“Spare me the details,” Joe groaned. “You must’ve really spread that old gospel around.” He turned to Ma Trimble, who still huffed like a catscratched bulldog. “You’ve had the experience,” he said. “You can hold shortarm inspection.” Freedy still gaped at the unhappy god shouter. “Well?” Joe asked.
The minuscule mouthed radioman went back to twirling knobs. Abruptly he pursed his lips and stopped. After a moment the fuzzy, faintly audible noise broke into dots and dashes. Joe could not recognize a single letter. Freedy was also puzzled. Gorson abruptly took charge. “Get a fixl” he snapped, and reached for the direction finder.
Joe rushed into his cubicle, then returned. He couldn’t lay out a fine of position unless he knew where the signal came from. “Can you read it?” he asked.
Gorson gave him a wry look. “No, but I know what it is.” Joe waited.
“Kana code,” the bos’n grunted. “Imperial Japanese Navy Headquarters, Tokyo.”
“What year we in?” Cookie asked. “You s’pose we’re still at war?”
“Unless it hasn’t started yet,” Gorson said. “I led the working party that blew up that transmitter.”
Freedy switched to another band. Minutes later the RDF left them in no doubt of their position. The Alice lay between thirty-six and thirty-eight degrees north, and approximately a hundred sixty degrees west. The transmitters were too far away to get a closer bearing but no one cared. A thousand miles north of the Hawaiian Islands there was little chance of running aground or into anything else, save possibly the Japanese fleet. It was New Year’s Day, 1942.
XII
THEY FACE each other, stunned. They had followed the yawl’s meanderings uncomplainingly throughout antiquity but a mere twenty years staggered them. Somewhere at this minute, Joe thought, my mother’s wheeling me around in a stroller. My father is just about to be swindled out of his partnership in the restaurant.
Gorson broke off the revery of his own hectic life in the early days of the war. “What do we do now?” he asked.
Joe glanced around at Ma Trimble’s blondes and felt an unreasoning anger at the casualness with which they combed, mended, and chattered. Might as well get one thing over, he thought. “All hands assemble for a shortarm inspection. Ma Trimble’s the expert.” He retreated to his cubicle and closed the door.
1942. He couldn’t stay here, he knew. Joe had read extensively in the newspaper files of this period. If the Alice showed up in any American port they’d all rot in prison camp while some birdbrained bureaucrat tried to figure the angles behind the Axis sending out a load of saboteurs with such a weird cover story.
No, not even in prison, Joe decided. They’d be lucky if they weren’t shot.
And that miserable god shouting eightball had managed to get himself a dose. Even if there had been any medicaments aboard the yawl Joe would have been afraid to use them. He reviewed all his theories, hunches, and superstitions about time travel.
They were about twenty years from their starting point—which, all things considered, was pretty good. So far he had learned how to separate forward from reverse. He wondered if further refinements were possible and wished he could understand what Einstein had said about time. Damn it, if only he could learn to separate logic from magic in his thinking!
What was time? All this talk of rhythms and streams and fourth dimensions sounded to Joe like the learned balderdash of scientasters who concealed their ignorance behind Greek-rooted redundancies. Whatever it was, only one time really existed for Joe, for the Alice, and for the Alice’s original company. That was their own time: mid-twentieth century. Everything else was history and no matter how real to those who lived in it, it would never be real to Joe. Only 1965 was his.
The future was equally nonexistent, except as a series of extrapolations—a branching of probabilities, a budding of possibilities from the only true and real time: Joe’s present.
If the future were equally nonexistent to the machine, perhaps it would not or could not venture forward beyond its own time.
But it was confusing. Did Raquel and these blondes and all the others know they had been living in the past? Probably not. It was their present and only the past for Joe. Maybe a machine built in their time would reject any later era as impossible or unreal. If so they could jump again and cut down the remaining distance to their own era!
Joe smiled momentarily. They could still make that Saturday inspection. But, he sobered, there was not one shred of evidence to prove his theory, Well, what could he lose? Not much, considering that typhoon was due any time now.
