by Nichole Van
Emme laughed. “Welcome to the 21st century,” she said, patting his arm.
Still smiling broadly, Emme proceeded to show him all the interesting features of a smart phone. Loving the way James gasped with delight over each new thing, crowing like a small child. His questions were never ending. They sat, shoulders touching, for several hours as Emme explained her life to him.
She showed him the maps of Herefordshire she had cached as part of her research. He found them endlessly fascinating, comparing what had changed and what was still the same.
She plugged the headphones back in and put them into his ears, showing him exactly why she hadn’t heard him earlier. James jerked his head in surprise at her raucous rock-n-roll.
“Okay, that might be a little too advanced for you right now,” Emme chuckled, stopping the track. “But trust me, you’ll learn to love it.” She flipped through her music until she found some Mozart. “Try this instead.” James’ eyes widen in wonder.
“It’s incredible,” he whispered, shaking his head in near awe. “I can’t even comprehend being able to listen to such beauty whenever I would like. With such a device always with you, how can you manage to concentrate on anything else?”
“Careful!” Emme chuckled at length. “You might start to sound like my mother with lines like that. But yes, to answer your question, a smart phone can be an incredible time waster.”
Digging into her photos, she showed him images of Marc, her mom, Jasmine, her apartment in Seattle, her cousin’s wedding outside Nassau, her sabbatical research work .
“So, you are a professor of history?” James asked. “You hardly seem old enough.”
“Now you’re being too kind,” Emme said, nudging his shoulder with her own. “I turn thirty this year, so I’m plenty old to have finished up a doctoral degree.”
“Thirty? Truly? Heavens, that makes you only a year younger than myself! And here I thought you were closer to Georgiana’s age.”
James continued to ask question after question, wanting to know about cars, airplanes, computers, television, current politics. The list was endless.
“So you mother works as a . . . what did you call it?” James looked quizzical.
“A flight attendant. She cares for people when they fly in an airplane and generally manages the passengers.”
James paused and then said, “Truthfully, I don’t think I can get my head around that right now. Flying through the air like a bird. But these cars sound fascinating. Tell me more about them. Can anyone drive one?”
Laughing, Emme told him about the airport fiasco with the small car and then showed him images of the upgraded BMW. He was suitably appreciative of its sleek, glossy look. She also remembered she had some video of Marc’s fight scenes. James watched the clips over and over, finding the martial art moves engrossing.
And he raised his eyebrows at the photo of her in tight jeans, moto jacket, knee-high boots and huge sunglasses.
“I think I could get used to seeing you dressed like this,” he said with a teasing wiggle of his eyebrows.
Emme snorted. “Well, that’s good, because I’m a little done wearing a dress all the time. It feels . . . a little too 19th century.” James laughed in delight. “Here,” Emme took the phone from him and scrambled to her feet. “I think I need a photo of you.”
“Me?” James said in surprise. “It creates the images too?”
“Of course! Now stand up and look manly, please.”
James laughed again and obligingly got to his feet. He leaned back into the tree, folding his arms, causing the muscles in his chest to bunch together. Hair windblown and disheveled. Eyes sparking with mischief. He lifted a knee and rested one booted foot against the trunk, his long overcoat rippling in the gentle wind.
He looked impossibly delectable.
Emme took several photos and then switched to video. “Say something,” she said, watching him through her phone screen. “Something smooth in that urbane aristocratic accent of yours.”
James stared at her with a penetrating smile on his face. Drinking her in.
“You are utterly irresistible,” he said. “Just when I think it isn’t possible to adore you more than I already do, you find a way.”
Oh my.
Emme raised her head from her phone and locked eyes with him. Answered his smile with her own. She stopped the video and walked back to him, snuggling against his side as he wrapped an arm around her, tucking her close.
“Look,” she said and showed him the video. He shook his head in amazement. Emme gave him a small smile, dropping the phone into her coat pocket.
James sighed and pulled her even closer, brushing a kiss against her forehead. “I can scarcely believe I am going to say this,” he murmured into her hair, “but I think you have convinced me. You really are from the future.” And then he paused, as if only suddenly realizing something. “But what about the locket? I don’t understand how that factors in to all of this?”
Emme nestled into his shoulder, breathing him in. “I don’t know either, actually. It is from your time period. I found it in an estate sale in Portland, Oregon years ago.” She paused, the emotion of it finally overwhelming her. Choking against the sudden tightness in her throat.
He was here! The man that she had yearned to be with for so long, puzzled over, ached for. Here in her arms at last. All those feelings of connection and rightness utterly vindicated.
Drat Jasmine and her psychic abilities!
She buried her face in his neck, turning to twine her arms around his head, pressing her nose into that hollow between his ear and throat. As she had longed to do for more years than she cared to admit.
With a sigh, Emme whispered against his neck, “I found the locket and felt an intense connection to the man in it.” She paused to rub a tear off her cheek. “Like a seriously intense connection. Profound and spiritual. Transcendent. But I knew nothing about the locket. About the sitter.” She sniffed. “I was actually in Marfield to try to find out more about it. The portrait is the work of Giovanni Spunto, or at least my research indicated as much.” Emme shook her head and pulled back, taking James’ face in her hands.
