Time Riders

CHAPTER 77

2001, New York

It took them the better part of an hour to find it. There were quite a few tagswith numbers too faded to read, and others where the cardboard insert had long ago fallenout.

But two hundred yards down from the basement entrance, on the opposite wall, on a shelf thatrequired Maddy to climb up to reach, they found the correct tag.

And nothing else.

Maddy wiped dust and sweat from her forehead, and slumped against the metal support. Itcreaked and groaned softly, dislodging flakes of rust and motes of dust.

‘Nothing here,’ she called down to them. ‘Nothing at all.’

‘There must be something,’ said Sal. More a plea thana comment.

‘It’s bare. Somebody made a clean sweep a long time ago.’

The three sat in defeated silence for a moment, the coarse rasping of their breathing echoingdown the empty basement floor, accompanied by the sound of dripping water somewhere faroff.

‘We’ll be losing daylight soon,’ said Foster. ‘We’ve done whatwe can.’

‘I don’t want to be outside in the dark,’ whispered Sal.

‘Then I suggest we leave.’

Maddy nodded. ‘All right.’

She pulled herself up on to her feet and carefully swung one leg over theside of the wooden-slat shelf. She reached for the torch, casting a cone of light, thick withswirling, dancing motes of dust, towards the wall. As she did, she noticed within the circleof light on the wall, one particular block of concrete more clearly outlined than theothers.

No. Surely not.

‘Wait a moment,’ she said to the others, swinging her leg back on to the shelf.On all fours she crept carefully across the creaking slats of wood, mindful to place herweight where the metal support brackets passed underneath. She reached out for the block andoptimistically gave it a nudge. It shifted with a sharp gritty scrape that echoed loudly likethe lid of a stone sarcophagus shifting aside.

‘What have you found up there?’ asked Foster. He must have heard.

‘Would you believe it? There’s a loose breeze-block… I’m just…just going to pull it — ’

She eased it slowly out of the hole in the wall. Heavy, it slipped through her hands, landingon the shelf. She heard a wooden slat crack under its weight, and the entire metal framerattled and complained loudly.

‘Be careful, Maddy!’ said Sal.

‘I’m OK.’

Oh my God, this has to be it.

She ducked down, thrusting her torch towards the foot-wide hole in the wall, peering into theswirling dusty space beyond. It was a small space, just a cavity between walls littered withfossilized rat droppings and strung with webs. But nestling in the middle of it, unmistakable,was a large leather-bound book.

Oh my God.

Grimacing, she reached in and gently took hold of it, lifting it outthrough the hole in the wall. She wiped dust from her glasses and shone her torch down on theleather cover.

And grinned. ‘It’s here! I’ve got it!’

She heard both Sal and Foster yelp with excitement.

Pulling the stiff leather cover open, she quickly flipped through the thick pages of thebook. ‘What’s the last possible date that Liam and Bob could have come here, doyou reckon?’ she asked.

‘With Bob terminating six months after mission inception, — that would make it acouple of days after the window we tried opening in Washington. That wouldbe…’

‘Fifth of March 1957,’ said Sal.

Maddy leafed through the pages, noting the dates left by various guests. There were many fromthe previous year. But they quickly dried up in the late summer of 1956.

Perhaps the museum was closed then.

She reached the last page and a last entry from a visitor by the name of JessicaHeffenburger. ‘The museum must close today. The enemy is about totake our city. I could cry.’

She scanned the other entries on the page. They all shared the same sentiment: sadness,bitterness and defeat… a broken people seemingly accepting the inevitable. Paying onelast visit to their beloved museum.

But then, in a fainter ink, she spotted it: written with a different pen in the gap leftbetween one comment and another, scrawled in the untidy hand of a person writingquickly…

Me and Bob would really like to come home now, please.

Lat: 40°42′42.28"N

Long: 73°57′59.75"W

Time: 18.00, 05-03-1957

She crawled across the slats with the book cradled in her handsand looked down at Foster and Sal standing in the aisle below, both of them staring up at herwith expectant expressions.

‘You find anything?’ asked Foster.

She tore the page out of the book, grabbed her torch, swung her legs over the side and jumpeddown on to the floor, creating a small mushroom cloud of dust.

‘He’s right here!’ she said, flourishing the page in front of her face,then her voice caught and she found her shoulders shaking as adrenaline-fuelled laughterfilled the silence of the basement.

‘He freakin’ well did it!’