First Flight (3 page)

She waited until she was fairly sure she was out of earshot of the men at the flyer, and then waited a mite more before she started talking. “You ever read H. G. Wells?”

“Of course I have.”

“Well, that’ll make things a little easier.” She stopped abruptly and turned to face him. Homer was almost on her heels and half-stumbled back to keep out of arm’s reach. Louise snorted. “Do you remember the book
The Time Machine
?”

Homer blinked and then guffawed. “You aren’t trying to tell me you’re from the future.”

“Being a witch is more believable?”

“Well. . . no offense, ma’am.” He dug his toe into the ground. “But a time traveler wouldn’t be old.”

“I wouldn’t have thought so either, but it turns out that time travel only works within the span of a person’s lifetime. They picked me because I was born this year.”

His face screwed up with concentration. “Let’s say that’s so. Give me a good reason for you to vanish, then.”

“The machine broke and I can only stay here for so long as it’s turned on. It took a full day for them to fix it while I was back in my own time.” She shook her head. “I told them to set me down near you so I could explain, but they thought you wouldn’t understand. I’m very sorry about that.”

“Prove it. Bring me tomorrow’s paper or something.” Those arms were crossed across his chest again as if he were preparing for war. At least Louise knew he’d survive the Great War, because the records they’d found about him showed Homer dying in the seventies.

“I can’t nip back and forth in time on a whim. It’s an expensive machine that’s sent me here, and the operator is back in my own time.” Louise pursed her lips, thinking. Dr. Connelly wouldn’t approve, but the only obviously modern thing she had with her was the opera glass camera. Pulling it out of her handbag, Louise rewound the footage a little so he could watch it. “Here. This is a moving picture camera, disguised as opera glasses. I was filming the plane.”

Homer started to reach for them, and then stopped. “What if this is just a story and that’s ensorcelled?”

“Young man. I don’t know why you’re so set on me being a witch instead of a time traveler. Why on earth would I pretend to be something so unbelievable if I were trying to hide being a witch? It doesn’t make a spot of sense. If I were going to make up a story, it’d be a cleverer one than that—unless I’m telling the truth. Now you tell me why I’d pretend to be a time traveler instead of letting you think I’m a witch?”

“There are laws against witchcraft. You could be burned at the stake.”

She didn’t say anything to that, just sighed and looked over the rim of her glasses at him. Living as long as she had gave her plenty of time to perfect the withering glare of scorn. She’d decimated sons and grandsons with it, and this boy melted as easily as the others. His face colored right out to the tips of his ears, which burned bright enough to serve as a landing beacon for the Flyer. He rocked back on his heels and raised his shoulders as if he were trying to protect his neck from the butcher’s knife.

Swallowing, Homer said, “I guess that’s not too likely.”

“No. It’s not. Now are you going to look at this or not?”

He took the opera glasses from her and held them up to his eyes. Immediately he yanked them away, eyes wide with shock. Spinning on his heel, he stared at the airplane. Homer brought the glasses up to his eyes, and even with his back to her, Louise could see his hands shaking. “What is this?”

“It’s a camera.”

“I mean, why are you taking all these pictures of the flyer?” He lowered the glasses, turning to face her.

“Because, today is the first day that they really fly. Wilbur will go up for eighteen minutes and not come down until he drains the gas tank. It’s a historic moment, but they weren’t expecting it, so there’s no photographer here. Day after tomorrow, Orville will fly in front of a crowd for thirty-four minutes, but today’s the day everything changes. And later on, after they fly it, they’ll make changes and eventually dismantle the flyer. In 1947 Orville will rebuild it for an exhibit, but he’ll only have about sixty percent of this plane. There’s a historical society that wants to check the rebuilt plane against this one.”

And right then, Wilbur stepped out of the open door of the hangar. “This has gone on long enough. Madam, you should be ashamed of yourself, filling this boy’s head with nonsense in order to get him to help in your espionage.” He held out his hand to Homer. “Give me the camera, son.”

