Time Travel Omnibus Volume 2

by Anthology

  “Well, that and something for all of our society to look to. We need inspiration, Henry, inspiration to make more of ourselves. You can be that inspiration!”

  The vehicle stopped and the door slid open. They were in a large empty warehouse, parked under a feeble pool of light cast by the only two fitfully-working bulbs that were hanging from the high ceiling. Arnold walked into the light to greet Henry as he got up from his seat and stepped out.

  “How can a broken-down drunk be inspiration?” asked Henry. “You can be so because we made you so!” said Arnold. “Come join us.” He almost whispered this last.

  Henry shook his head. “No. I want to go home.”

  Arnold grimaced. “You can’t, even if I could let you. I’m sorry that’s your answer.”

  There was a distant whine near Henry’s ear, a mosquito maybe, although he’d not seen or heard any insects up until now, and then he felt a small sting in his neck. He swatted at it, but already things were going dim. As he fell forward, he managed to focus for a brief second on the gurney that rushed up to break his fall.

  Episode Ten:

  The Henry Effect

  The space car comes in for as smooth a landing as can be expected, considering the circumstances. “You’re in,” comes the distant voice of Slam Rankin, now promoted to Sector One. “Good luck.”

  “Thanks.”

  He steps out, views the unfamiliar landscape, almost alien in proportions. Buildings are too small and spaced too far apart, the riot of colors is almost too much for his unaccustomed eyes.

  And there are more lights here than last time—a bad sign. Too many more joining this and the Space Cops will collapse. There is also no movement at all, and the silence is a different sort of quiet, unlike anything he has ever experienced in his life.

  The walk is a short one, due to the space car being able to land in such small areas. Trees, scorched by the passing rockets, are already healing themselves, fast motion, almost liquid as they turn from shriveled and black to grey to erect and brown and green.

  The entrance is open to him. After a pause to collect his thoughts, he steps across the threshold and into the room. They are there, the two of them, sitting as he expected to find them.

  Henry looks up. “Arnold! So good to see you! Come in, come in.”

  Michael looks up from the nonsense patterns playing on the screen, smiles when he sees Arnold. He waves the hand that is not holding the bottle of beer, grinning. “Hiya Arnold. Been watching you on TV.” With the hand holding the beer he gestures at the black and white screen.

  Henry gets up and walks to another room, comes out holding a second bottle of beer, which he hands to Arnold. Arnold’s protests that he is on duty are ignored.

  When they are all settled in on the couch and chairs Henry smiles and says, “Good life you brought me to, Arnold. And I sure like what you’ve done to my old show.”

  Arnold is about to say something, but the nonsense on the screen fades and he is hushed. “The show’s back on,” says Michael. “Wait until the next commercial.”

  Arnold shrugs his shoulders, takes a sip of the beer, and leans back to watch himself, Henry and Michael sitting in a room drinking beer and watching TV.

  All up and down the street, thousands of others share in the experience. Ratings go through the roof.

  Eventually, Arnold goes and grabs another beer, settles down to enjoy the show.

  WHAT IF . . .

  Isaac Asimov

  Norman and Livvy were late, naturally, since catching a train is always a matter of last-minute delays, so they had to take the only available seat in the coach. It was the one toward the front, the one with nothing before it but the seat that faced the wrong way, with its back hard against the front partition. While Norman heaved the suitcase onto the rack, Livvy found herself chafing a little.

  If a couple took the wrong-way seat before them, they would be staring self-consciously into each other’s faces all the hours it would take to reach New York; or else, which was scarcely better, they would have to erect synthetic barriers of newspaper. Still, there was no use in taking a chance on there being another unoccupied double seat elsewhere in the train.

  Norman didn’t seem to mind, and that was a little disappointing to Livvy. Usually they held their moods in common. That, Norman claimed, was why he remained sure that he had married the right girl.

  He would say, “We fit each other, Livvy, and that’s the key fact.

  When you’re doing a jigsaw puzzle and one piece fits another, that’s it. There are no other possibilities, and of course there are no other girls.”

  And she would laugh and say, “If you hadn’t been on the streetcar that day, you would probably never have met me. What would you have done then?”

  “Stayed a bachelor. Naturally. Besides, I would have met you through Georgette another day.”

  “It wouldn’t have been the same.”

  “Sure it would.”

  “No, it wouldn’t. Besides, Georgette would never have introduced me. She was interested in you herself, and she’s the type who knows better than to create a possible rival.”

  “What nonsense.”

  Livvy asked her favorite question: “Norman, what if you had been one minute later at the streetcar corner and had taken the next car? What do you suppose would have happened?”

  “And what if fish had wings and all of them flew to the top of the mountains? What would we have to eat on Fridays then?” But they had caught the streetcar, and fish didn’t have wings, so that now they had been married for five years and ate fish on Fridays. And because they had been married five years, they were going to celebrate by spending a week in New York.

  Then she remembered the present problem. “I wish we could have found some other seat.”

  Norman said, “Sure. So do I. But no one has taken it yet, so we’ll have relative privacy as far as Providence, anyway.”

