“I could not do less,” the countess said. “In recognition of the historic friendship between our two countries. Mother Russia never forgets.”
“Of course,” Ves said. “But nevertheless, I feel I must thank you. I hope we may meet again.”
“Undoubtedly,” Tatiana Petrovna said. “The travelers between the times are a brave and hearty band. Once you are a member, it is hard to resist the lure of the It. We will meet again, at some unknown shore in some ancient time…”
“You’ll meet again for dinner tonight,” Burr said. “Save the romantic farewell until you need it.”
The trolley entered a tube-like tunnel, then the wheel-clack sound stopped and the trolley began swaying and bouncing. When it emerged from the tunnel a few seconds later it was about twenty feet above the ground, swaying gently, and the track had disappeared.
“What happened?” Ves asked, sticking his head out the window and trying to find what was holding them up.
“The trolley has switched from tracks to cables,” Burr told him. “We cross over the Hudson on a pair of overhead cables. Saves the problem of having to build a bridge.”
“Aha!” Ves said nervously, “very clever. Thick cables?”
“Haven’t lost a trolley in months,” Burr reassured him. He laughed at Ves’s expression. “Welcome to New York, Prime,” he said.
“New York Prime,” Ves repeated. “Sounds like a cut of beef.”
The trolley service terminated in a large trolley barn on the Manhattan side of the river. A variety of vehicles awaited them at the taxi exit to the bam: checker cabs, yellow cabs, hansom cabs, cabriolets, barouches, chariots, hackneys, victorias, a charabanc, a jinrikisha, and a dogcart. “Pick a conveyance,” Burr said. “I will drop you at your hotel and continue on. Dinner in about four hours; that should give you enough time to relax and um—oh, you haven’t any luggage, have you. Perhaps a bit of shopping.”
“An impressive variety,” Tatiana Petrovna said, “but I see no droshki.”
“A serious oversight,” Burr said. “I shall inform the town council.”
They settled on one of the victorias, where they could sit comfortably facing each other. “Cultural shock,” Ves said. “I feel a slight case of confusion at this mix of cultures. I mean, look at this block we’re passing: a small Roman temple, a pair of brownstones, a Victorian manor house, and a glass-faced office building. And they all look new.”
“Not new,” Burr said, “just well cared for. The Primes take great stock in appearances. It doesn’t matter what you look like, understand, but you’d best do it well. Let me tell you the trouble with this invention, the It. It’s the last thing the Primes ever discovered. Now they import everything. They have no science of their own; they have no art of their own; they have no culture of their own; they import their laws with their food, their attitudes with their clothing. It’s a completely amorphous society. It has no form of its own, it merely assumes disguises.”
“What are you doing here, Colonel Burr?” Ves asked.
“They say I’m searching,” Burr said.
“For what?”
“Some say I’m searching for my wife, some for my daughter, some for myself. I consider the last the most likely; but as far as I know myself, I am merely passing time and learning. I have some vague thoughts of teaching someone—I don’t know who—after I’ve done learning. Not that one can ever be truly done learning unless one is also done with life—which I shall never willingly be. Here is your hotel.”
Ves and the countess checked in and went to their separate rooms to their separate tasks. Ves, with credit established at the hotel—they accepted any credit card from anywhen—went on a small shopping spree. A double-edge razor, blades, a comb, underwear, overwear, upperwear and lowerwear. He tried to pick a suit as close to his own time style as he could find. He ended up looking like a gangster circa 1925, broad lapels, pin stripe and all.
“Elegant!” the countess declared, when he met her in the lobby.
“You take my breath away, Countess,” Ves said, staring at her. A rose-red gown replaced the riding garb, and her chestnut hair was swept up and expertly tossed about on her head, topped with the simplest of diamond tiaras.
“You like it?” the countess asked, running her hands down the silken fabric covering the curve of her hips.
“Am I not a man, Countess?” Ves asked.
“You are very gallant, sir,” the countess said, pronouncing it a la Francaise. “You think Colonel Burr, he will like it?”
