Time Travelers Never Die - Jack McDevitt [26]
Shel shook his head. “Not that way, Dave.”
“Shel—”
He reached into the bag and produced a second Q-pod. “I don’t know how these things work. They’re above my pay grade. But just trust me for a minute, okay?”
Dave frowned at the two units. What in hell was Shel talking about?
“Hook it onto your belt. There’s a clip on the back.” He waited until Dave complied. Then he did the same.
“What’s the thing do? We going to listen to a concert?”
“You see the big black button?”
“Yes.”
“On a count of three, push it. Okay?”
“Okay. But—”
“Just be patient.” Shel checked his watch. “One.” He zipped his jacket. “Two.” Dave slid his thumb onto the unit and found the large black button.
“What’s—”
“Three.”
DAVE, utterly puzzled as to what he was—as he thought—going to hear, pushed the button. The room began to fade. To grow darker. Momentarily, he thought he was passing out. But he didn’t grow weak. Simply became mystified. And scared. Then the lights came back, and he got knocked aside.
A guy in a scruffy brown overcoat bounced away from him. Where the hell’d he come from? And the living room was gone. The walls had vanished, and he was looking at a street scene. At night. Horns blaring, music playing somewhere, lots of old-fashioned cars. The guy who’d collided with him looked back with a snarl. “Watch where you’re going, will you, buddy?”
The world was full of moving traffic, streetlights, theater marquees. People crowded around him, moving in both directions. Some were trying to get across the street, waiting for a break in traffic.
And it was cold.
“You okay, Dave?” Shel was at his right hand. Just a foot or two away.
“Where are we?” His voice squeaked. “What happened? How the hell did we get here?” His knees buckled, and he’d have fallen had not Shel grabbed him and prevented him from going down.
Shel pointed at his Q-pod. “It’s a time machine.”
“For God’s sake, Shel, where are we?”
“David, we aren’t in Philly anymore.”
“I can see that.” He was breathless. So much so it was hard to get the words out. The cars were all vintage models. Tall boxes with bumpers. An old-fashioned trolley was unloading passengers, guys with fedoras, women with their hair piled on top of their heads. A horse and wagon.
“Don’t worry. We can get back home anytime we want. Just don’t lose the converter.”
“I won’t.” He looked down at it. Grabbed hold of it. “Time machine? It’s not possible, Shel. It can’t be done.”
“Look around you.”
“My God.” Dave was having trouble breathing. “What happened to my house?”
“We left it. It’s back in 2018.”
They were in a theater district. But not the one along Chestnut and Walnut in Philadelphia. They were standing in front of the St. James Theater, which was showing Naughty Marietta. Across the street, the Imperial was running Laugh Parade, and the Schubert had Everybody’s Welcome.
The women wore jazz-age clothes, and a lot of them were wrapped in furs. Skirts were long.
Shel’s hands were in his pockets. He stood quietly, gazing around, taking everything in, making no real effort to conceal how pleased he was. Behaving as if he did this every day. “Dave,” he said, “we’re in New York. On West Forty-fourth Street.”
Dave’s voice had deserted him. He needed a minute to get it back. “Not possible,” he said.
“It’s 1931.”
“Come on, Shel.” Dave leaned against a doorframe.
“December thirteenth.”
He wanted a place to sit down. But there were no benches. They were standing outside a music store.
“There was no way to warn you about this,” said Shel. “Or prepare you for it.”
“Time travel—” Dave shook his head. “They only do that in the movies.”
“You want to ask a cop?” Shel nodded toward a police officer strolling in their direction.
The policeman took a quick look at them as he passed. And apparently decided they didn’t constitute a threat. Snippets of conversation caught Dave’s attention:
“—I heard it on WEAF—”
“—Hoover’s going to figure it