Marie laughed cheerfully again.
He looked at her curiously. She stopped laughing. She leaned forward gracefully, and offered him her right hand again. "Shake," she said.
He shook.
"Now," she said seriously, "let's at least be friends. I'm not inclined to take to being hurled at any man's head. I might add 'either.' But if this Book of Acts is the complete thing it seems to be, we'll find it out soon enough. But," she said leaning back against the divan, "I won't marry any man I do not love. And I happen to love Tony."
Peter nodded. "I happen to love Joan Willson," he said. "Until I change, we'll let it continue that way."
"OK," chuckled Marie Baker. "Gin Rummy!"
"Right," said Peter, reaching for a deck of cards.
* * * *
Graydon looked at Hedgerly across the top of his glass. "If you're from the future," he said,
"you could do some real chipper things."
Hedgerly nodded. "I know what you're thinking," he said. "You believe that I have the advance dope on the stock market and other items for speculation."
"Well?"
"I have. Of course, my time happens to be some sixty years after now, understand?"
"Perhaps, what are you driving at?"
"I'm trying to tell you," said Hedgerly, "that if I help you amass a fortune on speculation, this will be known fact by my time."
"So?"
"So," said Hedgerly, "the only thing I've done--the only thing that is historic fact--is that which I'm going to do for proof. Just one thing."
"Go on."
"I'm going to write something on this envelope. Then I'm--Wait. We'll do it. I came prepared."
He wrote a sentence on the flap of the envelope and handed it to Joan. "Keep it carefully," he told her.
"Now," he said to Graydon, "There will be a big nine-event day at Bay Meadows tomorrow. I have here a listing of nine horses. You will put a sum of money on these nags, and you will become famous as the first man ever to win a complete nine-horse parlay."
"Interesting, if true," said Graydon, looking over the list. "We'll know tomorrow."
"We'll go out to the track tomorrow," said Hedgerly.
"What about Marie and Peter?" asked Joan.
Hedgerly smiled. "True love," he said, "never runs smooth. Peter and Marie are busy playing Gin Rummy now, and both of them agreeing that they'll have none of this. But propinquity--"
The low growl in Graydon's throat stopped him cold. Perhaps his history told him to stop.
* * * *
The roaring hum of the generator made speech difficult but not impossible. Marie, with pencil in hand, was interestedly recording the data that Peter was calling to her. His lips brushed her ear occasionally, because it was necessary to get the figures across through the din. The brush of lip against ear was not unnoticed; under the circumstances it was hard to ignore anything, even the least minute of personalities. Finally he snapped the switch and the roar died.
"That's it!" he said exultantly.
"It's beyond me," said Marie, looking dazedly at the solid bank of figures she'd written down.
"That's because you've never been exposed to the stuff before. Come on--I'll show you."
He snapped the safety switch and watched the last dying flicker of the radiation counter above the control panel. Then he pressed a button and a huge door creaked open.
He led Marie along a zigzag hallway, explaining, "Radiation products, like all Chinese Devils, travel only in straight lines."
Then, inside the shielding, she saw the generator.
"This made that terrible racket?" she asked.
He nodded.
"I'd hate to be inside here when it's running," she said nervously.
"Me, too," he grinned. "But I daresay the radiation would kill you long before the noise did."
"Oh!" she gasped, getting the implication of the dangers of nuclear physics in one gulp.
"This," he said, "is brand new. In the center is a small, thin-walled brass container filled with radon gas, and suspending a cloud of finely divided beryllium. This produces neutrons. Very slow neutrons, not worthy of mention compared to most nuclear reactions.
However this is but a source, instead of a complete deal.
"The neutrons emerge from the container in all directions, but are urged into motion by a swift, increasing pulse of gravitic force. It used to be magnetic, but it is now gravitic.
We've changed it over, according to my findings of recent work. Then, with the neutrons moving in a cloud, we alternate the gravitic field, varying it from attraction to repulsion. Just like a cyclotron uses radio-frequency energy in the Dee Plates, we use gravitic energy to accelerate neutrons.
