by Anthology
Finally, once all the seats were filled, the curtain rose on a fake street that looked very much like one of the streets in Little Germany. Behind the street stood several tenement buildings, in front of which peddlers pushed their carts, children ran around, and men and women walked with purpose to their daily errands.
Suddenly smoke and flames emerged from one of the windows high up in a four-story tenement. The crowd of people, who had been moving in all directions, stopped in their tracks to stare up at the window. Then they started running around again, screaming, “Fire! Fire!”
Faces of women and children appeared at other windows near the one with the fire. Their screams rended the air as the fire spread first to one window, and then to the next, until the entire upper floor of the building burned in flame.
It wasn’t just the performers in the building and on the street who reacted. The spectators also began to jump up in their seats, screaming for someone to rescue the actors.
Just when it seemed as if there would be no hope for the unfortunate souls trapped in the building, a fire bell clanged and three fire engines sped down the makeshift street. Ten firemen grabbed hoses and began spraying water on all sides of the building, while another ten grabbed ladders and placed them along the building, so that the trapped residents could descend quickly to the safety of the street below.
A few people in the windows screamed that they couldn’t reach the ladders, and another group of firemen rushed over with safety nets. They called out “Jump!” and the last people trapped in the building’s top floor jumped into the nets, to thunderous applause from the audience.
The crowd roared with exhilaration, and even Mr. Schmidt joined in with great enthusiasm, but not Adele. She felt faint.
“Mr. Schmidt,” she whispered.
Schmidt turned to look at her, and his mouth fell open. “My God, Miss Weber. Your face is so pale. Are you feeling okay?”
“Please get me out of here,” she said.
“I don’t understand.”
“I thought I could take it, but I can’t. I’m sorry.”
“What are you talking about?”
She waved her right arm around, gesturing at the other members of the audience, who remained transfixed by the spectacle. “How can they watch this? How can they sit here unmoved by the horror?”
“It’s a disaster spectacle. Entertainment.”
“I can’t believe it. Although I suppose if people are going to gather at a fire for entertainment, it’s better they do so at a fake fire than at a real one.”
Schmidt cleared a path for the two of them, escorted Adele to a bench in a far corner of the park, and brought her a cup of water. She drank deeply.
“Are you feeling better?” he asked.
Adele nodded. “I think so. I just can’t believe it.”
“I couldn’t believe it either when I first read about it. That’s why I had to see it for myself. I have something of an interest in fires.” He paused. “I just didn’t realize that it would affect you this way.”
Adele remained silent for a few seconds. Then she cleared her throat and spoke. “My mother and I never told you how my father died.”
“No,” he said after a moment. “You didn’t.”
Adele looked away from Mr. Schmidt. She looked into the distance, where the beach melted away into the huge ocean. “He was walking home from work one evening when he heard shouts of a fire in a tenement. The firemen hadn’t arrived yet, and there were women and children trapped inside. Father threw off his coat and ran into the building, to try to rescue them.” She paused. “He never emerged.”
“I am sorry, Miss Weber.”
“Mother couldn’t bear it. I had to identify the body.”
“That . . . that must have been difficult for you,” Schmidt said quietly, while the noise of the park still surrounded them.
Adele shook her head, trying to dismiss the memory from her mind. “Fires are far too common in our world. I was but a young twelve-year-old girl when that building he ran into went up in flames. Ever since then, I’ve had recurring dreams of fire.”
“Ironic,” Schmidt said softly.
“Why is that ironic?” Adele asked.
“Oh, um, no reason,” Schmidt replied, with a wave of his hand. “I wish I could have met your father. It sounds like he was quite the heroic man.”
Adele grunted. “Hm. I sometimes feel that the more heroic choice would have been to ignore the screams of strangers and stay alive for his family.” She smiled. “Selfish of me, I suppose.”
“You’re entitled to such feelings. But why didn’t you tell me about this when I suggested seeing Fire and Flames?”
