The Future of Another Timeline

^TWENTY-EIGHT TESS

Raqmu, Ottoman-occupied territory… Chicago, Illinois… New York, New York (1893–94 C.E.)

We’d given ourselves six months to complete the Comstock edit, but Morehshin and I couldn’t book passage on a ship back to Chicago for three weeks. It was an annoying delay, but it gave me a chance to spend more time with Anita, processing everything that had happened. To earn money while waiting for us, Anita took on some research duties with the American Geophysical Union and taught public classes at Raqmu Technical University. Meanwhile, C.L. traveled back and forth to do more analysis and possibly get some clues about what those cuts in the Machine interface might mean.

As long as I kept busy with research at the AGU library, I could put aside my emotional vertigo from what had happened with Beth. The local pharmacist got used to my requests for willow bark extract, which made my stomach burn but took the edge off my near-constant headache. After a couple of weeks it got so bad that I bought some opium to relieve the pain.

I tried to keep it to myself, but it was hard to fool Anita for long. We were sharing a small room. One night she came home early from the university and caught me with a dab of opium, blowing smoke out the window.

“Tess.” She folded her arms. “You know that stuff is seriously addictive.”

“Sorry. I don’t do it very often. Sometimes it hurts too much to sleep.”

“You’re still getting those headaches? From the double memories?” Anita sat on the edge of our cubby while I stashed the remaining nugget of opium in a silver snuff box. I hadn’t smoked very much, but my agony had dulled to a twinge. I was probably too high to have this conversation, but I knew she wouldn’t let me off the hook.

“Correlation doesn’t equal causation, so we can’t be sure the pain is related to my memories.” I was mumbling. “Besides, the memories aren’t the difficult part. It’s more… the feelings.”

“What do you mean?”

“I used to feel certain about our mission. Like we are definitely making the timeline better. Now I feel… divided. What if we’re making things worse?”

Anita sighed. “I’ve been feeling this way a lot since my mom died.”

“Wait, what?” Some of my drug haze lifted. “Your mom died? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It was right after you left, and there’s been so much going on… I guess I didn’t want to deal with it.”

I thought of Anita’s mom, a fierce woman named Yvonne who had raised Anita by herself and worked the whole time as a nurse—then, when she had time to get more education, a doctor. When she visited L.A., I often went out to dinner with the two of them. I’d heard the story about how Yvonne hooked up with Anita’s dad while carousing across the U.K. with hippie friends. Anita’s parents had one of those baby boomer relationships I didn’t really understand, half-traditional and half-liberated. They never married, but her father had taken care of Anita financially, given her his last name, and invited her on summer trips to London, Mumbai, and Singapore. He’d been in and out of Anita’s life, but Yvonne was there every day. Anita called and texted her all the time. I couldn’t believe we’d been talking about my stupid headaches when Anita was dealing with this.

“Anita, I’m so sorry. What happened?”

“You know… getting old. She died in her sleep. But somehow that makes it worse. It’s like her time came, and it was peaceful and natural, but I wasn’t ready at all. I feel like I’m in the wrong timeline, even though I know this was supposed to happen. Suddenly I can’t figure out who the hell I’m supposed to be. She was the only person who remembered my childhood other than me, you know? I keep wanting to get her advice, and thinking that I see her…” Her voice cracked, but she didn’t cry. Somehow that made her face look more raw and broken.

I hugged her and listened for a long time. We talked about how death feels like abandonment, especially when you lose your mother. “Mothers are a primordial force that links us to our history,” Anita said through tears. “When they die, it’s like some of history dies too.” In the early hours of the morning, we kept whispering through our exhaustion. I wondered whether the timeline itself was an endlessly repeating cycle of loss that divided humanity from itself, and Anita nodded, her face wet on my shoulder. Wrapped in blankets together, holding hands, we finally started to drift off.

“Anita, don’t ever do that again, okay?”

“What?”

“Don’t not tell me when something huge happens to you. You are my best friend. I don’t want to feel like we’re in one of those crappy movies where the black girl has to fix all the white girl’s problems and deal with her own shit too.”

Anita snorted. “So you’re saying I have to tell you my problems to alleviate your white guilt?”