"Probably doesn't mean too much to you," he said with a smile. "But for the first time in history we can hurl a beam of neutrons of any desired range of energies at a target in any desired cross-section."
"It must be important," smiled Marie. "It is so complicated."
"Sophistry," he grinned. "Remember those 'nonsense engines' that were full of spools, levers, gears and stuff; all working furiously, but producing nothing?"
" 'A tale told by an idiot,
Full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing,' " quoted Marie.
"Sort of like our friend Hedgerly," grinned Peter.
* * * *
"Speaking of the devil," came a voice. Hedgerly came in through the winding passageway, followed by Graydon and Joan Willson, who came last. Joan passed through the group until she could take Peter's arm. "Peter," she said. "I'm wealthy."
"So?" he said.
"Hedgerly produced a nine-horse parlay at Bay Meadows. Mr. Graydon... Tony, that is... put down a ten-dollar bill on it in my name. I'm now possessed of about sixty-three thousand dollars."
Ignoring the statement, Peter squinted at Joan and asked, "It's 'Tony, that is', now?"
Graydon scowled faintly. "Let's all be stuffy," he said.
"Sorry, Graydon," said Peter. Graydon nodded. He thought he understood. He tried to, anyway. As irking as the situation was to him--having this character Hedgerly blithely hurling his fiancee at Peter's head, and callously telling everybody else that they might as well give up trying to change Fate--he believed that Peter and Marie both were more than irked at being hurled together. Peter was not a boor, nor even stuffy.
Joan filled the silence. "That isn't all," she said. "Last night Hedgerly wrote this in an envelope before he gave Tony the horses to pick. It says: 'Graydon will place ten dollars on the parlay in Joan Willson's name, and she will win sixty-three thousand, four hundred seven dollars and sixty cents.' That's what happened, Peter."
"Um," said Peter.
"Trapped," said Marie.
"Gypped," growled Graydon.
"Bought," muttered Joan.
"I've told you again and again," said Hedgerly, "that no matter what you do, you're doing just what history said--note the past tense--you did! Even to producing a means of controlling neutrons, Peter. Now, of course, you'll continue here, though this being the Theoretical Physics Laboratory, you'll let this information disperse. The other boys will pick it up and develop it while you continue to delve into the relationship between magnetism and gravities."
"And suppose I do not?"
"Oh, but you did."
"Not," growled Peter, his voice reaching a crescendo, "if I go nuts first!"
Hedgerly spoke quietly to Marie. "You take care of him," he told her. "There's nothing like it for cementing a fond relationship."
"Must I give up my life work?" exploded Peter angrily. "I'd rather work on this gadgetry than eat! I've got me a lead that may end up by making me as famous as Faraday or Einstein, and if I follow it, I'll end up so far behind the eight-ball that it'll look like a split pea."
Marie leaned back against the frame of the generator and smiled at him. "This," she said in a voice dripping with phony tones, "is a shock to me. Men usually brave fire and flood to touch the hem
of my skirt. But you'd rather give up being historically famous than--"
"Shaddup," snapped Peter. "And let me think!"
"Think?" muttered the girl helplessly. "I think we're licked."
Peter nodded. "Licked, drawn, and quartered. Y'know, Marie, I've tried to resent you.
I can't. Probably because I know you're in the same boat as I am."
She nodded. "Whatever he does, whatever we do, he's got the answer and he gives it one hundred per cent. No man in his right mind would ever have stood up to Tony and told him to reduce his feeling toward me to platonic friendship. Not unless he knew beforehand that Tony wouldn't half-kill him. But I am beginning to understand. Even though what he says is odious, I must admit that it does come to pass."
Peter looked unhappy. "This is a fine mess," he said. "It wouldn't be half bad if Hedgerly and his confounded history were capable of changing our feelings as well as our lives. But he blithely ignores the fact that you and I are expected to marry--with both of us feeling that we'd rather marry someone else, and know who. Then, to top that, not only is it going to be emotionally difficult in the first place, but think of the emotional wrench we'll get when Tony and Joan--" Peter stopped, swallowed hard, and then added, "I'm not speaking too selfishly, Marie. I've not mentioned how they will feel. The whole thing is a trumped-up mess."
