The Eternal War

CHAPTER 15

2001, New York

It took ten minutes to get three-quarters of the LEDs on the charge display lit up. Maddy was certain that was going to be enough. She only needed to send the unconscious form of Lincoln and Bob, perhaps Liam too, back to 1831. She turned round to check Bob and Sal were still keeping an eye on the man, curled up on one of the armchairs.

‘How is he?’

‘Still out,’ replied Sal, looking up from reading something on the table.

‘OK, computer-Bob, we’ll use the same drop-location data as the last trip. Punch them in to just before they rescued Lincoln from that wagon.’

› Affirmative, Maddy.

‘When he wakes up, he’ll think he passed out right outside that inn you mentioned, Liam.’

‘Right. Then me an’ Bob need to sniff out what caused that wagon to go hammer and tongs.’

‘You got it.’ She turned to the webcam. ‘Oh, and get a density probe running.’

Last thing they needed was a dock worker in there witnessing the arrival of Lincoln and heralding him as some kind of prophet from God.

› Density probe is activated.

Liam was standing beside her. ‘He’s a character, so. That Lincoln fella.’

‘A regular firebrand,’ she tutted. ‘Too much energy for his own good, like a freakin’ toddler on a sugar rush.’ She pulled up the density-probe display bar and nodded with satisfaction that nothing so far had stepped through their drop space. ‘If he’d been alive in my time, I guess he’d make a pretty good children’s TV presenter … except for the fact he’d scare the kids with that monobrow.’

Liam laughed. He got the gist of that. ‘Still … I suppose it’s energy like that that makes a poor farmer’s son a president?’

She nodded. ‘I guess so. I’d like to think that — ’

The MSNBC news feed flickered. Both of them caught the sudden change out of the corner of their eyes — the news reporter standing outside the White House and reporting on President Bush’s sliding approval ratings had been wearing a pale blue shirt and a black tie … all of a sudden he was now wearing a white shirt with a dark red tie.

‘Did you see that?’ said Maddy.

More than the shirt and tie, a second ago his skin had been a coffee colour, now it was white. The same face, the same dark hair slicked back, but the skin had lightened a tone, as if some studio engineer had adjusted the contrast setting on a camera.

Maddy turned in her chair. ‘Sal … I think we just had another wave. Bigger one, this time.’

Sal was on her feet. ‘I’ll go look outside.’ They’d left the five-dollar note just outside the shutter, hidden beneath a discarded McDonald’s carton. On one side was the Abraham Lincoln image. She wondered if this time wave would have wiped his face off the note and replaced it with another scowling president.

Maddy turned in her seat back to Liam. ‘OK, I think we need to put Abe back pretty fast.’ She winced at the sight of the empty perspex tube. It would take too long filling it up again. ‘You guys are going back dry.’ She looked at Liam, still wearing his morning coat and cravat … and Bob, still dressed like a dock worker. ‘And you’re still all dressed right … so we’re good to go.’

The noise of the shutter cranking up echoed across to them. Sal stepped outside into the evening. ‘Looks the same!’ she called in. ‘Manhattan’s still there!’

Maddy sniffed and wiped her nose. ‘Well, that’s something, then.’

‘Jahulla!’ Sal came rushing back in.

‘What?’

She ran over to the computer desk. ‘Look! See?’ She spread the five-dollar note out on the desk. Lincoln’s face was gone and, just as Maddy had expected, in his place was another elder statesman with mutton-chop whiskers and a joyless frown.

Becks joined them, looking down at the note. ‘Lincoln’s presence has been completely removed from this timeline.’

Maddy nodded. ‘No Lincoln memorial in Washington, then … or — ’

‘STOP!’ Bob’s voice suddenly boomed. They all turned just in time to see the heels of Bob’s boots disappear out of sight through the open shutter door and out into the alley. Becks responded immediately and sprinted across the archway to join him.

Liam looked at the armchair where Lincoln had been slumped unconscious just moments ago. ‘He’s only gone and done a bleedin’ runner!’

Lincoln’s long legs carried him swiftly down the cobbled backstreet, the soles of his boots slapping the ground like an audience clapping applause at his death-defying escape into the darkness.

Behind him, two dozen yards and no more, he could hear the heavier footfall of that giant of a man moving with a quite unbelievable agility. Lincoln was a fast runner; as a boy in Coles County, Illinois, he had won every race with his friends — legs like a stallion, his father used to say.

The busy end of the street opened up in front of him. He could see mesmerizing lights of all kinds and all colours: lights on horseless carriages, lights down the sides of buildings, distant winking lights far up in the sky.

He passed a large, barrel-sized bucket of rotting garbage and yanked at it. In his wake he heard it fall, spilling a small avalanche of stinking refuse across the cobblestones. He chanced a glance over his shoulder just in time to see the giant man slip in the rotten mush and lose his footing.

‘Ha haaaa!’ he yelled triumphantly as his pounding feet now found firm tarmac, and instinctively he turned left on to the busier street, resolving not to allow the bewildering sights of the future tempt him to hesitate and lose the hard-earned lead on his pursuer.

But even with his sprinter’s legs carrying him fast and away from those mysterious travellers in time, who quite clearly were intent on taking him back to his hopeless, back-breaking and dead-end life in New Orleans, his mind continued to spin like a yarn wheel at the incredible sights and smells and sounds all around him.

This is the future of America, he told himself … the future, the future, the future … his feet slapping pavement to the rhythm of his mantra. He felt as excited as a dog with two tails.

This is the future! And, by Jove … I think I like the look of it!