Stowaway in Time

by Cathy Peper

  “Then what am I to do? How can I survive here, alone, in the nineteenth century? I have no family, no money.” She heard the rising hysteria in her voice. “How will I make a living? Women can’t vote and have few rights.”

  “You are not our responsibility, Miss Merrell. You would still be in your own time, hounding other people, if you hadn’t pursued us so relentlessly.”

  “Bryce,” Ari cut in.

  He gave her an impatient look, but reined in his temper. “I own several shops here in St. Louis. You can have a job working at one of them.”

  “What? No, I don’t want to be a shopgirl.”

  Bryce raised his brows. “Too good to work in a shop?”

  Maybe. “That’s not what I meant. I’m a reporter. I have no experience in sales.”

  “Then work for one of the local papers. I have some influence in town. Perhaps I can get you on.”

  “This is a lot to take in,” Ari said. “You can stay here for a few days while you make some decisions about your future.”

  “Absolutely not. Have you forgotten how she treated us in the twenty-first century? No, I will give her a sum of money and help her find employment, but that’s my final offer and damn generous if you ask me.”

  “I don’t know what would have happened to me if Victoria’s mother hadn’t helped me, Bryce. Or what you would have done if I hadn’t found you. Diamond’s right. We owe her something.”

  “I offered her something. My sympathy for this woman only stretches so far.”

  “I know, but I can’t abandon her. Go back to your meeting at the bank. We will figure something out.”

  Bryce made a sound of impatience, but didn’t argue. He dropped a kiss on his wife’s cheek and shot one last glare at Diamond before leaving the room, his posture stiff, his gait marred only by a slight dependence on his cane.

  “I understand how difficult this must be for you,” Ari said.

  “How could you? You wanted to travel to the past. Planned for it. Something about your brother…” Diamond frowned. She’d been so upset she hadn’t been paying full attention. “Your brother was here? In the nineteenth century? Is he a time traveler too?” Hope rose again.

  “No, Sebastien has never used the stone. But I have. I was born in 1784.”

  Diamond shook her head. “I knew something was off about Bryce, but you seemed like a normal person.”

  “When we met, I had already spent four years in the twenty-first century. I had learned to adjust. You will do the same.”

  Diamond’s head spun. “If you traveled to the future and Bryce came after you, there must be two time travel devices.”

  “No. I’m sorry. It’s complicated.” Ari took a deep breath. “After I traveled to the future, I gave my necklace to a friend, and she traveled to the past. Bryce took the necklace from her and came to the future.”

  “That’s when I come into the story. I knew Bryce was hiding something.”

  “We weren’t hiding anything bad. Can you imagine what would happen if people discovered time travel was possible? Everyone would want to do it and that would be very dangerous. Just by traveling to the future, Bryce changed some things in the past. He put my brother in danger. We had to go back and fix the problems, but then we got stuck here.” Her tone was placid as if she were telling a story about someone else.

  “You didn’t mind coming back.” Diamond found it hard to believe. “I’m sure you missed things from the future, but you were happy to get home.”

  Ari nodded. “Bryce wanted to stay in the twenty-first century, but I’m happier here, where I belong. I understand your position. But I also know you must adapt. Your life is here now. You must make the most of it.”

  “I won’t accept that. What about your friend, the one you gave the necklace to? Did she ever get back to the twenty-first century?”

  “No, she married my brother and chose to remain with him.”

  “How did she manage?” Diamond couldn’t imagine giving up so much for a man.

  “It wasn’t easy, but she loves him. I will introduce her to you. She can give you advice.”

  Diamond tried to cover her surprise. She found it astounding that these people were all still alive. Wasn’t life expectancy much lower in the nineteenth century? “Okay.” She mentally kicked herself as soon as the word left her mouth. Nothing about this situation was “okay.”

  “I’m afraid I have to rescind my invitation to stay here. Bryce won’t stand for it. But I won’t leave you on the street. Do you need a place to stay?”

  “I have a room at a hotel with a friend, but I can’t keep sponging off him. He has to return to his life and I—well, I thought I could return to mine. If that’s not possible, I don’t know what to do.”

  Ari’s brows raised. “A male friend? Consider marrying him. This may not sit well with you, but the best position for a woman of this time period is that of a wife.”

  “I’ve only known him for two weeks and he’s due back at his regiment. Not to mention the tiny problem that he hasn’t asked me to marry him and I can’t imagine why he would.”

  “You’re not romantically involved?”

  “We’re not sleeping together if that’s what you’re asking. We’ve been busy just trying to stay alive.” Diamond clamped her mouth shut. Sarcasm wouldn’t help. She needed to remain calm, if such a thing was even possible in this nightmare scenario. “Please, Ari. Leave a message for Hannah. Ask her to come back.”

  “Finish your tea. I will talk to Bryce tonight. We’ll consider trying to contact Hannah, but I still think it’s too risky.” Ari raised a hand as Diamond tried to interrupt her.

  “Hear me out. If you don’t want to come work for us, your best option would be to marry. I think I can convince Bryce to give you a dowry. Maybe that would entice your young man to come around?”