“I—I didn’t want you to be disappointed.”
Schmidt took her in his arms, held her for a moment, and then released her. “Are you ready for another ride?”
Adele shook her head; the emotional roller coaster she had just gone through felt more intense than a real one would have been. “Actually, I’d like to go home.”
“But we barely got here,” Schmidt said.
Adele looked him in the eye. “Mr. Schmidt? I think I’ve had enough stimulation for one day. Please?”
He sighed. “Very well, Miss Weber.”
The two of them rode the next ferry back to Manhattan.
After that day, Adele saw less and less of Mr. Schmidt. In the mornings, he would scurry off before breakfast, calling out that he would pick up a muffin or roll on his way to Newspaper Row. In the evenings, after returning to his rooms, he would go out to assist Mary Abendschein in getting shopkeepers and business owners to purchase advertisements in the excursion journal.
This bothered Adele, because even taking into account the disastrous trip to Coney Island, she had come around to her mother’s way of thinking. Lucas Schmidt did seem to be a man of good prospects, and his pleasant appearance certainly made him favorable in Adele’s eyes.
But his recent secrecy worried her. Was he avoiding her simply because of her behavior at Luna Park? Or was there another, more sinister reason? There were many stories of criminals who passed as decent, hard-working men. Suppose Mr. Schmidt had fooled Reverend Haas? Suppose her mother had opened their household up to a man who planned to run off with their possessions? Or worse yet, murder them in their sleep?
Adele admitted to herself that these thoughts were more flights of fancy than real concerns, but she still had a devouring curiosity about Lucas Schmidt. And so, one Monday, in the middle of the day when she had little to do, Adele walked downtown to Newspaper Row, on the eastern edge of City Hall Park.
The New York World was housed in its own tower that sported a tall golden dome on top, so Adele found the building with ease. She maneuvered her way through the newsboys on the street as they shouted the headlines in hopes of getting her to buy the latest edition of whatever paper they were hawking. The big news story was still the murder of Caesar Young by Nan Patterson, his mistress. Adele rolled her eyes at one of the newsboys and pressed her way into the building. She approached the reception desk where a bored-looking man sat.
“Yes?” he asked.
“I’m here to see Mr. Lucas Schmidt. He’s one of your reporters.”
The man checked a printed list on his desk, running his finger down it for a moment. Then he looked up at Adele. “What was the name again?”
“Schmidt. Lucas Schmidt. He would have just started working recently.”
“I don’t think so. This list is pretty up to date.”
“But I’m sure this is where he works.”
“Well,” the man said suddenly, “that gentleman might know.” He pointed at a man who had just gotten off an elevator, and shouted to him. “Mr. Green! Mr. Green!”
Mr. Green’s head snapped around at the sound of his name, and he walked over to the desk. “Yes, John?”
“This lady could use some assistance.”
He turned to Adele and shook her hand. “Martin Green, New York World. I’m an assistant
editor here. May I help you?”
“Adele Weber, and yes, you can, Mr. Green. I’m looking for one of your other reporters, a Mr. Lucas Schmidt.”
“Sorry, no one by that name works here.” He paused, then, with a little too much eagerness in his voice, said, “Is there a story you’d like to share, Miss Weber? If it’s good, we can get it into the evening edition.”
“Um, no. Are you sure Mr. Schmidt doesn’t work here?”
“Positive. I assign the stories to all the reporters. I know everyone who writes for us.” He frowned. “Why? Is this fellow pretending to be a reporter for the World?”
“Um, no. I must have gotten the name of the paper wrong. I’ll try the others. Good day, Mr. Green.”
“Um, good day, Miss Weber,” he said as Adele scurried away.
Granting the possibility that she had misunderstood, Adele spent the rest of the afternoon checking at every newspaper on Newspaper Row. Not to her surprise, she discovered that not a single paper knew of a reporter named Lucas Schmidt. The only newspaper she skipped over was the Herald, since after checking with every other major city paper, she didn’t feel that a trip uptown to Thirty-Fourth Street was necessary.