Now she was sounding more like the Anita I loved. I laughed sleepily. “You know what I mean. I’m here for you. I know I can’t be what your mom was to you, but you are my family.”

“You are my family too, Tess.”

“I’m sorry I was so caught up in my own bullshit that I didn’t ask how you were doing sooner.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, too.” She gave me a hug that blotted out more pain than opium ever could.

Morehshin and I made it back to Chicago in December. It was almost 1894, the Expo was over, and Aseel had moved into Soph’s old rooms now that the Algerian Village was gone. She made beds for Morehshin and me on the floor as we told her about Soph’s sacrifice.

“I suppose she loved that. Calling on the goddess was always her specialty.” Aseel looked down. “I miss her.”

“She misses you, too. I’m sorry it had to be like this.”

“We did the right thing. Plus, Soph’s ‘death’ got people riled up about how terrible Anthony is. Have you seen the pictures of him doing the hoochie coochie?” She pulled out a copy of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and spread it on the soft rug where we sat on cushions. Holding up a lamp so we could see clearly, Aseel pointed at a long article about Comstock’s fight against the dancers at the Expo. Apparently he had tried to get another theater shut down in New York, and granted a press conference about his efforts. To describe the horror of the dance, he stood up and did some wobbly gyrations, much to the amusement of the audience. A political cartoonist had quickly drawn a sketch of the portly Comstock, buttons bursting on his waistcoat, face flushed, shaking his ass. That picture was more of a blow than the twenty inches of arch commentary in the article. It turned Comstock from a moral authority into an out-of-touch loon.

This was progress. But unfortunately, politicians didn’t care what the newspapers said about Comstock. He still had powerful people on his side, including wealthy New Yorkers who dumped cash into Congress.

“We need to organize another anti-Comstock protest, but even bigger than the last one,” I said.

Aseel made a face. “I don’t think a protest will work.”

“But the last one was great! I have some ideas—”

“We need to switch tactics. If we protest again, without the Expo, we look like crazy children. It’s easy to ignore us.”

That stung a little, especially when Morehshin grunted assent.

“All right then, Aseel—what’s your plan?”

“I started thinking about this a few months ago, when the burlesque girls stole our moves and… our song.” Aseel dropped her eyes for a moment, and I remembered her helpless rage that night at the Persian Palace. “Now that Sol and I are selling the sheet music at the shop, it’s become incredibly popular. What if we had an event to celebrate the hoochie coochie? People really hate Comstock for going after hoochie coochie dancers. That’s the biggest stumble he’s made. We could do something in New York that was so spectacular that even those rich socialite Astors would come see it. Comstock would have to go after us, and it would make him terribly odious to everyone.”

Morehshin nodded. “It would put him in a very bad position. He’d damage his reputation if he tried to stop it, and damage his reputation if he didn’t.”

I imagined a hoochie coochie protest and was filled with so much glee that it almost chased my headache away. “Yes!” I yelped, pumping my fist in the air like I was at a show.

Sol and Aseel named their new business the Independent Music Company, shortened on the sheet music to Ind. Music Co. Far north of our old haunt on the Midway, it was nestled among tall brick buildings in the riverfront district along Wabash Street. Cable cars clanged outside, and the theater next door had a massive billboard advertising “The Original Midway Dancers Here.” In the mornings, when the street was redolent of bacon and fresh bread, the neighborhood had an air of respectability. But as the afternoon wore on, and the barkers hawked their ten-cent tickets, packs of young men with beer foam in their moustaches smoked cigars on the street. The stench of rotting meat drifted in from the water. That’s when it was obvious that the Midway had found a permanent home in Chicago. Still, it hadn’t been domesticated. Not yet.

