The Map of Time (20 page)

Suddenly, he experienced an incredible sense of relief, as though a burden he had been carrying since birth had been lifted from his shoulders. He felt unfettered, reckless, and wild. He had an overwhelming desire to reconnect with the world, to tread the common path of life again with the rest of humanity, to send a note to Victoria Keller, or to her sister Madeleine if Victoria was the one Charles had married, inviting her to dinner or to the theater or for a walk in a park where he could ambush her, brush his lips against hers—simply because he was aware that at the same time he would also not be doing that. For it seemed this was the way the universe worked: excluding nothing, allowing everything to happen that could happen. Even if he did decide to kiss her, another Andrew would refrain from doing so, and would carry on rolling down the hill of time until he came to another pair of lips and split into another twin who, after dividing a few more times, would finally plunge over a cliff into the abyss of solitude.

Andrew leaned back in his seat, amazed that each of life’s twists and turns should give rise to a new existence vying with the old one to see which was the most authentic, instead of falling like sawdust and being swept away by the carpenter’s broom.

It made him giddy just to think that at each crossroads, clutches of other Andrews were born, and their lives went on at the same time as his, beyond the moment when his own life ended, without him being aware of it, because ultimately it was man’s limited senses which established the boundaries of the world. But what if, like a magician’s box, the world had a false bottom and continued beyond the point where his senses told him it stopped? This was the same as asking whether roses kept their colors when there was no one to admire them. Was he right or was he losing his mind? This was obviously a rhetorical question, and yet the world took the trouble to respond. A soft breeze suddenly sprang up, lifting a leaf from among the many carpeting the pavement and making it dance on the surface of a puddle, like a magic trick performed for a single onlooker. Mesmerized, Andrew watched it spin until his cousin’s shoe halted its delicate movement.

“All right, we can go now,” said Charles waving his hat triumphantly, like a hunter showing off a bloodstained duck.

Once inside the cab, he raised an eyebrow, surprised at the dreamy smile on his cousin’s face.

“Are you feeling all right, Andrew?” Andrew gazed at his cousin fondly. Charles had moved heaven and earth to help him save Marie Kelly, and he was going to repay him in the best way he could: by staying alive, at least until his moment arrived. He would pay Charles back threefold for all the affection he had shown him over these past years, years he now felt ashamed to have wasted out of apathy and indifference. He would embrace life, yes, embrace it as he would a wondrous gift, and devote himself to living it to the best of his ability, the way everyone else did, the way Charles did. He would transform life into a long, peaceful Sunday afternoon in which he would while away the time until nightfall. It could not be that difficult: he might even learn to enjoy the simple miracle of being alive.

“Better than ever, Charles,” he replied, suddenly perking up. “So good, in fact, that I would gladly accept an invitation to dine at your house, provided your charming wife also invites her equally charming sister.”

17

This part of the story could end here, and sure enough for Andrew it does, except that this is not only Andrew’s story.

If it were, there would be no need for my involvement: he could have told his own story, as each man recounts the tale of his own life to himself on his deathbed.

Yet that tale is always an incomplete, partial one, for only a man shipwrecked on a desert island from birth, growing up and dying there with no more than a few monkeys for company, can claim without a shadow of a doubt that his life is exactly what he thinks it has been, provided of course that the macaques have not stashed away in some cave or other his trunk full of books, clothes, and photographs already washed up by the tide.

However—with the exception of shipwrecked babies and other extreme cases—each man’s life forms part of a vast tapestry, woven together with those of countless other souls keen to judge his actions not only to his face but behind his back, so that only if he considers the world around him a backdrop with puppets which stop moving when he goes to sleep can he accept that his life has been exactly as he tells it. Otherwise, moments before he breathes his last, he will have to resign himself to the fact that his understanding of his own life must of necessity only be vague, fanciful, and uncertain, that there are things that affected him, for good or bad, which he will never know about: ranging from his wife’s at some point having had an affair with the pastry cook to his neighbor’s dog urinating on his azaleas every time he went out. And so, just as Charles did not witness the charming dance the leaf performed on the puddle, so Andrew did not witness what happened when Charles got his beloved hat back. He could have pictured him entering Wells’s house, apologizing for the fresh intrusion, joking about not being armed this time, and the three of them crawling about like small children on their hands and knees hunting for the elusive hat, except that we know he had no time to wonder about what his cousin was doing because he was too busy with his heart-warming deliberations about other worlds and magicians’ boxes.