  Livvy was unconsoled, and felt herself justified when a plump little man walked down the central aisle of the coach. Now, where had he come from? The train was halfway between Boston and Providence, and if he had had a seat, why hadn’t he kept it? She took out her vanity and considered her reflection. She had a theory that if she ignored the little man, he would pass by. So she concentrated on her light-brown hair which, in the rush of catching the train, had become disarranged just a little; at her blue eyes, and at her little mouth with the plump lips which Norman said looked like a permanent kiss.

  Not bad, she thought.

  Then she looked up, and the little man was in the seat opposite. He caught her eye and frowned widely. A series of lines curled about the edges of his smile. He lifted his hat hastily and put it down beside him on top of the little black box he had been carrying. A circle of white hair instantly sprang up stiffly about the large bald spot that made the center of his skull a desert.

  She could not help smiling back a little, but then she caught sight of the black box again and the smile faded. She yanked at Norman’s elbow.

  Norman looked up from his newspaper. He had startlingly dark eyebrows that almost met above the bridge of his nose, giving him a formidable first appearance. But they and the dark eyes beneath bent upon her now with only the usual look of pleased and somewhat amused affection.

  He said, “What’s up?” He did not look at the plump little man opposite.

  Livvy did her best to indicate what she saw by a little unobtrusive gesture of her hand and head. But the little man was watching and she felt a fool, since Norman simply stared at her blankly.

  Finally she pulled him closer and whispered, “Don’t you see what’s printed on his box?”

  She looked again as she said it, and there was no mistake. It was not very prominent, but the light caught it slantingly and it was a slightly more glistening area on a black background. In flowing script it said, “What If.”

  The little man was smiling again. He nodded his head rapidly and pointed to the words and then to himself seve
ral times over.

  Norman put his paper aside. “I’ll show you.” He leaned over and said, “Mr. If?”

  The little man looked at him eagerly.

  “Do you have the time, Mr. If?”

  The little man took out a large watch from his vest pocket and displayed the dial.

  “Thank you, Mr. If,” said Norman. And again in a whisper, “See, Livvy.”

  He would have returned to his paper, but the little man was opening his box and raising a finger periodically as he did so, to enforce their attention. It was just a slab of frosted glass that he removed—about six by nine inches in length and width and perhaps an inch thick. It had beveled edges, rounded corners, and was completely featureless. Then he took out a little wire stand on which the glass slab fitted comfortably. He rested the combination on his knees and looked proudly at them.

  Livvy said, with sudden excitement, “Heavens, Norman, it’s a picture of some sort.”

  Norman bent close. Then he looked at the little man. “What’s this? A new kind of television?”

  The little man shook his head, and Livvy said, “No, Norman, it’s us.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t you see? That’s the streetcar we met on. There you are in the back seat wearing that old fedora I threw away three years ago. And that’s Georgette and myself getting on. The fat lady’s in the way. Now! Can’t you see us?”

  He muttered, “It’s some sort of illusion.”

  “But you see it too, don’t you? That’s why he calls this, ‘What If.’ It will show us what if. What if the streetcar hadn’t swerved . . .” She was sure of it. She was very excited and very sure of it. As she looked at the picture in the glass slab, the late afternoon sunshine grew dimmer and the inchoate chatter of the passengers around and behind them began fading.

  How she remembered that day. Norman knew Georgette and had been so embarrassed that he was forced into gallantry and then into conversation. An introduction from Georgette was not even necessary. By the time they got off the streetcar, he knew where she worked.

  She could still remember Georgette glowering at her, sulkily forcing a smile when they themselves separated. Georgette said, “Norman seems to like you.”

  Livvy replied, “Oh, don’t be silly! He was just being polite. But he is nice-looking isn’t he?”

  It was only six months after that that they married.

  And now here was that same streetcar again, with Norman and herself and Georgette. As she thought that, the smooth train noises, the rapid clack-clack of wheels, vanished completely. Instead, she was in the swaying confines of the streetcar. She had just boarded it with Georgette at the previous stop.

  Livvy shifted weight with the swaying of the streetcar, as did forty others, sitting and standing, all to the same monotonous and rather ridiculous rhythm. She said, “Somebody’s motioning at you, Georgette. Do you know him?”

  “At me?” Georgette directed a deliberately casual glance over her shoulder. Her artificially long eyelashes flickered. She said, “I know him a little. What do you suppose he wants?”

  “Let’s find out,” said Livvy. She felt pleased and a little wicked. Georgette had a well-known habit of hoarding her male acquaintances, and it was rather fun to annoy her this way. And besides, this one seemed quite . . . interesting.

  She snaked past the lines of standees, and Georgette followed without enthusiasm. It was just as Livvy arrived opposite the young man’s seat that the streetcar lurched heavily as it rounded a curve. Livvy snatched desperately in the direction of the straps. Her fingertips caught and she held on. It was a long moment before she could breathe. For some reason, it had seemed that there were no straps close to be reached. Somehow, she felt that by all the laws of nature she should have fallen.

  The young man did not look at her. He was smiling at Georgette and rising from his seat. He had astonishing eyebrows that gave him a rather competent and self-confident appearance. Livvy decided that she definitely liked him. Georgette was saying, “Oh no, don’t bother. We’re getting off in about two stops.”