Marie put her hand on Peter's arm. "I don't exactly love you," she said with a shy smile, "but you are a very nice guy, Peter."
"Huh?"
"You're sensitive and gentle and thoughtful of other people's feelings. I have a hunch that you could also be very hard and rough if the need arose." "
Peter smiled a little crooked smile and said, "All of which gets us nowhere, does it?"
"No," admitted Marie. "But if I'm going to have myself hurled into an 'arranged' marriage, I'd rather it be with someone I respect."
* * * *
Hedgerly leaned over the back of the divan in Peter's living room and looked from Joan to Tony, one on each side of him. "What's so wrong with it?" he asked. "People have been happy in prearranged marriages for centuries. Sometimes the participants never meet until they are introduced by the minister."
Tony looked up sourly. "Hedgerly," he said, "you may have traveled back into time.
But mister, you didn't come THAT far back!"
Hedgerly shook his head impatiently. "I fail to see why people rant against their fate. It is written that Peter and Marie get married. It is also written that they celebrate their golden wedding anniversary--shucks, I was there as a kid, and I know. They were very happy together."
"So?" demanded Joan.
"So you might as well give up," said Hedgerly. "As I told Peter when I arrived a few days ago, I've come to help him. The chances are that things would have gone off all right if I'd not come. Peter and Marie would have met, regardless. As for you and Tony, Joan, I might tell you that you were very happy together, too. So you might as well give up completely and accept the dictates of fate."
"I hate to go through the motions of a play for nothing," grunted Tony.
Hedgerly winked at Joan. "You'll find some of the motions are fun," he said.
The door opened and the other couple came in. Hedgerly looked at them and smiled genially. "Have fun?" he asked. His tone was that of an indulgent father.
Peter looked vague. "We've been sitting and talking."
"No better way of becoming acquainted," smiled Hedgerly. He leaned back over the divan. "Let's go out and leave them alone," he said in a low, quiet voice.
Tony shook his head. "I live in strict bachelor quarters," he said. "And Joan couldn't have a visitor at this time of night. And I'll not go out and sit on a park bench so that some bird can make time in a comfortable living room with my fiancee."
Hedgerly shrugged. "This, then, is one time when four's company but five's a crowd."
He said good night all around, and then left, knowing that the two couples would talk for hours, and each word would bring better understanding.
For this was it.
Hedgerly went to his hotel and called a private airport. "I want two planes ready to be hired for a quick trip to Yuma," he said. There was answer. "No, I'm not hiring both. I'm just telling you that there will be another party inquiring. You'll see that they're satisfied. Let me know when they do. I'm going in the second plane."
Then, because he knew he'd be up most of the night and early morning. Hedgerly went to bed.
* * * *
Back in Peter's living room, there was not a quiet discussion. It was an armed rally.
"I'll speak plainly if I can," said Peter, striding up and down. "And when I miss a point, someone can call me on it."
"I don't know what you're after," said Tony, who was holding Marie's hand in a manner that should have disturbed Hedgerly's sleep. "But I'm for it."
Peter smiled. "Hedgerly is supposed to be my grandson," he said. "I'm to marry Marie. We are to celebrate a golden wedding. Fine and dandy. Now look: the one weak point in Hedgerly's wild story is the question of why he came back."
"Because it is so written," suggested Joan.
"Fine," grinned Peter. "Now leaving all personalities out of this for the moment, Marie, if you were introduced to me at a party, would you be interested in me?"
"Perhaps," she said. "On the other hand, Peter, you're not a spectacular chap. One must really know you before one can see what makes you tick. Then they're not certain. I wouldn't know, really."
"But how do you feel now?"
"Resentful! As much as I know and admit that you are a fine man, Peter, I feel as though I were being forced into a duty that offered little compensation."