I, on the other hand, see and hear everything whether I want to or not, and it my task to separate the seed from the chaff, to decide which events I consider most important in the tale I have chosen to tell. I must therefore go back to the point at which Charles realizes he has forgotten his hat and returns to the author’s house. You may be wondering what bearing such an insignificant act as the fetching of a hat could possibly have on this story. None whatsoever, I would say, if Charles really had forgotten his hat purely by accident. But things are not always what they seem, and save me the trouble of burdening you with a list of examples which you could easily find by rummaging around a little in your own lives, regardless of whether you live near a cake shop or a have garden full of azaleas. And so let us return to Charles without further ado: “Blast, I’ve forgotten my hat,” said his cousin, after Andrew had clambered into the cab. “I’ll be back in a jiffy, cousin.” Charles strode hurriedly across the tiny front garden and entered the author’s house, looking for the tiny sitting room where they had taken Andrew. There was his hat, calmly waiting for him on a peg on the coat-stand exactly where he had left it. He seized it, smiling, and went out into the passageway, but instead of going back the way he had come, as would appear logical, he turned round and mounted the stairs to the attic. There he found the author and his wife hovering around the time machine in the dim glow of a candle placed on the floor. Charles made his presence known, clearing his throat loudly before declaring triumphantly: “I think everything turned out perfectly. My cousin was completely taken in!” Wells and Jane were collecting the Ruhmkorff coils they had hidden earlier among the shelves of knickknacks. Charles took care to avoid treading on the switch that activated them from the door, setting off the series of deafening electrical charges that had so terrified his cousin. After asking for Wells’s help and telling him about his plan, Charles had been skeptical when the author came up with the idea of using those diabolical coils. He had confessed rather sheepishly to being one of the many spectators who had fled like frightened rabbits from the museum where their inventor, a pale, lanky Croat named Nikola Tesla had introduced to the public his devilish device and the hair-raising blue flashes that caused the air in the room to quiver. However, Wells had assured him that these harmless contraptions would be the least of his worries. Besides, he ought to start getting used to the invention that would revolutionize the world, he had added, before going on to tell him with a tremor of respect in his voice how Tesla had set up a hydroelectric power station at Niagara Falls that had bathed the town of Buffalo in electric light. It was the first step in a project that signaled the end of night on Earth, Wells had affirmed. Evidently, the author considered the Croat a genius, and was eager for him to invent a voice-activated typewriter that would free him from the burden of tapping the keys with his fingers while his imagination raced ahead, at impossible speed. In view of the plan’s success, Charles had to agree in hindsight that Wells had been brilliant: the journey back in time would never have been as believable without the lightning flashes, which in the end had provided the perfect buildup, before the magnesium powder concealed behind the false control panel blinded whoever pulled the lever.

“Magnificently,” Wells rejoiced, getting rid of the coils he was holding and going to greet Charles, “I confess I had my doubts; there were too many things that could have gone wrong.” “True,” admitted Charles, “but we had nothing to lose and much to gain. I already told you that if we succeeded, my cousin might give up the idea of killing himself.” He looked at Wells with genuine admiration, before adding, “And I must say that your theory about parallel universes to explain why the Ripper’s death did not change anything in the present was so convincing even I believed it.” “I’m so glad. But I don’t deserve all the credit. You had the most difficult task of hiring the actors, replacing the bullets with blanks, and most of all getting this thing built,” said Wells, pointing to the time machine.

The two men gazed at it fondly for a few moments.