“Espionage?” Louise lifted her cane so it served as a barrier between the man and Homer. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but the opera glasses are mine and I’ll thank you to leave them alone.”

“I overheard everything, and though your story is designed to play upon the fancies of a boy, I could hear the elements of truth.” He reached over the cane and snatched the opera glasses from Homer’s hand.

“Hey!” Homer pushed Louise’s cane out of the way and stepped toward the man. “Give that back.”

“We’ve been at pains to keep our invention out of the wrong hands” He brushed past both of them and hurried across the field, waving the opera glasses.

Homer ran after him and caught his coat. “Please, Mr. Wright. I was just funning with her. I didn’t think anyone would take me seriously.”

Louise hurried after them, focused more on the uneven ground than the man in front of her.

Wilbur shrugged off Homer’s hand and shook his head. “We didn’t advertise this test flight, so how do you suppose that she knew to come out here today, except through spying?”

Louise laughed to hide her discomfiture. This was the sort of thing that it would have been nice for the Time Travel Society to let her know. “You can’t think that people aren’t talking about this in town, can you?”

“The people in town aren’t out here snooping around. Who looks at things up close with
opera glasses
?” Wilbur lifted the opera glasses and mimed snooping.

The moment he looked through the opera glasses he cursed and jerked his head away from the eye piece. Slowly he put it back to his eyes. His face paled. Wilbur wiped his mouth, lowering the opera glasses to stare at Louise. “Who do you work for?”

“I’m just a woman that’s interested in seeing you fly.” She could barely breathe for fear of the moment. “You’re making history here.”

“History.” He snorted. “You were talking to the boy about time travel.”

Before Louise could think of a clean answer, Homer said, “She disappeared earlier. Utterly vanished. I . . . I think she’s telling the truth.”

“And if she is?” Wilbur turned the glasses over in his hands. “I look at this and all I can see are the number of inventions that stand between me and the ability to do. . . . If I weren’t holding it, I should think it impossible.”

Louise could not think of a thing to say to the man. He looked as if his faith had been as profoundly shaken as a small boy discovering the truth about Santa Claus. Louise shook her head. “All I want is to watch you fly; once I’ve done that I’ll be gone and you won’t have to worry about the pictures I took.”

“This is why you were so certain the Flyer will work today, isn’t it?” There was no wonder in his voice, only resignation.

“Yes, sir.”

“And what you told the boy, about Orville rebuilding the plane. True? So, we’ll be enough of a success that someone builds a museum and sends a time traveler back to visit. That’s something, even if I’m not around to see it.”

Startled, Louise replayed the things she had told Homer. “Why do you think that?”

“Because everything you said was about my brother. At some point, I’ll stop registering on the pages of history.” He twisted the glasses in his hands. “Is the future fixed?”

Louise hesitated. “The Good Book promises us free will.”

“You have not answered my question.” He took his bowler off and wiped a sheen of sweat from his scalp before settling it back in place.

When he looked back at her with eyes as blue as a frozen river, she could see the boy she’d read about. Self-taught and brilliant, he had been described as having a voracious mind. Everything she said would go in and fill his mind with ideas.

“You understand that I’m only a traveler and don’t understand the science? If you think about time like a stalk of broccoli, what Mr. Barnes’s machine does is it takes a slice of the broccoli and shuffles it to a different point in the stalk. My past is one big stalk. My future is made up of florets. So the only places I can travel back to are the ones that lead to the future I live in. If I tried to go forward, they tell me that the future will be different every time. Which I believe means that you can do things different and wind up in a different stalk of the broccoli, but I’ll only ever see the pieces of broccoli that lead to my present.” She shook her head. “If that makes any sense to you, then I’ll be impressed.”

“It makes sense enough.” Wilbur lifted the glasses to his eyes again, and with them masked said, “I’ll thank you not to intimate this to my brother.”

“Of course not.” Louise shuddered.

