Arcadia

18

All events displace in both temporal directions simultaneously and equally. The magnitude of displacement is in direct proportion to the mass of the event — Meerson’s second law.

I formulated this in a library in 1949, the Bibliothèque Mazarine in Paris, rather a pleasant place to sit and read. I had worked out some of the mathematics before I left but it was highly speculative and didn’t make much sense, even to me. While I was still stymied, I had little to do, so I spent many years reading — really reading, I mean, in libraries at a wooden desk, or curled up on a settee with a little light, holding the book in my hands, turning the pages, glass of brandy, warm fire, all of that. Anyway, I was reading La Cousine Bette by Balzac (which I also recommend) and was struck by how convincing were both the characters and the situations he described. I wondered whether Balzac had taken them from personal observation and simply amended real people and circumstance to serve his purpose.

Then it dawned on me in a moment of such excitement I can remember it perfectly well to this day. Of course he had done that; he had transferred reality into his imagination. But — and this was my great insight — he must, at the same time, have transferred his imagination into reality. Clearly, in an infinite universe every possibility must exist, including Balzac’s. Imagining Cousin Bette called her into being, although only potentially. The universe is merely a quantity of information; imagining a fictional character does not add to that quantity — it cannot do so by definition — but does reorganise it slightly. The Betteish universe has no material existence, but the initial idea in Balzac’s brandy-soaked brain then spreads outwards: not only to those who read his books, but also, by implication, backwards and forwards. Imagining Cousin Bette also creates, in potential, her ancestors and descendants, friends, enemies, acquaintances, her thoughts and actions and those of everybody else in her universe.

I settled down for a long night of home-brewed LSD and (in homage to Balzac) coffee and brandy. A fabulous mixture, and the result was pure joy, although I paid a price with a headache of monumental proportions when the effects wore off. So very simple. It was merely a question of turning my insights into mathematics and much of that was there already, just not in a coherent form. I felt drained and exhausted when I finished after five days of delirium, but more satisfied than at any time in my life.

It was gorgeous. Elegant, stylish and so obviously correct that my one regret was that there was no one to tell. No one could possibly understand it. Many generations of physicists and mathematicians would have to do their work before anyone could even begin to grasp what I had accomplished. It would have been as if Einstein had laid out his work in the Middle Ages. Out of context, without the background of another couple of centuries of other people’s labour, even the notation was meaningless. That was a pity, as a little applause and admiration would have been most welcome.

My insight marked the point where orthodoxy and I diverged for ever. The standard model, current for several centuries by my time, assumes that all pasts, presents and futures exist, and that time does as well; out of that came Hanslip’s insistence that travel through time is impossible. If we change events in the past, and the past is fixed, then we cannot be changing our past, but must be moving to the universe where what we do takes place. QED. He even stole my phrase for it: ‘What was, is.’

Cute. But wrong. ‘What was, is. Until it isn’t.’ Not as elegant, I admit, but more accurate. The universe is not wasteful: why have lots of universes, when one will do perfectly well? It is simpler to assume an infinite number of potential universes, than an infinite number of actual ones. So, a universe with Cousin Bette in it could exist, but doesn’t. If it did, then a universe without her — like ours — could not. One or the other. Take your pick.

What was more, I had already proven it before I left. I just didn’t understand the proof. It was the bluebottle experiment that nailed it, an attempt to examine the hoary old paradox-of-time business that has so annoyed anyone who has dealt with the issue. It got no funding, as no one took it seriously; only a very lowly researcher was assigned to it as a training exercise and so, naturally, no one paid any attention to the result.

What if you go back and shoot your grandmother before you are born, so that you are not born and can’t shoot her? Dealing with this logical impossibility gave birth to the alternative universe theory: you can shoot your grannie, but not in your own universe, so that in one you exist as a murderer but are not subsequently born, and in the other you are born, but disappear when you transit to a different one to commit your crime.

Experimental simulations were carried out to test the hypothesis, but were subsequently abandoned because there were so many errors. The idea was simple: a bluebottle was persuaded to eat its own egg. This was difficult, as it was assumed this had to take place within the confines of the machine and the technicians kept on making mistakes. The results were confusing and meaningless; sometimes the bluebottle simply refused to eat its own egg, which prevented a paradox; sometimes the controlling programme altered the present so that, if the insect did eat the egg presented to it, then it was subsequently discovered that the wrong egg had been sent and again no paradox occurred. But occasionally the right egg was sent and the bluebottle happily ate itself without any consequences.

