by Wendy Nikel
After a morning of keeping quietly to myself and a luncheon of sandwiches served on a tray in my suite, I muster up the courage to wander about a bit, my footsteps echoing conspicuously in the empty rooms. I find the library and music room that Madeline mentioned, and, at the end of the hallway, another staircase leading upward. Had Madeline mentioned a third floor?
“Looking for something?”
I spin around, startled to see Hugh there when I’m sure that moments ago, I was alone.
“What’s on the third floor?”
“Just the mistress’s quarters,” Hugh says, taking me by the elbow and leading me from the stairs. “Have you seen the gardens yet?”
“Ah, no. I haven’t.”
“Let me show you out.”
The way he rushes me off makes it obvious that, though not explicitly stated, the third floor is, for some reason, “off-limits,” and makes me wonder why. What might Madeline be hiding up there: her “dead” husband, locked up a la Rochester’s wife?
“Oh,” I say, suddenly remembering the letter to Dodge I’d tucked into my pocket. “Madeline said that I could give this to you.”
I’d had to sneak my PVDs out of their hiding place to check that I’d addressed it correctly; still, Hugh looks at it as though it’s a dead rat that he doesn’t want to touch. Reluctantly, he pinches it between two fingers. “I’ll see to it that it’s taken care of.”
CHAPTER TWELVE: April 28, 1914
Nearly a week passes before I hear from Madeline. By that time, I’ve read a dozen novels, given myself a sunburn from falling asleep out in the garden, and written three letters to Dodge and one to each of my former roommates on the California Limited out of sheer boredom. So when Hugh knocks on my door that morning and hands me a message from Madeline that says she’s finally arranged me a meeting with her organization, I nearly scream with pent-up anticipation. Finally, I can stop sitting around eating bonbons and actually do something.
I dress in one of the everyday dresses that Madeline’s seamstress supplied me with, hide my PVD away in the bodice, and hurry out to the waiting car. The Rolls Royce rumbles along the road at a pace that feels achingly slow, considering how anxious I am. Miles and miles of country roads stretch onward, and I feel like I may never reach the city. Finally, the buildings grow less distant from one another and rise skyward. The car pulls up before a building that is either the residence of someone just as wealthy as Madeline is, or else some sort of museum.
“Miss Argent!” Madeline bursts from the building’s front door as the driver lets me out, and she descends the stone steps as if she’s surprised to see me—despite being the one to arrange all this. “Come in, come in. We’ve all been awaiting your arrival. How was your trip?”
“It was fine.”
“Good, good.” She pulls me alongside her up the steps, chattering brightly. “Everyone else is already here, and they’re eager to hear from you. Just follow my lead, and don’t worry about a thing. Oh, did I tell you that news has arrived from Ludlow?”
“Ludlow?” I stop midstride. “You mean the National Guard—”
“Yes,” Madeline says. “It happened just as you said it would.”
“That’s awful!”
“It is. Truly tragic.”
We enter the front hall, where a cluster of hats sit on a hat rack and the décor, though somewhat less opulent than at the Barker manor, still doesn’t give me any clues about where we might be.
“This way,” Madeline says, leading me toward a sitting room where I can hear overlapping voices speaking enthusiastically.
“Wait,” I say, placing a hand on her arm. “What happens if they don’t believe us?”
“If they don’t believe us?” Madeline looks at me, puzzled. “Why, of course they will.”
I open my mouth to protest—why should they believe me when no one else has?—but then bite it back. After all, Madeline believed me, and according to her, the whole organization is based on knowing the unknown, explaining the unexplained. If anyone’s going to listen to me, they will.
“Now, you’ll want to pay special mind to the gentleman in the green cravat,” she whispers. “He’s the nephew of the Secretary of Defense. And the woman next to him is the First Lady’s cousin. Twice removed.”
“I thought these were people who knew the president. Who could get us an audience.”
“Rome wasn’t built in a day,” Madeline says, leading me through the doorway. “I warned you that there were certain channels that we must work through.”
In the parlor, a dozen armchairs, settees, and sofas are set about in a wobbly circle, and on those seats are perched a range of people who look up at us as we enter—from a young, wide-eyed man in a scholarly looking jacket to a white-haired woman with a set of knitting needles clicking in her lap. There’s a pair of gentlemen in stark, black suits and a woman no older than myself who glares up at me over the rim of gold-handled spectacles.
“Everyone,” Madeline says, sweeping me into the center of the circle. “I’d like to introduce Miss Cassandra Argent.”
“Cass,” I say, though I suspect no one’s listening to me. A flurry of whispers encircle me and, not knowing what else to do, I dip into an awkward, one-legged curtsy.
“Have a seat, dear,” Madeline whispers, gesturing me to a low bench.
A maid in a black dress and white apron offers me a delicate teacup on a saucer with poppies painted along the rim and I thank her quietly, my mind suddenly and unexpectedly turning toward the Harvey Girls on the California Limited. I wonder how they’re doing, if they’ve received the letters I sent yet.
“Let’s see the watch!” one of the older gentlemen calls out, and others nod and mutter in agreement.
