CHAPTER 8

1906, San Francisco

They returned to their al eyway with half an hour to spare, having spent an hour on the dockside watching the steam ships being loaded and unloaded, Maddy relishing every lit le detail of the past and giggling with unbridled delight as dockside workers knuckled their foreheads and do ed their caps at her politely as they walked past.

‘Oh my God! I feel like some sort of duchess!’ she whispered out of the side of her mouth to Liam as they turned into the al ey. ‘Everyone’s so … I dunno, so polite and proper back in this time.’

He nodded. ‘Especial y to a lady … like yourself.’ He nodded at her dress, her amboyant hat with its ostrich feathers. ‘Them clothes mark you out as a lady of means. You know? A real y posh lady, so you are. Now, if you’d found some dowdy dress that made you look common, them workers would’ve walked on past without a by-yourleave.’

‘Oh, right … thanks,’ she said.

Liam grimaced. ‘Ahhh, now see that came out al wrong-sounding, so it did. I didn’t mean to say it like that.’

‘No, you’re probably right,’ she hu ed. ‘I’ve always been plain-looking. I’m sure shoving on a fril y dress and some plain-looking. I’m sure shoving on a fril y dress and some stupid feather hat isn’t going to make much of a di erence.

’ They walked down the al ey, sidestepping a toppled crate of festering cabbages until they reached the spot where they’d materialized several hours earlier.

‘Seems harsh that, though,’ said Liam thoughtful y.

‘What?’

‘That fel a back there, Leighton. You sure he’l die?’

She nodded. ‘Yes … it makes sense.’ Yes, it did. But it was the feel of … the feel of … ruthlessness that gnawed away at her; the agency seemed to know everything about everyone – and exploited that knowledge mercilessly. In less than eighteen hours the young man she’d been talking to would be nothing more than a twisted black carcass amid the smouldering remains of that bank.

And I have to learn to deal with that, she told herself. Liam seemed to sense her turmoil. ‘Wel , this is the job now, Mads. We don’t have much of a choice in the mat er. Do we?’

She looked at him and realized it wasn’t just the young bank tel er that the agency was ruthlessly using, but Liam too. The side e ects weren’t apparent yet: the onset of cel ular corruption, the onset of premature old age. But they’d begin to show at some point, wouldn’t they? The more trips Liam was sent on into the past, the more damage it was going to do to his body, until, like Foster, one day he was going to be an old man before his time: his muscles wasted; his bones brit le, weakened and fragile; muscles wasted; his bones brit le, weakened and fragile; his organs irretrievably corrupted by the e ects of time travel and one by one beginning to fail him. She so wanted to tel him. To warn him.

How many more trips, Liam? How many before I’m looking at you and seeing a dying old man?

But she couldn’t. Not yet. Foster had told her it would be unkind for him to know his fate too early.

‘Let him enjoy the freedom of seeing history for a bit; seeing his future, his past … at least give him that for a while before you tel him he’s dying.’

Liam smiled his lopsided smile. On the face of a grown man, it might have been cal ed rakish, charming even. On him it looked just a lit le mischievous. ‘You al right there, Maddy?’

‘Yeah.’ She nodded. ‘Yeah … I’m ne.’

He let go of her arm and checked his timepiece. ‘Return window any second now.’

Almost on cue, a gentle breeze whistled up the al ey, sending the loose debris of rubbish skit ering along the cobble-stones. A moment later, the air several yards from them shimmered like a heat haze: a bal of air twelve feet in diameter, hovering a foot o the ground. Through the portal she could just make out the twisting, undulating shapes of the archway beyond and Sal waiting impatiently for them.

You have to tel him, sometime, Maddy. Tel him time travel wil slowly kil him.

She didn’t like the fact that Foster had left the decision She didn’t like the fact that Foster had left the decision to her. Having secrets like that, having something she couldn’t share with him or Sal.

And what about that note?

She could feel the lump of bal ed paper in her glove, something else she was being asked to keep from her friends. And why? And who was Pandora? She didn’t like that … it felt like she was being used.

What? Like you just used that young bank tel er?

‘Come on, then,’ said Liam, stepping forward with the jewel ery case in his hands.

‘Liam?’

He stopped. ‘What?’

She could tel him about the note. She could also tel him about the damage time travel was silently wreaking on him. That every time he went back in time subtle corruption was occurring to every cel in his body, ageing him long before his time. She decided she’d want to know, to know that every time she’d stepped through a portal she was knocking perhaps ve or ten years o her natural life. She’d want to at least be able to choose for herself whether she was prepared to make that sacri ce for the rest of mankind.

‘What is it, Mads?’

Or maybe Foster was right – she should keep the truth from him for as long as possible …

She pul ed her glasses out of her handbag and put them on, then took the sil y bonnet o her head with its long, ridiculous ostrich feathers. Al of a sudden, dressed in her ridiculous ostrich feathers. Al of a sudden, dressed in her tight corset and bil owing lace skirts, she felt dishonest, a phoney, a fake and, her eyes meeting Liam’s, she felt like a liar.A worn-thin smile spread across her face. ‘Nothing, Liam. Let’s go home, eh?’