The Independent Music Company storefront was crammed with carefully alphabetized offerings in wooden racks labeled with signs advertising COMIC SONGS and HITS. A modern cash register with brass fittings occupied most of the marble-top counter, and a glass-front display case held a hodgepodge of impulse items: piano strings, guitar picks, wood polish, Smith Brothers cough drops for singers. Cozy and well lit, the place attracted a steady stream of musicians and promoters. But it wasn’t the heart of Aseel and Sol’s operation. That lay behind a door in the back, which opened into an airy warehouse. The previous owners used it for storing barrels of liquor, and a few busted casks still huddled in a corner, smelling faintly of sherry. Now half the room was taken up with a printing press and paper, and the other half was a woodworking shop where a former drummer from the Algerian Theater made fiddles. A spiral staircase led to the manager’s office, where Aseel worked from Sol’s favorite chair at a large conference table.

This room became our informal planning headquarters. We met for the first time on an icy Tuesday, as Aseel was going over sheet music mockups for a new dance hall hit. The cover would be in two colors, and she used a red fountain pen to sketch out where she wanted the title to swirl upward, spewing flowers and curly lines. At last she looked up at Morehshin and me, gathered earnestly at the table. Here, at the center of a thriving music business, it was more obvious than ever that Aseel was one of the few turn-of-the-century women who had managed to unbind herself from the strictures of her time. Partly that was thanks to her strength and talent, but also to the lucky edit that brought her a male boss who recognized both and rewarded her for them.

I was certain she would bend history to make room for more women like her.

She motioned for us to sit down at the table, and we talked for a while about her idea for a New York event. “But how will we organize it?” I asked. “Comstock has eyes on the post. Given what happened to Soph, we have to assume he’s still watching our correspondence. We can’t mail anyone if he’s spying on us.”

There was a banging on the stairs, and one of the printers knocked on the door. “Miss Aseel? Do you know how many copies of ‘Chicago Dancers Polka’ we’re going to need?”

“Make two dozen.” She waved him off.

That gave me an idea. “What if we sent something through the mail that looked completely innocent? You could issue a special edition of the hoochie coochie song, but with a new name, something innocuous like… ‘Country Lad.’ We could include the description of our event in the sheet music booklet.”

Aseel’s eyes gleamed. “What if we made it a dance contest? Twenty-five bucks to the best interpretation of… ‘Country Lad.’” She giggled. “I bet we could get some of the Four Hundred to shell out for prizes and a ballroom.” She was referring to a fabled group of New York socialites, whose number supposedly never topped four hundred. Rumors swirled in the gossip pages that some of their secret parties included private dances from a Lady Asenath imitator.

“How are we going to do that?” Morehshin was zapping tiny holes in the table with her multi-tool, then repairing them. When Aseel glared, she made a protesting noise. “What? I’m practicing!”

I twirled a pencil around my thumb, lost in thought. “There must be some dumb, rich dudes in New York who want a bunch of hoochie coochie girls to perform for them.”

“You know who is really dumb, and in thick with the Four Hundred? Archibald Fraser, the son of that guy who does animal shows.” Aseel put the sheet music aside excitedly. “His dad owns performing seals and elephants and sells a million tickets. Sol knows Archy, and I bet he would introduce us. If we pull this off, it’s good for the business.”

Aseel and I debated where we could hold the event. The problem was that I hadn’t been in New York since hanging out with Emma Goldman’s crew over a decade ago. Aseel only knew about venues through Sol and the gossip pages.

Oddly, Morehshin turned out to have in-depth knowledge of Gilded Age New York. “Do you know Sherry’s Ballroom?” she asked. “That’s where the Four Hundred like to throw their parties.” Then she told us about Louis Sherry, whose catering was so sought-after among the city’s elite that he’d had to move his venue twice to accommodate bigger and bigger shindigs.

“Let’s aim for that, or something like it,” I said. Then, perplexed, I turned to Morehshin. “Why do you know so much about New York society in this period?”

“I learned Atomic Age English from historical romances. Nobody asks questions when a woman watches ancient love stories about heterosexuality.”

Over the next two weeks, a flurry of letters passed between Aseel, Sol, Archy, and the booker at Sherry’s. Archy was, as promised, a socialite playboy with way too much money to spend. When Aseel told him he could invite his bachelor friends to be “judges” at the contest, he was sold. She figured out the logistics around money, food, seating, and staging, while he sent telegrams with useless advice about ribbons and trophies. It was just like old times at the Algerian Theater.

