Out of Time: A Time Travel Mystery

by Martin, Monique

  “Yes?”

  “Coney Island!” She loved amusement parks, and a chance to see Coney Island as it was meant to be was thrilling. “Wouldn’t it be fascinating to see it in its heyday. You know, before it got all kitschy and gross.”

  “I’m not sure I’m—”

  “This is living history. How many people get a chance to see that?”

  “Be that as it may—”

  “Haven’t you always wanted to go to Coney Island?”

  “I think I can safely answer that with a resounding no.”

  “Oh, come on,” she said. “It’s too good to pass up. And it’ll be fun. Roller coasters, strange freaky side show things.”

  “As appealing as that sounds, which by the way, is not at all, I don’t—”

  “Okay. You don’t have to go,” she said quickly.

  “Thank you.” He watched her for a moment, then picked up the paper again. “I understand there are free concerts in Central Park.”

  “I’m sure you’ll have a good time, but I’m going to Coney Island.”

  “Elizabeth,” he ground out.

  “Simon,” she mimicked. “Really, you don’t have to go,” she said, as she coyly played with the collar of her dress. ”I think it would be fun and educational. A double whammy. But, if you want to mope, I mean, stay around here, you’re perfectly welcome to.”

  Simon put the paper down and sighed. “I’m not really the amusement park type.”

  “You didn’t strike me as the piano player in a speakeasy type either, but...” she said with what she hoped was a dangerously engaging smile.

  “Lord help me.”

  * * *

  The early afternoon train was packed with people heading out to the island. Back to front, side to side, two to a seat, people crowded into the subways and the elevated train to Brooklyn. The crowd jostled with every bump and turn as the train moved steadily toward the Nickel Empire, where five cents bought everything from a red-hot to a turn at the Tilt-A-Whirl.

  Simon gripped the overhead handhold, and Elizabeth gripped Simon. Unable to reach a pole or a hand grip, she’d tried standing on her own for the first few minutes. The shimmying of the car nearly knocked her off her feet and would have if Simon hadn’t caught her. She smiled bashfully and wound her fingers into the fabric of his jacket. He kept an arm loosely around her waist.

  She looked up at him with a questioning glance.

  He looked away shyly and then lifted his chin in poor imitation of indignation. “Purely for safety reasons.”

  Elizabeth slipped her hand onto his shoulder. “Safety first, I always say.”

  The car was stifling, or would have been if either had been paying the least bit of attention to anything but the other. The tiny windows let in only the barest warm breeze, and the mass of bodies filled the car with an unrelenting heat.

  Elizabeth felt a single drip of sweat inch down her back with torturous slowness. It started to tickle, and she arched her back to help it along. In the close quarters, her tiny movement forced her hips up against Simon. She thought she heard him groan, but the bustle of conversation and the thrumming of the train made it impossible to tell.

  “Sorry.”

  He shook his head. “What?” he asked loudly.

  She started to push herself up on her tiptoes to move closer to his ear, when the car abruptly lurched. She threw her arms around him to steady herself and felt his hand press firmly against her back. She was only inches from his face now. The sharp rise and fall of his chest pressed against hers. His lips were so tantalizingly close. Full and masculine, seemingly waiting to be kissed. She looked up into his eyes. They were dark and intense. They lingered with hers before dipping down to her mouth, then back again. An unspoken question hovered between them. Her heart was about to answer when the car jerked violently and started its swift deceleration.

  Once again, their moment was gone and reality crashed back in. People shouldered for the door, each having to be the first one out. Simon glared at a large sweaty man and his wife who shoved their way past them.

  Elizabeth reluctantly eased her arms down from Simon’s shoulders. That was the second time she’d been in his arms, not that she was counting. Okay, she was counting. And each time to have someone ruin it when they were so close. Not that there was anything to ruin. Was there?

  The crowd pushed up against her and when the doors opened she was swept away with them. She lost sight of Simon the moment her feet hit the platform. She struggled back to him, but it was no use. Caught in the tide, she edged her way to a large stanchion. Wriggling her shoulders and giving a few people a good elbow in the ribs, she managed to grab hold of the pillar. She stepped up onto the lip and scanned the crowd for Simon.

