The Time Trap

by John Russell Fearn

  They moved along the dark beach towards the vessel, gained the deck, and then went down the companionway to the captain’s cabin. Dawlish lighted the oil lamps and then went out again to the storage-hold. By degrees he assembled a meal, adding to it a bottle of wine with cobwebs round its neck.

  “Six of ’em stored away,” he said, as Betty looked sur­prised. “Only thing I can find to drink.”

  “It isn’t as though we’ve anything to celebrate,” she said slowly.

  “Depends on the point of view....” Dawlish uncorked the bottle and poured the wine into two glasses; then he added, “Drink up—and when you’ve done that we’ll have our meal.”

  “I still can’t see what we have to celebrate.”

  “Well, at least we can touch glasses and hope for the best.”

  Betty settled down and the glasses clinked. She studied Dawlish’s lean features as he drank the wine slowly.

  “From the way you talk, Daw, it sounds as if you think there is something to celebrate,” she said.

  “It’s more a personal than a general matter,” he replied.

  “Up to now I have had to set myself up as an example to the others and refrain from doing any of the things which I banned for them. Now it doesn’t matter. There’s only you and me. I am assuming that you still feel the same towards me as you did before?”

  Betty smiled slightly. “If you mean do I still love you, well of course I do! I am—”

  “I was against marriage,” Dawlish broke in, thinking. “I agreed with Bronson that it would not be right. But nature has a tremendous compulsion, Betty, which I do not believe you or I are strong enough to resist. For my part I don’t intend to anymore. For the sake of the civilized education we have had we must solemnize our marriage. We can do it on the Bible. It will not mean anything without witnesses, but at least our consciences will be clear. You agree?”

  Betty did not answer. Instead she got up, hunted around the cabin for a moment, then returned to the table with the Bible. She laid it down with a significant movement, and waited.

  “You and I, and Mr. and Mrs. Brand, are probably the only human beings in this plane,” Dawlish continued, a far­away look in his eyes. “Whether any children will come of the two unions we do not know, but if they do, let us pray to heaven that they will grow, and live, and not remain eternal infants.”

  Betty filled the wine glasses up again. As she sipped she put a thought into words.

  “Something’s bothering you, Daw. What is it? Believe me, I’m entirely with you in everything you say and do.”

  “Nothing much,” he shrugged. “Just that, if we ever do get home again, we must legalize everything. Now, let’s have our meal.”

  Betty settled down and began to eat—and she drank more wine. Dawlish drank too and despite the food, which had a steadying influence, they were neither of them particularly comfortable when at last they rose from the table. Had they not known the ship was beached and the tide fast receding they could have sworn it was on the move, so definitely did the cabin seem to sway.

  “Damned powerful wine,” Dawlish muttered, picking his words and hanging onto Betty’s arm as she stumbled forward. “We ought to have remembered that. Been stored a long time, y’know.”

  “Uh-huh,” Betty acknowledged, and reached the cabin doorway by degrees.

  On the way up the companion-ladder she slipped once or twice and Dawlish had to haul her back to the level again; then presently they came out into the open air, the night, and the rod-like stars. It should have cleared their buzzing heads a little, but it did not. They felt as if their knees were giving way and the deck was swirling horribly with every move they made.

  “Soon be all right,” Dawlish said, with far more hope than conviction.

  They gained the rope ladder hanging over the ship’s side and to descend it was a real work of art—even for Dawlish, who had a stronger control over his movements than Betty. She was quite unable to find the rungs and at last Dawlish had to carry her over his shoulder. Gaining the beach he put her on her feet again.

  As usual there was the aching silence, except for the lap of the waves from the gentle, deserted ocean. Then, for a reason she could not explain Betty found herself weeping copiously.

  “Okay, Betty, take it easy,” Dawlish murmured, hugging her to him. “I know the outlook gets tougher the more we contemplate it, but we’ll find a way to master ourselves some­how.”

