Changing Yesterday

by Sean McMullen

  Beneath the false bottom of the bag were seventeen pounds in banknotes, two gold coins, two pocket watches, five gold rings, a list of names and addresses, a false beard, a wig, and a spare pickwire set.

  Daniel picked up Fox’s radiocomm unit, then hesitated. Were he to switch it on, Liore could track it down with her own radiocomm. Drawing Liore’s attention to the stolen goods was about as dangerous as jumping into a pit full of scorpions, yet it would definitely tell her where she could find the ship carrying Barry and her weapon. She would need her weapon to do whatever was still needed to save the world. Alternatively, he could telegram her from Colombo, but that would give Barry a start of another two weeks.

  Daniel examined the smooth black box. There were several little depressions with studs at the bottom. He tried to remember what Liore did when she activated her own unit, and recalled that she used her thumb to make it work. Holding it as she did, he noted what studs were within reach. Then he remembered that she held it differently when starting it. She only shifted to another grip when she was doing things with it.

  Daniel changed his grip and pressed a stud. Nothing happened. He pressed another with the same result. The third stud caused a small green light to come on. Green probably means the thing is working, Daniel thought hopefully as he slipped the radiocomm into his pocket. Liore would find him first. If she did not kill him on the spot, he could direct her to Barry. Barry would then have the difficult task of accounting for the weapon in his bag.

  ‘Well, what have I got to live for anyway?’ Daniel said to the black radiocomm. ‘I’m not even sixteen and my life is already ruined.’

  The prospect of Barry still having the weapon did not appeal to Daniel, however. Had he found a way to activate it? If so, what might he do with it, if and when Liore caught up with them? If Barry could activate it, he might kill her with it.

  ‘Liore, dead?’ said Daniel. ‘No, never. Not Liore.’ Daniel pondered the problem of activating the weapon. A part of Liore’s body could activate it. Any part, alive or not. It was something to do with what she called DNA, and that had not been discovered yet. What to do? Any part of Liore would probably be good enough, but he had nothing of her. He had been obsessed by Muriel alone, even to the point of keeping a strip of her petticoat that had been used to bandage him. He had kept it, never washing it because it had once belonged to his lost sweetheart. His dried blood was still on the cloth, and the cloth was in his luggage . . . but there was also another strip of her petticoat with it! Liore had been bandaged on that same day, also by Muriel. In his obsession with Muriel, Daniel had kept both strips of petticoat.

  Daniel went to his own suitcase and sliced the lining of the lid open. The folder with Fox’s sketches of Muriel and the two strips of petticoat was hidden inside. Dried blood was on both strips. He pressed one strip against the security pad. Nothing happened. He pressed the other strip against the pad. A faint red light came on. The cloth is stained with Liore’s blood, he thought, and it once brushed against Muriel’s legs.

  The symbolism of the two strips of cloth was all too much for Daniel. He burst into tears and collapsed across his bed, the strips of Muriel’s petticoat clutched tightly in his hands. Presently he remembered that he had duties to perform, duties involving the fate of the world. He rubbed his eyes and sat up, then pocketed Barry’s money and postcards, put Liore’s weapon, uniform and medical kit aside, and began to pack everything else into a cloth lace-up bag that his mother had given him to carry trinkets and souvenirs that he might buy in Colombo and Port Said. He hesitated over the book on human reproductive biology, then decided to keep it as well. After all, Fox had borrowed the book, and Daniel did not want to be Fox’s inferior in any way that could be helped. Weighting the lace-up bag with the German pistol, he went out onto the promenade deck, checked that he was alone, then heaved it into the ocean.

  Daniel now returned to his cabin and sat on the edge of the bed for a long time. He felt wretched, yet in a strange and warped way this suited him. He was sure that he had nothing to live for, so despising himself justified his death. His only wish was to make sure that his death would be in a good cause. Daniel stared at the PR-17. Getting it back into Liore’s hands might save the world, and that was surely a good cause. He also wanted to protect Liore, and to let her know that he had deliberately signalled the weapon’s location to her. If he could not have Muriel’s love, he would have Liore’s approval. He picked up the PR-17.