We set the date for the contest in late April, five months from now, when the weather would be warming and the Four Hundred would be ready for debauchery after the staid “Lenten season” that followed their winter balls. That would also give us plenty of time to blanket the East Coast with Ind. Music Co.’s “special commemorative edition of the Midway Hit known as ‘Country Lad.’” On the last page, we included a full-page ad for the dance contest to be held at Sherry’s Ballroom, hosted by Archibald Fraser. All contestants were to line up at the servants’ entrance and, if admitted, would be allowed one chaperone and one musician to accompany them.

We made no mention of the hoochie coochie or danse du ventre, so it would slide past Comstock’s front line of censors. But any dancer familiar with the song would know exactly what we were talking about. If all went according to plan, Comstock wouldn’t figure it out until we were already in New York, where he would be forced into a humiliating face-to-face showdown with us at Sherry’s.

My headaches were getting worse, and I measured the days in willow bark and opium dabs. Morehshin and I worked in the music shop, and rented a bigger room above Soph’s old parlors. There were bad nights and not-so-bad ones, but I never felt like myself except on days when I received a letter from Anita. She’d gotten a few nineteenth-century students interested in the idea of collective action, despite the fact that Great Men currently ruled geoscience departments. I wished we were back at UCLA together, and then I wished I were back at the Temple of al-Lat with Soph. Anywhere but here, where the mornings froze me in ice and memories polluted my brain like soot.

We started our heaviest promotion for the show in late March, sending out freshly printed releases and posters, and I fell upon the project with the shaky, starving energy of a bear out of hibernation. The press was calling it “Lady Asenath’s Musical Revue,” and the Four Hundred dubbed it “Archy’s big bash.” We kept selling out of “Country Lad” at the store. By the time we decamped for a suite of rooms in New York City, the sheet music had gone into its tenth printing. Which was why Sol was footing the bill for our trip, and puffing delightedly on a cigar when we arrived at the venue.

Sherry’s looked like something the peasants would have trashed during the French Revolution. In the ballroom, copper laced the edges of a high arched ceiling encrusted with molded plaster protrusions that dribbled chandeliers. The floor was a polished dark wood spread with thick carpets beneath upholstered chairs. Dinner would be spread across this vast room and spill into the more formal dining room beyond.

The Carpenters Union sent out an apple-cheeked rep barely out of apprenticeship to explain excitedly how they would build the stage on Saturday and have it ready in time for staff to decorate. Sherry’s chef created a special twelve-course menu, including dozens of pheasants, hundreds of oysters, Jerusalem artichokes, carrot soup, and a bewildering array of after-dinner cakes and dessert cheeses. Of course, Archy had ordered two dozen barrels of liquor. Every time a new delicacy was added to our tab, the Sherry’s event manager jotted it down with a polite nod. His nonchalance made me realize this was an ordinary party for him. Everyone who rented Sherry’s expected cartloads of fancy meats and crates of imported champagne. Our show was an exotic dessert for the children of robber barons, and for a second I was revolted by what we were doing. Teaming up with these Gilded Age sleazeballs might not be collective action after all—maybe it was simply pandering.

Too late for second thoughts now. I needed to focus on why we were here. I was doing this for the women of the Midway, their daughters and mothers. Maybe some of them would be here this Saturday, showing off their hoochie coochie moves. I hoped so. I wanted to see all of them one more time before leaving this moment forever.

On Saturday, we dodged last-minute preparation disasters at Sherry’s and puddles of freezing water in the filthy gutters along Broadway. Cocktails began after sunset at 7 P.M., and that slid into dinner. People kept arriving and arriving; it seemed the entire Four Hundred had come with at least one or two friends, all wearing glittery ball gowns and plumes in their hair, or tuxes with rakish waistcoats.

Morehshin stood outside the servants’ entrance to check in the dancers and their escorts, while I played liaison with the staff. I saw the dinner from the sidelines, catching snatches of conversation and vague impressions of white skin gone florid with conspicuous consumption. My trepidation from yesterday returned. These people were here to consume us, not to join our struggle against reproductive moralism.