“So that’s it,” Ves said. “I should have guessed. I’ve read about him. What does he have…? Countess, he will be enchanted, you have my word.”
And so the Colonel was, when he came for them some ten minutes later. “Enchanting, Countess,” he said, kissing her hand. “You have made good use of your time. And you, Mr. Romero, you look like a new man. An importer of Dutch chocolate I once knew, to be precise. Shall we go to dinner? I have reserved a booth for us at Delmonico’s.”
Over dinner they discussed many things. Colonel Burr possessed the ability to discourse brilliantly on any subject, as he proceeded to prove. The countess looked at him with increasing admiration after each course. Finally, when their flaming dessert was blown out and served, they got down to Ves’s current problems and worries.
“Your friend will show up here in Prime,” Burr said. “No need to worry about him.”
“How will I find him when he does arrive?” Ves asked. “Put an ad in the papers?”
“One possibility,” Burr said. “But why not use that transmitting device you mentioned? I assume he also carries one? You merely broadcast over it until he responds.”
“Its range is very limited,” Ves said. “A couple of blocks at most.”
“So? Contact the City Paging Service. They broadcast messages for subscribers in this area. I’m sure they can duplicate the frequency of your transmitter. A wire loop with your voice on it can be broadcast periodically. Then they listen for your friend’s reply, and direct him to your hotel. Simple?”
“I’ll be in touch with them in the morning,” Ves said.
“And now about this Constitution thing. These people here on Prime really have no regard for anyone else. It’s amazing, their attitude. I think it must be a private collector or dealer; if it were a government, museum or other official project, I feel sure I should have heard of it. I’ve been carefully thinking that point over. And, I must admit, I made some inquiries this afternoon. Nothing official is happening along that line,” Burr told Ves.
“And how do I go about finding this private collector?” Ves asked.
“I like your earlier suggestion,” Burr said. “Advertise.”
“Come to think of it,” Ves said, “that’s how I got here.”
“You told me you were a private inquiry agent in your own time,” Colonel Burr said. “I see no reason why whatever techniques worked successfully for you there would not be equally rewarding here.”
“But I know so little about this time,” Ves said.
“It’s just like your own time,” Burr said, “And mine, the countess’s, ancient Rome, and any other period you can think of. That’s the glory of it.”
And so Ves went away after dinner, leaving Colonel Burr and Countess Tatiana Petrovna still at the table, staring into each other’s eyes and holding hands. “No, no, that’s quite all right,” he assured them, as he left. They may even have heard him.
The next morning Ves went to the offices of the City Paging Service, who were delighted to be able to help him. They made a wire loop of his voice—they used wire recorders instead of tape—and promised to broadcast it every fifteen minutes, and listen for an answer for the next ten. Then Ves settled down to work out a program for locating the Constitution.
There were several possible approaches. An ad in the appropriate paper might be
the simplest. After all, the present possessor of the Constitution had nothing to hide here in Prime; the law was on his side. Crimes committed in other time zones were not punishable or extraditable. Interviews with dealers and collectors might be fruitful if the possessor was reluctant to come forth. After all, such desires grow upon a person gradually. The possessor’s colleagues might know of his desire, even if not aware of his actual acquisition of the document. Both of these approaches could be pursued simultaneously. What Ves needed was a list of the names of collectors and dealers, and the names of whatever periodicals they mostly read. (Collectors of what? he wondered, dealers in what? Well, that would sort itself out.)
Ves went to the city directory at the front desk of his hotel to hunt up the name of an appropriate dealership in his area to which he could go and ask questions. It wasn’t exactly a telephone directory, due to the peculiarities of the Primes. Some of them had phones, others teletypes, others visicables, others centcomp receptors. There seemed to be no central company to service all of these competing forms of communication. Indeed, there were at least three competing companies in Manhattan offering only telephone service: Bell Telephone Company; Lower Manhattan District Signaling Company; and Pictaphone Corporation. And their services, apparently, did not interconnect.