  Barry had stolen it, so Barry quite probably knew how to make it work. He probably had fingernail parings or hair from Liore’s place. How to mess it up a little so it cannot be used against Liore? he wondered. It was hard to know what to do. Daniel could keep the weapon, but Barry might tell the master-at-arms about it and have Daniel’s cabin searched. If Barry demonstrated its power, the master-at-arms would confiscate it and hand it over to the authorities when the ship reached London. It was currently in Daniel’s power to throw it over the side, but Liore might needit to fight the Lionhearts.

  Daniel knew that guns came apart easily so that they could be cleaned and serviced, and he assumed that the PR-17 was no different. After some experimentation he managed to get a cover off by pushing down on one edge then rotating it. He peered at the internal workings, but not much made any sense to him. On closer examination he found that one tiny switch had writing on it: CAUTION: FIREW DISABLE. It was in a box that also enclosed a little glass tube and some complicated, delicatelooking thing that resembled a honeycomb trailing tiny wires as thin as hairs. At one side of the switch was a black cross, on the other a green tick. FIREW is to do with firing the weapon, Daniel guessed. It must mean FIRE WEAPON, and flicking the switch disables the weapon’s ability to fire, like a pistol’s safety catch. With the end of a pen Daniel pushed the switch across to the green arrow.

  Now the thing will not fire if Barry tries to use it, thought Daniel smugly.

  He examined the cavity further. There were other switches here and there, but the tiny letters on them were cryptic and made no sense to Daniel. One of them had the word TRACE on it. TRACE, thought Daniel. What does TRACE mean? It appeared to be off. He decided to flip it on. Another switch was labelled BC, and it was off. Battle Commander? wondered Daniel. Does this switch have something to do with the Battle Commander? Not knowing what else to do, Daniel flipped this switch as well.

  After flipping two more switches that looked promising, Daniel thought about test-firing the weapon. It seemed like a dangerous idea, but then Daniel reminded himself that he was expendable. If he died, it would be to defend Liore. Liore was definitely worth dying for. She was his commander, she was perfect, incorruptible. He opened the porthole of his cabin, aimed at where he thought the water was, then hesitated. If he died now, Liore would never know that he had died for her.

  ‘What is more important?’ he hissed to himself. ‘To die defending Liore, or to brag about it? Would you die for your queen?’

  Perspiration trickled down the side of Daniel’s face. The weapon might explode like a little bomb.

  ‘Is Liore my queen?’ Daniel asked himself.

  Liore was above courtship, and was absolutely dedicated to her mission into the past. Liore was safe to die for.

  ‘Yes!’ Daniel concluded breathlessly. ‘Liore is my queen, so I can die for her.’

  Before some new twist of logic materialised to stop him, Daniel squeezed the firing stud. Nothing happened. Daniel staggered back from the porthole and collapsed across his bed, the PR-17 still in his hands. He had done it! He had disabled the weapon so that Barry could not use it against Liore. Daniel lay still for two entire minutes, trying to comprehend that he was still alive, then sat up and wrote down all the changes that he had made to the switches so that Liore could reset everything properly when she got the weapon back. Even if she failed to catch Barry, and the little thief got as far as the king, he would be seriously embarrassed when he tried to demonstrate the weapon.

  Finally Daniel pushed the cover
back onto the switch recess and rotated it until it clicked into place. He did not notice a very small pressure switch on the edge, a safety switch that prevented the weapon from being fired if the cover was not in place. Now that the cover had been put back, the weapon was most definitely ready for use.

  Daniel’s father was one of those men who thought that they should be absolutely self-reliant if they ever found themselves cut off from the services of a wife, daughter or maid to do the sewing. Thus he had given Daniel a little sewing kit with ARMY stamped on it to give it a masculine look. The kit contained needles, buttons, a little blade and waxed thread. Mr Lang’s theory was that waxed thread was so strong that you would not need much of it to sew a button on a shirt or mend a tear.

  Daniel took the kit with him as he returned to Barry’s cabin with the weapon in the pillowcase. After pushing the PR-17 back into Barry’s bag, Daniel began to sew up the slit that he had made in the side seam. It was slow work, for the seam faced inwards and he was working blind most of the time, but the bag had other repairs, so Daniel reasoned that once some more wax was melted onto the seam Barry would not notice. With the cabin restored to the way he had found it, Daniel locked the door and went to the infirmary.