  He was being swept along as she had been, but was fighting it all the way.

  “Simon! Over here! Simon!”

  His head jerked around, and he saw her. His expression both frustrated and relieved. He forced his way through the crowd, which was finally thinning.

  “What the devil?” he ground out.

  “Pretty enthusiastic bunch, aren’t they?”

  “Ill-mannered, rude—”

  “They’re not that bad. And anyway,” she said with a gleam in her eye. “We’re here.”

  His face was flat. “Hooray.”

  “Oh, come on sourpuss. This is gonna be fun. You’re gonna love it. Trust me,” she said and held out her hand.

  He looked at her hand suspiciously. Finally, he took it and sighed. “All right, I’ll come, but I’m not going to enjoy it.”

  But he did enjoy it. Walking among the throng, holding Elizabeth’s hand, he felt like he belonged. He wasn’t apart from life now, but a part of it. He glanced down at her hand resting in his. It really was so small, his fingers seemed to engulf it completely. And he liked the feeling. The constant, subtle reminder that he wasn’t alone.

  Surf Avenue swarmed with tens of thousands of people. Cars tried vainly to weave their way between the pedestrians. Simon pulled Elizabeth onto the crowded sidewalk, and she gawked at the scene.

  Barkers sang out their outrageous promises of the fantastic to lure the unsuspecting to their attractions. The roaring sound of the roller coasters rumbled like thunder, and the smell of garlic and cooking meat drifted through the crowd, tempting each passerby.

  “This is amazing!” Elizabeth cried.

  “It is quite a spectacle,” he admitted.

  “Ooo, the Cyclone!” she squealed and pulled Simon down the street.

  They passed by Nathan’s Famous Redhot stand, where people stood ten deep waiting for the best dog in town. They walked past the bilious entrance to Luna Park, which was one of the three existing self-contained amusements parks. Coney Island was a controlled sort of chaos. Luna Park, Steeplechase Park and the Bowery were separate entities. Mixed in between them were independent rides. Coasters and spinning cup machines, rides of every variety, all owned and operated apart from the big parks. The world famous Cyclone was the most majestic of them all.

  The ride was a behemoth, a figure eight design with a ridiculously steep drop. The cars screeched overhead, flying past the street below at over seventy miles an hour.

  Elizabeth looked up into the bright sunlight shining off the wood and steel giant. “This is gonna be great.”

  “You aren’t seriously considering going on that deathtrap?”

  “You bet yer bippy I am,” she said and hurried over to get in line.

  Simon watched her with veiled amusement and no small amount of alarm. Safety wasn’t exactly of paramount concern during this decade. Did they even have seatbelts? He did his best to swallow his worry and found a shady spot to wait. He watched her chat with a pair of young children behind her in line. She was smiling, laughing, and absolutely lovely.

  The line was atrociously long and snaked in and out of his sight. At each bend he could see her, and she waved to him, bouncing on the balls of her feet in anticipation. Content with the warmth of
the sun and the vicarious pleasure of her excitement, he waited patiently. Before too long, he was rewarded with a breathless, wind-blown Elizabeth.

  “I am definitely doing that again.”

  Simon shook his head in defeat. “Go ahead.”

  “Later,” she said with a wave of her hand. “We haven’t even been in the park yet. Come on, time’s a’wastin’.” She started back up Surf Avenue without him.

  They paid the quarter admission price and stepped inside Luna Park. A large, artificial beach and long, rectangular pool rested just inside the gate. He could smell the salty air rolling in from the Atlantic ocean, barely a block away. Bright, white towers topped with intricate spires and lattice work reached for the sky in the distance. Elizabeth turned around in a circle, taking it all in. People swarmed around her, excitedly buzzing about the afternoon’s pleasures. Eclectic architecture ringed the outer perimeter, a series of snapshots of faraway lands, transporting each visitor to places they’d only dreamt of.

  “It’s amazing,” Elizabeth said.