Tony nodded and then said, "Look. I can sum this all up, I think. Peter, you are welcome to enter my home at any time. You can even be known and recognized as my wife's best friend."
"Just so," interjected Joan, "he doesn't get too friendly."
Peter grinned. "We're a long way off of the track," he said. "This is as much a time-cliche as the fiction about the man who stabbed his father. The joker is, what do we do about it?"
"What can we do?" asked Joan helplessly.
"All we have to do is to foul him up just once," said Peter. "If he doesn't come back to annoy us, then Marie and I may never meet."
"In other words," said Tony, "the pattern is complete only when Hedgerly comes back and interferes."
Peter nodded. "Either we live by accident and die by accident, or we live by plan and die by plan. If our lives are written in the Book of Acts, then no effort is worth the candle. For there will be those who will eternally strive to be good and yet shall fail. There will be others who care not nor strive not and yet will thrive. Why? Only because it is so written. And by whom? By the omnipotent God. Who, my friends, has then written into our lives both the good and the evil that we do ourselves! He moves us as pawns, directs us to strive against odds, yet knows that we must fail, because he planned it that way. For those, then, that fail, there is everlasting hell.
"So," said Peter harshly, "I plan that this goldfish shall try to live in air." He plunged his hand into the aquarium and dropped a flipping fish onto the table. "I direct that this goldfish shall try to live. See, it strives hard to live in an unfriendly medium. It fails--of course, because the goldfish is incapable of following my dictate."
Peter's face took on an angry expression. "It has failed to obey me," he thundered.
"Ergo it must be punished!"
He lifted a heavy letter opener and chopped down, cutting off the head of the still-gasping fish.
"And that," he said bitterly, "is predestiny!"
"All of which proves--?" asked Marie.
"Hedgerly exists," said Peter. "But suppose Hedgerly exists only as a probability. A probability that he himself has made high. You see, there is always the probability that any man will meet any woman. Suppose the outcome of this probability was strong enough for the outcome--Hedgerly--to invent time travel, and then come back here
to insure the probability?"
"I think I see," said Joan with a twinge of doubt.
"Well, all we have to do is to be darned sure that his own particular probability does not occur. Then he won't occur, and all of this will not occur, and we--"
"Look," said Tony excitedly, "it may be grasping at straws, but it seems to me that anything that is as certain as your friend... your, ah, grandson... Hedgerly claims shouldn't require a lot of outside aid."
Marie brightened, and then looked glum. "There's one thing that we all forget," she said unhappily. "We're speaking of predestiny as though we were a bunch of people going through the lines of a play. That may or may not be so. Let's face it, predestiny means that we may or may not know what our next move may be. We do not know, and there seems to be no way of finding out. Therefore whether or not our acts are all written need not take any of the fun out of life."
Tony faced her in surprise. "Just what are you advocating?" he demanded.
She reached up and took his hand. "Tony, never doubt that I love you. Yet Peter is a nice fellow, and had I met him first I'm reasonably sure that we could have been happy together."
"All right," nodded Tony. "Granted that love is a matter of coincidence, of the desirable factors of personality, propinquity, and propitiousness, so what?"
Marie looked unhappy. "He... Hedgerly... did win a nine-horse parlay, didn't he?"
"Yeah."
"He is here."
"Indubitably--and damnably!"
"Well," concluded Marie, "it is distasteful, but it seems ordained. And when--like going to the dentist--you're faced with something distasteful, there's little point in fuming over it. Do it--and forget it!"
Joan jumped to her feet. Then she sat down, dejected. "Beating my head against the wall," she said. "All right. I give up."
Peter thought for a moment. "Look," he said brightly, "sometimes people must take chances. Sometimes people gotta ride close to the edge in order to gain safety. I suggest that we all elope to Yuma and have a double wedding!"
Tony advanced upon Peter with fire in his eye. "You're going to let that character get away with this?" he demanded. "I'll kill him first."
The Worlds of George O Page 18