  The nurse opened the door when he knocked.

  ‘I came to see how Master Chalmer is recovering,’ Daniel said, going across to the bed where Barry was lying on his side with his mouth over a bedpan.

  ‘Are you a friend of his?’ asked the nurse.

  ‘No, we only met yesterday, on the ship. There are no other boys of fifteen in first class, so we have been keeping each other company.’

  ‘Fifteen!’ exclaimed the nurse. ‘He told the steward in the smoking saloon that he was twenty-two, but that smoking had stunted his growth.’

  ‘I think that was just one of Master Chalmer’s amusing little stories,’ said Daniel.

  ‘The little pig is certainly no charmer.’

  ‘Is this his coat?’ asked Daniel, reaching over to the coat draped over the back of a chair. ‘What a mess.’

  Daniel slipped Barry’s key back into his coat pocket, promised the nurse that he would try to keep Barry out of trouble in future, then left. Returning to his own cabin, he lay down on his bed fully clothed, too keyed up to even close his eyes. Within his pocket was one of the two most advanced communication devices in the world. Now aware of his location was the deadliest killer in the world, and she had probably set off after him already.

  Daniel curled up tightly, emotions and contradictions pouring through his head. Muriel had run off with Fox, who was Daniel’s superior in every way, so his love for Muriel was entirely without hope. All he could do was die, but if he died heroically, there was a chance that Muriel would think the better of him when he was gone. He wanted to die at the hands of Liore, that was one thing he was certain of. It would be like being executed by Napoleon or King Arthur.

  ‘I’m going to die,’ whispered Daniel, again clutching the strips of Muriel’s petticoat in his hand. ‘Muriel, Muriel, will you ever know that I died for love of you?’

  Daniel stroked the strips of petticoat, wishing that they were Muriel’s cheek. Eventually he fell asleep.

  Within a few minutes of leaving the hotel, Liore and Madeline were on the docks. The Millennium was getting steam up, but had very few lights burning. Liore examined it through her small telescope.

  ‘Three men on guard, one visible at the gangway, the other two flanking at forty feet apart. All three will be armed, and they have the bearing of trained guards rather than stewards. I cannot get aboard without a very visible fight.’

  ‘They would not shoot at a girl,’ said Madeline.

  ‘Explain?’

  ‘We must make you look harmless.’

  ‘No target.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘No target means I do not understand.’

  ‘We need a disguise for you.’

  ‘Disguise?’

  ‘A dress.’

  ‘But it is nearly midnight, the dress shops are not open, and there is no time to return to the hotel for one of your dresses.’

  ‘Since when has that stopped you? Come along, I’ll point you at a dress.’

  A minute later Liore had her target acquired. Madeline stayed back in the shadows as Liore walked up to a woman leaning against a gas streetlight.

  ‘Hullo sailor, you just off your ship?’

  The woman was elaborately dressed in lace and frills, and was somewhat fuller of figure than Liore.

  ‘Your clothes, I want them.’

  ‘Cor, now that’s a first. Sorry luv, the wrapping’s not for sale.’

  ‘Take them off. Now.’

  The woman suddenly looked uneasy.

  ‘Horace, I got a bad swell!’ she called.

  A heavily built man swaggered out of the nearby shadows. He was used to intimidating people with his sheer size, and he knew that few could punch hard enough to harm him seriously before he could beat them senseless. Liore’s foot came up to her knee like that of a ballet dancer, then drove straight out into his abdomen. As Horace doubled over Liore seized his head and slammed her knee into his face. Horace collapsed. Liore seized the woman by the arm, twisted it and pressed a nerve. The pain was so great that the woman only wheezed rather than screamed.

  Liore wished that she had had more experience with wearing female clothing and footwear as she teetered up the gangway behind Madeline. The deputy master-at-arms confronted the pair. He was not sure what to make of them. Madeline had been assigned the role of negotiator.

  ‘Hullo luv, you might remember us from the trip from Colombo,’ she said cheerily.