“Yes, and the end result is truly splendid,” Charles agreed, and then joked: “What a pity it doesn’t work.” After a brief pause, Wells hastened to chortle politely at his joke, emitting a sound from his throat like a walnut being cracked.

“What do you intend doing with it?” Wells asked abruptly, as though wanting to smother as soon as possible the impression of that sickly laugh with which he had dared to show the world he had a sense of humor.

“Nothing, really,” the other man replied. “I’d like you to keep it.” “Me?” “Of course, where better than at your house? Consider it a thank-you present for your invaluable help.” “You needn’t thank me for anything,” protested Wells. “I found the whole thing hugely enjoyable.” Charles smiled to himself: how fortunate that the author had agreed to help him. Also that Gilliam Murray had been willing to join in the charade—which he even helped plan—after seeing how devastated Charles was when he informed him the company did not provide journeys into the past. And the wealthy entrepreneur agreeing to play a role had made everything that much easier. Taking Andrew straight to the author’s house without calling in at Murray’s offices first, in the hope that he would believe Charles’s suspicions about Wells having a time machine, would not have been nearly as convincing.

“I’d like to thank you again from the bottom of my heart,” said Charles, genuinely moved. “And you, too, Jane, for persuading the cab driver to hide down a side street and to tether the horse to the front gate while we pretended to intimidate your husband.” “You’ve nothing to thank me for either, Mr. Winslow, it was a pleasure. Although I’ll never forgive you for having instructed the actor to stab your cousin …” she chided, with the amused smile of someone gently scolding a naughty child.

“But everything was under control!” protested Charles, pretending to be shocked. “The actor is an expert with a knife. And besides, I can assure you that without that added bit of encouragement, Andrew would never have shot him. Not to mention that the scar it will leave on his shoulder will be a constant reminder he saved his beloved Marie’s life. Incidentally, I liked the idea of employing someone to play a guardian of time.” “Wasn’t that your doing?” declared Wells, taken aback.

“No,” said Charles. “I thought you’d arranged it …” “It wasn’t me …” replied Wells, perplexed.

“In that case, I think my cousin scared off a burglar. Or perhaps he was a real time traveler,” joked Charles.

“Yes, perhaps,” Wells laughed uneasily.

“Well, the main thing is it all turned out well,” concluded Charles. He congratulated them once again on their successful performances and gave a little bow as he said good-bye. “And now I really must go, otherwise my cousin will start to suspect something. It has been a pleasure meeting you. And remember, Mr. Wells, I shall always be one of your most devoted readers.” Wells thanked him with a modest smile that lingered on his face as Charles’s footsteps disappeared down the stairs. Then he heaved a deep sigh of satisfaction and, hands on hips, gazed at the time machine with the fierce affection of a father contemplating his firstborn child, before gently stroking the control panel.

Jane watched him, moved, aware that at that very moment her husband was being assailed by an emotion as intense as it was disturbing, for he was embracing a dream, a product of his own imagination that had stepped miraculously out of the pages of his book and become a reality.

“We might find some use for the seat, don’t you think?” Wells commented, turning towards her.

His wife shook her head, as though asking herself what the devil she was doing with such an insensitive fellow, and walked over to the window. The author went and stood beside her, a look of consternation on his face. He placed his arm round her shoulders, a gesture that finally softened her, so that she in turn laid her head against him. Her husband did not lavish her with so much affection that she was going to pass up this spontaneous gesture, which had taken her as much by surprise—or more—as if he had hurled himself from the window, arms akimbo, in order to confirm once and for all that he was unable fly. Thus entwined, they watched Charles climb into the cab, which then pulled away.

They watched it disappear down the end of the street beneath the orange-tinted dawn.

“Do you realize what you did tonight, Bertie?” Jane asked him.

“I nearly set fire to the attic.” She laughed.

“No, tonight you did something that will always make me feel proud of you,” she said, looking up at him with infinite tenderness. “You used your imagination to save a man’s life.”