by Marissa Moss
There are other time travelers, like the woman at the racetrack, who try to stop us. They’re evil people who profit from misery and destruction. We can’t let them win.
Since you’re here, it means you need to change things too. It all has to do with Dreyfus, the man I was with at the races. I think you are meant to make Degas support him. He’s an important public figure and his voice defending Dreyfus could make the difference. You need to make that difference happen. Then find your touchstone and go home. I’m also working to change things, so don’t worry about me. You work on Degas. I’ll work on Zola.
Love,
Mom
Unlike the other letters, this one actually told me something, but the tone was so tight and worried that it scared me. The something Mom needed to change must be really horrible. And the fact that the beautiful creepy woman was so determined to stop Mom made it even riskier. I wanted to help Mom, like she asked, but now that I knew what my job was, it made no sense. Who was Dreyfus and why did Degas need to support him?
I read the letter again, hoping for more answers, more clarity, but I was just more confused. Except that one thing was clear. I was here for a very specific reason. This wasn’t an accident at all. I wondered if that meant I wouldn’t find my touchstone until I’d done whatever it was I was supposed to do. Would I be stuck here forever if I couldn’t figure it out?
“Excuse me, mademoiselle.” A man sat next to me on the bench, far too close for a stranger. I quickly folded up the letter and glared at him. Only it wasn’t a stranger—it was the Walrus Man. I thought he’d gone to another time when he vanished in Notre Dame, but here he was, back again.
“I’m Morton, a friend of your mother’s,” he said, leaning in and speaking in a hoarse whisper. “A time traveler, like yourself. She asked me to find you.”
“Is she okay?” I asked. “Where is she?”
“She’s fine, she’s fine.” He wiped beads of sweat off his pasty forehead. “She wants you to go to 1894. That’s when you’ll be useful to her.”
As if I could just open the door that said “1894” and walk through it! How was I supposed to time-travel? I hadn’t done any of this on purpose.
Besides, I already had instructions from Mom in her letter. I didn’t trust this so-called friend at all. “My mom said I need to get Degas to support Dreyfus,” I told him. “So that’s what I’ll do. Once I figure out who Dreyfus is and why Degas should support him.”
“No, that’s a waste of time. I told her that would never work. She thinks instead you can save Dreyfus from being accused of treason in the first place. Then Degas’s opinion won’t matter.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“You saw your mother with me. You know she’s my friend.” He looked surprised that I’d doubt him, which made me believe him even less.
“Being together doesn’t make you friends.” Everything he said made him even more suspicious.
“I can’t prove anything, it’s true. And if you don’t want to believe me, well, all I can say is that I tried.” He shrugged and actually looked relieved. “Maybe it’s best if you don’t listen to me.”
“Even if I wanted to believe you, I don’t know how to get to 1894. I don’t know how to control time travel. Can you explain it to me?” I didn’t trust pasty, sweaty Morton, but I might learn something useful from him.
“I can’t tell you how to time-travel. You have to figure that out for yourself, but you need to be looking for something, really looking, to go anywhere. After a while, you develop an instinct for what works.” Morton leaned back, looking almost relaxed. “These kinds of things I can tell you, it’s allowed, but you’ll still have to figure out what works yourself. Anything can be a touchstone. You just have to look. But you should know that sometimes they work only once. You can’t always go back and use the same touchstone again.”
“What do you mean ‘it’s allowed’? What isn’t allowed?” I asked.
The man turned purply red so suddenly that I thought he was having a heart attack.
“I can’t tell you more,” he choked. “That’s for your mother to do. She said she’d given you the rules.”
“She did. She said we shouldn’t be in the same time and place since we’re related. Is that true?”
The man nodded, his skin blotching into a mottled pink and white as he calmed down. “Better you avoid each other. It’s safer for everyone that way. And you know you can’t tell anyone you’re from the future.”
“That’s a pretty obvious rule,” I said. “More like common sense. Explain to me about Dreyfus. Why does it matter if he’s accused of treason? Why does Mom care?”
“I can tell you what she thinks,” the man said. “I don’t completely agree with her, you understand, but she’s right about this. A single person’s life can make an enormous difference.”
“So?” I pressed. “Why this man? Who is Dreyfus anyway?”
“He’s a captain in the French Army who will be accused of selling military secrets to the Germans.”
“Why does Mom care about a traitor?”
“He’s accused,” snapped Morton. “That doesn’t mean he’s guilty.”
“He must have done something suspicious,” I insisted.
“What makes him seem suspicious is that he isn’t Christian.”
And suddenly it all made sense. Claude’s comments about the Jews, Degas’s friendship with the Halévys. Dreyfus must be Jewish, and that made him seem automatically guilty.
“I get it,” I said. “So Degas needs to like Jews to support Dreyfus?” It kind of made sense, though it seemed stupid to accuse or not accuse, support or not support simply because of somebody’s religion.
