“If it’s that ye’re completely mental, that’s nae secret,” her friend offered with a chuckle. “Ye’ve got to be to dress like that on purpose but do tell. I’m all ears.”
Brontë’s image reflected in the full-length mirror attached to the wall. Old-fashioned as the dress might be, she thought it looked nice on her. The wide white collar spanned from shoulder to shoulder with a notch in the center. Delicate floral embroidery decorated the points. A narrow V of the same fabric was inset down the front of the pleated bodice to the belted waistline. Tiny purple buttons dotted a path along the center. From the waist down along the center seam, rows of more covered button broke the simplicity of the plain purple cotton skirt. Tight three-quarter length sleeves ended with a white cuff turned up at the end. The gown was simple but far more elegant and appropriate than her last choice.
“Brontë?”
“What do you think?” She smoothed her hands down the skirt and shifted her gaze to Aila’s in the mirror.
“It looks fine if ye’re going for a...” What would surely be another sarcastic set down faded away as Aila studied the dress. “Wait a sec. I recognize that dress. Didn’t Lady Sybil wear it on Down —”
“One of the designers I interned with in London worked on the series,” Brontë cut in. There’d been more options with Lady Mary’s many costumes, but Brontë’s more bountiful curves necessitated she use one worn by the younger Crawley sister. “She lent it to me as a professional courtesy which should not be mentioned aloud.”
Aila nodded as she examined the dress, but with a touch of envy now. “Back to why ye’re wearing it?”
“Have you ever thought about what you might do if you could travel into the past?” Brontë asked. “Thought about the possibilities?”
“Ye mean like going back and killing Hitler?” Aila cocked her head to the side. “Or going back to tell myself not to sleep with Georgie McMahon just because watching Love Actually for the hundredth time made me feel like a sad sack?”
“Sure, like that.”
“’Course I have. Everyone does,” Aila told her. “All the wishing in the world can’t change the past though.”
“What if you could?”
“I don’t get yer meaning.”
“You’re going to think I’m mad.” She turned and retrieved the device from her purse. Curling her fingers around it, she sat on another stool and swiveled around to face Aila. “I know, I know. You already do. But you might want to sit down for this.”
With a curious gleam in her eyes, Aila scooted up on one of the work tables. “What are ye up to?”
“Do you know Donell?”
“The set manager for Cyrano? Aye, I’ve come across him.” Her friend’s eyes widened in mock horror. “Shite! Please don’t tell me he asked ye for a date and this is ye presenting yerself as part of the same age group.”
“No, I’m off dating for the foreseeable future.” Brontë swallowed a laugh as if that were the only reason Aila’s jest was incorrect. “Shut up and listen. You’re never going to believe this.”
A few minutes later, tale told, Aila nodded her head. “Ye’re right, I don’t believe it.”
“It’s real,” Brontë insisted, handing off the time travel device. “Careful where you touch. It about gave me a heart attack when I first set it off. At first, I didn’t believe it any more than you do, but this thing really works.”
“It’s a time machine?” Aila flipped it over in her palm. “Seems a wee bit small, doesn’t it? Less... vehicular in nature than one might imagine.”
Brontë nodded in agreement. Any mention of a time machine automatically prompted visions of some sort of car. Thank you to The Time Machine and Back to the Future. It was more than natural for Aila to have the same doubts she’d had.
“I’ve thought the same things myself,” she said. “It’s crazy, miraculous, terrifying. But it’s real.”
Aila didn’t have the look of a true believer yet. “Say it is, what does it have to do with the way ye’re dressed?”
After spending the night mentally contemplating the myriad of possibilities the time travel mechanism presented — including going back to doing away with Hitler. Wasn’t that on everyone’s list? — Brontë had sat across the breakfast table from Violet listening to her grandmother’s spirited reminiscence of the past, a pastime that occupied more and more of her conversation of late. Not that Brontë minded. She loved listening to the old stories.