  Diamond closed her eyes, wishing she could close herself off to reality. “You’re willing to bribe someone to marry me?”

  “It’s not a bribe. Parents have been providing dowries for their daughters for centuries. It’s an established practice which only went out of fashion in the twentieth century.”

  “I’m not your daughter.”

  “No, but I feel somewhat responsible for your predicament.”

  “Why not just give me the money?” Did it matter? She didn’t want a payoff; she wanted to go home. But a payoff would be better than nothing.

  “Bryce is from this time period. He won’t feel comfortable letting you handle the money.”

  Diamond threw up her hands. “That’s crazy.” She searched for a way out of this mess, an advantage she could leverage. Only blackmail came to mind. “I could go to the press. Tell them about the time travel.”

  Ari’s face hardened. “I already told you how dangerous that is. Time weaves its fabric to a particular pattern. Break the pattern and the whole picture changes.”

  “I don’t care. I can’t worry about the fabric of time when my whole life is ruined.”

  “You don’t mean that. Not in the long run. Besides, no one will believe you. They will think you’re crazy.”

  “Someone might believe it.”

  “Don’t threaten me.” Ari warned. “If I were to tell Bryce about this, he would refuse to help you. He might do worse. I want to help you; don’t make me change my mind.”

  Diamond stared down at her tea. She preferred to go down swinging, but she felt guilty for threatening Ari when she’d been nothing but kind. She could even understand the woman’s reluctance to risk her daughter. Diamond wished she’d never even heard of time travel.

  “I’ll provide you with a new wardrobe. And something for your friend. Our shops are the finest in the city.”

  When the door closed behind Ari, Diamond swallowed the rest of her tea. It was lukewarm, but still rich with spices. She took a bite of her cookie. It tasted of ginger and was delicious, but she had no appetite. She had come here full of hope, certain she would be home in a matter of hours. Now he
r home was forever out of reach. As she stared down at the cookie, tears welled up in her eyes. She blinked them back, but one escaped and splashed onto the fine china plate. Brought to tears twice within an hour when it usually took broken bones to bring her so low.

  What had she done to deserve such a fate?

  Twelve

  Chapter 12

  When Jesse saw Diamond get into the carriage with an older woman, he went back to the hotel. It seemed things were going well for Diamond and the Pooles would help her. Soon he could rejoin the Confederate Army. Not that he wanted to. He already felt sick of bloodshed, poor food and living rough. But it was his duty. He had never wanted the situation to come to war, but once it had, he had done as his father wished and signed up to fight for his homeland. That committed him for the next eighteen months at least.

  He stopped by a newsstand on the way back to the hotel and bought a copy of every paper they carried. He hoped to discover the fate of his regiment and the situation in New Madrid. As far as he knew, his sister was still living in their house in New Madrid, but he hoped she had fled to their father once it became clear the town would fall to the Yankees. Their father should never have left her alone in the first place, but he wanted someone to watch the property.

  Jesse ordered a drink at the bar and settled in with the papers. They offered no definitive news, but as he suspected, losing Island #10 had been costly for the Confederacy. The Union now controlled the Mississippi River, a vital trade route, all the way to Memphis. The Yankees had also taken close to two thousand prisoners, including most of his regiment. He hoped Cole had escaped.

  In better news, it appeared the Yankees had taken New Madrid with few casualties. He found no mention of his sister, but one article reported his home was being used for Union headquarters. The thought of Union soldiers living in his house, sleeping in his bed, and eating from his dishes left a bad taste in his mouth, but at least the house still stood. There was no mention in the article about violence to civilians. Janet should be safe.

  After reading news of the war, Jesse skimmed the other stories, all the while monitoring the entrance to the hotel. He was almost out of reading material when Diamond returned to the hotel. One glance at her grim expression and drooping shoulders told him things had not gone as she had hoped. He set the newspapers aside and entered the lobby.

  She didn’t notice him coming and jumped when he laid a hand on her arm. “Jesse,” she said, her hand flying to her throat. “You startled me.”

  “Is everything all right?” He blamed himself for allowing her to go off alone with that woman. “Where did you go when you left the shop?”

  “To Ari’s house.”

  “Were you able to get what they took from you?”

  “No. They can’t help me, Jesse.”

  To his surprise, she didn’t sound angry. She sounded defeated. “Can’t or won’t?” he asked, barely able to recognize the Valkyrie who had dragged him across Reelfoot Lake in the woman in front of him.

  She shrugged. “Does it matter?”

  “It matters. They are powerful people, but we will keep after them.”

  “It won’t do any good, Jesse. They no longer have what I need.”

  “What is this mysterious thing? You might as well tell me now.” He didn’t understand what could be so important that she refused to trust him.

  “Can we go up to my room to talk?”

  “I can’t come to your room without destroying your reputation.” As capable as she usually was, at times she appeared naïve.

  “I don’t care—” she broke off. “Where else can we talk in private?”

  He considered suggesting they get a cup of tea in the restaurant, but Diamond looked ready to shatter. “Let’s go for a walk.”

  She took the arm he offered, and they left the hotel. They kept quiet as they passed other pedestrians. Carriages rumbled through the streets, but he steered them away from the center of town. By the time they reached a grassy area where cows grazed in front of a building with arched windows and a central tower, Diamond appeared less vulnerable, but still unlike her usual self.