Holy Neptune! He’d forgotten about the barometer and that brassy sky. He opened the cubicle door and brushed past Ma Trimble as she tried to say something.
It was dead calm now, without a sniff of wind. The late afternoon sun was an immense flaming ball, as if no protective atmosphere separated it from the Alice. The sea had-a sluggish, oily look and the Alice’s sails slatted gently as she rocked in an old swell which came from the southwest. In the direction of the swell the horizon was different—as if some gigantic hand had pried sky and sea apart and was now driving a thin black wedge in between.
Joe glanced absently at his wrist. Damn those watchstealing Romans! How much time had he? He went below and after one unbelieving glance at the barometer yelled for Gorson and Cookie. “Set up the still—make it quick!”
Gorson and Cookie stared dumbly, with eyes like catatonic spaniels. The rest of the crew was mute and worried. Ma Trimble was solemn. “Well, what’s wrong?” Joe snapped. “Everybody got a dose?”
Ma Trimble shook her head and her chins quivered. She dabbed at her eyes with an oversized man’s handkerchief. Gorson cleared his throat and swallowed a couple of times. “Three girls gone,” he said. “No sign of them anywhere. Abishag, Miriam—”
“Abishag—she the one who was unravelling a jersey?”
Rose nodded unhappily and held out a ball of yam.
Joe remembered how the girl had disappeared at the moment of the jump. He thought she’d gone on deck. Why hadn’t all the girls gravitated back to their own time just as Howie had been snatched back to his?
The bell jar and coil must set up a field. Close to it, you’re safe, but get so far away . . . The girl had been leaning against the chain locker bulkhead—almost in the Alice’s bows. Abruptly, Joe stopped, realizing what news they were trying to break to him. He drew a deep breath and looked for a place to sit.
Gorson nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Raquel too.”
“You’re sure?” he finally asked, and knew they were. Damn it, why did she have to go now? Up on deck awhile ago he’d been—well, what? It wasn’t—He sighed. Well, it just wasn’t fair. He could see it all now. She hung out in the chain locker. Whenever things went wrong she crawled into her hole just as he crawled into his cubicle. Why hadn’t he guessed earlier why she flaunted that gamy stink? More important, he should have realized what those intervals of cleanliness meant. If he had said the right things she wouldn’t have run off to the chain locker. Why had he put it off?
He felt his insides tense at the anticipation of pain. It was going to hurt, he knew. Each day the aching would grow and swell. The emptiness inside him would grow until one day the thin shell would crumple and there would be nothing left of Joe. He wondered what the crew of the Alice would do if he were to tear his hair and scream quadrilingual blasphemies.
“Sir,” Gorson was saying, “the barometer—”
Holy hell, the typhoon!
Someday he would have time to moum. Someday her name would be graven with letters of fire in some dark and secret comer of his duodenum. But for the time being he was captain of the Alice.
“Guilbeau, Rose, Schwartz, and Villegas, on deck! Take in all sail. Dog everything down ready to jump. Gorson and Cook, rig the still. Freedy, you know what to do.”
He went on deck. The giant was prying horizon and sea farther apart. The black wedge could not be more than minutes away from the Alice.
“Step lively with that sail!” he yelled, and began lashing the wheel.
Instructions were unnecessary. The Alice’s people knew the weather and their captain were both ready to break. “I won’t think about it,” Joe muttered, and helped punch the tattered mains’l into a neat furl. There isn’t time to think. He took a final look at that widening black wedge before following his people down the after scuttle.
The deck was secured, the hatches dogged. Gorson and Cookie were at the still. Freedy’s hands poised over the fathometer. “Everything set where it was last jump?” Joe asked.
Freedy nodded. “All right, let’s try it.”
The switch clicked and all hands waited for the warmup. Joe reviewed all the countless possibilities for disaster. I won’t think about her. So far the Alice had always fetched up afloat. Did their time machine have a special fondness for salt water or was each jump straining the law of averages? Five continents and seven seas; you pays yer money and you takes yer choice. I won’t think about her.
Nothing was happening.
“Move back to zero,” Joe said, “and start ranging out again.”