Upstairs, the dancers were oblivious to the stakes—they were here for the fabulously lucrative $25 prizes, or maybe for fame. They crowded into a dining hall repurposed as a dressing room. Costume racks jostled against a wall of full-length mirrors. Musicians waited in the hall outside, smoking and drinking from a crate of champagne I’d asked the staff to bring upstairs.

Gradually the composition of the party underwent a metamorphosis. Elderly men filtered out, along with a few dozen ladies. The women who stayed for the show were younger and dressed in French fashions. They ate rosewater ices while the men stood up to mingle, drinking cognac and smoking. It was starting to feel like the hipster gin bar.

Staff cleared tables from the ballroom. As promised, the Carpenters Union had built a low, sturdy stage piled with rugs, drums, and some wooden camel tchotchkes. Sherry’s also supplied us with a handy backdrop from storage with an “exotic orient” theme, including an oasis surrounded by veiled women and some pyramids looming in the distance. Apparently it was left over from a costume revue staged by a secret men’s society. It set the tone for our evening, where the entertainment would wobble between appropriation and authenticity.

Six ornate thrones for the judges dominated the front row. I looked at them, full of dread. Would there be an execution or a revolution?

Upstairs, the dressing room was perfumed insanity. Women crushed against each other at the mirrors, coins and beads on their outfits jingling, applying makeup or veils or sparkles or elaborate headdresses. Some were like the white dancers from the Persian Palace, adding a few fake Bedouin touches to their burlesque flounces. Others had costumes that were very close to indigenous North African styles. Dancers practiced their moves, undulating and humming bars of Aseel’s song. It was impossible to say who was inhabiting an identity they’d lived, and who was simulating a culture they’d never known. The many shades of brown skin revealed beneath bodices suggested these women might be from the Maghreb. Or India. Or Mexico. Or the Bronx. Maybe all of those places.

We handed out a number to each woman, noting their stage names so that Archy could introduce them. Many used monikers that were variations on Lady Asenath, which made sense given her international renown. I counted two Lady Asenaths, two Mademoiselle Asenaths, a Dusky Asenath, and one particularly saucy Asenath the Temptress. After witnessing Aseel’s rage at the Persian Palace, it worried me. Were these acts ripping her off, or paying homage? Only she could decide.

I found Aseel across the room, helping a woman with her signup sheet. “A lot of these women are using your name. Do you want me to make a rule that they have to pick an original stage name?”

Aseel rolled her eyes and laughed. “I’m not surprised. I’ve heard through the grapevine that lots of people have been performing as Lady Asenath.”

“Are you okay with it?”

“On another night, I’d likely say no. But tonight, I’ll take it as a compliment.”

I leaned over and whispered in her ear. “You will always be the best Lady Asenath.”

She winked. “I know.” Then she turned back to the line. “Okay, ladies, let’s get started! Where is number one?”

Aseel deputized me as an escort, which meant my job was to bring acts downstairs and guide them to the stage. At first, I watched the crowd nervously. Archy sat on the biggest throne, with five other tuxedoed and mustachioed young men flanking him. They scored each dancer by holding up cards with carefully handwritten numbers on them. When I arrived with act number three in tow, none of the dancers had gotten higher than a 7. But that was about to change.

Act three gamboled around the stage, veils revealing nothing but blue eyes in a white face. Then she began to toss aside gossamer layers of fabric and a roar of appreciation hovered over the room like cigar smoke. When she dipped into a particularly vigorous shake, one of her breasts popped out of her top. I barely caught the sleight-of-hand move she’d made to release it; this was part of her act, and she was good at it. As she made a big show of fluttering her scarves and blushing, the judges held up their votes: 8, 8, 9, 10, 7, 8. And thus it became clear what was required to get a high score. This was what we’d wanted; this would draw out the Comstockers. But it didn’t feel righteous like our protest at the Expo, where we’d linked arms and shouted the truth. What we were doing here might be more powerful, but it was more ambiguous, too.

By the time I arrived with dancer twelve, Mademoiselle Asenath, the ballroom had come undone like a man’s tie after a night of bar hopping. People yelled and demanded lap dances. Staff cracked open another whiskey cask. Archy invited Mademoiselle Asenath to sit in his lap as part of the contest. “It’s to be your weigh-in!” he yelped. “Like at the racetrack! You’re a beautiful racehorse, honey, aren’t you?” His friends roared with laughter.