“Because of how the French military treat Dreyfus, because of their prejudice, the government will collapse and the military will never recover. The direction of France, of all Europe, will be changed. Intolerance will breed more intolerance, which will breed violence. All because of how this one man is unjustly accused.” Morton cleared his throat. “That’s your mother’s opinion, not mine.”
“So how does she know what has to be changed? What will turn history down a different path?”
“She doesn’t. None of us do. We guess, we try, and we try again.” Morton’s voice got lower and lower, turning into a whisper. “But it’s dangerous. You might think you’re doing the right thing and do completely the wrong thing.”
“And what about the people who try to stop you? Like the woman who followed you into Notre Dame? How dangerous is she?”
“What woman?” Morton looked terrified. “Describe her!”
I told him what she looked like and what had happened after he vanished that day in the cathedral. I was going to add the scene from the racetrack, but he interrupted me, wringing his sausage fingers together in worry.
“This is dreadful, just dreadful! She knows what Serena is doing. She knows what you’re doing. Maybe it’s best to forget about all this. Yes, just forget about it. Don’t try to do anything! Find a touchstone and go home!”
“But then she wins! Mom said we have to do this—it’s really important. She said this affects my future, so it’s not a vague problem but something very specific. Besides, we can’t let the bad guys win.” I was surprised Morton would give up so easily. Could I really trust this man?
“She told you that!” Mr. Walrus squealed in panic. “She shouldn’t have!”
“Why? What is she really trying to stop?” I pressed.
“This, the whole Dreyfus mess,” he insisted. “Which will lead to the collapse of the French government and to some other issues that are all connected. Maybe something that happens in your future, but I don’t know anything about that. And you shouldn’t either!”
Obviously he knew a lot more than he was admitting. “What about that woman
? Who is she exactly?”
“Someone you should avoid at all costs!” Morton snapped. “Stay far, far away from her!”
“But who is she?”
“I can’t tell you any more. I really can’t,” he said. He looked scared and miserable at the same time.
“Can you at least tell me what happens in 1894?” I asked. “What am I supposed to do?”
“You can stop Dreyfus from ever being accused. A French spy, working in the German Embassy as a cleaning woman, will find a torn-up note that lists military information passed to the German military attaché. That’s the note Dreyfus will be accused of writing. Your mother wants you to find it before the cleaning lady does.”
“Me? How? And if it’s so important, why doesn’t she do it herself?”
“I’m just passing on the message.” The man looked anxiously behind us as if the woman he was so afraid of would appear at any moment. “But if you don’t want to do this, just go home where you belong. That’s my advice. Your mother can change things all by herself without involving you. If she really thinks she has to.”
“Are you a friend of Mom’s or not? You tell me what she wants, then tell me to ignore it. And I’m supposed to trust you?”
“Don’t trust me! I don’t care! I did what I said I would and that’s it! Sometimes I think your mother is crazy. Sometimes I know she is!” Morton stood up, wiping his sweaty face with a large lavender handkerchief. “Good day, mademoiselle!” He stuffed the kerchief back in his pocket and hurried off.
I wanted to chase after him. He was the only link I had to Mom. But was he a good link or a bad one? I had no idea. What if everything he had said was a complete lie? Did Mom really care about Dreyfus that much? Was his life the change she meant?
I could assume that much was true because of her letter, but did she really expect me to sneak into an embassy office? Was I supposed to knock out the cleaning woman and take her place? That sounded like the kind of thing that would happen in a spy movie. But was it something I could do? And could I get to 1894 to do it?
Or was this whole thing a setup by Morton? Was he an evil time-traveler like the beautiful creepy woman? I didn’t think he’d be so scared of her if they were on the same side, but I wasn’t sure who or what to believe.
Over tea with Claude, Degas chatted about his favorite jockeys, the dancers he’d draw tomorrow, and one particular one that he was recommending Halévy find a position for in the musical theatre. He was so cheerful that I stopped thinking about the crumbling of the French government and how I was supposed to stop it somehow.
“Monsieur Degas,” I said. “I was surprised to see you sketch at the races! I never see you paint outside like Monsieur Monet.” It was easier to talk about art than why he should like Jews more. I couldn’t quite get myself to do that.
“Ah, well, drawing a quick sketch is one thing. Painting is another. You know how I feel about that! If I were the government, I’d have a special brigade of police to protect the public from artists who paint landscapes outside from nature. They don’t have to arrest anyone, but a little bird-shot now and then as a warning would be effective.”
“Those are your friends you’re talking about!”
“I respect Monet, but he’s no friend. Now Manet and Renoir, they are true friends, so I forgive them their follies.”
“And Claude? He was drawing outside too. And he’s Jewish, so how about him?” Ugh, that was clumsy. I was practically asking Degas if he was ready to round up Jews and shove them all into a locked ghetto.
“Claude is Jewish?” Degas raised an eyebrow. “I did not know that. Should I reconsider his position here?”
“No, of course not!” What a mess I was making! Was I getting Claude fired? I shot him a panicked look. Would he ever forgive me? “I thought you didn’t care he was Jewish. After all, the Halévy family is Jewish.”