Nobody could understand how such a simple thing could be so badly handled and the poor researcher was fired as a result. But, much later, I began to wonder what explanation could be offered if you assumed that everything had, in fact, been done perfectly. The answer was that if everything was done perfectly to create a paradox, then both past and future had to change simultaneously. Clearly, this was difficult to prove, because not only would all documentary evidence be re-formed, all memories would be as well — the researchers could not remember having done the experiment properly because, the moment the fly dug its nasty little choppers into its own egg, then everything changed so that, in fact, it hadn’t been. The point being that the re-formation of events took place subsequent to the paradox; at neither point, past or future, were paradoxical actions prevented.

Let me put it this way. We accept easily the idea that the future is the consequence of events in the past. With a bit of an effort, we can wrap our heads round the idea that the past is the consequence of events in the future. What this suggested was that neither of these was quite true; rather both are simultaneously dependent on the other. An event which we consider to be in the future is not happening after, or as a sole consequence of, events in the past. Remove that illusion, and the whole business becomes understandable.

People are naturally so fond of themselves that they assume the past must lead to them. They have egos of such size that they cannot imagine it doing otherwise. Rather like biologists of the past imagining the whole of evolution leading to Homo sapiens, so that we almost become the point of evolution, or religious types assuming that the world was created to give us somewhere nice to live, so those who concern themselves with time assume that the only purpose of the past is to produce the present, with us as the lead characters. This desire is so strong we wilfully ignore all evidence to the contrary.

The central point is that while all variants of the universe exist in latent form, only one is actualised. A simple metaphor will suffice; say that reality is a piece of string on a flat surface. Birth at one end, death at the other. Big Bang to Big Crunch, if you prefer. ‘Now’ is at any point between the two. The piece of string can, in theory, move anywhere on the surface, but can only be in one place at a time.

Now, if you push it at any one place, the string on both sides of your finger will change position a little — in temporal terms, both before and after will adjust. Next, move the end — create a different future. Again, the rest of the string will move. There are an infinite number of places where the string can be, but only one where it actually is.

Now add another illustration. Say that the relationship of future and past is also like a pair of scales: events in one balance the other; ‘now’ is merely the fulcrum. A change in the relationship between the two alters the balance. Either side can instigate that change or it can even take place from outside the balance, but the sides respond equally.

The more strongly an alternative world is imagined, the more it becomes a viable candidate as a successor to our present. Then events become merely probabilistic. Historical evolution will naturally tend to the easiest destination, a bit like water finding the easiest route down a hill. The point is that there is nothing special about my future, except in terms of probability. Nor (by extension) is there anything particularly special about my past. The trouble was that the computer simulation had already established that, in terms of probability, my own history was both highly unlikely and very unstable. If it was knocked off course, it would tend to flow in a different direction very easily. I should have paid more attention to that than I did.

In theory, therefore, all I had to do was come up with an algorithm which made it more likely for, say, Hanslip not to exist and the laws of probability would take care of the rest. Past and present would re-form to flow in a new direction to reach the easier destination. The computer simulation had demonstrated (even if it had otherwise been useless) that this is difficult — history follows definite, if broad, rules. The more dramatically different the future, the more dramatically different the past must become. But all I wanted was a simple tweak to take care of my little difficulties.

Time travel has nothing to do with either travel or time. The term is a sort of unfortunate hangover. When I went to 1936, I was not travelling ‘through’ time in any real sense; this has no meaning. Rather, I was making small adjustments to the totality of information that makes up the universe. It was like cutting a block of text from a manuscript and inserting it at an earlier point, which causes everything else to shift to make room. ‘I’ am simply a particular block of information within a much larger whole which, as far as I am concerned, seems like a different time and place. The version of 1936 without me faded out, and the version with me came into existence. I moved the string, to use my metaphor again, or, if you prefer, slightly changed the disposition of events on the scales.

Now I wanted to experiment with more deliberation to see if it would be possible to reconstruct my own point of origin, but with certain improvements. If I was going to go back, then there was no point in returning simply to be arrested and locked up, as I was sure would happen. The calculations for that, however, were way beyond my current abilities. I wanted to experiment with a grosser construct first of all to amass the data. So I needed a world so outlandish that the likelihood of it seriously challenging my own line of reality would be too slight to be worth worrying about. I didn’t want a nasty accident.

Fairly simple in theory. Very optimistic in practice.