After some searching in the Business section of the book, Ves found the line he’d been looking for:
PIPPINN & CRIE.
Documents, Stamps, Coins,
all sectors, all times, bought & sold.
Highest Prices Guaranteed
141 Upper Wall
Upper Wall, the room clerk assured Ves, was only minutes away from the hotel on foot. So Ves footed it into the street towards PIPPINN & CRIE.
Upper Wall Street was out of Dickens by way of Disney. A narrow, twisty street of small two-story shops, with the upper floor overhung, it looked too cute, too clean, too well-drawn to be real. Ves half expected to see little instruction signs by the doors: D-ticket needed, may be purchased at booth in Queen Victorialand. But the signs were very pragmatic and businesslike, although excessively neat and well-lettered.
141 Upper Wall had a wrought-iron signbar with a swinging, intricately scrolled PIPPINN & CRIE. wooden signboard hanging below. Inside, the store was dark wood paneling, a few cabinets and display cases, and a host of mottoes and slogans about the walls. Across from the door a sign said, Ask! Could it hurt? Below that, a framed verse, decorated with painted eagles and dramatic whirls:
From there to here
From then to now
To make it clear
To show us how.
Sideways in Time
We dip our oar
Above we climb
Beyond we soar.
—Seessel
“And how may Pippinn and Crie. help thee?” a gaunt man in a bright green waistcoat and cutaway asked, emerging from behind the counter. “Excuse the poor rhyme. It’s actually pronounced ‘cray’, you know.”
“No, I didn’t,” Ves said.
“It is,” the man assured him. “Phoenician, I believe. Before my time, of course; although I did know Pippinn. The original Pippinn, that is, not his son; whom I also know, of course. He is the owner. The son, that is. I am the manager. Phipps. At your service.”
“It’s, ah, only some information I need,” Ves said.
“We do our best to oblige, whatever your need,” Phipps said. “What would you like to know?”
“I’m looking for a, ah, Constitution. You know, of the United States. Trying to locate a, ah, specific, ah, Constitution.”
“Certainly,” Phipps said. “Which one?”
“Ah, a, ah, well, mine. That is the one from my time—sector—which was stolen.”
“In what way is this Constitution different from all other constitutions?” Phipps asked patiently. “That is, how can we differentiate it?”
“Well,” said Ves, who hadn’t expected such a helpful reaction, “it was signed by Hamilton. Alexander Hamilton.”
“Most of them were,” Phipps said.
“The one that was left in its place,” Ves said, “was signed by Burr. Aaron Burr. In place of Hamilton.”
“I know,” Phipps said, “Alexander Hamilton. So that’s what happened to it.”
“How’s that?” Ves asked.
“I’ll tell you who took your constitution,” Phipps said. He reached behind him to the counter and flipped a magazine off the top, handing it to Ves. CURIOSITIES, VARIETIES, VARIANTS, it said across the top, THE INTERTEMPORAL COLLECTOR.
“The magazine?” Ves asked.
“Back page,” Phipps said.
Ves turned The Intertemporal Collector over. The back page had an ad. Chitterly, Boatswain, Meloris, Pettiglob and Sims offered a whole page of documents and assorted intertemporal goodies for sale to the discerning collector. Like this:
23.Z9S29 Bill of Rights, 9 articles, (omit 7)sp $1,300
24.Z66S11 Capitulation of 1777 St. Fr.gd $2,500
25.Z7S9 Annexation of Mexico—draft of Jefferson’s official speech before Congress (r)fr $3,500
“These people have our constitution?” Ves asked.
“One of them does,” Phipps said. “Chitterly, by name. Now this is just a guess, but it’s a pretty well-informed guess. Just don’t use my name.”
“Why do you think this man Chitterly has my, our, the Constitution?”
Phipps considered. For a moment Ves thought he wasn’t going to tell, and so did Phipps. But then he nodded his head, his mind made up. “It’s just an opinion, you know. But it makes sense. You see, Chitterly wasn’t trying to steal your Constitution—the one with the Hamilton signature. He was trying to conceal the Burr Constitution.”