“The Halévys were Jewish,” Degas corrected me. “They are good Christians now. You can hardly fault them for their ancestry. Well, actually, I suppose one could but I, for one, do not.”
“Monsieur Degas is teasing you, Mira,” Claude said. “He knows perfectly well that I am a Jew. What matters is whether I can draw, and that is something I am still struggling with. And you are an artist yourself, no matter how much you protest. I’ve seen you drawing in your sketchbook.”
I could feel my cheeks turn bright pink. “I told you, those were just notes,” I stammered. “I admit I like to draw, but I’m not an artist.” Not on the same level as Claude. And certainly not Degas. I would never show either of them my clumsy scrawls. It would be easier to talk about Judaism than that!
Anyway, Degas was tolerant enough with Jews, and nothing I said made a difference one way or another. If he wanted to support Dreyfus, he would. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t. I suppose that meant I should think about the second task Mom had given me, at least according to Morton, but that would mean finding a touchstone that would somehow get me to 1894.
Claude walked me home after Degas left for the theater. It all felt so normal that I almost forgot I didn’t belong in this time or place. It was easier to think about Claude than time travel and urgent secret missions. Neither of us said anything, but it was a comfortable silence, the kind that holds you like a soft blanket.
“Let’s walk through the jardin,” Claude suggested. “Paris has a lot of fountains, but my favorite is in here.” He steered me through the paths lined with rosebushes to an impressive but strange fountain. In front of the spouts of water crouched a sculpture of a lion eating someone’s foot.
“I like the lion but why is it devouring a foot?” I asked.
Claude shrugged. “I think that is meant to be naturalistic.”
“It seems anything but natural to me!”
“You don’t like it?” Claude sounded disappointed.
“Of course I do! I love it! Thank you for showing it to me.”
“Perhaps you want to add it to your collection,” he suggested.
“What do you mean? My collection of what?”
“Drawings. Go ahead and sketch it. I won’t look.” Something soft in his face and voice encouraged me. And he was right. My fingers were itching to draw it. I had thought I’d sketch it from my memory, later alone in my room, the way I usually did, but now the temptation was too great. I opened my sketchbook and started to draw.
Claude kept his word and didn’t look, but he was so sweet and patient, waiting for me to finish, that I did something I never thought I’d do. I showed him the drawing.
“Mira, this is wonderful! You have such an expressive line, so full of life! And you said you were not an artist.” Claude looked up from the page, gazing directly into my eyes.
“It’s nothing, really,” I murmured, embarrassed.
“No, it is a definite something. You have a real talent, you know. Thank you so much for letting me see this.”
Something shifted between us at that moment. We hadn’t kissed, hadn’t even held hands, but there was an intimacy between us, as soft and warm and welcoming as I’d imagined a kiss could be.
“There is something else I would like to show you,” Claude said, his voice hushed and low.
“Yes?” My voice quavered.
“I…” he leaned forward, his gaze intent on mine.
“Yes?” I remembered how his lips felt on my wrist.
He leaned closer still and I tipped my lips up to meet his. He stepped forward and I don’t know why, but I stumbled, bumping into the lion. A jolt went through me, my stomach lurched, my eyes glazed over, and the park whirled around me in greens, golds, blues, and browns. Suns rose and set rapidly, and when the ground stopped tilting, I was still in the park but Claude was gone. I must have found my touchstone—at the absolute worst minute. When I definitely wasn’t looking for it at all.
Winter?
It was cold, the grass rimed with frost, and my dress far too thin for the biting chill. I didn’t see any cars or satellite dishes so it wasn’t 2012. I was still in the past. I walked toward Mary Cassatt’s apartment, and everything seemed much the same as in 1881.
The same but not the same. The little grocery store Claude and I had just passed was now a butcher shop. But the newsstand was still there, and so were the bakery and the music hall with the lanterns hanging outside.
The hats in the milliner’s window were similar, the dresses and shoes in familiar styles, so not enough time had passed for fashion to change. A playbill announced the opera Carmen, music by Georges Bizet, libretto by Ludovic Halévy. Halevy, Degas’s friend! So still the 1880s, I bet. Then I noticed the date on the poster, January 1895! Mom wanted me to go to 1894. I’d skipped past when I was supposed to go. But I hadn’t meant to time-travel at all. I had no control on how to make it work. What was I supposed to do now that I was here?
I walked aimlessly in a daze. All I wanted was to be back with my family in the right place at the right time. How could I trust I would ever have a future when time kept changing around me? I felt totally lost.
The streets grew more crowded, and I found myself jostled by children running and yelling, men rushing, even women joining the throng. Everyone was heading in the same direction. I tried to read from people’s expressions what was happening. Some looked furious, others excited. Some had a strange look I couldn’t quite place. Almost like happiness but with a nasty edge to it. A whirlpool of people swirled around me, pushing, pulling, shoving. What was going on?
I stopped one woman who looked eager, like she was rushing to some kind of big giveaway at a store opening. I held on to her sleeve, forcing her to answer me when I asked in faltering French where she was going.