“Right,” Freedy grunted. The instant his hand touched the knob Joe felt that now familiar twisting. Past, present, future? At least they were at sea. The Alice was rocking violently. He’d better get on deck and set a little canvas to steady her.
Two jumps away from her now. Did she land safely or spend her final hour treading water lonely leagues from land? I won’t think—His head emerged from the scuttle and he found himself staring at a blank gray wall. He glanced up straight into horrified faces which stared down at him from the deck of a destroyer. The destroyer was at flank speed, passing the Alice’s portside with barely four feet to spare. He glanced about and realized even this horror could be magnified.
Six destroyers had been steaming two abreast. Now they were peeling off at impossible angles as radar or bow lookouts sighted the Alice. The last destroyer in the starboard column had apparently not gotten the word; her knifelike bow pointed unerringly at the Alice’s mizzen mast. She was a length and a half away, making all of twenty-two knots!
Joe dived down the after scuttle, scattering the blondes who headed up it. Thank Neptune the bell jar was still set up. The red pilot light glowed on the fathometer. Brushing Freedy aside, he spun the range selector. All hands poured on deck to see what had spooked him.
Cringing against the crash to come, Joe spun the dial frantically. Agonizing seconds passed before he again felt that shimmering flicker which meant they had jumped. Was he getting used to time travel or was the sensation getting weaker? Three jumps away from her.
He stuck his head out of the scuttle, wondering what new disaster would present itself. The Alice’s crew stood and sat in various attitudes of numbed stupefaction. Gorson struggled to his feet when he saw Joe. “That tin can,” he croaked. “I know those guys!”
The chief’s eyes were showing too much white. “Jesus!” he muttered, and began wilting. Joe caught him and lowered the bos’n gently. So he knows them. Had he known them a month ago or twenty years ago? The tin cans had looked fairly recent but—Abruptly Joe remembered the telltale bulge of a piece of super-secret electronic gear. That gadget hadn’t been operational six months ago.
The sun had an early morning look and, after a glance at the compass, he decided they were still in the northern hemisphere. Freedy still mumbled and counted his fingers. Joe gave him a despairing glance and went below. After turning off the fathometer and letting air in the bell jar he turned on the radio. Is she alive somewhere?
This time the air was full—not just short and long wave, but all the UHF and VHF channels which had not existed twenty years ago. Down in one comer someone was single sidebanding. These return jumps were apparently a logarithmic progression. Or was that it? Each one, at any rate, grew shorter as they approached their own time. He wondered if he were days or weeks away. Chances were that lessened twisting sensation meant this last jump away from the destroyers had only covered a week or two.
He found a news broadcast and began swinging the direction finder. Mellifluous, pear-shaped tones revealed territorial encroachments on five continents. Fine Italian hands penned notes in Cyrillic to the Secretary-General.
Joe decided he was either due east or west of the transmitter. When would that mealy-mouthed commentator shut up long enough for station identification? He glanced absently at his wrist. Damn those Romans!
Abe Rose came down the after scuttle. “I see were home,” he grunted.
“How do you know?”
Rose gave a humorless hah. “I’d know that prevaricating son of an unnatural union between Barry Goldwater and Daddy Warbucks if I heard him in Katmandu. And considering the wattage on which he defiles us Democrats, I’d say we aren’t a hundred miles from San Diego.”
Howard McGrath came below, looking pale and unhappy. He was followed by Dr. Krom, who helped Ma Trimble down the scuttle. Tears shimmered in her eyes. “All gone but Ruthie,” she sniffled. “We’ll be next.”
Ruthie—that was the blonde who’d shared Villegas’ bunk. Again Joe was reminded of Raquel.
“—and so we come to the end of KLOD’s political powwow for this day, March 2, 1965—”
March 2—why, tomorrow was the day—Commander Cutlott’s crowd would be holding inspection. And oh God, what a mess the Alice was in! Foul-bottomed, topside paint peeling, spear, axe and catapult scars in her deck, half her gear missing and the other half rotten—
“All hands turn to,” he yelled, “We’ve got to get this bucket shipshape.”