  “How strange,” she said, pointing to the cows. “We’re not that far from the city.”

  “I’ve heard there used to be a lake here. City officials filled it in after a cholera epidemic.”

  “Do they happen often? Cholera epidemics?”

  “Filling in the pond helped. I don’t think St. Louis has had a major outbreak in a decade.” They strolled around the edges of the depression where the lake had once been, avoiding the cows. It was impossible to avoid the smell, however, which lingered in the air.

  “I might as well tell you everything—not that you’ll believe me.”

  “You’re not a liar, Diamond.” Not by nature, anyway. If she was a spy, she lied for her trade, not for inclination.

  “I’ll exaggerate if it makes a better story, but no, I don’t lie.” She picked her way through the field, dodging the cow patties. “I’m not from here, Jesse. Until two weeks ago I was living in the twenty-first century. I followed Bryce and Ari because I knew there was something suspicious about them. They led me into the country where they used a time travel device, a magic stone, which transported them to 1812, but since I was farther away from the source, I only came back to 1862. That’s the theory, anyway.”

  Jesse stiffened, his hand curling into a fist. “If you don’t want to tell me, you don’t have to, but I think after all we’ve been through, you wouldn’t try to fob such nonsense off on me.”

  “See. I said you wouldn’t believe me. I threatened to go to the press, but Ari’s right. They would only think I’m crazy.”

  Jesse frowned. She didn’t argue with him or try to defend her ridiculous story. He remembered her pack, knife and water bottle, all things he had never seen before. Was there any chance she was telling the truth? “Who wins this war? If you’re really from the future, you must know.”

  She turned somber eyes upon him. “The North will eventually crush the South.”

  Jesse felt like she’d stabbed him in the gut. Sure, things were going poorly for the Confederates in the west, but they were winning battles in the east. Then he realized the other word she had used. Eventually. This horrible war had already lasted almost a year. The South had predicted a quick and easy victory against the incompetent Northern Aggressors. That had not come to pass, but how much longer could the war drag on? How many more people would have to die? “How long does the war last?” She has no more knowledge than I do. Does she?

  “The South surrenders in 1865.”

  Three more years of this suffering, only to end up in defeat? Jesse didn’t think he could bear it. He wanted to walk on forever, vanishing into the horizon. But that would mean desertion and Weber’s didn’t desert. They finished their assignments.

  The sun shone down through the clouds and the cows grazed contently, unaware of the violence not too far away. “Assuming I believe you, how is such a thing possible?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t think it was possible, but here I am.”

  Did he really believe her? He wasn’t sure, but continued as if he did. “You went after the Pooles to find this magic stone, but they no longer have it? Do they know where it is?”

  “They claim their daughter used it to return to the twenty-first century.”

  “Do you think they were telling you the truth?”

  Diamond nodded. “Ari was kind to me. Bryce, not so much, but I gave him a hard time in the twenty-first century. I suppose he thinks I deserve his abandonment.”

  Though Jesse had never met the man, he’d heard rumors of Bryce’s ruthless business practices. But his stomach twisted at the thought of the man pitting his power and influence against Diamond.

  “Ari would help me if she could. She’s giving me a new wardrobe, as if clothes could replace a stolen life.”

  This is insane. But Diamond spoke in a matter-of-fact tone. She dropped Jesse’s arm and drew within a
few feet of a calf. The animal watched them with soft brown eyes, apparently unafraid. A cow called after it and the spindly-legged creature obediently lumbered over to its mother.

  He gazed beyond the cows at a row of houses. A steeple rose in the distance. The cows didn’t really belong here, even though they were on the outskirts of the city. “So you’re telling me that Bryce Poole, a wealthy St. Louis businessman, is a time traveler from the future.”

  “Not exactly. According to Ari, both she and Bryce were born in the eighteenth century. They traveled to the future and when they came back, I got caught up in their wake.”

  It might explain why Diamond was so inept at simple tasks, despite her grit. He’d assumed she relied on servants to do the work, but perhaps people didn’t need to light fires or clean fish in the future. “Have you been to St. Louis before? What does it look like in your time?”

  “No cows, that’s for sure. It has skyscrapers, buildings twenty or more stories tall, and it isn’t even a big city by twenty-first century standards. Most roads are paved, and people no longer use horses. They drive cars, motor-driven vehicles originally called horseless carriages.”

  Jesse couldn’t imagine how a vehicle could move without a horse or mule to pull it. And he didn’t understand how a building twenty stories tall wouldn’t collapse under its own weight. “And New Madrid? Does it also have tall buildings and cars?”

  “I’ve never been to New Madrid, but it’s a small town. No tall buildings. Cars, however, are everywhere.”

  “My home?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. Probably gone.”

  “Do I survive the war?”

  “I don’t know.”

  That made sense. It’s not like he could reel off a list of those who had lived and died in the Mexican War. Only a few of the famous ones. Apparently he wasn’t going to be famous. Not that he expected he would be, but still, didn’t all soldiers go off to war with dreams of glory?