I gripped the dancer’s arm. She was one of the women in a mostly traditional costume, and the smooth, dark skin of her neck gleamed with necklaces. I spoke loudly enough for Archy to hear. “You don’t have to do that. It’s not in the rules.”

The dancer was completely unruffled. “Oh no, it’s okay, honey. These gentlemen are good tippers.” Slightly taken aback, I let her go.

Archy loved that. “That’s right! I pay top dollar for my fillies!” He bounced her on his knees and she pinched his cheek as if he were a naughty boy.

“You’ve never saddled one as wild as me, love.”

Fingering one of her spangled sleeves, he stroked her arm and winked at the judge next to him. “Not a purebred, I think. But I’d ride her!” Though the dancer kept a smile carved into her face, I could tell she was no longer enjoying the banter. Archy and his friends speculated about her “breeding,” and I felt something that I’d suppressed for a long time. I wondered where Sherry’s kept its steak knives. Ever since Beth survived, it had gotten harder for me to banish those kind of thoughts.

These men were supposed to be our allies, but they treated us like animals. Was this really going to work? Had we made a terrible miscalculation? I surveyed the ballroom of glittering hypocrites, their eyes glued to the stage, delight on their faces. They didn’t respect us, but they loved us. We’d ripped a giant transgressive hole in their expensive petticoats, and given them a chance to revel in a sweet, chaotic moment of freedom.

“It’s time for the dance,” I said, holding out my arm to Mademoiselle Asenath. She escaped Archy’s lap and snatched a tip out of his fingers, perhaps a bit more violently than was strictly necessary. As the music started, her hips swayed and shivered, expressing a perfect hybrid of burlesque and hoochie coochie. Whirling in front of the thrones, skirts frothy with bells, she ripped off her modest bodice and scarves to reveal nothing but a lacy bra over her curved, naked belly. The room went wild.

“Take it off!”

“That’s my doll!”

“Show us everything!”

“Yes, yes, yes!”

“That’s a ten! A ten right there!”

Her stomach muscles rippled as she clashed finger cymbals and commanded the room to watch. It made me think of al-Lat’s statue at Raqmu, or a Grape Ape concert. She was erotic and brilliant and something ineffable that none of these men would ever truly comprehend. I let out a laugh. Aseel really had created a show for the women of the Midway. Maybe the Four Hundred thought it was for them, but that was only because they assumed everything was for them and could comprehend no other possibility.

As the cacophony in the room reached a fever pitch, the noises moved from appreciation to anger. From my perch near the stage, I spotted a singular figure making his way from the back of the room, red face trembling with moral outrage and unfashionable facial hair. Our honeypot had lured in the drone to lead all drones. The revelers parted to reveal Anthony Comstock, flanked by Elliot and boys from the Society for the Suppression of Vice in their Puritanical plain suits. Two officers from the NYPD pushed members of the Four Hundred out of the way. Our moment had come.

Comstock stood on a chair. “THIS IMMORAL FILTH WILL STOP RIGHT NOW. YOU ARE INSTRUCTED TO LEAVE OR RISK ARREST.”

Outrage came from every quarter, delivered in high-toned accents. Archy marched on Comstock and threatened to kick the chair out from under him until the man stepped down.

“What is the meaning of this? It’s a private party! You can’t barge in here…”

“But that’s where you’re wrong, sir. This is an obscene performance, and I have brought the police with me to enforce the law. No one, no matter how rich, is above the law.”

“I beg to differ. Do you know who we are?” Archy made a large, drunken gesture at the room. It had gotten very quiet, and I had no idea what would happen next. I jumped onstage to bundle the dancer into a silk robe, hoping to lead her away unobtrusively.

But Elliot had his eyes on us. Raising his voice for everyone to hear, he declared, “HALT, MADAME. THIS WHORE IS VIOLATING THE LAWS OF GOD AND NEW YORK CITY. SHE IS COMING WITH US.”

