Thrice upon a Time (45 page)

"Well," Charles said as he paced slowly to and fro in front of the snow-crusted library window. "I still think the only workable approach is the one on which we've already more or less agreed: Keep it simple to begin with by using the results of complex algorithms that nobody can know in advance, and adhere strictly to a rigid, predefined schedule. Then later on maybe, we could try repeating the whole thing using random numbers or something like that." He stopped and turned to look questioningly at where Elizabeth was listening in one of the armchairs.

"Yes, but that still wouldn't completely eliminate the element of human choice," she pointed out. "For example, somebody would still have to make a decision at some point of which algorithms to use. Until somebody makes that decision, obviously the actual results that will be obtained must remain undetermined. Whatever you do, you can't get away from human choice still being part of it. There's nothing that predetermines what we may or may not decide to do."

"I agree with you," Charles said, raising a hand. "But what else can we do? We're really going round and round the same circle all the time. And besides that, all this speculation will be just guessing in the dark until we've accumulated some tangible data. I say let's not try and prejudge how it might or might not work; let's just go ahead and set up a schedule of tests along the lines I've suggested, work through it systematically and with no deviations, and then see where we go from there."

Elizabeth considered the suggestion for a few seconds, then nodded. "Very well. You're right, I suppose, Charles. And after all, it is your machine. Let's do it that way then."

"Good." Charles came away from the window and sat down in the chair facing her. "We'll put it to Ted when he comes back upstairs. If he agrees, then we could start thinking about a broad outline form for the schedule right now, this afternoon. The general form that I had in mind was to break it into a series of phases, each designed to isolate one of the variables. The first thing I'd like to—" He stopped speaking abruptly as a loud crash sounded from somewhere outside the library. It sounded like a door being thrown open. Running footsteps clattered for a second, then the library door burst open, and Cartland exploded into the room.

"Extraordinary!" he shouted. "It's unbelievable! The machine!" He gesticulated wildly in the direction from which he had come. Charles and Elizabeth were already on their feet, staring at him in astonishment.

"What in God's name's wrong wi' ye?" Charles demanded. "Is it a ghost you've found down there or something?"

Cartland continued to wave his arms, at the same time hopping excitedly from one foot to the other. "It's gone berserk! There's all kinds of stuff coming out of it… reams of stuff!"

"What kind of stuff?" Elizabeth asked.

"I don't know. Something about black holes."

"Black holes?" Charles stared at him incredulously. "What about black holes?"

"I don't know," Cartland told him. "But that's not the point. It's coming from
May!
The message says it's come all the way back from the end of May!"

"That's preposterous," Charles declared.

"Come and see for yourself," Cartland said, at last calming down a little.

Charles strode out of the library and made for the door that led down to the lab. The other two followed close behind. Inside the lab, the hardcopier had stopped running, but a small wad of output sheets was lying in its catcher tray. Charles snatched them up and began scanning them rapidly. As he did so, his face creased into a frown of noncomprehension. After a few seconds he passed the first sheet to Elizabeth and began thumbing through the rest.

"How do you know this is genuine?" Charles asked. "How can it be?"

"Unless somebody in May found a way of extending the machine's range," Cartland suggested, but even as he said it, he shook his head. "No. That's not possible surely. The power it would need would be unimaginable. It would have to be a whole new machine. If anything like that was going to be working by May, we'd have had to have begun designing it a long time ago, and we didn't."

"Is it conceivable that somebody else has built
another machine
that we don't know about?" Charles mused, half to himself. He thought for a moment and shook his head decisively. "No, of course not. Obviously this message was sent in the code that our circuits are designed to handle. It's impossible to believe that another machine would use exactly the same protocols. The message must have been transmitted from this same machine."

Elizabeth was studying intently the sheet that Charles had handed to her. When she at last looked up, there was a strange expression on her face. Charles and Cartland looked at her curiously.

"Charles," she said quietly. "Does anybody else from Burghead, apart from me, know about your machine?"

"Of course not," Charles replied, sounding surprised. "Why?"

"Is anybody else from Burghead likely to learn about it within the next twenty-four hours?" she asked.

"Not for any reason I can think of. Why? What are you getting at?"