My hand automatically goes to my wrist, but before I can say anything, a woman sitting beside me—who seems old enough to be my mother—grabs my arm and begins to study the watch. I try to pull back, but she frowns at me and grips it tighter, pressing her nails into my skin.
“It looks real enough,” the man beside her says, leaning in.
“No, no. It’s all wrong,” the first woman argues. She presses the buttons, but nothing happens, which only seems to irritate her more.
“Tell me, girl,” one of the black-suited men says, “where did you get this watch, and what is its purpose?”
“I… My brother gave it to me.”
“See!” The woman who’d been holding my arm releases it. “It’s not even hers!”
“Who’s your brother?” the knitting woman demands.
“Yes, where did he get it?”
“Ladies, gentlemen,” Madeline says, holding up her hands to try to calm the crowd. “Please, let Miss Argent tell her story. Go on.”
My mind goes blank. Every one of the people in the room, save for Madeline, is looking at me with such hostility and skepticism that I don’t even know where to begin.
“Start with where you’re from,” she says.
“I… I’m from the year 2133,” I say quietly.
“What city?” someone shouts.
“Yes, what city? And who’s the president?”
“Those are absurd questions,” the woman beside me argues. “She could make up any names at all, and how would any of us know the difference?”
“Tell me, is your brother an extraterrestrial?” one of the men asks.
The knitting woman leans in over her yarn. “Can you read my mind?”
“No! No, he’s not an extraterrestrial, and I can’t read minds.”
She shakes her head, looking back to her knitting. “Everyone in the future can read minds.”
I don’t even know how to respond to such a false statement, so I leave it hanging and look to Madeline for help instead. She’s still standing in the center of the room, her arms crossed and a frown deepening on her face. Obviously, this was not the reception she expected, either.
“Please,” I say, finally finding my voice. “I’m just here to help. I want to help make h
istory— that is, make your future better than the one I learned about in school. Better than the one that will come if we just sit back and refuse to do anything.”
The room is silent for a moment, and then the voices overlap again. I can see the frowns, the scowls, the head-shaking, even before their words of derision and skepticism reach me.
“She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
“But the Ludlow incident—” Madeline argues.
“Everyone knew that was about to blow up. It was only a matter of time.”
“She probably stole that watch.”
“Bet you anything Madeline put her up to it.”
“Girl, did Madeline put you up to this?” the woman with the gold-handled spectacles asks me.
“No,” I say. “I never—”
“Come on, Madeline, if you’re going to try to convince us your theory is correct, you’re going to have to do a lot better than a facsimile watch and an actress who can’t even remember her lines.”
One of the men grabs my wrist and twists it around, working at the clasp on the watch. “Here, let’s examine it.”
“No!” I shout, pulling my arm away.
“Give us the watch, girl,” the knitting woman says.
“No. It’s my watch, and I’m not an actress,” I protest, but Madeline’s already grabbed my arm and wrenched me from my seat, away from the eager hands of the others in the circle. Her face is flushed with embarrassment or anger or some combination of the two, and I can hear the others’ arguments rise as she quickly ushers me to the door.
“What happened in there?” I ask when we step through the foyer and down the front steps to the waiting car.
She turns on me, gripping my arm so tightly it hurts. “What happened is that you made me look like a fool.”
“I did?” I pull my arm away and gesture back toward the building. “Those people in there are the ones looking like fools. Extraterrestrials? Mind-readers? They’re nothing but a bunch of crackpots and conspiracy theorists. They don’t really want to know the truth at all.”
“Get in the car,” Madeline says, her voice like a sharpened sliver of ice.
“No.” My voice is just as firm. “You promised me these people would get me an audience with the president. You promised they’d believe me.”
Madeline sets her jaw and shoots a glance back up at the building. Her brow furrows in concentration, but when she turns back to me, any sign of hesitation is gone. “Fortunately for us, there is more than one way to get a man’s attention.”
“What do you mean?”
“Get in the car,” she says, and when I hesitate, the chauffer grabs my arm and guides me firmly into the seat. Madeline closes the door behind us and lowers her voice. “I need some information from you.”
“About what?”
“You are from the future, aren’t you?” She looks to me as if for verification, and I nod numbly. “Then it should be no problem at all for you to find for me the most devastating scandals, secrets, and confidential information you can about President Woodrow Wilson.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: May 1, 1914
I sit on the floor before the fireplace with a piece of paper in my hand. The information on it is plenty scandalous. Throughout the decades, historians have discovered many details of the president’s love affair with Mary Hulbert Peck, including the vacations they’d spent together in Bermuda while his wife was home with their children, and his clandestine visits to her New York apartment. There’s also notes on his health issues, including strokes, high blood pressure, and chronic stomach problems that he tried to keep hidden from the public. And, most recent to the current date were reports about his wife Ellen. Just a month earlier, he’d publicly disputed claims that her health was deteriorating, claiming that a fall she’d taken was merely because the floors were so well-polished. According to the page in my hand, we’re only four months out from her death.