This morning though, as the sunlight speared through a gape in the curtains and lit Violet’s face, it had struck her how lovely her grandmother was. Beyond the weight of her nearly eighty years and the loss of her husband, beyond the pain of her recent accident reflected in the fine wrinkles on her beloved face and the white hair masking any trace of the brunette she once was, her grandmother remained lovely outside and in. Warmth and love shone in her unusual deep blue eyes.
“Everyone’s always told me how I look just like Granny when she was young,” she told Aila. “And I got to thinking about what it would be like to see for myself, you know? To see her young and happy. Then, that’s when it occurred to me.”
“What? That a straitjacket might be the next great fashion trend?”
“Very funny. Shut up,” Brontë shot back. “No, that’s when the true range of what I could do hit me. Don’t you see?”
“Not really.” Aila toyed with the time machine, turning it over and over in her hand as if it were a toy. “I’m completely in the dark here and pure worried about ye.”
“You don’t need to be. It’s the most brilliant plan.”
All her life, she’d adored her grandmother above all others. They were both middle sisters, Violet often pointed out. Shy and awkward, both stuck between older and younger sisters who were far more confident and dynamic than they. Middle sisters need to stick together, she’d say with a wink.
That bond had filled Brontë with comfort and contentment her whole life. Whatever troubles she’d had, her granny had been there for her. A ready ear and open arms. A heart filled with love. A home when she’d been lost and alone. So, when Violet had needed someone to care for her, Brontë readily stepped up to return the favor.
What if she could do more, though? Pay back a lifetime of love?
All of her self-involved aspirations had melted away and she’d begun to think about the true benefits of this opportunity. Not for herself, but for others. Optimism the likes of which she hadn’t known in years washed over her.
If she gave the device back to Donell straight away, she wouldn’t be able to see anything. She wouldn’t be able to see Granny, meet her grandfather or...
“I’m going to fix it.”
“Fix what?”
“This curse that seems to follow my family.” Brontë smiled. She wasn’t going to sit back and hope and dream of better things. She was going to make them happen. Not just for herself but for the people she loved. “It’s brilliant really. I’m going to start at the beginning, back with my great-great grandmother Hazel. I’m going to stop her husband from getting on the Titanic and save his life,” she said. “They’ll live happily ever after. After that I’ll work my way down the line and somehow right the wrongs that Fate delivered.”
“Sounds a jolly plan.”
Snatching the device back, she cupped it protectively between her palms. “If you aren’t going to take this seriously, you can go.”
“I’m serious. Seriously worried about ye. Ye’re off yer head.”
“I’m completely lucid. You’ll see soon enough.” Brontë clung to her confidence despite the skepticism tainting her friend’s light brogue. “And it’ll work. This time, it will work.”
“This time?”
Brontë winced and provided a brief recounting of the previous week when she’d impulsively tried and failed miserably to complete her task.
First, she’d erred in her costume, choosing a simple navy skirt and ivory blouse from the Lyceum’s costume shop. She thought it’d
suit her purposes well enough as it had been used in a production of The Unsinkable Molly Brown, a play set in the correct time period as the title implied.
Second, she’d blundered in thinking the house she shared with her grandmother a suitable departure point.
When she’d turned back the clock and sent herself back a century that first time, she’d dropped fifteen feet from her first floor bedroom to the empty lot of more than a hundred years previous. She hadn’t considered that the house her newlywed great-grandparents purchased in Leith in 1933 hadn’t existed in 1912.
After that, things went really wrong. Normally she caught a bus from Leith to Usher Hall for work. Without funds — or an existing bus route for that matter — the three-mile walk had taken hours. She’d limped along, bruised from her fall, cursing herself for not taking into consideration the fact that Leith had once been an entirely separate city before being absorbed into the greater Edinburgh area. A smart woman would’ve abandoned the effort in that moment and lived to fight another day. Instead, she’d carried on through the misty, chilly spring day and arrived at her destination near the heart of Edinburgh damp and shivering. The butler who answered the door took one look at her plain cotton and linen clothes and directed her to the servants’ entrance before she could say a word. The housekeeper who’d greeted Brontë there had been friendly enough until she’d seen the strands of rose-gold ombre hair color that had escaped her loose bun on the long walk over and declared Brontë a harlot.