"Then this message is genuine," Elizabeth said simply. "It was originated in May." Charles's and Cartland's faces asked the question for them. Elizabeth explained, "There is information here of an extremely technical nature concerning the design of the Burghead reactors. Only somebody who was from Burghead and intimately involved with the physics of it could have supplied that information. If this message was sent from somewhere inside the machine's range, in other words within the next twenty-four hours, then I must have been involved with sending it. But if it did come from within that time, it would be a hoax because it claims to have come from May. I can think of no reason why I would wish to be a party to any hoax of that nature. Why should I? If it's not a hoax, it must have come from where it says it came from. Don't ask me how, but that's the only logical interpretation."

Charles stared hard at her for a long time, then nodded his head slowly. "Aye, Elizabeth, I think you're right," he said. He shifted his gaze back to the machine and shook his head wonderingly. "But how on Earth—"

"They downline loaded it!" Cartland exclaimed suddenly, snapping his fingers. Charles looked at him, momentarily puzzled. "A kind of bootstrap," Cartland said. "Somebody in May must have found a way of programming it to transmit to itself, to itself, to itself, all the way back in one-day stages. It
has
to be something like that. When you think about it, it's feasible."

An intrigued gleam came into Charles's eyes. "Aye… " he said, nodding his head slowly and thoughtfully. "There could be something to that, Ted. If that was how they did it, the program they used must have appeared in the computer first to read the message in after it. We'll see if we can get Lee to have a look at it when he and Murdoch get back from Kingussie. Did they give any idea of how long they thought they'd be?"

"I don't think they'll be back until after tea," Elizabeth said. "Maybe not until later this evening. Lee came back into the house just before they left and asked Mrs. Paisley to leave them out some sandwiches."

"Ah well, we'll just have to wait," Charles said. "In the meantime let's have a look at the message and see what all this business is about black holes."

At that moment the door opened, and Morna walked in. She stopped abruptly when she saw them, and brought her hand up to her mouth.

"Och! I did not think there was anyone down here. I thought ye were all still upstairs in the library."

"What do you want?" Charles asked a trifle impatiently.

"I was lookin' to find Maxwell. His dinner was ready over an hour ago, and it has not been touched. He's always appeared in the kitchen on time to the minute."

"Well, he's not here I'm afraid, Morna," Charles said. "He's probably got himself shut in a cupboard somewhere. We are rather busy."

"I'm sorry to have bothered ye," Morna said, backing toward the door. "I thought ye were all in the library."

Just as she closed the door, a flashing symbol appeared on the main screen of the machine's console, indicating that an incoming message was being received. Then the symbol became steady.

"Another one!" Charles gasped in amazement. "My God! What have we started with all this?" Cartland was already at the console, hammering in a command for whatever had come in to be displayed. A second later the screen came to life. The message on it read:

"It looks pretty busy," Lee observed as he looked out of the car at the crowds of shoppers threading their way along the snow-cleared sidewalk of the town's main street. He looked along the line of parked vehicles beside them. "You're gonna have problems finding a space here."

"It just needs patience," Murdoch said, slowing the car to a crawl. "Ah, what did I tell you—there's one." He brought the vehicle to a halt just ahead of an empty space, checked behind them, and reversed into it.

"They don't exactly have a surplus of parking lots in this town," Lee observed, looking around.

"What would you pull down to make some more?" Murdoch asked him.

"Mmm, okay, point taken. Where to first?"

"Well, if you still want a beer, why don't we do that now. Then we won't have to carry lots of junk all over town. There's a place you'd like just around the corner, all oak beams and stuff. Must be three hundred years old."

"Sounds fine."

Murdoch climbed out into the road and closed the car door. Lee opened the door on the other side, then paused for a moment to check his pockets for the list of things he needed to buy. Then he got out and turned to close the car door behind him.

Murdoch was halfway around the car when a startled shriek, coinciding with an ear-rending S-Q-U-A-W-K, stopped him dead in his tracks. At the same instant, Lee, who was just straightening up on the other side, spun around. They were just in time to see a girl who was coming out of one of the stores stumble over something and drop most of the packages she had been carrying.

"Oh, shit!" Murdoch groaned as he recognized the ball of black-and-white fur streaking away from beneath her feet and into the crowd. Lee yelled something and leaped away in pursuit. For a second Murdoch stood staring helplessly.

And then he noticed for the first time how stunningly attractive the girl was, with long, dark hair, and elegantly dressed in a brown sheepskin coat with matching knee-length boots. He hurried across the sidewalk to see what he could do to help.

Naturally…