Now Archy was pissed. He folded his arms and put on his best entitled-rich-guy expression. I had to admit it was pretty impressive. “No one is going with you, little man. The police commissioner had dinner with us last week. I believe he will have something to say about this ridiculous trespass on our private party!”

There were a few muffled noises of assent from the crowd. Some of the dancers crept down from the dressing room to watch. They hovered next to the stage, a glittering bonfire of bright fabric in the suddenly somber space. Comstock seemed to realize he was losing ground, but he stood firm.

“I have no beef with you, sir, as long as you clear off. But I must insist that you produce Lady Asenath, who authored this abominable performance. I have a warrant for her arrest!” Next to him, Elliot waved a piece of paper and sneered at me. I wondered how much he remembered of the night he eavesdropped on us. Comstock raised his voice again. “WHERE IS LADY ASENATH?”

My heart was pounding. What should we do?

That’s when Aseel stepped forward. She’d changed into a ball gown of pale yellow silk with puffed sleeves and a wide sash. Her skin glowed a rich brown in the chandeliers’ candlelight. “I AM LADY ASENATH.”

What the hell was she doing? Sending Aseel to jail wasn’t part of our plan. Then something unexpected happened. Mademoiselle Asenath broke away from me onstage to stand next to Aseel. “NO. I AM LADY ASENATH.”

And then more came forward, all the various Lady Asenaths raising their arms and yelling her name. “I AM LADY ASENATH! I AM!”

Suddenly, a society lady in the audience jumped on her chair and joined in. “I AM LADY ASENATH! ARREST ME!” Another lurched tipsily onto her chair, aided by a gentleman friend. “I AM LADY ASENATH!”

That’s when I noticed Sol at the edge of the room, smoking his cigar, looking straight at me. He winked and tapped his temple with a finger, reminding me of what he’d said last year during the Expo: You change a man’s mind by showing him a good time. Maybe he’d hit upon an odd, unknown corollary to the Collective Action hypothesis. The people in this room had come here looking for fun or for titillation or for justice, and maybe it was all right that we didn’t see the same truth when we looked at the stage. So what if these soused men on their thrones didn’t notice the connection between hoochie coochie dancers and women’s reproductive freedom? It didn’t matter. Because we all agreed on one thing. We were in this together.

“I AM LADY ASENATH!” I yelled from the stage. A reckless, strange solidarity gripped the ballroom, and more voices spoke her name. One of the judges scrambled up next to me and howled in a practiced falsetto, “I AM LADY ASENATH AND I’M A PERFECT TEN!”

Archy couldn’t have been more thrilled. This would be all over the gossip pages tomorrow. Like a twenty-first-century reality TV star, he thirsted for the fame and party invites that came with his scandalous reputation. “I guess you’ll have to arrest all of us, then,” he said loudly. “I’m sure the police commissioner will be happy to hear about that.”

Comstock looked at Elliot, and then at the police officers. “This isn’t over. I’m going to bring charges.”

“I welcome your charges.” Archy glowered. “I can’t wait to bankrupt you in court.”

My headache was gone and I felt intoxicated in every part of my body. Archy was doing far more than we’d ever hoped he would—and so were his glitter trash uptown friends. For a triumphant second, I allowed myself to imagine history emerging from this moment in a perfect, uncomplicated arc. The Four Hundred’s appetite for sexy entertainment would challenge the obscenity laws that bore Comstock’s name. As he lost his grip on the mail, information about birth control and abortion would circulate freely again. The hoochie coochie dancers’ edit was what we’d needed all along.

I looked at Morehshin, who was grinning fiercely. Maybe, centuries from now, her queens were becoming people.

Sunday morning’s society pages were full of salacious drawings and exaggerated accounts of the evening. Archy’s “bash” was duly condemned as racy and decadent, but Comstock emerged as the evening’s biggest gossip target. The papers satirized everything about him, from his threadbare suit to his accent. His morals were absurd; they belonged to an era before the invention of electricity. George Bernard Shaw, a snarky British theater critic, made oblique reference to the scandal in a widely republished essay about how “Comstockery” was ruining American culture. Morehshin was excited to see the true slaughter of Comstock’s reputation was under way. Sol and Archy gave everybody big tips, including to the dancers who hadn’t won the prize.

