Touchstone (Meridian Series) Page 10

  “Spooky,” said Nordhausen.

  “It’s got me thinking about security issues now,” said Paul. “We’re going to have to be more careful than ever.”

  “You think they may have spies right here in Berkeley—a permanent operation running here to keep an eye on us?” Kelly looked up from his laptop, clearly unhappy, as he had been the first target. “You think they may try a hit or something—on the facilities here?”

  “I don’t know,” said Paul, “but consider this: Suppose that guy was an operative from the future. He could have been verifying something as simple as my arrival time for this meeting. You said it yourself, Maeve. Most of all the history is unknown to us. It’s made up of all the little nothings of the hour that surround the big moments—but that’s where the key Pushpoints are. Hell, Graves came back the night of our first planned mission intent on saving Kelly’s life. All he had to do was step in front of him near an off ramp and delay him for a few brief seconds. You can’t run an operation like that without knowing a lot of precise details.”

  “Well, how would they know about this meeting?” Maeve asked. “We aren’t keeping minutes anymore, and nothing is hard scheduled.”

  “How could they know? Just by watching the four of us arrive here, that’s how. That takes reconnaissance, surveillance, a lot of sleuth work. You follow me?”

  “Right,” said Nordhausen. “Hell, they ran an operation last night to strike at Kelly. I suppose it makes sense that they might have someone posted here to do the equivalent of a damage assessment. You know,” he looked at Maeve now, “to see what the consequences of their mission were. They ripped off Kelly’s DVD and thought that would be the end of it, but the Nexus must have still been in force for a time, because Paul and I were here, and the Arch was spinning at near 100% after my mission.”

  Paul smiled. “You’re getting the hang of this at last,” he said. “That’s just another positive outcome from your illegal mission. Yes, we were in the sphere of influence of the Arch, and that made us Free Radicals. We got Maeve’s call about Kelly while we were still in the Nexus, and we resolved to go to Kelly’s aid then and there. That resolve was enough to put the issue in doubt. Time was not ready to close the continuum, so she put Kelly into a Schroedinger’s Box and we made sure that cat stayed alive!”

  “So now they realize their plot against Kelly failed,” Maeve breathed. “They know we are on to them, and if what you said is true they are looking for verification on the events surrounding this meeting.”

  “Exactly,” Paul agreed. “They want clarity. It’s the only way they can plan any counter-operation against the action we decide to take here.”

  “But they can’t have spies everywhere,” said Kelly. There’s no one here now but the four of us, for example, and this is where the real decisions will be made.”

  “True, but you would be amazed what a good historian can dig up,” said Nordhausen.

  “A lot of trouble!” Maeve harried him, and the professor waved her off.

  “The point is well taken,” said Paul. “We leave subtle clues on the world, almost without a second thought. The phone calls we made last night make an easy example. There’s a record of them somewhere now, with exact times. The queries we run on the Internet can be data based.”

  “Not!” Kelly protested. “I’ve got our systems locked up tighter than a witch’s—” He caught himself, realizing he was not just out with the boys. “Well you know what I mean.”

  “OK, so our systems here are secure,” Paul continued. “Yet every time we spin up the Arch, Con-Edison knows about it, right? Our damn electric bill could stand as a record of our operation times. Last night we all signed in at the hospital registration desk to go visit you, Kelly. And Robert—didn’t I see you swipe a credit card for the meals we picked up on the way over to your place?”

  “Well all I had with me were British pounds and shillings left over from my mission,“ said the professor.

  “Fine, but there’s a record of that transaction—timed and dated. We drive, we buy gas, groceries, we go through intersections that have been rigged with cameras for years now. We pass through RFID chip readers every time we go into a store. Beyond that, we scribble notes and just toss them into trash cans like they were gone. Hell, we leave fingerprints on everything we touch. A good gumshoe and a forensics team could learn an incredible amount of detail about our lives if they set their mind to it. Look how we solved the spatial and temporal coordinates for the mission to the Hejaz? It was just an errant note scribbled on a receipt. And speaking of Mr. Graves: when he showed up seven years ahead of schedule what did he do? He holed up in a monastery to leave as little impression on the Meridian as possible. The almost invisible wakes we leave while going about ordinary activities could be the crucial elements of a breaching plan.” He halted, out of breath, but it was clear by the look on their faces that he had made his point.

  “He’s right,” Maeve concurred. “If we’re going to take on a responsibility like this we have to start being very careful—very precise.” She looked at Nordhausen.

  “And get the numbers right,” Robert whispered in Kelly’s direction.

  “Oh, be quiet, or I’ll send you back to the dinosaurs again!” Kelly smiled, but his point was made.