He’d have to go over the yawl from stem to stem and get rid of anything the blondes had left. Things were going to be hard enough to explain without getting into that right off! He’d start with the lazarette, which was just about as far as he could get from the chain locker. I won’t think of her.
The lazarette was empty. Joe stared. The last time he’d looked it’d been full of sacked rye. Then he realized what happened. With each jump the Alice’s hold on these extratemporal articles had become more tenuous. Finally, they had gone the way of the girls, the way of—
He climbed down into the compartment to see if a dress or sandal had been left behind.
The lazarette was empty, save for Corson’s and Cookie’s immense foot lockers. Why they needed these empty trunk-sized boxes aboard ship he would never know unless—No, he’d looked several times and they’d always been empty.
Well, they were nearly back to normal. All the Alice’s original people were aboard. There remained only Ma Trimble and one blonde to explain away. Villegas could sneak them ashore before inspection time.
Howard McGrath was looking down into the lazarette. “Mr. Rate,” he complained, “I can’t hardly pee at aUl”
“I’m fresh out of aspirin. Have you tried prayer?” Joe climbed out of the lazarette and hesitated as he saw how utterly crushed the young god shouter was. “Oh, keep your shirt on,” he growled. “You’ll be in naval hospital in twelve hours. When you get out I’ll see if I can’t get you a medal.” He glared into the mist. When would Point Loma loom up through the coastal fog?
Whtf’m I poking around like this? he wondered. Gorson had enough sense to get anything incriminating out of sight before inspection. He went into his cubicle and opened the “want book” and inventory sheets. How would he ever make them come out? I won’t think of her.
He buried his head in his hands. He should, he supposed, be thankful it had ended this way. After all, how could she have fitted into faculty life in a college town? Like it or not, he was a professor. Subconsciously, he had always known he would never make a career of the navy. He had had his little fling; now he would tuck his tail between his legs and scuttle back quietly into Dr. Battlement’s History Department. He’d be a year behind his contemporary bright young men so far as seniority and tenure went, but . . . I won’t think of her.
The Alice’s motion had changed. He stripped the makeshift curtain (som
ething else to replace before inspection) from his tiny porthole and saw a tug drift slowly past the Alice. There was a gentle bump as someone fended off. He was ready to go on deck when some instinct made him hesitate. What was Corson up to? Why hadn’t the bos’n warned him they were sighting someone?
Straining his head against the bulkhead, he caught a walleyed glimpse of a scow piled high with unsmeltable bits of antique aircraft, electronics gear too obsolete to be useful but too secret to be surplussed to the unsuspecting public who paid for it. The after part of the scow was nearly awash with cases of shells and small arms ammo. While Joe watched, a small crane lifted two footlockers from the Alice and strained two identical but much heavier boxes back aboard the yawl.
“Oh fine!” Joe muttered. He’d finally found out what Commander Cutlott wanted to know. His future was assured if he wanted it. What was in the two footlockers? Something the navy was quite willing to heave overboard but which could land the bos’n and Cooke in Mare Island for turning a fast buck at less cost to Uncle than some retired admiral’s perfectly legal lobbying.
How did they intend to get the loot ashore? Didn’t they realize the land of going-over this poor old bucket would get tomorrow? Commander Cutlett had been awfully nice about finding a boot ensign a job, but Joe didn’t see how he could throw Corson and Cookie to the wolves after all they’d been through together. He’d have to warn them to jettison the stuff before they reached San Diego.
It was nearly dawn before the coast came into sight In spite of the foghorn’s twin-toned blat and the lighthouse’s glimmer they crisscrossed the entrance several times before picking up the last buoy. The Alice began her slow way up the channel.
When they finally docked at 0900 a schooner twice as large as the Alice was crowded into the slip opposite. Joe gave her a look of fleeting envy. The Baleen had been built specifically for oceanographic work, with a fiberglass hull impervious to rocks, rot or worms. She was furnished with everything to keep forty men in fresh-water showered comfort for six months at a stretch. Why couldn’t he have had something like that? Joe wondered. He sighed, consoling himself that she was twice as cumbersome and no faster than the weddy-bottomed Alice.
The Ship That Sailed the Time Stream Page 17