In the light of day, I still felt sure we’d reached a transition point. This wasn’t an “angry mob” protesting Comstock’s moral cleansing campaign. It was New York’s best and richest, simply trying to have a good time. We’d driven a wedge between the Four Hundred and the moralist who depended on them.

Of course, I might never know if I was right about the eventual outcome of last night’s blowup. That would require me to get back to 2022. And I couldn’t do that until Morehshin and I tapped back millions of years to deal with the men who were still trying to rob us of our history.

I realized this might be the last time we would see Aseel, and I was sorry to say goodbye. Hungover but happy, we met in the hotel dining room for a late breakfast of eggs, rolls, and various gelatinous meats beloved in this era. Morehshin poured a small amount of coffee into her cup from the carafe on our table and stared at it.

“You going to drink that?” Aseel was amused.

I tried to explain. “People don’t drink coffee in her time.”

“Some people do.” Morehshin frowned. Then sipped. “Ugh, this is bad. Maybe some rules don’t need breaking.”

We laughed and I noticed that Aseel didn’t seem as angry as she used to. Running a shop suited her, and she was publishing a lot of music that came from traditions outside the usual European oompa crap. “What are your plans for the Independent Music Company?” I asked.

“Sol and I talked last night, after everybody left. We’re making a tidy profit with our sheet music, and he wants me to start organizing more events like this one back in Chicago.” She got a faraway look on her face. “We could bring back some of the Midway dancers, like Salina, and put on shows in the dance hall next door. A bunch of venues are opening up on Wabash.”

“That sounds fantastic! The Algerian Village lives on!”

She nodded. “I got a big raise, too. I can buy a house.”

Morehshin talked around the bacon in her mouth. “That’s good. A house is important. My sisters have a saying: If you have property, you can’t be property.”

Aseel gave us both a quizzical look. “I’m not sure that’s true, but I definitely feel more secure.”

We talked about where she might move, and how Sol was going to let her take charge of hiring, and then finally it was time for us to go. Aseel took the train back to Chicago while we headed to the pier. We had a long trip ahead.

When we arrived at Raqmu, the news was waiting for us in tidy piles at the inn in the scholars’ neighborhood. Literati and society types had taken up the “Comstockery” meme with zeal. It came to mean anything unfashionable, addle-brained, or dull. Comstock’s raid had also cost him some very rich patrons, who quietly distanced themselves from his crusade. When he was harassing abortionists, smutty postcard peddlers, and low-class theaters, they considered it their duty to support him. But not when he tried to smear the reputations of Archy and the other lads, who were only having a bit of fun. Comstock’s operation had always been on a shoestring budget, and now he had fewer resources than ever. If he wanted to continue his legal battles over obscene materials, he couldn’t afford to sustain his regular busts in the street.

One of Soph’s friends wrote to say that Comstock’s boys from the Society for the Suppression of Vice had stopped harassing abortionists right after the party. For now, the women of New York and Chicago had precarious access to birth control—as long as they ordered the right euphemisms from the right catalogues, or called on a sympathetic midwife.

Comstock, who once boasted of driving sex educators to suicide and had attracted followers from across the timeline, was losing his grip on America’s britches. His “special agent” position with the Postal Service was only as powerful as the elites allowed it to be. Without help from the Four Hundred and their politicians, he would be relegated to the status of a religious nuisance shouting in the halls outside Congress.

I imagined what Beth’s life would be like if the Comstock Laws really were crumbling. What if getting an abortion was an unremarkable aspect of healthcare for anyone with a uterus? What if she didn’t have to risk arrest for wanting a normal teenage life without the burden of early motherhood? Maybe she wouldn’t need me to help her, but neither would all those other girls who hadn’t been born to a mother like mine.

Of course, the reality would be more complicated than that golden arc I’d imagined when we invoked Lady Asenath’s name. Clever moralists of the future might come up with new legal tricks to invade people’s private lives and control reproduction. As long as we had Machines, no edit was permanent. We would have to stay one step ahead, adding loopholes and footnotes and exemptions to their power.