“Very good.” Wilbur spun on his heel. “Well, find a spot to watch.”

“But Miss Jackson’s opera glasses . . .” Homer trotted after him.

“I’ll give them back after I’ve flown.” Wilbur Wright grinned. “If your history is going to lose track of me, then perhaps the future needs to be reminded.”

* * *

On the far side of the hanger, the other men were still celebrating the flight. Eighteen minutes and forty-two seconds precisely. She’d recorded their joy, but whenever Wilbur looked at her, Louise got the shivers and had finally given up to wait out her remaining time out of sight. She leaned against the side of the hanger, studying her watch. Time was almost up.

At a run, Homer rounded the corner of the hanger with the opera glasses in his hands. He relaxed visibly at the sight of her. “I was scared you’d be gone already.”

She held the watch up. “Two minutes.”

“He didn’t want to come. Said that the doubt would be better than knowing for certain.” Homer chewed his lip and handed her the opera glasses. “What happens to him, Miss Jackson?”

Louise sighed and remembered all the things she’d read about Wilbur Wright before coming here. “He dies of typhoid when he’s forty-seven. I do wish I hadn’t said a thing about the future.”

Homer shook his head. “I’m glad you told me. I’ll—”

And he was gone.

The tall grass of Huffman Prairie was replaced by a crisply mown lawn of chemical green. Where the weathered hanger had been stood a bright, white replica. Neither the hanger nor the lawn seemed as real as the past. Louise sighed. The air burned her nostrils, smelling of carbon and rubber. The homing beacon in her handbag should bring them to her soon enough.

She leaned back against the barn to wait. A paper rustled behind her. She pulled away, afraid that she’d see a big “wet paint” sign, but it was an envelope.

An envelope with her name on it.

She spun around as quickly as she could, but there wasn’t a soul in sight. Breath fighting with her corset, Louise pulled the envelope off the wall. She opened it carefully and found a single sheet of paper. A shaky hand covered the surface.

Dear Louise,

You will have just returned from your first time travel mission and meeting me, so this offers the first opportunity to introduce myself to you in your present. I wish I could be there, but that would mean living for another forty years, which task I fear would require Olympian blood. You have been such a friend to me and my family and so I wanted you to know two things.

1. Telling me the truth was the best thing you could have done for me. Thank you.

2. We are (or will be by the time you read this) major shareholders in the Time Travel Society. It ensures that your future trips to my past are without incident, and also will let my children know precisely when your first trip takes place in your present. I hope you don’t mind that I took the liberty of asking my children to purchase shares for you as well. I wish we could have presented them to you sooner.

Be well, my friend. And happy travels.

Sincerely yours,
Homer Van Loon

At the bottom of the sheet was a bank account number, and then a list of addresses and phone numbers arranged in order of date.

Her eyes misted over at the gift he’d given her—not the account, but the knowledge that she had not harmed him by telling the truth.

In the parking lot, the Time Travel Society’s minivan pulled in, barely stopping before Mr. Barnes and the rest of the team jumped out. “How was the trip?” he shouted across the field, jogging toward her.

Louise smiled and held out the opera glasses. “I think you’ll like the footage I got for you.”

“May I?” He stopped in front of her, as long and lanky as she imagined Homer being when he was grown up.

“Of course. That’s why you sent me, isn’t it?”

He took the opera glasses from her and rewound. Holding it to his eyes as the rest of the team gathered around, Mr. Barnes became utterly still. “Miss Jackson . . . Miss Jackson, how did you get the camera on the plane?”

Dr. Connelly gasped. “On the Wright Flyer?”

“Yes, ma’am. I watched from the ground with the hat-cam while Wilbur was flying. I’m quite curious to hear the audio that goes with it. We could hear him whooping from the ground.”

“But how did you . . .” Dr. Connelly shook her head.

“I told him the truth.” Louise sighed, remembering the naked look on his face at the moment when he believed her. “He took the camera because he understood the historical context.”