Time Travelers Never Die - Jack McDevitt [100]
Aspasia had already looked into the possibility.
“Anyhow, they want to put it on the fall schedule. I think it’s a great idea, but I thought I’d better run it by you.”
“I do, too, Harv. But let me look into it, and I’ll try to get back to you in a couple of days. Okay?”
SHE put the request on her Web site: AMATEUR THEATER GROUP WANTS TO PERFORM ACHILLES. DO YOU HAVE OBJECTION? PLEASE REPLY FROM LAST POST OFFICE.
That had been the main post office in Philadelphia, and, since she didn’t know whom she was dealing with, it would serve as confirmation.
The response came by overnight mail.
Dear Dr. Kephalas:
We see no problem. The plays can be considered in the public domain.
The letter, like the earlier correspondence, had no return address. And, of course, with no signature, wasn’t worth much. “But I’d be willing to bet,” she told Harvey later that day, “that whoever’s doing this will show up at one of the performances.”
“You have any way of recognizing him?” said Harv.
“Zip. Maybe, though, he, or she, will do something that would give him away.”
“You really think so?”
“Not a chance.”
“Okay. Anyhow, I’ll keep you apprised.”
DAVE’S cabin in the Poconos had been in the family as long as he could remember. He loved the view, loved the mountains, loved the isolation.
He would have given a lot to be independently wealthy, so he could live in a place like that without having to worry about finances. For him, the ideal outcome would be to live up there with Helen and simply while away his life watching TV, reading, hiking, and hanging out on the deck in the moonlight. But the money part of it was never going to happen. He’d tried investing shortly after he’d begun his teaching career, hoping to ride some small company into big money. But he knew now that, no matter how the market went, twenty shares in a small electronics company wasn’t going to take him to glory.
He hadn’t entirely given up on Helen. There was a good chance that Shel would walk away from her, and if that happened, he might be able to turn the situation to his advantage. But his odds would be much better if he had something to offer.
Helen had admitted she was tired of her career track. The world, she’d told him several times, was full of hypochondriacs, people who craved attention and could find no way to get it other than by either pretending to be sick, or convincing themselves that they were sick. She’d begun talking about going into teaching. Get herself a position at a medical school. The odd thing about such pronouncements was that she always made them when Shel was out of earshot.
Dave had told her on occasion about his dream of moving into the cabin, and she’d encouraged him. Told him it sounded like a good way to live. That didn’t mean she’d necessarily find it appealing, but there was a chance.
He never ceased regretting that he hadn’t challenged Shel for her from the beginning. He could have been more persistent with her. Moved on her like a Marine landing party, the way Katie had suggested. But he’d let it go, constantly put it off, hoping that, in some idiotic way, his chances would improve if he remained aloof.
Aloof.
He’d paid a price for that.
Talking with Tom Paine, and Galileo, and Aristarchus, had shown him how shallow and dreary his own life was. Not the time-travel part, of course. But his real life. He and Shel had visited Rome in the glory days of the Republic, and he’d come home to bored students who had no appreciation for, nor interest in, the power of living languages. Or the instability of democratic forms of government.
Maybe it was time to stop playing by Shel’s rules.
ON the impulse, without waiting to think it out, knowing that if he did, he’d back away, he set the converter for the same location, his living room, at 10:00 A.M. five days later, and punched the button.
The living room faded and came back. The only thing that had changed was that the books and a newspaper on the coffee table had moved around. It was Monday, April 28, and the future Dave Dryden was, of course, at school.