  “I’m frightened,” Betty panted. “More frightened tonight than I’ve ever been before. Maybe it’s the wine. I wouldn’t know. I feel so horribly shut away from all the things I’ve ever known. There’s nothing but this awful, silent world, which we’ll never understand. The empty ocean, the weird stars, the deadly birds, the— I can’t stand it much longer, Daw! Honestly I can’t!”

  “Take it easy,” he insisted. “You’re riding those elec­tronic waves again, or else it’s the reaction of that blasted wine. You’re getting into just the mood of profound melan­cholia that led Miss Forbes and Bronson to kill themselves. It must not happen to you, Betty! It just mustn’t!”

  What she would have done had he released his grip upon her he did not know. He just didn’t give her the chance, though at times he could feel her making ineffectual efforts to tug away towards the tide line.

  “We’ll take a walk,” he said decisively. “It will help to clear the muddle of that confounded wine out of our heads. You will feel better then. Remember what I told you, my dear, you must master these onslaughts which are being made upon your mind. They’ll always be present, so a resistance must be built up against them.”

  “And what about us?” Betty asked, as they began walk­ing in the loose sand. “What happens now? Do we keep to the original idea of marrying and witnessing our own union?”

  “No other way now. Maybe we can capture those ghostly voices again, then we shan’t feel quite so shut out.”

  They left the beach and strolled through the midst of the dry, crackling grass. Neither of them were walking with any ease. The wine was twirling their heads round so they had little consciousness of what they were really doing, and in their knees was a desperate weakness.

  “Is there any point in anything any more?” Betty asked at last, her voice low. “Just where is the sense in prolonging things?”

  “Why will you not fight?” Dawlish demanded angrily, stop­ping and shaking her. “You promised you would, yet with every statement you make you’re sinking lower! Much more of this and every spark of vitality will have gone out of you! Get a grip on yourself, Betty! Remember that you said some time ago you rather liked being here. It has improved your heart, for one thing—”

  “Oh, I felt different then. Now there is only you and I left, I—I sort of want to lie down and fade away. A world in which nothing ever happens. I’m sure I’ll never be able to face it, Daw, not even with you at my side. Every­thing seems so utterly—unnatural!“

  “You’ll face it, Betty, because I’ll see that you do! Now come along. Fresh air’s the only thing to straighten us out. And don’t get the impression that I don’t feel as depressed as you do. I do—but I’m straining every nerve and muscle to keep myself above it. We musn’t go under. Betty. That way lies death.”

  Betty did not answer. Dawlish’s arm was about her shoulders again, gently but firmly moving her. So she kept on walking, closing her eyes presently to shut out the irritat­ing, ridiculous visions of rod-like stars and pearl-gray heavens.

  “We’re going a long way,” she said at length, opening her eyes and looking about her. “I’m getting tired, or else my legs are weak.”

  Dawlish glanced back. “We’ve only come about half a mile as yet. I want to see if we can pick up those voices again. They may restore our flagging spirits....”

  The grass continued to crackle under their feet. They had become so used to it they did not trouble to look down. Just as they had become accustomed to the rod-like stars, so they did not bother to glance up. Straight ahead:
that was the only direction in which they gazed, and this only with diffi­culty with their vision so distorted by hangover from the wine.

  But even a hangover could not account for hedges where none had been before, or the curious hardness that the ground had assumed. It still cracked, with a different note, and it cut sharply into bare feet.

  Dawlish came to an abrupt stop, his ears measuring along drawn-out note that quivered into silence on the warm air.

  “Betty.” His voice was a husky whisper. “Betty, take a look!”

  “Huh?” She opened her eyes sleepily and looked around her. At the dim hedges, the fields, and then the stars. They were misty with heat haze, but they were round points and not rod-like bars.

  For several seconds there was a tremendous silence. Then from the far distance came the sounds of an approaching train. A train—?

  “We’re back!” Dawlish yelled, as the truth burst upon him. “Betty, we’re back! The stars are normal. That was a train we heard a moment ago! We’re walking on rough, stone-surfaced roadway where formerly it was grass.”