His eyes were wide, searching hers.
“I still have no idea who the sitter is, James. But I strongly suspect he . . . he is actually you. There is no one else. There is . . . and has only ever been . . . you.”
James responded in the only way a man could to such a statement.
He bent his head and kissed her.
Chapter 27
Auntie Gray’s cottage
The next day
June 15, 1812
So you see, Auntie, the oak really does house a portal, a door into another time, as it were. We were hoping you might have more insight for us,” James said quietly.
He and Emme sat in Auntie Gray’s small cottage, Emme dressed again in Georgiana’s riding habit. She had committed to behaving as a proper genteel lady. Running around broadcasting anachronistic clothing, behavior and speech patterns would not help their current situation.
They had also agreed, for the time being, to not tell anyone about her returned memory, not even Georgiana. Knowing Emme had regained her memory would necessitate far too many explanations.
James was still trying to wrap his head around her tale. He had been ready to accept any number of dastardly reasons for Emme to have been upon his lane that night, but he had never remotely considered the truth. Why would he have? True, Emme embodied adventure, but this twist had startled even him.
What they were to do about the situation they found themselves in, James didn’t know.
After talking for hours and hours the day before, they had returned to Haldon Manor. Emme had brought her purse into his study, and he had spent hours exploring the fascinating objects within. James had found her wallet and passport particularly interesting, even if Emme had not appreciated him laughing at her driver’s license photo. Though there were things he did not understand. Like how coul
d a rigid card—a ‘credit card’ Emme had called it—be considered a form of currency?
And cinnamon gum? Who knew?
Then there was her tablet, the larger version of her phone. He struggled to comprehend what she meant by the word ‘internet,’ finding the entire concept utterly foreign.
But he had grasped Angry Birds easily enough. Emme had finally laughed in exasperation and left him to play late into the night until the tablet’s battery expired. How could annihilating those pesky pigs be so addicting?
Today, they had called on Auntie Gray to see what more she knew about the portal. How specifically did it work? Could Emme return to her own time? Was she to remain here?
“Please, Auntie,” Emme said. “Please tell us what you know.”
Auntie looked calmly at Emme and then gave a quiet smile. “You seemed like a traveler to me, child.” Her aged voice gentle and low. “I do not know much about the portal, only what my mother told me, which she learned from her mother and so on back through time. The gate does not operate indiscriminately. It is specific in whom it chooses to let through. One who would travel the portal must have a powerful reason to do so. Something that is more than mere want or curiosity.”
“But I had no idea the portal even existed, that such a thing would be possible.” Emme shook her head. “It seems so confusing. Why would it recognize me?”
“The portal knows the longing of the heart. Perhaps even better than you yourself.”
Emme laughed, soft and wistful. “Yes, that much is true. I did know the longing of my heart. Just not that it could be fulfilled.”
James thrilled at her soulful look, her hazel eyes adoring.
“Indeed,” Auntie agreed. “In the end, the reason for traveling the portal must be vital. A pull beyond time. The destiny of one’s soul.”
James looked at Emme, feeling the weight of her gaze.
“Would any of us be able to pass through the portal?” James asked. Auntie Gray tilted her head, pondering the question.
“I cannot say, m’boy. To the portal, time is not a straight line, moving from one event to the next. Instead, all history—past and future—is fully present. Time is a vast ocean where all things occur at once. The lives of everyone exist together as rippling circles on its surface. And from time to time, the rings of one soul’s expanding circle intertwine with those of another. At that point of contact, the portal provides a gate. A link that can be traversed.”
James heard Emme draw in a sharp breath, as if Auntie’s words had touched a chord, resonating within her.
“The portal is not indiscriminate,” Auntie cautioned. “It is purposeful. If the path of one’s life requires a trip through, then it will happen.”
James reached out and took Emme’s hand, gently squeezing it.
“I am glad you have come to us, child,” Auntie Gray continued, her eyes sparkling. “You have been a delightful ray of sunshine here in Marfield. Please tell me you will stay for a cup of tea and a nice coze. I should love to hear something diverting about the future.”
After leaving Auntie Gray, James unthinkingly steered their mounts toward the meadow and the ancient oak tree. He walked Luther into the meadow, dismounted and then turned to help Emme off her mare. His workmen were at the sawmill today, but he could see the beginnings of the foundation being cut. The house would probably be framed and roofed before the first snowfall.
James took Emme’s hand but instantly hated the gloves that separated them. Catching her eyes, he removed his gloves from his hands. And then, bringing her knuckles to his lips, he gently kissed them. Lightly, he pulled the gloves from her hands, stripping them off one finger at a time, and tucked them into his coat pocket. She cocked an eyebrow at him and with a smile reached for his hand, lacing her warm fingers through his.
Hand in hand, they walked up to the remains of the enormous stump. It had been cut down significantly, but the empty center still gaped, dark and yawning. There was heaviness in the air, the tingle of something powerful. James clutched Emme’s hand tightly. She sucked in a deep breath.
He turned and gazed at her. “What are you thinking?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered, giving her head a plaintive shake.
“Would you stay here with me?”