  They did. Livvy said, “I thought we were going to Sachs.”

  “We are. There’s just something I remember having to attend to here. It won’t take but a minute.”

  “Next stop, Providence!” the loud-speakers were blaring. The train was slowing and the world of the past had shrunk itself into the glass slab once more. The little man was still smiling at them.

  Livvy turned to Norman. She felt a little frightened. “Were you through all that, too?”

  He said, “What happened to the time? We can’t be reaching Providence yet?” He looked at his watch. “I guess we are.” Then, to Livvy, “You didn’t fall that time.”

  “Then you did see it?” She frowned. “Now, that’s like Georgette. I’m sure there was no reason to get off the streetcar except to prevent my meeting you. How long had you known Georgette then, Norman?”

  “Not very long. Just enough to be able to recognize her at sight and to feel that I ought to offer her my seat.”

  Livvy curled her lip.

  Norman grinned, “You can’t be jealous of a might-have-been, kid. Besides, what difference would it have made? I’d have been sufficiently interested in you to work out a way of meeting you.”

  “You didn’t even look at me.”

  “I hardly had the chance.”

  “Then how would you have met me?”

  “Some way. I don’t know how. But you’ll admit this is a rather foolish argument we’re having.”

  They were leaving Providence. Livvy felt a trouble in her mind. The little man had been following their whispered conversation, with only the loss of his smile to show that he understood. She said to him, “Can you show us more?”

  Norman interrupted, “Wait now, Livvy. What are you to try to do?”

  She said, “I want to see our wedding day. What it would have been if I hadn’t caught the strap.”

  Norman was visibly annoyed. “Now, that’s not fair. We might not have been married on the same day, you know.”

  But she said, “Can you show it to me, Mr. If?” and the little man nodded.

  The slab of glass was coming alive again, glowing a little. Then the light collected and condensed into figures. A tiny sound of organ music was in Livvy’s ears without there actually being sound.

  Norman said with relief, “Well, there I am. That’s our wedding. Are you satisfied?”

  The train sounds were disappearing again, and the last thing Livvy heard was her own voice saying, “Yes, there you are. But where am I?”

  Livvy was well back in the pews. For a while she had not expected to attend at all. In the past months she had drifted further and further away from Georgette, without quite knowing why. She had heard of her engagement only through a mutual friend, and, of course, it was to Norman. She remembered very clearly that day, six months before, when she had first seen him on the streetcar. It was the time Georgette had so quickly snatched her out of sight. She had met him since on several occasions, but each time Georgette was with him, standing between.

  Well, she had no cause for resentment; the man was certainly none of hers. Georgette, she thought, looked more beautiful than she really was. And he was very handsome indeed.

  She felt sad and rather empty, as though something had gone wrong—something that she could not quite outline in her mind. Georgette had moved up the aisle without seeming to see her, but earlier she had caught his eyes and smiled at him. Livvy thought he had smiled in return.

  She heard the words distantly as they drifted back to her, “I now pronounce you—”

  The noise of the train was back. A woman swayed down the aisle, herding a little boy back to their seats. There were intermittent bursts of girlish laughter from a set of four teenage girls halfway down the coach. A conductor hurried past on some mysterious errand.

  Livvy was frozenly aware of it all.

  She sat there, staring straight ahead, while the trees out
side blended into a fuzzy, furious green and the telephone poles galloped past.

  She said, “It was she you married.”

  He stared at her for a moment and then one side of his mouth quirked a little. He said lightly, “I didn’t really, Olivia. You’re still my wife, you know. Just think about it for a few minutes.”

  She turned to him. “Yes, you married me—because I fell in your lap. If I hadn’t, you would have married Georgette. If she hadn’t wanted you, you would have married someone else. You would have married anybody. So much for your jigsaw-puzzle pieces.”

  Norman said very slowly, “Well-I’ll-be-darned!” He put both hands to his head and smoothed down the straight hair over his ears where it had a tendency to tuft up. For the moment it gave him the appearance of trying to hold his head together. He said, “Now, look here, Livvy, you’re making a silly fuss over a stupid magician’s trick. You can’t blame me for something I haven’t done.”

  “You would have done it.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You’ve seen it.”

  “I’ve seen a ridiculous piece of—hypnotism, I suppose.” His voice suddenly raised itself into anger. He turned to the little man opposite. “Off with you, Mr. If, or whatever your name is. Get out of here. We don’t want you. Get out before I throw your little trick out the window and you after it.”

  Livvy yanked at his elbow. “Stop it. Stop it! You’re in a crowded train.”

  The little man shrank back into the corner of the seat as far as he could go and held his little black box behind him. Norman looked at him, then at Livvy, then at the elderly lady across the way who was regarding him with patent disapproval.

  He turned pink and bit back a pungent remark. They rode in frozen silence to and through New London.

  Fifteen minutes past New London, Norman said, “Livvy!”

  She said nothing. She was looking out the window but saw nothing in the glass.

  He said again, “Livvy! Livvy! Answer me!”

  She said dully, “What do you want?”