Prologue (41 page)

“I would remember such men, Señor,” he said slowly. “Carlos does not meet with anyone I do not know. I know well this Señor Oswald. But no men like you describe have met with Carlos or with any of the others who are with us.”

Ginter looked hard at the Cuban before nodding.

“Thank you,” Ginter finally said. “If you see them please tell Carlos for us that they are not to be trusted.”

“I will tell him, Señor,” the man said as Lewis and Pamela walked back outside.

In the car Pamela asked, “Do you believe him?”

“Yeah,” Ginter answered, turning the key and starting the Corvette. “Collinson and Pomeroy haven’t been around here either.”

Paul deVere answered the telephone on the first ring.

“Dr.
deVere
?” the female voice asked.

“That’s me.”

“This is
Charlotte
from the New York Times. I know you have been calling to see Mr. Salisbury. I just found out he’ll be out of town all next week. He’s going to be giving a speech up at
Syracuse
University
Tuesday night and from there he’s flying to
Kansas City
. His first available appointment would be in two weeks.”

“
Syracuse
University
?” deVere asked. “What kind of speech is he giving up there?”

“He’s going to be speaking to the journalism school about the church bombings story from last winter.”

“I see,” deVere answered. “No, that will be all right. If we still need to see him in two weeks we’ll get back to you then,” he said and hung up.

Paul deVere dialed the front desk and asked to be connected to Amanda’s room. How long is the train ride to
Syracuse
?
he
wondered.

Chapter 20

Paul and Amanda sat in the back row of Hendrick’s Chapel on the campus of
Syracuse
University
. It was mid-September, and the school had been back in session only a few weeks. The lecture by Harrison Salisbury was well attended. In the aftermath,
Salisbury
stood at the front of the chapel chatting with a few students. One by one, they peeled off. Paul knew from his own teaching experience,
Salisbury
would soon be alone.

“Without the documents, he’ll never believe us,” Paul said.

“You’re the scientist,” Amanda said as she rose from the pew. “You explain the science. I’ll cover the history.”

Paul followed her to the front of the chapel. Seeing two adults approaching, the last student moved past them toward the doors.
Salisbury
, who Paul estimated to be about his own age, looked up. Amanda extended her hand.

“Mr. Salisbury?”

The man’s glance moved from her to deVere, and then to the rear doors. He slowly extended his own hand.

“Yes,” he answered cautiously. “Can I help you?”

“My name is Amanda Hutch. Dr. Amanda Hutch. And this is Dr. Paul deVere. Is there someplace we could speak privately?” she asked, searching the now empty chapel.
Salisbury
followed her gaze before shrugging.

“This is probably as good a place as any,” he said. “Is this about my speech? I noticed you sitting in the back, and you don’t look like students.”

“Oh, no, sorry,” Paul stammered. “It’s not about your speech. Although it was very interesting,” he added quickly.

“Are you physicians?”
Salisbury
remained polite but Paul detected concern in his voice.

“No,” Amanda answered. “We are not physicians. Actually, we are professors. We teach, sort of, at MIT.”

Salisbury
raised his eyebrows. “What does ‘sort of’ mean?”

Paul cleared his throat. “Mr. Salisbury. The information we have to share with you may seem odd. We just ask that you hear us out before jumping to any conclusions.”

Salisbury
’s gaze again moved from one to the other. “So, this is not about
Birmingham
?”

“
Birmingham
?” Paul asked.

Amanda turned to Paul, clearly exasperated. “You
know,
the topic of his speech.”

She turned back to the lecturer. “Mr. Salisbury, your articles on the church bombings were excellent.
No, not about
Birmingham
.
Paul, why don’t you explain the science.”

DeVere took a deep breath.
Salisbury
had visibly relaxed when Amanda had said that they were not there about
Birmingham
.

“Dr. Stephen Hawking’s book,
A Brief History
Of
Time
, discussed the concepts of time and space. Dr. Hawking wrote and lectured extensively on the subject, and developed a theory of wormholes. However, he believed that time travel was not possible.”

“Hawking? Does he teach with you, sort of, at MIT?”

“At
Cambridge
University
in
England
.
Astrophysics.”

“Ah,”
Salisbury
nodded.

“Same field as
myself
at MIT. We’re both Astrophysicists.”

“Well,”
Salisbury
interrupted. “I’m not the science man at the Times. If you’re looking to get a science article written-”

“No,” deVere interrupted. Amanda frowned at the force of deVere’s interjection.

“No, I’m not,” deVere continued. “Please hear us out. Another theorist, Kip Sone, believed that wormholes could be used to connect various points in time and space, in other words, to act as time machines.”

“Like H.G. Wells?”
Salisbury
asked.

“Yes. Like Wells. Anyway, a third theorist, Dr. Bennett David, took Sone a final step. Hawking felt that if one attempted to travel through a wormhole the resultant disruption in the space-time continuum would make the travel impossible. In his view this explained why we can only remember the past but not the future.”

“Or sometimes neither,”
Salisbury
joked.

DeVere smiled and continued. “Dr. David theorized that travel through wormholes was possible if matter were sufficiently accelerated. But to keep the balance in the universe that he theorized was necessary, there had to be contrapositive wormholes, in order to get back.”

Salisbury
nodded slowly.
“Roundtrip ticket.”

“Exactly!” deVere thundered. “And everything that traveled back to the earlier time can return without being accelerated again.”

Harrison Salisbury leaned back against the table, pursed his lips, and nodded.

“This is interesting. I like this. It’s certainly different than
Birmingham
. This David fellow, can I talk with him?”

DeVere shook his head. “In his later years he kind of, how should I say this, went off the deep end. He became a full time surfer.”

“Oh? That’s too bad. He moved to
California
?”

“No, he spent his days on the Gorenect.”

“The what?”
Salisbury
asked, his brow furrowed.

It was Amanda’s turn to enter the conversation.

“The Gorenect,” she added quickly. “It’s a system linking computers so that they can all talk together.”

She looked to Paul for help.

“It was named after its inventor,” Paul offered.

“I see,”
Salisbury
said. “I’m not familiar with computers. Well, what about this Hawking fellow. You said he wrote a book. When was it published?”

“Nineteen eighty-nine,” Amanda answered without flinching.

DeVere watched as the expression on
Salisbury
’s face stiffened. He looked at the pair and then his gaze drifted to the closed chapel doors behind them. Paul was aware of how alone the three of them were, and realized that
Salisbury
felt it too. His heart sank.

“I see,”
Salisbury
said. He cleared his throat. “This has been very interesting, but I’m not your writer.”

He stood up off the table and reached to the podium for his notes. “However, there are several writers in the
New York
area-“