tesla asked Sierra and Max. "He was one of the great inventors, a Da Vinci of his time, yes?"

  Sierra nodded and considered. Even in the worst-case scenario of these two being in league with Heron, it couldn't hurt to tell them what Heron already knew she knew. "I first met him in 150 AD. There are multiple possibilities as to who he was and is, when and where, and at this point it's not safe and probably not even possible to find out more. There might have been an original Heron back then, and our Heron, a genius from the future, took his place at some point – either before or after I met him in Alexandria in 150 AD. You know, in the future, even further from where Max and I were born, it's very easy to create faces—"

  "You mean, masks?" Astor asked.

  "No, faces," Sierra said. "In our future we know the codes – the ingredients – that can be used to create living things, such as cells, organs, and complete organisms."

  "Codes . . . as in, what Charles Babbage was working with?" Tesla asked.

  "That's right," Max said.

  "But back to Heron, please," Tesla requested.

  "So there might have been an original Heron, whom our Heron replaced at some point," Sierra said. "Or, our Heron may have been the original Heron, who somehow invented time travel—"

  "But how, specifically, was Heron able to do that?" Astor asked. "We have all time traveled, of course, but how? Even in our own enlightened time, the mechanism of time travel is a firm denizen of fiction."

  "Yes, I have traveled to the past with Jack," Tesla said to the questioning gazes of Max and Sierra, "though I grant that time travel is a lot more complex than the steam-powered doors and persistence-of-vision devices that the real Heron or whoever invented."

  "I think that's correct," Sierra said, not really surprised that Telsa had used the Chairs, given that Astor had taken Telsa into his confidence. But she saw no reason, at this point, to spell out to Tesla – and to Astor, if he didn't already know it – that the entire blueprint for time travel was in the very Chronica that she was seeking.

  "But please, go on about Heron," Tesla asked Sierra again.

  "Well, the third possibility is that there never was a Heron in the past, until our man, a time traveler and inventor from the future, went back to ancient Alexandria for some reason and created a life and identity as Heron."

  "Which do you think is the most likely?" Astor asked.

  "I honestly do not kn
ow," Sierra said, truthfully, "probably an original, ancient Heron replaced by ours, but all three possibilities have factors in their favor."

  Tesla stroked his moustache. "Tell me, do you think it is possible for a man – such as I, or Jack, or Max – to travel to the future, and take on Heron's appearance? What impact do you think that might have on your attempts to stop him?"

  Sierra sipped her brandy. "I never thought of that."

  ***

  "Why do you trust them?" Max asked Sierra about Astor and Tesla, as she lay in his arms in their bed at their hotel, after the two had made love, and then again.

  "I don't know," Sierra said. "I don't – not completely. But something about the music tonight, and the brandy, made me feel, I don't know, better about them. I guess I drank too much."

  "I'm not complaining about the music or the brandy," Max said, and kissed her softly on the forehead. "They made it easier for me to take advantage of you."

  "Like you have to work so hard when there's no music and I haven't had a drop to drink," Sierra said, and kissed him on the side of his neck.

  Max chuckled and closed his eyes. "You and I are changing roles now, aren't we," he said, eventually. "I'm the suspicious one, seeing the glass half empty, and you're seeing it half full or more." He became aware that Sierra was softly snoring, and kissed her even more gently on her head.

  One thing that did appeal to Max about the conversation with Astor and Tesla, however, was the idea that he could travel into the future and put on Heron's face. Well, it wasn't a full-fledged idea, it was just a toss-away thought, but still. He as Heron would certainly put a crimp into whatever Heron was doing, and maybe permanently derail his plans. But . . . what did Heron look like now? Sierra was sure he changed faces whenever needed, and Max had a vague recollection of Synesius or Jonah or someone telling him at some point that Heron was looking like Augustine – was Tesla aware of that, aware that there was no specific Heron face that Tesla or Astor or Max could make themselves look like? Max sighed. This was the nub of the problem. For all he and Sierra knew, Tesla or Astor was Heron, and they had been talking to Heron right across that table, as Sierra sipped her brandy and Max his rum.

  Could the DNA facial reconstruction make the recipient look much younger? Of course it could, that's how this surgery had started in the first place, and was still by far its most frequent usage in the 21st century. Could it change the face of the recipient enough to make him or her look like a different gender? This was no doubt done for some number of people, too. But following through on what your new gender could do obviously would require a different kind of surgery.