Madeline has asked for it twice already, but each time I’ve made excuses not to give it to her. In my time—my past, in the future—all this is searchable, documented knowledge. And yet here, now, this amount of evidence and documentation could ruin the man’s career, if not his life.
And yet, if Madeline only intends to use this information to establish the truth of my other claims… Do the potential benefits outweigh the cost?
I shove the paper into my knee-high stockings, once again cursing the fact that none of the clothing Madeline loaned to me has pockets, and slip to the doorway.
Downstairs, the manor is abuzz with activity. Workers hammer and saw and construct some structure in the gardens below my window. Savory scents rise from the kitchen. The number of servants seems to have multiplied in the days since our return to the estate, all bustling about, carrying parcels and moving furniture. Hugh stands, as permanent as a statue, in the foyer, directing the others in his short, clipped tone, and each time I descend the stairs, he scowls at the sight of me, as if he’s forgotten that I’m still here and doesn’t want to be inconvenienced by my presence.
“Madame Barker left a note for you,” he says. “She is hosting a party tonight and wishes you to know that, throughout the course of the event, you are to remain in your quarters. She indicates that this is for your protection. Oh, yes, and she says that she will be needing the list she requested from you this evening.”
He hands me the card, seeming smug as I read it and find that, yes, that’s exactly what Madeline said.
Stay in my quarters? The paper shakes in my hand. I’ve been waiting patiently for days with no news, no company, and nothing to do except dig up dirt on the president, even after that awful experience in the city, and she just expects me to sit in my room like a naughty child while she has her party downstairs?
Not happening.
This is not what I traveled two centuries down the timeline for, not what I traveled across the country to accomplish. Madeline promised to help me, not to act like a house mother over me, deciding when I do what and who I’m allowed to speak to. If Madeline thinks I’m just going to keep sitting around waiting for her permission to show my face, then she’s dead wrong, and I intend to tell her so.
Hugh still stands before me, obviously awaiting a response. His mousey whiskers twitch as if in anticipation.
A heavyset maid passes through the foyer, balancing two massive floral arrangements on her hips, and I wait until she’s disappeared into the parlor before tucking the telegram into my stocking alongside the notes about President Wilson.
“Thank you, Hugh,” I say, forcing a smile. “And where is Mrs. Barker now?”
“She’s gone out for lunch. I’m afraid she’ll be very busy in her preparations this afternoon and will likely be unable to meet with you before the guests arrive, so perhaps you ought to give me the list to which she referred so that I may pass it along to her. She’s a very busy woman, you understand.”
“I’m afraid it’s not quite ready yet,” I say through gritted teeth. “I still need to check it over and make sure I’m not making any foolish mistakes.”
Or one big mistake.
With that, I turn on my heel and climb the steps, my heart racing. At the landing, I happen to glance out the window to where the chauffer is polishing up the Rolls Royce in the circular drive, and it gives me pause. I hadn’t heard the car leave this morning; could Hugh have lied to me about Madeline’s whereabouts? Is it possible she is still here, upstairs maybe, beyond the third-floor staircase that the butler had shooed me away from earlier?
I lean over the banister and check that Hugh is still standing guard in the foyer, then quickly slip off my shoes and tiptoe through the corridor and up to the third floor.
***
Somewhere on the lawn, an orchestra is tuning their instruments. Their discordant tones waft up the stairs and through the empty rooms. There’s something strange about how they reverberate through the hallways as I pad silently up the third-floor staircase. At the landing, I survey my surroundings
. This corridor is shorter than the one on the floor below, darker and quieter as well. Framed landscapes line the walls, painted in earthy colors that remind me of the stones at the bottom of the koi pond at my parents’ apartment.
The first door opens easily, revealing a suite nearly twice the size of the one I was provided, with deep purple bedding on a huge, platformed bed. An elaborate wardrobe and matching desk hunker on either side of the room, with a great fireplace gaping between them.
This room faces the opposite side of the estate as mine, and the noise from the party preparations below sound like whispers in a dream—fragmented and indistinguishable.
The writing desk draws my attention. If there’s anything interesting at all in here, I suspect that’s where it would be. The top drawer creaks beneath my fingers, and I freeze, waiting for an alarm to sound. Nothing. I slide it the rest of the way open and dig through the piles of stationery, envelopes, paperclips, and scratchpads before moving on to the next drawer and then the next.
Most of the contents aren’t the least bit interesting, but in the final drawer are a pile of dossiers that are each tied with a string and have the word “confidential” stamped upon them.
Can they be any more obvious?
Paperclipped to the first folder is a photograph of a bride and groom, dressed for their wedding—her in a lace gown, him in a dark military jacket and felt hat. Peering closer, I recognize Madeline as the blushing bride. The gentleman, who leans heavily upon his cane, is at least thirty years her senior. Unused to skimming through physical documents, it takes me some time to understand what I’m looking at as I sift through the papers inside. A marriage certificate. A death certificate. A last will and testament. A certificate for an honorable discharge from the Union army. All perfectly normal things for a widow to keep, but there’s more.