My decision to go to England for the war was not merely a desire for self-preservation. By that stage, I had given up worrying too much about pursuit; I had assumed that Hanslip would at least try to send someone after me but no one showed up. It was true that I had disguised my destination and there was little juice left in the machine, but I had assumed that he would be able to do something. That he didn’t suggested he was much dumber than even I thought.

I began to relax. I had been more or less living the life of a hermit; I had only casual acquaintances, no one who might (for example) refer to me in a diary or letter that stood a chance of surviving, just in case. I avoided important or notable people and steered clear of officialdom as much as possible. I was stuck, however, with my name. The psychiatrists got it out of me in my delirium, and it was too late to change.

Two years in, though, and I felt much safer and began to explore the mysteries of friendship. The world had many attractions, and I was missing most of them. I was also becoming a little complacent and rash. What possible danger could I face in Europe in 1939?

One day that spring, while driving into Collioure, I stopped to get some petrol and water for the radiator at a small village. I loved that part of the world, not least because the first time I had seen it the whole area had been a barren, scorched wasteland. To see it in its glory — the pine trees, the vegetation, the olives, the vines, the sea still blue and alive — was glorious beyond words. I settled there, mainly because the place had lodged in my mind as being important.

This time, rather than watching with interest as the man slowly filled the tank and the radiator and washed the windscreen, I crossed over to the bar for a drink for myself. It was just over the road from the railway station.

I ordered a cold glass of local white wine with some bread and, when it was delivered, took a sip and looked around me.

There, at the only other table in this dusty little bar, was Lucien Grange, reading a newspaper.

My cry of shock must have been quite loud; if not, then the way I suddenly stood up, knocked over the chair and table and sent the bowl of rather tasty sausage spinning across the floor may have been what attracted attention. Either way, I was noticed. He saw my distress and himself got up.

‘Is anything the matter, madam?’ he asked in perfect French.

‘No, thank you so much,’ I said, still trembling. I examined him carefully, then began to relax. It was close. The same nose, the same eyes, the same mouth. But it wasn’t him. The moment I could collect myself enough and be calm I knew it wasn’t him. The voice was different, the shape similar, but not similar enough...

‘Forgive me,’ I said, as the waiter came over, grumbled and began repairing the damage I had caused. ‘You so greatly resembled someone I knew.’

‘I’m afraid it cannot be,’ he replied. ‘I could never have forgotten meeting you.’

Charmed? Of course I was; it was delivered handsomely, and I was unused to such rhetorical devices.

‘You must have thought me terribly clumsy.’

‘On the contrary. It brightened up a tedious time waiting for my train. May I offer you a replacement for your drink?’

Of course he might. He did.

‘May I introduce myself?’ he said once it was delivered. ‘My name is Henry Lytten.’

I suppose it was Henry who took the full force of my desire to explore the nature of human interactions, and the fact that (I suspected) he was the ancestor of someone I knew made me cling to him in a way I had never experienced before. I didn’t exactly kidnap him, but very nearly: I took him back to my little house in the hills, and he stayed with me for three weeks. By the end we were firm friends. He was a kind, gentle fellow, and put up with me: not easy considering the huge outpouring of entirely raw and uncontrolled emotions that erupted from me in those days. When I was angry I was murderous; when affectionate, then such love had never been felt before by any human being. My hunger was insatiable, my thirst unquenchable and I once laughed so hard I had to go into hospital for three days because of the torn muscles. I learned to avoid Walt Disney cartoons, as the despair at watching the cruelty inflicted on Snow White by that horrid Witch was so great it took me weeks to recover. As for Romeo and Juliet... Henry took me to see it in Stratford in 1941, with Margaretta Scott as Juliet; I nearly expired from sheer anguish. I was quite sophisticated by that stage, but was hard pressed not to leap onto the stage, grab the knife and kill myself in order to spare her. Only the thought of Henry’s embarrassment made me stop myself.

What I mean is that it took a lot of practice to get these emotions under control, and Henry, dear man, taught me more than anyone, with patience and kindness. Do you know, I even thought of marrying him? But how could I have possibly done such a thing? I still planned to go home one day and we were ageing at different rates. I had habits (drink, drugs and work, mainly) which he could not understand. Great friends make bad spouses. I cannot easily say how much I regretted it. I almost abandoned everything, just for the sake of happiness. It was the first time in my life I had ever loved anybody. The realisation that I could, and the extraordinary impact on me in comparison to the chemically induced emotions I was used to, made me think deeply. Did I really want to go back to a place where such things were illegal, where people conducted themselves only in a narrow range of efficient civility?