That had been a special moment.
Though she’d tried to argue the reason for her visit and her urgent need to speak with Hazel, she’d been shown the door by a burly footman with what Brontë considered unnecessary enthusiasm. As she was hustled out, she overheard commentary within that the master of the house had already departed on his journey to New York.
“The fault was mine, not the plan’s,” she finished.
Disheartened by her rejection, she’d begun the long walk back home...or rather where her home would eventually be. On the bright side, though she shivered in her damp clothes, jaw clenched to keep her teeth from clattering, the walk provided ample time for her to consider where she’d gone wrong, what she hadn’t anticipated. Once she overcame the learning curve, she was confident with better prep and placement, she’d succeed this time around. “I hadn’t fully considered the steps I’d need to take to make it work.”
“And now ye have? Ye ken ye sound completely mental?”
“You’ll see soon enough. If I can fix this one thing, the possibilities are endless.”
How wonderful it would be to see Granny not as a young war widow but today still married to her true love. She could make it all happen.
Brontë picked up Hazel’s diary, opening it to a page she’d previously marked.
“‘The brilliant light that has illuminated my life so long is gone. My soul is cast in darkness. My heart left shivering in the cold...’”
The entry in Hazel’s journal had been dated April 22, 1912. Ten days after the sinking of the Titanic. Ten days of ignorance before she’d learned her husband had perished in the tragedy. The entries for the previous ten days were filled with joy for her pregnancy and anticipation for the eventual return of her spouse so she could share the wonder.
Instead Hazel Burnham received a telegram with the news. The yellowed and brittle missive glued on the page opposite the day’s entry.
With somber resolution in her heart, Brontë flipped back through the pages of the diary to pinpoint the time and day Henry Burnham had left Edinburgh to make the journey to Southampton, England where he’d boarded the ill-fated vessel. On her first foray, she’d arrived too late to complete her task, but didn’t want to be too early this time either. Taking action to prevent his departure too soon might provide time for a quick fix and force her to try yet again.
Besides, while the weather was fine here in 2019, the spring day in 1912 had been a chilly and rainy one. She had no desire to freeze her butt off in the cold this time waiting to see if she were successful. Despite her greater effort to blend in, she doubted the ultra-reserved manservant she’d been kicked out by before would invite a stranger in to wait by the fire.
“Why not go to Southampton and stop him from boarding the ship there?” Aila asked, though there was a hint of mockery in her tone.
“This thing only seems to move time. I can’t change where I am,” Brontë told her. “Besides, I don’t have time to travel all the way to Southampton today. Real time, that is,” she added before Aila could question the laws of time travel. “We have a show tonight, remember?”
“Too bad that,” Aila sighed. “Would’ve been fascinating to go aboard the Titanic itself, aye?”
It would have been indeed. Tales of the tragic sinking had always fascinated Brontë. From the luxury of the interiors to the personal recounts of those who’d been on board, it had all resonated with her since childhood. Perhaps because of her family’s particular connection to the disaster, or maybe simply because it was an incident fantastic enough to enthrall millions in the years since, she didn’t know. Either way, the idea of witnessing the magnificence of the ship in person rather than in grainy, black and white photos...
“There’d be no way to ensure his survival if I were there,” she pointed out. “And, I’d rather not risk drowning myself. That would be less than ideal.”
“So where do ye plan to send yerself?” Aila asked.
“Right here. Too bad I didn’t think of it before. I could have saved myself a well-bruised bum.”
“Here?”