“Giving up my family, my life, my world? It seems impossible. But then, having finally found you, I can’t imagine relinquishing you. That also seems like an impossibility.”
“Would there be work for a man like me in the 21st century?”
Emme turned her head sharply toward him. “You can’t possibly be serious, James! What about Haldon Manor? Your family? Your tenants?”
James shrugged, pulling her closer to his side. “I’ve been contemplating leaving for a long while. It really is a pity I can’t just turn everything over to Arthur. That it is entailed on me. But if I am for all intents and purposes dead—or at least dead to this time period—well, that changes everything. Arthur would inherit.” He gave a teasing look. “I am not afraid of going into trade. I am not too proud.” He wagged his eyebrows at her.
Emme looked at him appraisingly, a smile touching her lips. “Oh, heaven forbid you find yourself in trade. I’m sure you could find work in any number of things. Though to be honest, you are a wealthy man right now and have time on your side. Two hundred years of it. That is plenty of time to have something grow.”
James tilted his head at her, confused. “You might have to explain what you mean.”
“I don’t know if there is much of a stock market right now, but if you put something into a trust, like . . . an old master painting or something else of antiquity, then you could sell it in the 21st century and have plenty of money to live on. I don’t know that you would necessarily need to work. You could remain a kept man of leisure.” Her eyes glinted teasingly.
“We could just take it with us through the portal?”
“Possibly, but when it comes to things of antiquity, provenance is almost as important as the object itself. Modern science has ways to determine the age of something. So it would need to be genuinely old. And held in trust somehow, somewhere. So people knew it existed. If you could find a way to ensure that the items reached the 21st century intact, well, they could be worth a large sum.”
“Interesting.” He shook his head. That most certainly did give him a few ideas. “So much to contemplate.”
Emme stilled, as if considering. “Could you really do it? Leave Haldon Manor and everything you have ever known?”
James turned and looked out over the meadow, the piles of stone waiting to be placed for the foundation, pondering, thinking.
“I have always felt out of place here,” he finally said. “Like I don’t belong. Like I was meant for a different life. Only Georgiana holds me here.”
“Georgiana,” Emme murmured, nodding as if something had just occurred to her. “She is truly dying. Of tuberculosis. Though I guess you don’t call the disease tuberculosis yet.”
James paused, the word unfamiliar to him. “She has consumption and, yes, it is generally fatal. Though some people have been known to recover. I am still determined to find something to save her.”
Emme gave his hand a tight squeeze, her hand warm and soft in his. “She would live, you know. In the 21st century, TB is rarely fatal, particularly in someone like Georgiana where her infection most likely isn’t drug resistant. She would take medicine for a couple weeks and would be completely whole. Cured.”
James gasped. He hadn’t considered the possibility.
Georgiana would live!
Painfully wonderful, the thought tore through him. To see his sister whole. To give her back her future. It was everything he had spent the last year working for. He blinked and swallowed, trying to rein in his emotions, taking a deep, measured breath before speaking.
“That would be . . .” He stopped as his voice cracked. Paused. And then tried again. “To see Georgiana restored to health would be miraculous. She has been so dea
r to me for so long. To not have to part with her so soon . . .”
His voice trailed off. James closed his eyes, struggling to bring his emotions under control. Emme wrapped her arms around his waist, burrowing her head against his neck, holding him tight for long moments. Clutching her in return, James finally found his voice.
“I would give up everything if it meant Georgiana’s life.” He pulled back to look into Emme’s eyes, touched her cheek. “I would.”
She nodded, blinking back tears. “I would do the same,” she whispered and then repeated. “I would do the same.”
James pulled Emme close again. Buried his face in her hair. Breathed in the scent of her . . . lavender and fresh summer air.
“What if the portal doesn’t work?” she murmured against his shoulder. “What if Georgie doesn’t want to come? The 21st century can be a confusing place.”
Excellent questions to which he had no answer.
“I don’t know. What is this medicine they would give Georgiana?”
“Antibiotics.”
James frowned slightly. “Another thing I’m not familiar with.”
“Yes, well, you are over a century away from their discovery. The simplest explanation is that they are like a kind of mold that targets the infection.”
“Mold?” James pulled back to look in her eyes. “Truly?”
Emme nodded her head.
“Well, who knew it was so simple.”
She laughed. “I don’t know that antibiotics are that simple, though they certainly save lives. But there is still time. Georgiana is ill but hardly at death’s door, and from what I remember, tuberculosis takes a good while to kill a person. It is not a fast disease.”
Silent for a moment, Emme rested her head against his shoulder, holding him, her body melting trustingly into his. She shifted slightly in his arms.
“What if the portal doesn’t work?” she asked quietly, her voice muffled against his coat. “What if I never see my family again?”
James pondered it for a moment, running his hand soothingly up her back.
Finally, he said, “I’ve always thought that life is a pattern of opposites. In any relationship, there is a line. A point where you cross over, and you can no longer extricate your life from another’s without pain.” James paused, hugging her more tightly and then continued. “For example, I only feel the terror of Georgiana’s death because I love her so well. The desperation of losing her is directly tied to the joy of having her in my life.”