Timeline. Part 56

"Diane, this is a G.o.dd.a.m.n no-brainer," Doniger said, tugging at his tie. "Are you telling me they may come back unshielded?"

"Yes."

"Well, we can't risk that."

"It's not that simple...."

"Yes, it is," Doniger said. "We can't take the risk. I'd rather they didn't come back at all than to have them come back seriously damaged."

"But-"

"But what? If Gordon has this computer projection, why is he going forward?"

"He doesn't believe the projection. He says it's quick and dirty, and he thinks the transit will go fine."

"We can't risk it," Doniger said, shaking his head. "They can't come back without shields. Period." She paused, bit her lip. "Bob, I think the-" "Hey," he said. "We got short-term-memory loss here? You were the one who wouldn't let Stern go back, because of the risk of transcription errors. Now you want to let the whole G.o.dd.a.m.n bunch come back unshielded? No, Diane."

"Okay," she said, obviously reluctant. "I'll go and talk to-"

"No. No talk. Kill it. Pull the power plug if you have to. But don't let those people come back. I'm right about this, and you know it."

In the control room, Gordon said, "He said what what?"

"They can't come back. Absolutely not. Bob was firm."

"But they have to come back," David Stern said. "You have to let them."

"No, I don't," Kramer said.

"But-"

"John," Kramer said, turning to Gordon. "Has he seen Wellsey? Have you shown him Wellsey?"

"Who's Wellsey?"

"Wellsey's a cat," Gordon said.

"Wellsey's split," Kramer said to Stern. "He was one of the first test animals that we sent back. Before we knew that you had to use water shields in a transit. And he's very badly split."

"Split?"

Kramer turned to Gordon. "Haven't you told him anything?"

"Of course I told him," Gordon said. He said to Stern, "Split means he had very severe transcription errors." He turned back to Kramer. "But that happened years ago, Diane, back when we also had problems with the computers as well-"

"Show him," Kramer said. "And then see if he's still so eager to bring his friends back. But the point of the conversation is, Bob's made his decision on this, and the answer is no. If we don't have secure shields, n.o.body can come back. Under any circ.u.mstances."

At the consoles, one of the technicians said, "We've got a field buck."

They crowded around the monitor, looking at the undulating wave and the tiny ripples in the surface.

"How long before they come back?" Stern said.

"Judging from this signal, about an hour."

"Can you tell how many?" Gordon said.

"Not yet, but ... it's more than one. Maybe four, or five."

"That's all of them," Gordon said. "They must have gotten the Professor, and they're all coming home. They've done what we asked them to do, and they're coming back."

He turned to Kramer.

"Sorry," she said. "If there're no shields, n.o.body comes back. That's final."

01:01:52.

Crouched beside the trapdoor, Kate got slowly to her feet. She was standing in a narrow s.p.a.ce, no more than four feet wide, with high stone walls on either side. Firelight was coming in from an opening to her left. By its yellow light, she saw a door directly ahead of her. Behind her was a set of stairs, going steeply upward to the top of the chamber, some thirty feet above.

But where was she?

Chris peered over the edge of the trapdoor, and pointed to the firelight. He whispered, "I think we know why they never found the door to this pa.s.sage."

"Why?"

"It's behind the fireplace."

"Behind the fireplace?" she whispered. And then she realized he was right. This narrow s.p.a.ce was one of the secret pa.s.sages of La Roque: behind the fireplace of the great hall.

Kate moved forward cautiously, past the wall to her left-and found herself staring out from the back wall of the fireplace in the great hall. The fireplace was nine feet high. Through the leaping flames, she saw Oliver's high table, where his knights were sitting and eating, their backs to her. She could not be more than fifteen feet from them.

She whispered, "You're right. It's behind the fireplace."

She looked back to Chris, then beckoned him to come forward. She was about to continue to the door directly ahead when Sir Guy glanced back at the fire as he tossed a chicken wing into the flames. He turned back to the table, resumed eating.

She thought, Get out of here Get out of here.

But it was too late. Guy's shoulders twitched; he was already turning back again. He saw her clearly, his eyes met hers, and he shouted, "My Lord!" He pushed back from the table and drew his sword.

Kate ran to the door, tugged at it, but it was locked, or stuck shut. She couldn't open it. She turned back to the narrow stairs behind her. She saw Sir Guy standing on the other side of the flames, hesitating. He looked at her again, and plunged through the fire toward her. She saw Chris coming through the trapdoor and said, "Down!" He ducked down as she scrambled up the stairs.

Sir Guy swung at her feet, narrowly missing her, his sword clanging off the stone. He cursed her, then looked down at the opening to the pa.s.sage below. Apparently he didn't see Chris, because immediately afterward she heard him coming up the stairs behind her.

She had no weapon; she had nothing.

She ran.

At the top of the stairs, thirty feet above the ground, was a narrow platform, and when she reached it, she felt a thicket of cobwebs clinging to her face. She brushed them away impatiently. The platform could not have been more than two feet square. It was precarious, but she was a climber and it didn't bother her.

But it bothered Sir Guy. He was moving very slowly up the stairs toward her, pressing his shoulder against the wall, keeping as far from the edge of the stairs as he could, clutching at tiny handholds in the mortar of the wall. He had a desperate look and he was breathing hard. So, the valiant knight was afraid of heights. But not afraid enough to stop, she saw. If anything, his discomfort seemed to make him angrier. He glared at her with murderous intent.

The platform faced a rectangular wooden door, fitted with a round view hole the size of a quarter. The stairs had clearly been built to lead to this hole, allowing an observer to look down on the great hall and see everything that occurred there. Kate pushed at the door, leaning her weight against it, but instead of opening, the entire rectangle fell through, dropping onto the floor of the great hall below, and she half-fell through after it.