I fear I hurt poor Henry, but I think that even he realised that I would have been a difficult partner; he had certainly seen enough to know that I would be, at best, an uncertain companion who would not easily fit into the quiet contemplative life he had in mind. On the other hand, he never found anyone to take my place. I regret that too; had I not come into his life then perhaps he would not have become the slightly reclusive figure of later years, although considering the polite and distant way most of his contemporaries dealt with their marital relationships I am not sure he was missing so very much.

We spent a great deal of time in each other’s company until the war started, and afterwards, when I went back to France, he would come and visit almost every vacation. We drove around France and Italy, staying in little hotels, eating in restaurants, enjoying ourselves as the world recovered from its trauma. He taught me about Christmas and birthdays, how to give gifts and pay compliments. I still smile when I think of that period.

He was a great talker as well. We would sit until late at night and I would question him remorselessly about everything — life, family, work, education. About his country, the books he liked, those he didn’t. About music, theatre, poetry and the cinema. About the French and the Germans, the Italians, Americans and the Spanish. About politics and religion. About manners, customs, habits. I absorbed it all and came back for more. He taught me the art of conversation, of being in company for no purpose. The pleasure of wasting time.

It was not that I didn’t know the facts. I knew many of them better than he did. I just didn’t know what they meant, how they fitted together. Henry didn’t provide all the answers, but he was a good start, and his generosity and kindness was the greatest lesson of all. He changed me irrevocably, and certainly for the better. I fear that I was not able to do the same for him. But from that moment, I began to question many things I had previously taken for granted.

It was because of Henry that I came to England and again because of him that I spent much of the next five years doing my bit for British Intelligence, although in a very much more lowly capacity than his. He came to rescue me in France in early 1940, which was terribly chivalrous of him, and whisked me off to safety. I had already decided this was the best option, but Henry’s assistance and then recommendation was useful in getting me employment to pass the time. If this sounds both grand and unlikely, then it was not. The country was desperate for expertise of all sorts and my quite phenomenal ability at languages was useful. My somewhat greater skill at mathematics remained unknown, however; properly tanked up, I could have done all of Bletchley Park’s work for it over a cup of tea, but that would have been hard to explain. Besides, I didn’t really want to do it; I rather thought it would have been pleasant to be a land girl, ploughing the fields and growing vegetables for the war effort. Dawn, fresh air, the nobility of physical labour, all that stuff. The camaraderie of a common purpose, getting drunk in pubs on days off. Lots of sex. I had a particularly romantic notion of working in a factory, joining a union, complaining about the oppression of the capitalist classes.

But no: because of Henry, I worked for intelligence, ploughing through Polish, German, Norwegian, Swedish, Bulgarian, Serbian, Greek and Russian texts with a speed which was considered by my superiors to be extraordinarily impressive. Boring work, for the most part. I wouldn’t have minded being parachuted into France and shooting people as Henry got to do, as it sounded quite fun, except that I was extraneous to history and so there was no guarantee I would survive. The moral considerations were complex, as well; I would hardly be murdering people, as from my point of view they were long dead anyway, but I would be shortening their lives, and I would have had to calculate the potential consequences for each target. Too much work. I still think I would have been quite good at it, though. I did think of offering myself as a sort of Mata Hari, seducing German officers, combining business with pleasure, but Henry’s superior, the saintly Portmore, was rather prudish and thought it a bit unladylike and un-English. Pointing out that I was neither a lady nor English did not persuade him. Later in the war, though, such scruples were abandoned.

It had its moments, although in my case the drama was a little spoiled by knowing the outcome. I didn’t share the frisson of fear at the thought of defeat, nor the remarkable uplift at the realisation of likely survival. I only let my guard slip once, in 1941, with Henry’s friend Sam Wind, a man I never liked much. I had just about figured out relationships between the sexes; male friendship was quite beyond me, at least the very peculiar English variety of it. I was being cheerful — don’t worry, I’m sure it will all be fine — and Wind had snapped back that I didn’t know what I was talking about. Once Germany had defeated the Soviet Union and could turn back to us...

‘No,’ I said with a cheery wave of the hand. We were in a pub and I had been sampling the whisky. ‘After Pearl Harbor and Stalingrad...’

Then, of course, I remembered it was only October. Some time to go before either of those. And the Germans were doing jolly well at that moment.

Sam, who was supercilious and superior at the best of times, gave me one of his finest sniffs of disdain, but as the news of the Japanese surprise attack began to come through in December, I remember him looking at me in a funny sort of way. All I can say is that it was the only time I ever made a mistake like that.