  Betty was cold sober now as she still looked around her.

  “I heard a sound,” she said quickly, remembering. “Just like the queer gong we heard when we drove in here to begin with—I mean there. Wherever it is—” She was hopelessly confused, too delighted to speak, too frightened to say much in case it should prove a delusion.

  “Look!” Dawlish gripped her arm and pointed. Dimly in the starlight they could see something white standing not far away. Regardless of cuts to their bare feet they raced along to it and it merged into a white signpost. It said—TO MYTHORN TOWERS.

  “It’s it! It’s it!” Betty shouted, executing a war dance. “And there’s the church behind it— But look at the time!”

  The weather-stained gold fingers were just visible, pointing to two minutes past midnight. Dawlish looked about him, mystified, then he gazed at the dust in the lane which led to the distant major road—that road they should have reached and never had.

  “See,” he directed, pointing.

  Though there was only the starlight it was reflected back brightly enough from the dust to reveal the tyre marks of a car—marks freshly made. They went a certain distance and then stopped dead. Beyond them the dust of the lane was undisturbed.

  “Our car tracks?” Betty questioned at last, bewildered.

  “No doubt of it.”

  “But, Daw, they can’t be! Look at the time we have been away and the things we have done.”

  “I know; but look at the number of things you can do in a dream and it only lasts a split second in actual fact. Some thinkers aver that dreams are excursions into the fourth di­mension: if so, the time-factor is thereby verified.”

  “I just don’t understand.”

  “Perhaps we never shall. The fact remains that these freshly-made tracks do belong to the car I was driving. I have good reason to recognize that particular tread. And that gong note we heard as we stepped back was the rear half of the last stroke of twelve from the church tower there. Remember how we heard it cut off as we crossed over?”

  “Yes. Yes, of course I do.” Betty was still looking about her. “But it’s still impossible! It means we haven’t been away any time at all!”

  “Maybe we haven’t! Remember those voices? They were speaking before midnight. We drove into nowhere at al­most the last stroke of twelve, and came out again as the last stroke was still striking. In the interval—if any—we lived at ultrafast speed contrary to normal time. And the funniest thing of the lot is that we got out when we were more or less tight! Which is probably why we did it. In not looking for a way out we found it.”

  “Well,” Betty said, commencing to assimilate things at last, “the best thing we can do is go straight to Mythorn Towers and tell them everything.”

  “No,” Dawlish broke in quietly. “It wouldn’t do. Betty. Not a soul would believe us. We might even get ourselves certified! Look at us! Nearly naked, and brown as Poly­nesians. The folks at Mythorn Towers would think it was some kind of fancy dress charade. We don’t want to spend the rest of our lives in a booby-hatch, do we?”

  “No,” Betty muttered. “Of course not. Which makes the situation decidedly difficult. There’s going to be an awful lot of questioning soon. What has happened to Nick and Berny, for one thing. Where are Lucy and Harley Brand? How do we even begin to answer?”

  “We don’t. We might put ourselves right in line for a murder charge or something. Our only chance now is to disappear quickly to somewhere quiet and start life all over again under different names. You without your father’s millions, and me without a job. It can be done—if you’re willing.”

  “I’m willing—but how do we do it? We’ve no money, and no clothes that can be called decent. We wouldn’t get above a mile

  “In my home I have some savings in cash,” Dawlish replied. “I have a small cottage about twenty miles from here. My mother was born and died there, and of course I stopped living there when I went into service with Mr. Clayton. But I kept it on for my time off. If we walk most of the night we can reach the cottage by dawn. There are some clothes there too. Some of my mother’s that she left behind might fit you. Then we’ll get away as quietly as possible, maybe to the Continent, before any questions are asked.”

  “Which means we’ll be fugitives for the rest of our lives! Have you thought of that?”