  ‘I’ve only just joined the ship,’ replied the man suspiciously. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I forgot a bag in me cabin when I left the ship, I’d just like to get it back.’

  ‘You will have to see the purser for the key.’

  ‘Oh. Well we know where pursey lives. You just stay here.’

  ‘Hurry up, the ship is about to sail.’

  Liore and Madeline made for the second-class cabins. Those that were unoccupied were unlocked, so they were soon out of sight.

  ‘The ship definitely has almost no passengers,’ said Liore. ‘This is very unusual.’

  ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘I become a boy again and join the crew.’

  From somewhere nearby there was a scream of outrage. Liore’s victim had finally been discovered and set free from the strips of Madeline’s petticoat that had been used to bind and gag her. People began to gather on the wharf.

  ‘Some filthy young deviant stole my clothes,’ she shrieked, but the rest of her words were lost as the Millennium’s horn announced that the ship was casting off.

  ‘I can’t go ashore with all that going on,’ said Madeline.

  ‘Agreed,’ said Liore reluctantly. ‘Best you hide in a cabin while I arrange identities for us. Prepare to cut your hair.’

  ‘My hair?’ exclaimed Madeline. ‘Cut it? But –’

  ‘While we are aboard this ship you must be a boy. It is one of many prices for living as I do.’

  The ship was about a hundred yards from the shore when the master-at-arms came in search of the two women his deputy had allowed aboard the ship, and the two stewards who were meant to have seen them off. Liore was dressed as a saloon steward and standing where one of the real stewards had been.

  ‘Boy, did you see two women wandering about here?’ the master-at-arms demanded. ‘I’ve been looking everywhere for them.’

  ‘Yes, sir, and they waved to me and went down the gangway. They were carrying three bottles of spirits.’

  ‘What? Why didn’t you stop them?’

  ‘Your deputy let them aboard, sir.’

  ‘The young idiot! They were harbour trollops, sneaking aboard to steal liquor.’

  ‘One of them said she had bought the bottles in Colombo, sir.’

  ‘Those three bottles will come out of his pay! Now rem
ember, you are a patrol steward, which means you are meant to keep the ship secure, not stand about looking decorative. What is your name?’

  ‘Kingsley, sir.’

  The master-at-arms held a clipboard up to a lantern.

  ‘Albert Kingsley, patrol steward,’ he said, nodding. ‘Perkins was meant to be flanking the gangway with you. Where is he?’

  ‘George Perkins, patrol steward, reporting, sir!’ said Madeline behind him.

  The master-at-arms turned.

  ‘Now that’s a better attitude – but aren’t you two a little young to be patrol stewards?’

  ‘We are cadets, sir.’

  ‘Cadets? We have no cadets.’

  ‘With respect, sir, we do indeed,’ said Liore firmly. ‘There is a secret Lionheart training school for cadets in the mountains near Adelaide.’

  ‘Is there indeed? What sort of training have you had?’

  ‘Sufficient training to know not to stop the two women,’ said Madeline. ‘They would have created a fuss, so it was more prudent to let them escape with the stolen bottles than draw attention to the ship, especially with police on the wharf attending that woman whose clothes were stolen.’

  This had not occurred to the master-at-arms. He smiled after a moment.

  ‘Good work,’ he said. ‘I must learn more of this new cadet programme when I get back. Carry on.’

  Once they were alone again, Madeline whispered to Liore.

  ‘Where did you get our clothes and papers?’

  ‘They were superfluous to the needs of the previous owners.’

  Madeline looked over the side, but there was nothing to be seen but glints on the waves from the distant lights.

  ‘Does that mean what I think it means?’

  ‘I am a warrior, and this is war. Now repeat our names to me.’

  ‘I’m George Perkins, you are Albert Kingsley.’

  ‘Remember that until we reach Colombo, our lives depend on it.’

  ‘What now?’

  ‘We go to their cabins and go to bed.’

  Some time later, once she was off duty and alone in Kingsley’s cabin, Liore checked her radiocomm again. The signal from the radiocomm aboard the Andromeda was still clear and strong. There was now a tiny red circle beside it.