  Sierra had turned over in her sleep, and her hand was now resting right below his abdomen. He thought about waking her up, for a third go. But she needed her rest, and she was sleeping so peacefully. No, not tonight.

  Maybe he wasn't as young as he used to be.

  But her hand felt so good where it was. He carefully swiveled around, and glancingly kissed her sleeping lips. Hell, he still felt younger than most of the people in the world, in this or any time.

  ***

  Sierra found a note under the door the next morning. She woke Max.

  "He wants to meet us for breakfast in an hour," she said.

  "Who?" Max rubbed his eyes and sat up. "Astor?"

  "Yep."

  Max got out of bed. "You showered yet?"

  Sierra nodded.

  Max walked into the bathroom, left the door open, and started to shower. "One thing I don't like about this guy is he yanks us around like puppets on his string," he said loudly.

  "If we believe he's on our side, his wanting to see us so often could be a good thing," Sierra said, right outside of the bathroom door.

  "You've softened your attitude about Astor," Max said. "Surely the symphony wasn't that persuasive."

  ***

  The two joined Astor for breakfast. He was already seated at the table, and rose to greet them.

  "I have news that might interest you," he said, after the waiter took their orders.

  'Tell us," Sierra said.

  "I have a report from one of my contacts that Heron may now be in 1899," Astor said. He lowered his voice. "Whatever 'now' may mean in this context." He laughed loudly.

  "How did your contact come to tell you this?" Sierra asked.

  "Traveled from there – 1899 – to where, or when, we are now," Astor replied. "All of this is happening in New York."

  "And you're not going to tell us who your contact is, right?" Max noted with a frown.

  "Not until I know the two of you a little better," Astor replied. "Let me be honest with you." He put out his hands, open palms, on the table. "I told you that Thomas O'Leary and I spoke. He was very thorough. He explained to me that the face he had when we were speaking was not his original face. He told me automata in the future can be fashioned with faces that look like specific humans. I won't pretend to you that I understood it all. But I comprehended enough to understand that the two of you may not be who you seem to be. Don't get me wrong – I believe that you are Sierra Waters and you are Maxwell Marcus. Certainly William Henry Appleton believes that, and he's in a much better position than I to know. But I just can't yet be 100% sure, and the stakes, as you know, are awfully high."

  "I guess we should be grateful that we've found a champion like you," Sierra said, "especially with William declining. And I don't mean that the least bit sarcastically."

  Astor bowed his head slightly. "Thank you. But I wasn't fishing for compliments."

  "What do you think Heron is doing in 1899," she asked Astor, though she knew the answer.

  "To wring what he can out of William," Astor replied, sadly, "including the Chronica, if it's not already under translation in other hands. Heron must know that William does not have many days left in 1899."

  Sierra nodded, and thought again, does Astor know he himself will die on the Titanic in 1912? She controlled an urge to blurt this out. Unless Astor already knew about his death, telling him about this now would only pitch this whole conversation and whatever help Astor was trying give into wild disarray. But she didn't know how much longer she could keep this out of her mind and her speech.

  "You're suggesting we travel to 1899, to protect Appleton?" Max asked.

  "Yes," Astor said, "all three of us. He's certainly no match for Heron on his own, especially in his deteriorating health. By the way, William has been thoroughly briefed since 1896 about my knowledge and use of the Chairs, so you need not be concerned on that account."

  ***

  "One good thing about short leaps into the future or past is that you needn't worry about time-appropriate apparel," Astor said to Max and Sierra as the two met him in front of the Millennium Club a few hours later, to take their trip to 1899. It was his way of saying he approved of what Max and Sierra were wearing.

  "How far into the future or past have you traveled?" Max asked Astor.

  Sierra shot Max a look which she hoped Astor didn't catch. She fervently hoped Astor hadn't traveled anywhere past April 15, 1912, the date of the Titanic's sinking.

  "Not very far," Astor said, cheerily. "I'm trying to first develop my time-travel legs."

  Sierra smiled. "You've confirmed that the room at the top of the spiral stairs has three Chairs?" She knew that he had, but wanted confirmation anyway.

  "Oh yes," Astor replied. "Cyril Charles told me in fact that there were four Chairs up there, not more than an hour ago."