“I’m afraid I don’t follow that,” Ves said.
“Senor Chitterly is what in polite society is referred to as a fence,” Phipps said. “Not only that, but he has been suspected of committing the one unforgivable offense here in Prime: he steals from his friends. It’s all right to purloin papers from the lower zones, but to steal here in Prime is a venal sin, sir. And of that is Chitterly suspected. The Burr Constitution is a valued relic that has been in a private collection since it was acquired some thirty years ago. Shortly after it was signed, you see, in its zone.”
“And?”
“And it disappeared. Chitterly was suspected—never mind why—and a group of us went to beard the jackal in his den. The visit was a complete surprise and, by applying certain forms of moral persuasion, we were able to completely search the premises, including certain secure, secret sections. Several constitutions were found, but none had the Burr variation. One of the constitutions there was uncatalogued, and was undoubtedly yours.”
“I think I see,” Ves said.
“There was a tabletop It on his workbench. The old principle of the purloined letter—you’re familiar with the purloined letter?—faked us out completely. We use the midget It to fish for valuable documents. It didn’t occur to any of us that he might have hidden the Burr Constitution by running it through the It and getting your version in exchange; trading down, so to speak.”
“How can you tell if that’s true; if that is what he did?” Ves asked.
“Easily,” Phipps told him. “Just run the Constitution through the It again. Since the Burr variant and yours changed once, they have the highest affinity and would reverse again.”
“So why don’t you go back and make the experiment?” Ves asked.
“Can’t,” Phipps said. “Caught him unawares the first time. Now he’ll have applied to the magistrates for protection against a recurrence of our, eh, invasion. Law lets you get away with anything—almost anything—the first time. Now if we’d caught him…” Phipps sighed wistfully.
“How do you suggest I go about getting my constitution back?” Ves asked.
“Wa
it,” Phipps said. “It might be a couple of years, or longer, until the heat dies down. But I’m sure he’s got a customer for the Burr variant. He’ll hang on to your version until the heat dies down, then he’ll make the switch and you’ll have yours back again.”
“We can’t wait a couple of years,” Ves said. “Suppose I get another midget It and make the transfer with the Burr Constitution?”
“Then you’ll get yet a third variant. The tuning is critical, and there’s no way to duplicate his exactly, even if he would let us examine it.”
Suitably disheartened, Ves returned to his hotel. Nate was sitting in the lobby waiting for him.
Ves did a double take, then yelled, “Nate!” and hugged his friend.
“Ves!” Nate replied, slapping Ves on the back. “It’s good to see you. It’s unbelievably good to see you. That’s quite an answering service you set up here.”
“When did you get here?” Ves asked. “Where’ve you been?”
“About half an hour ago,” Nate said. “I’ve been… it’s been… I have some stories to tell you. I have a feeling you’ll believe them. You probably have some stories to tell me too.”
“Over lunch, Nate, old friend, over lunch. And a bottle of Chianti. Have they Chianti? They must have! Come into the dining room, come!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Nate leaned back in the most overstuffed chair the Great Auk and Gremlin lounge had to offer and sipped at the first coffee he’d had since he left Ves’s house, a lifetime before. Pretty decent coffee it was, too. “So now it’s our turn to beard the vulture in his den, eh?” he said. “You’ve done a competent job, Ves. That’s the ‘in’ phrase among us government service types this year, ‘a competent job’. All understated and everything.”
“Phipps called this Chitterly a jackal, not a vulture,” Ves offered. “And thank you for the praise, but it was pure blind luck.”
“Well, you know what they say about luck,” Nate said, “it comes only to the prepared.”
“Then we’d best prepare,” Ves said, deciding he didn’t care what the management thought, and stretching his feet out on the couch. “Because we’re going to need a bit of luck. How do we entice this Chitterly to hand the Constitution over to us? What can we offer him?”
The Whenabouts of Burr Page 18