Prologue (63 page)

“I wonder what else is different,” he mused.

“Paul, there’s something I have to tell you,” she said from behind him. “Something I couldn’t tell you before.”

He turned back to her. In doing so he momentarily became dizzy and reached out with his hand to steady himself on the counter.

“I know,” he said. “It’s about your child.”

“What?” she exclaimed.

“I know all about it,” he said. “You weren’t honest with me. Lewis told me. He didn’t trust you so he looked into it.”

“Lewis?” she asked. She glanced back at the screen and manipulated the mouse some more.

“Lewis knew?” she asked incredulously. “And Lewis told you?”

“He had someone check your divorce decree from
North Carolina
. The court papers said you two had no children. There was no Jeffrey in
Braintree
. That whole story was bullshit.”

He waved his hand. “It’s O.K. It doesn’t matter now. You told us why you really came to
Cambridge
.”

She looked back at the screen and kept searching. “There’s something else,” she said, and began typing on the keyboard.

“Here I am,” she announced simply. She leaned forward and studied the screen. After a few moments she turned to where Paul stood, still gripping the counter.

“Amanda Hutch,” she said softly.
“Full professor, MIT, History,
Cambridge
,
Massachusetts
.
Personal: Married to Dr. Paul deVere, full professor, MIT, Astrophysics.”

Paul stared at her, not comprehending. His cobwebs still hadn’t fully cleared.

“Paul,” she said. “We have to talk. There’s something I need to tell you.”

To deVere’s left a telephone jangled. He stared at it.

“Go ahead, answer it,” she urged.

To deVere the ring sounded slightly different. He stuck his finger in his right ear to clear it. He picked up the receiver and punched the lit button.

“Hello?”

“Daddy!” the voice implored. “Tell me you’re not going to be late are you?”

“Late?
For what?”

“Aw, c’mon, Dad.
Don’t give me a hard time. The game starts at seven.”

“Game?”
Even through his haze his heart leapt at the voice.

“We finished at the mall and Nance wanted to know if I could show her your lab before we go over to Fenway so I figured we’d come up before you and Mom left. I knew you’d be late. I’ve been calling your cell all the way across town but you’ve got it turned off again. You’ve got to learn to just keep it on. And don’t give me that generation crap. Even Uncle Pete and Elaine say it bugs them too. You gotta’ get with it, Dad.”

DeVere paused.
“Fenway?
The game is at Fenway?” His mind began to clear.
“Uncle Pete and Elaine?”

Grace clucked sarcastically.
“Duh.
No, it’s in the middle of the bay. Hey, we’re in the lobby now. We’ll be right up. Love ya.’ Bye.”

Grace hung up. DeVere stood holding the receiver.

“Who was that?” Amanda asked, clutching at her forehead.

He replaced the receiver and turned to face Amanda, a huge smile across his face.

“It was Grace.”

“Grace?”

“My daughter, Grace.
We have tickets for the Sox tonight.
Against the Mets.”

“Tonight?
That’s impossible,” Amanda scolded. “We’ve got far too much to do.”

DeVere began to laugh. It started with a chuckle and then erupted into a full-blown roar. He moved to the counter and slumped on the stool opposite Amanda.

“Are you okay?” she asked with concern.

“Don’t you get it?” he asked. “We’ve got tickets to see the Sox. Grace is on the way up here with a friend of hers and we’re going to the game.” DeVere continued to roar. Seeing Hutch’s blank look only made him laugh harder.

“At
7:00
.
At
Fenway
Park
, where the Sox are playing.”

“What do I care whether the Red Sox are playing a baseball game? Are you mad?” Hutch asked incredulously.

“You really don’t get it,” he said, and then laughed even louder. “The Sox are playing at
Fenway
Park
. Not at Petrovyards. Fenway was torn down in 1996 to make way for a more proletariat friendly Petrovyards where all sports were welcome. But now this is
Fenway
Park
. It never got torn down. Petrovyards was never built!”