  After the constant browns and grays of the city, the pristine white buildings and red shingled roofs were another world. She wasn’t the only one gawking at the splendor of the park. There was an electricity in the air. People who had never traveled more than a few miles from their homes were suddenly thrust into a replica of an ancient Egyptian tomb or a jungle oasis filled with headhunting natives, anything the imagination could conjure.

  The frantic strains of a ragtime band seemed to catch Elizabeth’s attention, but before she reached the bandstand, another spectacle pulled her away. There in the middle of the park sat a huge lagoon. She ran to the railing and leaned over to look down into the murky, deep, green water.

  Simon, who’d been trailing behind, finally caught up with her. She moved around the park with exhausting, childlike enthusiasm, reminding him how young she really was. As she leaned against the rail, a gentle breeze blew the hem of her skirt, and he caught a glimpse of her legs and the black garters that hugged her thighs. He felt his pulse race and forced himself to look away. Perhaps, not quite so young after all.

  “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Wow. Look at that,” she said, pointing to the far end of the lagoon. A boat, large enough to hold six people, slid down a wide flume more than one hundred feet long before it plunged into the lake. A crowd standing on platforms around the Shoot-the-Chutes applauded as each boat took its turn on the giant slide and splashed down into the lagoon.

  The hairs on the back of Simon’s neck prickled with anxiety. The water, the boats, it was all too eerily reminiscent of his nightmare. It was an unreasonable fear, he knew, but as he watched Elizabeth lean farther over the railing, a cold panic washed over him. He gripped her arm tightly and pulled her away from the edge.

  She looked at him in surprise and he let go. “I... This looks interesting,” he said too casually and gestured to another attraction a safe distance from the water.

  If she noticed the strain in his voice, she chose to ignore it and happily continued her giddy exploration of the park. He grumbled good-naturedly as she dragged him from one end of the park to the other. He pointed out the egregious historical and cultural inaccuracies of each exhibit they visited: the ridiculous errors of confusing the Fourth and Eighteenth Dynasties of Ancient Egypt, the headhunters of Borneo sporting Central African headdresses. It certainly wasn’t the way he’d choose to spend an afternoon. But she met each new discovery with such unremitting wonder, he found himself actually having a good time. She stared wide-eyed from one attraction to the next, and he was content simply to watch her.

  After a rather nauseating spin on the Tilt-A-Whirl, Elizabeth was ready for something a bit more sedate and forced Simon to choose their next destination.

  He balked. She cajoled. He relented.

  He suggested the cyclorama, not mentioning that the short line was the main appeal. Cylcoramas were shown in cylindrical rooms with the crowd seated in the middle. A large, movable painted canvas was stretched around the circle with sound and lighting effects used to heighten the drama. The Battle of the Marne was a spectacular recreation of one of WWI’s epic battles. Despite the antiquated effects, Elizabeth jumped in her seat when a miniature car crashed from a small platform. Thunderous explosions echoed from behind the walls and a thick smoke swirled overhead. It was frighteningly effective, perhaps too much so. The costly battle was still fresh in the minds of the world. When the lights went on, the small crowd was quiet and reflective. The somber Zeitgeist cast a pall on the day. Simon had the absurd feeling that things had somehow taken a turn for the worse. When they left Luna Park and headed back down toward the Bowery, he knew he was right.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The all-monkey orchestra at the Hippodrome was too good for Elizabeth to pass up. Or so she thought. After the depressing show at the cyclorama, she hoped something fun and silly would lift her mood.

  The performance consisted of fifty trained monkeys dressed in band uniforms playing miniature instruments. It was certainly silly, but not the fun she’d been hoping for. Maybe it was the color of her mood as she took her seat on the long wooden benches. Maybe she was trying too hard to regain the excitement of earlier in the day. But as the animals wriggled and jumped on the stage, she felt her mood growing darker. She tried to remind herself this was a different time, with different sets of morals. The notion of animal protection was still in its infancy. It wasn’t as though the creatures were being overtly abused, but the sight of them subjugated in such a ridiculous farce set her mind into a tailspin of judgments. The SPCA was hardly a blip on the radar, no one was going to look after them, and with shows throughout the day, there was no way they were treated properly. At best, they were no more than props. At worst, she didn’t want to think about.