  “Yes. Fugitives from an asylum. That is what we have to avoid at all costs. One cannot have an adventure like we did and expect to be believed, Betty. The human mind just wouldn’t take it in, any more than we could ourselves at the beginning. The penalty for our experience, if we wish to remain free, is that we have to forget everything we ever did, and everybody we ever knew. There will just be—ourselves.”

  “And we’ll get married?” Betty straightened up. “All right; that’s good enough for me. The only person likely to mourn me is my father—and he was getting pretty tired of my draining on his bank account, too. In any case, he was under the impression I’d only six months to live, so if I disappear sooner it won’t be much of a shock. And you haven’t anybody who cares?”

  “Only you.”

  Betty started moving slowly, picking her way uncomfort­ably in her bare feet on the pebbly ground. Dawlish moved to her side, and then they both stopped as a light suddenly flashed upon them. They could see a solid form behind it.

  “Now, now, what’s all this about?” asked a heavy voice. “It isn’t all that hot tonight, is it?”

  Dawlish smiled. “That’s all right, constable. We’re not doing any harm.”

  “I should hope not.” P.C. Andrews of the Little Brook constabulary sounded dubious. “Just the same it’s against the law to be indecently clad on a public highway, even at night. Now, according to the regulations, it’s my duty to see that you—”

  “I don’t think you will, constable,” Betty murmured, turn­ing on her sweetest smile. “You see, the explanation is that we’re in a South Sea island play at Mythorn Towers. Henry T. is putting it on for the benefit of his guests at the house warming. We managed to escape for a while so we could be together. We never gave a thought to our dress.”

  “Mmmm.” P.C. Andrews switched off his flashlight and cleared his throat. “All right, if that’s the case. But get back to Mythorn Towers quickly.”

  “We will,” Dawlish promised. “Come on, Betty.”

  Glad to make their escape they went up the lane, but the moment they were out of sight of Andrews they went in the opposite direction to Mythorn Towers.

  “He’s going to remember us later when the story of our disappearance travels far and wide,” Betty remarked.

  “And how much credence will he get? He saw two deeply sun-burned people in the flimsiest attire. Hardly sounds like the staid chauffeur Dawlish and Betty Danvers dying of heart disease, does it?”

  “I’m not dying now, Daw,” Betty murmured. “I never felt better in my life. Whatever else that plane
did, it cer­tainly cured me, and one day I’ll have a doctor verify it.”

  Six months later she did just this, in Paris, and nothing whatever could be found wrong with her. During this six months the mysterious disappearance of millionaire Nick Clayton and his friends had hit the headlines and his lawyers had done everything in their power, with the help of Scotland Yard and innumerable advertisements, to trace Nick’s where­abouts. But of course they had drawn a complete blank.

  So, slowly, the mystery faded out, and on the outskirts of Paris Dawlish and Betty were a perfectly happy married couple. To them­selves they kept the secret of the weird adventure through which they had passed.

  Rarely indeed did they even mention it, busy making their new life together—but when the warm summer evenings came, they used to walk in the glow of the twilight and could not help but think again of that strange land with its elongated stars, its island of lost ships, its sudden violent tempests, its otherwise perpetual calmness. Land without shadows, without sun, without moon. Land without hope, and yet—no, not without hope. Harley and Lucy Brand had elected to stay in the weird plane for all time, so with them at least hope could not have been dead.

  “What I still cannot fathom is when it happened,” Betty declared one evening, as she and her husband returned slowly home. “Everything is so normal again now. You making good money, our own little home, and maybe a child soon. Yet there is always the feeling, to me, that we lost a chunk out of our lives somewhere, although the calendar and the clock say we never lost a second! That suggests that we added something, yet I don’t know where it came in or if it even happened at all.”

  “It happened, dearest, and it was added to our normal span of life.” Dawlish was as quiet and incisive as ever. “As for when it happened—well, we can only add a date of our own. One that does not exist. Let’s say it all hap­pened on the Thirty-First of June.”

  Betty smiled. The non-existent date fitted the situation exactly. She clung more tightly to Dawlish as they walked along in the soft dusk.