DeVere gestured around the lab. “The Russian is not lying here in a bloody mess with a broken nose because he was never here!” He pointed at the back wall. “The Accelechron is not here because it was never built. It was never built because there was no need for it!”

DeVere paused and watched Hutch’s face slowly transform as the significance of what he was saying registered. He could tell that her brain was also clearing. She remained inert on her stool, a stunned expression across her features.

“My God,” she said slowly when she finally spoke. “We did it. We didn’t just change us, we changed history.”

“We did do it.” DeVere continued to chuckle. “I don’t know what to do. I am as light as a feather. I am as happy as an angel. I am as merry as a schoolboy. I am as giddy as a drunken man! We did it, Amanda. We changed history. The spirits have done it all in one night.
Past, present and future!”

“Not the spirits,” Hutch corrected, becoming more professorial.
“Us.
You, me, and Lewis.
And Natasha,” she added with a look of sadness. “We all did it. So don’t give me the dickens on this one.”

DeVere nodded. He brushed off his clothes with his hands.

“That’s why Lewis didn’t come back with us,” Hutch said in a monotone. “He couldn’t come back and he knew it.
Because he was never here.
Without the Soviet victory everything is different with him. If he had come back through the wormhole he would have been a non-person. No personal history, no nothing. He would have been here physically alright, but out of place. And he knew it. God, we were so dumb.”

DeVere shrugged. “What did you mean we were married?” he asked softly. “Were you joking?”

“Paul, there’s something else I have to tell you. The staff bios are here on line at the MIT website. You and Lewis were right; I wasn’t totally honest with you. This whole thing was personal for me too.
Very personal.

“Paul, you had a great career ahead of you. Being married to me, some two bit
radical,
wasn’t going to help you. You never would have gotten where you did. And God knows you never would have invented the Accelechron and set everything right. I just didn’t know what else to do. I loved you so much. I was scared, so scared. I didn’t want to make trouble for you. And I knew I couldn’t do it by myself, I knew that.”

“What are you talking about?” Paul asked.

Amanda reached across the counter and took his hand. “You have to understand. Vlad was a wonderful man. He was a good friend when I needed a good friend. It was his idea and he was right.”

“I know that, you explained all this in the park,” Paul protested impatiently. “You don’t have to tell me about Vlad. Whatever you did with him is your business. You don’t have to explain anything to me. But what’s this about being married?”

She let go of his hand and shook her head. “You don’t get it. Vlad’s sister and her husband were the only real options. But then the war came and I was sick about it.
Horrible.
Millions dead.
And afterwards everything was so screwed up it was years before we could do anything. Years before we even knew anything. Every time off from school I’d go to the
Soviet Union
, searching...”

“That’s all different now,” he said. “We’ll look it up. For all we know those wars never happened, none of them.”

“But they did happen, Paul, at least, they happened for me and you.”

Behind him Paul deVere heard the knob rattle and he turned to the door. He watched as Grace, every inch the daughter he knew, walked through the doorway, her arms filled with shopping bags. His face exploded in a smile.

“Hey Dad, hey Mom, who’s pitching tonight?
It was supposed to be Conestan but the Globe said something about that rookie lefty maybe getting his first start.”

Three steps into the room Grace halted abruptly, her mouth hanging open. Paul stared back, equally open-mouthed, at the doorway.

“My God!”
Grace exclaimed.

“Oh my God!”
Paul repeated, under his breath.

Grace’s mouth closed. “That’s what I said, Dad. Mom, what the hell did you do to your hair? It, it looks great, doesn’t it, Sis?” she said over her shoulder to her companion.
“Although it does look like something out of the nineteen sixties.
You guys going to a costume party?”

Paul stared at the young woman standing just a few feet behind Grace. Her long brown hair hung straight down her back, and her angular features and deep blue eyes were unmistakable.

“Natasha?” he croaked softly. “I, I don’t get it.”

He swiveled back to Amanda who sat behind him, beaming broadly at the pair who had just walked through the door.

“How, how can this be?” he rasped in absolute confusion.