Clearly, Mr. Schmidt had lied.
So if Mr. Schmidt didn’t work for the World, or for any other newspaper, just what did he do during the day?
The question possessed Adele, disrupting her sleep as much as her vivid dreams of fire and water. And so, on Tuesday, in the middle of the day so as not to be discovered, Adele did the unthinkable. She went up to Mr. Schmidt’s room and let herself in.
She had been in the room many times before, and at first glance the room looked as pristine as always. Schmidt clearly was fastidious when it came to keeping his personal space clean. The bed was neatly made, the wooden floor was swept, and the chair and table free of dust.
However, there was something different. A book lay on the table, one that Adele knew did not belong to either her or her mother, because it had a colorful dust jacket. She pulled out the chair, sat down, picked up the book, and studied the cover.
She had seen a few books bearing dust jackets, although those jackets had been simple plain white paper covers. She had never yet seen one as elaborate and expensive-looking as the dust jacket for this book. Her eyes were first drawn to the horrific illustration of the steamboat General Slocum that filled the bottom half of the cover. Searing red flames burned away at the right side of the boat, with lines of thick, black smoke hovering above. On the left side of the boat, people were jumping into the water. The picture appeared so vivid to her eyes that she could almost feel the rising flames getting hotter and hotter, the smoke smothering the victims—
She shuddered and focused her eyes on the title of the book. In large letters, the book blared out its title: SHIP ABLAZE. Underneath, the subtitle explained what the book was about: “The Tragedy of the Steamboat General Slocum.”
Finally, her eyes drifted to the smaller text above the title. She read: “On a beautiful spring morning in June 1904, 1,300 New Yorkers boarded the steamer General Slocum for a pleasant daylong excursion. But in thirty minutes, disaster would strike and more than one thousand would perish . . .”
Adele shuddered again, and her chest felt tight. She fought to keep her breath calm and even, while she tried to understand what she was reading.
She opened the book and noticed that the top of the inside jacket flap gave the price of the book: “US $24.95 / Canada $37.95.” Her jaw dropped. Twenty-four dollars and ninety-five cents for a book? Even good books cost no more than a dollar or two.
The inside front cover showed what looked like newspaper headlines, cartoons, and clippings printed on the inside front cover. She ran her fingers over two of the headlines: “Negligence Doubled the Death List” and “ ‘Let Us Die!’ Cry Women at Morgue.” One of the cartoons, titled “Death’s Cruel Harvest,” showed the figure of Death holding a scythe and standing next to a field of fallen flowers with the heads of children. Another, “Death and Greed Partners,” showed a little girl lying on a table. On her left, a man in a coat and top hat counted his money, while on her right, a figure of Death, skull plainly visible and scythe in one hand, caressed the child’s forehead.
Adele felt cold and confused. What in the world was this?
She turned a few pages in and found a printed notice: “Copyright 2003 by EDWARD T. O’DONNELL.” The year made no sense to her. How could she be holding a book from almost one hundred years in the future? And who was this O’Donnell, an Irishman by the sound of his name, to write a book about a tragedy that befell a German community?
A small piece of paper fell out of the book and onto the table. Adele picked it up and examined it. It bore one line: “http://www.general-slocum.com.” She had no idea what it meant; “http” was clearly not a word, although she presumed she knew what the “general-slocum” part referred to.
It must be a joke, she thought. A cruel, elaborate hoax. But the book looked fine, much better than any other book she had ever seen. She started looking through the pages, faster and faster, trying to make sense of it all, when she heard the door open behind her. She quickly closed the book, placed it on the table, and stood up.
Schmidt saw her as soon as he entered. “Miss Weber! What are you doing in my room?”
Emotions of rage and embarrassment fought with each other, and rage won out.
“What am I doing here? What are you doing back here so early?”
“I had forgotten something in my room.”
“Really? What exactly?”
