Time Travelers Never Die - Jack McDevitt [64]
“Yeah. I noticed.” They were in each other’s arms, and Dave must have been staring at her.
“Something wrong?” she said.
“You’re gorgeous.”
FINALLY, there was the January 3 call from Shel. “You just left the cabin,” he said. “You—the other you—should be here late this afternoon. I’ll call you when it’s okay to come pick up the car.”
“Thanks, Shel.” The world was going back to normal. Being in two places at one time was unsettling.
CHAPTER 17
Time is but the stream I go a-fi shing in.
—HENRY DAVID THOREAU, WALDEN
SHEL had stayed away from the future. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was that, unlike the historical past, it was unknown territory. And he didn’t want to find out what lay ahead. Much of the pleasure that comes from being alive is day-to-day discovery. Will SETI succeed during my lifetime? Have we got it right about multiple universes? What will the next ten years of my life look like? Will it include Helen? Kids? Does anything positive come out of the converters?
If he went thirty or forty years downstream, he’d be even more tempted to stray from the general to the specific, to find out what his life had been like, and he wouldn’t want to discover that he’d ended up bored, that his career had gone nowhere (which was precisely what he suspected would happen), possibly even that he would come down with Boltmeyer’s Disease and at some future date spend most of his time mumbling at a TV, or whatever would pass for a TV in another few decades. The bottom line: He didn’t want to see a summary of his life. And in general did not want to see the future.
Still, knowing which way the markets might trend would be helpful. And whether hydrogen vehicles would finally come on line to replace electric and gas-powered cars. And where real-estate prices were going. He could even set up shop as a prognosticator. And, after he’d proven deadly accurate a few times, people would start to pay attention. He could provide warnings weeks ahead about an oncoming hurricane. Or where an earthquake would strike. Don’t get on that plane, lady; it’s going down.
It was an interesting possibility. He could eventually become a major ecumenical figure. Maybe even found a religion. But, to get serious for a moment, would he be violating any of the temporal conditions if he warned someone, for example, that a nutcase with a gun was planning to attack a mall? Was the future as fixed as the past seemed to be?
He had no idea. Thinking about it made his head hurt. When Dave had told him about traveling thousands of years downstream, he’d been alarmed. But maybe as long as they kept it long-range, there was no risk. The reality, though, was that he didn’t care that much about the next millennium. He was interested in next week. In whether he had a future with Helen. In the next political campaign. In the religious crazies who thought it was okay to lob bombs at infidels.
Both converters were now safely locked in his desk. He’d been uncomfortable asking Dave to return his. He hadn’t told him in so many words that he didn’t trust him. But the implication had been clear enough.
HE was never sure what actually prompted him to do it. It may have been curiosity; it may have been simply that he was tired of trying to learn Greek. In any case, on Saturday, January 19, he came home from eating lunch at Spanky’s, picked up one of the converters, and drove into Center City. He parked the car in a one-hour zone, put the converter in his pocket, and walked over to Rittenhouse Square, where he picked an empty bench and sat down. He waited until no one seemed to be looking his way and pulled out the converter.
Why not?
He set it to keep him in his present geographical location, roughly two months later, in mid-March. Then, when no one seemed to be watching, he stood and pushed the button. The park came and went, and the bench on which he’d been sitting was covered with snow.
He pushed his hands into his pockets and tried to stay warm. The park was empty save for a few people hurrying through. He walked quickly, shivering, crossed