  Simon took her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. When the show ended, he led her silently out of the amphitheater.

  Had she been looking, but not really seeing? Now that the idea had been planted, everything she saw was cast in a disturbing light. Bonita’s Fighting Lions looked thin and haggard in their tiny cages. Before, the park patrons seemed merely excited. Now, they looked frenetic, jigging madly from one spot to another. Even the carousel horses seemed twisted and disturbed. But it was Wagner’s World Circus Side Show that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

  Elizabeth shuddered when the barker paraded the freaks out for display. The Tattooed Man, the Spider Boy and the Wolfman. Simon muttered something about the obvious lack of any true lupine qualities. Elizabeth barely registered his remarks as Wagner brought out Pipo and Zipo, two microcephalics, or Pinheads as they were more commonly known. The crowd gasped in shock as the pair walked across the makeshift stage. Children hid behind their mothers, only to be encouraged to gawk at the poor couple.

  It was more than Elizabeth could bear, and she hurriedly slipped through the crowd. She had to get away from it all, and didn’t stop walking until she reached the edge of the Boardwalk. Black waves lumbered ashore in the distance, a dull roar in the background of the night. She leaned against the wooden railing and breathed in the salty, ocean air. Simon came up behind her, but she didn’t turn around.

  “God, this place is awful. I’m sorry I made you come,” she said. The sand close to the walkway glistened like pyrite.

  He leaned back against the railing. “It’s a different time.”

  Elizabeth mimicked his pose, turning back to face the park. The sun had set and thousands of fairy lights sparkled in the night. “It’s just a Potemkin village, isn’t it? A beautiful façade hiding a dark reality.”

  “Aren’t most things?”

  He sounded so resigned to it. Was this the world he lived in all the time? Never seeing the magic, only the man behind the curtain.

  “I guess so,” she said and pushed away from the railing and started back slowly toward the Bowery.

  They walked the short distance up 12th Street, passing the huge two-hundred foot Wonde
r Wheel. People giggled and screamed from their tiny, swaying cars on the Ferris wheel. Elizabeth barely noticed. The side show carnies and their nickel games of chance lined the sidewalk: age old scams waiting for the next sucker. Hucksters and conmen were all too familiar to her. A little three card Monty, a shill game; the fix was always in. Her daddy always believed that one good hand, one good roll of the dice was only around the corner. And it might have been, if the cards weren’t marked and the dice weren’t weighted. Even up until the end, he never lost sight of the brass ring, always just beyond his reach. Now it all felt like an illusion. A dream stripped away to the cold, bleached bones of reality.

  “We have a winner!” The stall owner handed a man a kewpie doll. The woman with him threw her arms around his neck and squealed in delight. The happy couple walked away arm in arm.

  Simon grew increasingly distressed by Elizabeth’s silence. More than once, he’d wished she would curb her enthusiasm, but now he found he missed it. Her smile that had warmed him during the day had faded with the afternoon light. He wanted to reassure her, but false comforts weren’t his nature. He knew it was absurd, but he felt compelled to see her smile again. He noticed the byplay of the couple and had an idea.

  “This way,” he said and led her toward one of the ring toss stalls.

  “Nickel for three tries,” said the carny. “Win something for the pretty lady?”

  “What would you like?” Simon said confidently. How hard could it be?

  Elizabeth laughed, but it was still lifeless. “It’s okay.”

  Simon surveyed the prizes. The kewpie dolls were grotesque. He looked over at Elizabeth and saw her eyes lingering on a small stuffed animal on the top shelf. “What do I have to do for the tiger? That one in the back?”

  The carny’s lips curled in pleasure. “Just gotta get one ring on the blue bottle and it’s yours.”

  Simon took off his coat and handed it to Elizabeth. She smiled, a bit of the spark he so loved lighting her eyes. Shouldn’t be difficult really—one ring out of three.