He sighed. “I don’t care for your tone, Miss Weber, nor do I care for your invasion of my privacy. I have to get back to work.”
“Where? At the New York World?”
“Yes. Now please leave my room.” He walked towards her, his eyes darting around.
Adele raised her hand in front of her, palm out. “You don’t work at the New York World, Mr. Schmidt.”
Schmidt stopped a few feet away. “How—what makes you say that?”
“I went looking for you there. They never heard of you. Nor had any other paper.”
“What did you tell them?”
“Oh, nothing at all. It’s not like I had found this yet.” She picked up Ship Ablaze.
Schmidt sprang towards her. “Give that back to me. It’s autographed.”
“What?”
“I mean it’s mine. Hand it over.”
Adele pulled the book close to her body, and Schmidt hesitated. “Not without an explanation,” she said. She waved the book around. “What is this?”
“Nothing you need to concern yourself with.”
“Oh, really? It seems to be a book from the year 2003. Are you sure that it’s not my concern that the current year is only 1904?”
“I—I don’t know what to say.”
“ ‘Die Wahrheit wird euch frei machen,’ ” Adele said.
“Pardon?”
“John, chapter eight, verse thirty-two. ‘The truth shall make you free.’ Tell me the truth.”
“Um. The truth.” He sighed. “I guess I ought to. That book is in fact from the year 2003. It’s the definitive work on the General Slocum tragedy.”
“The General Slocum tragedy,” she repeated.
“Yeah. There were other books written before and after, but this one is still considered the most comprehensive.”
She shook her head. “I don’t understand. That is, I think I understand, but I don’t want to.”
“A normal reaction.”
“Will you tell me what’s going on? Who are you?” She brandished the book even higher. “How is this possible?”
Schmidt crossed his arms. “Miss Weber, let me ask you something. Have you ever heard of an English writer, a man by the name of Herbert George Wells?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Well, one of the books he’s written—at least, I think he’s written it by now—has to do with the concept of time travel.”
&n
bsp; Adele searched her mind, and finally came up with a title. “The Time Machine.”
Schmidt nodded. “Yes. The Time Machine. A man builds a machine that allows him to travel into the past and the future. I stand before you as the final achievement of that dream. In the future, we have figured out how to visit the past.” He paused. “Do you believe me?”
“It seems an impossible fantasy,” Adele said. “And yet—the book—”
“The Time Machine?” Schmidt asked.
Adele glared at him. “No. Your book. The one I’m holding. Ship Ablaze.”
“Oh.” Schmidt’s eyes moved to look at the book. “That one.”
“Yes. This one. I can’t fathom how or why you might have arranged to have that book printed. The only conclusion I can come to is that the book is really from the twenty-first century.” She paused. “Which means that you really have come here from the future.”
He sighed, a world-weary sigh that seemed out of place in a man so young. “I’m not supposed to reveal that, but sometimes it’s so hard to hide the truth.” He walked over to his bed and sat down upon it. “I hope you won’t betray my confidence.”
“So tell me about this. Have you come back to stop this horrible tragedy? Is that why you’re here?”
Schmidt paled, and he didn’t reply.
“What is it?” Adele asked. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m afraid,” he said, “that I’m not here to stop the tragedy. I can’t stop it. No one can. That’s not how time travel works. There are restrictions.”
“Then tell me how time travel works. Perhaps I can figure out a way to get around the restrictions.”
Schmidt smiled. “How might you explain the workings of a telephone to someone in 1804?”
Adele raised a finger. “Do not patronize me, Mr. Schmidt. Perhaps I wouldn’t be able to understand the science or technology behind time travel. But I do understand possibilities. If I knew that a ladder had a rotten rung, and that if someone who climbed it would break the rung and fall, I would be remiss if I didn’t try to save them. Why can’t you do the same?”
“Miss Weber, let me try to use your ladder analogy to make it clear. Imagine time as a sort of ladder. History happens when you climb the rungs. Okay?”