She was inside the great hall.

She was up high, among the heavy wooden beams of the open ceiling. She looked down at the tables thirty feet below her. Directly ahead was the enormous central rafter, running the length of the hall. This beam was crisscrossed with horizontal rafters every five feet, which ran out to the walls on both sides. All the rafters were elaborately carved, and cross-braced at intervals.

Without hesitation, Kate stepped out onto the central beam. Everyone below was looking up; they gasped when they saw her, pointed upward. She heard Oliver cry loudly, "Saint George and d.a.m.nation! The a.s.sistant! We are betrayed! The Magister!"

He pounded the table, and stood, glaring up at her.

[image]

She said, "Chris. Find the Professor."

She heard a crackle."-kay."

"Did you hear me? Chris."

Just a static crackle.

Kate moved quickly down the center rafter. Despite the height above the floor, she felt perfectly comfortable. The beam was a foot wide. Nothing to it. Hearing another gasp from the people below, she glanced back and saw Sir Guy step out on the center beam. He seemed frightened, but the presence of an audience emboldened him. Either that or he was unwilling to show fear at so public a moment. Guy took a hesitant step, found his balance, and came directly for her, moving rapidly. He swung the sword loosely in his hand. He reached the first vertical brace, took a breath, and, holding on to the upright post, maneuvered his body around it. He continued on down the center beam.

Kate backed away, realizing that this center beam was too wide, too easy for him. She walked laterally along a horizontal rafter, heading toward the side wall. This horizontal rafter was only six inches wide; he would have trouble. She clambered around a difficult cross-braced section, then continued on.

Only then did she realize her mistake.

Generally, open medieval ceilings had a structural detail where they met the wall-another brace, a decorative beam, some sort of rafter that she could move along. But this ceiling reflected the French style: the beam ran straight into the side wall, where it fitted into a notch some four feet below the line of the roof. There was no wall detail at all. She remembered now that she had stood in the ruins of La Roque and had seen those notches. What was she thinking of?

She was trapped on the beam.

She couldn't go farther out, because the beam ended at the wall. She couldn't go back to the center, because Guy was there, waiting for her. And she couldn't go to the next parallel rafter, because it was five feet away, very far to jump.

Not impossible, but far. Especially without a safety.

Looking back, she saw Sir Guy coming out along the beam toward her, balancing cautiously, swinging his sword lightly in his hand. He smiled grimly as he came forward. He knew he had caught her.

She had no choice now. She looked at the next beam, five feet away. She had to do it. The problem was to get enough height. She had to jump up if she hoped to make it across.

Guy was working his way around the cross-beam bracing. He was only seconds away from her now. She crouched on the beam, took a breath, tensed her muscles-and kicked hard with her legs, sending her body flying out into open s.p.a.ce.

Chris came up through the stone trapdoor. He looked through the fire and saw that everybody in the room was staring up at the ceiling. He knew Kate was up there, but there was nothing he could do for her. He went directly to the side door and tried to open it. When it didn't budge, he slammed his full weight against it, felt it give an inch. He shoved again; the door creaked, then swung wide.

He stepped out into the inner courtyard of La Roque. Soldiers were running everywhere. A fire had broken out in one of the h.o.a.rdings, the wooden galleries that ran along the top of the walls. Something was burning like a bonfire in the center of the courtyard itself. Amid the chaos, no one paid any attention to him.

He said, "Andre. Are you there?"

A static crackle. Nothing.

And then: "Yes." It was Andre's voice.

"Andre? Where are you?"

"With the Professor."

"Where?" Chris said.

"The a.r.s.enal."

"Where is that?"

00:59:20.

There were two dozen animals in cages in the laboratory storeroom, mostly cats, but also some guinea pigs and mice. The room smelled of fur and feces. Gordon led him down the aisle, saying, "We keep the split ones isolated from the others. We have to."

Stern saw three cages along the back wall. The bars of these cages were thick. Gordon led him to one, where he saw a small, curled-up bundle of fur. It was a sleeping cat, a Persian, pale gray in color.

"This is Wellsey," Gordon said, nodding.

The cat seemed entirely normal. It breathed slowly, gently, as it slept. He could see half the face above the curve of the fur. The paws were dark. Stern leaned closer, but Gordon put his hand on his chest. "Not too close," he said.

Gordon reached for a stick, ran it along the bars of the cage.

The cat's eye opened. Not slowly and lazily-it opened wide, instantly alert. The cat did not move, did not stretch. Only the eye moved.

Gordon ran the stick along the bars a second time.

With a furious hiss, the cat flung itself against the bars, mouth wide, teeth bared. It banged against the bars, stepped back, and attacked again-and again, relentlessly, without pause, hissing, snarling.

Stern stared in horror.

The animal's face was hideously distorted. One side appeared normal, but the other side was distinctly lower, the eye, the nostril, everything lower, with a line down the center of the face, dividing the halves. That's why they called it "split," he thought.

But worse was the far side of the face, which he didn't see at first, with the cat lunging and banging against the bars, but now he could see that back on the side of the head, behind the distorted ear, there was a third eye, smaller and only partially formed. And beneath that eye was a patch of nose flesh, and then a protruding bit of jaw that stuck out like a tumor from the side of the face. A curve of white teeth poked out from the fur, though there was no mouth.

Transcription errors. He now understood what that meant.

The cat banged again and again; its face was starting to bleed with the repeated impacts. Gordon said, "He'll do that until we leave."

"Then we better leave," Stern said.