Brontë nodded. Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum Theatre had been built in 1883 and remained largely original despite numerous renovations throughout the years. Possibilities that hadn’t occurred to her before but now roused shudders of horror and memories of old Star Trek episodes where Scotty warned Captain Kirk of the dangers of beaming him into an unfamiliar location. She had no desire to be atomically parsed into a wall or worse and considered herself lucky that a bruised hip was all she had to show for her previous impulsiveness.
Also, the theater was far closer to her ultimate destination than her grandmother’s house had been. Less than twenty minutes on foot if she took the scenic route. Maybe thirty minutes total to account for the rain and long dress. Closing the journal, she slipped it in her purse. “I think I’ve got it this time.”
“Ye’re going now? Right now?” There was that ring of doubt again.
“Right now,” she confirmed.
“Ye might want to lose the nose ring.”
Ugh! Why hadn’t she thought of that? Honestly, she hardly registered the tiny gem when she looked in the mirror anymore.
“What about the tat on yer wrist?” Aila added as Brontë removed the nose ring.
Another overlooked feature. “I doubt I’ll be there long enough for anyone to notice.”
“And the makeup?”
“We can’t all be as naturally beautiful as you,” Brontë pointed out.
Like many in a creative field such as makeup artist, Aila was prone to dramatic makeup and had more than a few piercings and tats herself. Under it all, her friend was a natural ginger with enviable skin and a plethora of freckles that proclaimed a sweet nature she didn’t entirely possess.
Aila sniffed at the compliment, ever humble. “Won’t this butler guy simply kick ye out again the second he sees you?”
“No, that’s the beauty of it. I haven’t been there yet, you see?” She looked confused so Brontë continued, “I’ll be there and gone again before the other me comes along.”
“And when she shows up?”
“She’ll...I’ll likely get the same answer I got before.”
“Nay, ye wouldn’t,” her friend scoffed.
Brontë frowned. “No, I wouldn’t because they won’t be gone.” She flicked the problem away with a twitch of her fingers. “I’ll warn myself off then. It’ll be fine.”
“Aye, right. I’m so glad ye’ve truly thought this thro
ugh.” More sarcasm, but it rolled off Brontë without reaction. Aila didn’t really have another mode...and to be fair, she had a bit of a history of leaping into the fire without thought.
Not this time. Maybe she hadn’t nailed the details down to the micro chasm, but the plan itself was a sound one.
Donning a wide brimmed hat to cover her colored hair, she topped it off with a long black raincoat and picked up a plain black umbrella. Not period appropriate, but necessity trumped fashion in all time periods.
Arms spread wide, she showed off her costume. “You’ll see. It will be brilliant. Everyone will be happy. Granny will be happy. Maybe if that happily ever after works for them. some of it will trickle down to me.”
“Wait, what? Trickle down to ye?” Aila frowned. “That’s some pure fecked logic.”
“I know,” Brontë acknowledged. Waking the device, she traced the circular light rapidly counterclockwise then slowed when she neared the proper year, month, date and time without breaking contact.
“And a tad self-serving.”
“If you insist on disregarding my initial reasons for this plan. Absolutely.”
“Ignoring the fact that ye’ve repeatedly said out loud how ye dinnae even want a man?”
“We all know that’s a lie.”
“But ye’re going to do it anyway?”
“Of course.”
Chapter 4
Edinburgh, Scotland
April 9, 1912
IMAGINING AILA’S REACTION to her disappearance carried Brontë with a smile through the short walk to Moray Place. The New Town neighborhood north of the Edinburgh city center and Old Town where Edinburgh Castle and the Royal Mile stretched from west to east. On her previous visit, fatigue and cold had left her oblivious to the historic majesty of the area. Today’s positive mood — derived from humor, dry clothes and zero pain — allowed her to appreciate the sight spread before her as she approached. Stately blocks of four-story Georgian townhouses curved around each quarter of the circular drive. At its center, a round green space almost a thousand feet across provided a lush, natural counterbalance to the rigid symmetry of the buildings.
A Scot to Remember Page 3