  “That opens another issue,” said Maeve. “Robert thinks he has the temporal and spatial coordinates figured out for this trip to Rosetta, but who’s going?”

  There was a moment of silence and Nordhausen was the first to speak. “I’m the obvious choice,” he said. “I know the history and I can read the hieroglyphics.”

  “And you have a strange propensity to wander about and tip brandy with Primes,” Paul put in.

  “What?” Maeve was on alert at once.

  “Never mind,” Nordhausen hushed her, covering his tracks. “He’s just needling me, and I suppose I have it coming. I can promise you that the events of recent days have made a profound impression on me. I realize what we’re dealing with now, Maeve. I’ll be very careful—very precise in anything I do.”

  “Of course you will,” she said. “Because I’m going too.”

  Nordhausen’s eyes widened. “What? Who’s going to run the monitors?”

  “I suppose that gets dumped on me again,” Kelly complained.

  Robert looked at Maeve and said, “Do you realize what you’re saying?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “But we aren’t just going to sit in a gallery and watch a play. This is going to be dangerous.”

  “Of course it is.”

  “But you’re a—”

  “A woman? Yes, you’ve got that right as well. And don’t try to tell me that there was no place for a woman in this Milieu, because I know the history as well as you do.”

  Nordhausen gave Paul a frustrated look. “Do we really need three people on this operation?”

  “Three people? Hey, who’s gonna stay and help me here?” said Kelly.

  Everyone was looking at Paul, who stood with his arms folded, his brown eyes shifting from Robert to Maeve to Kelly as he sorted something in his mind. “OK,” he said at last. “Let me hear the approach scenario.” He wanted to catch up on anything he may have missed by coming late.

  “Savants,” said Robert. “We’re going in as members of the philosophers, scientists and literati that tagged along with Napoleon during his invasion of Egypt.”

  “Won’t the names of all the passengers who booked transport with the French fleet be in a register?” Paul probed. “Won’t they have assigned quarters, liaisons with the French Army? How will you pass?”

  “There were many that landed later, coming over on courier ships and independent transport.” Maeve explained her rationale. “I’ve done some research on this, and it solves our language problem. We can say we were Americans visiting relatives in France when we heard the proclamation announcing the expedition and simply had to return home by way of Egypt.”

  “Americans? Details,” said
Paul. “You’ve got to ring true.”

  Maeve reached into the pocket of her khaki shirt and drew out a paper. “The Perla,” she said with a smile. “A Spanish 34-gun frigate out of Malaga making a courier and supply run to Cyprus for a plantation owner there. She put into Mallorca, then ran up to Toulon, where they took on six more passengers, including three Americans. They went on to Sardinia, and then Tripoli, where one of the Americans got off. The ship hit foul water during a squall in the Gulf of Sidra and three passengers were lost, including the last two Americans—swept right out to sea and never heard from again. The Perla continued on and docked at Aboukir Bay three days before our planned entry date. She was there very briefly, before fleeing at rumors of the imminent approach of the British and Turkish fleets. She made her delivery but, nearing home on her return leg, she was caught in an engagement with a British squadron in the straits of Gibraltar and fled to the Barbary Coast, where she sunk. We can pose as those two lost souls, and just say we got off at Aboukir Bay. The ship will be gone. There would be no one to dispute our story. Who will be the wiser?”

  She had a pleased expression on her face, and was glad she had taken the time to do the initial research the previous night, after leaving Kelly at the hospital. The others were all somewhat surprised to hear this.

  “I stopped at the University wardrobe on the way in,” she pressed on.

  “So that’s what you dragged in with that duffel bag!” Nordhausen wagged a finger at her. “You were planning this all along. You just wanted to hear our arguments.”

  “No, I was planning it all last night, and I was just trying to make up my mind whether to let you go or not, Robert.”

  “What?” Nordhausen started to warm up for another argument but he held himself in check, looking at Paul to referee. “Well, say something, Paul!”

  “Alright,” Paul obliged him. “You want the mission, you’ve got it, Maeve. You’ve obviously been thinking about this, and the only experience you’ve had in the Arch was the Spook Job that fixed my position in the library so Kelly could bring me home. I owe you one. It’s all yours. I’ll stay here and ride shotgun with Kelly on the consoles.”

  “But—” Nordhausen had a pleading look on his face.

  “She’s in,” Paul said firmly. “So get used to it, Robert.”

  “You mean to say you’d give up on an opportunity to see Napoleon?” The professor knew that Paul had always admired the little French dictator.

  “See Napoleon?” Maeve jumped on that notion at once. “Not on my watch.”

  Nordhausen sighed heavily. “She won’t let me do anything!”

  “Of course I won’t.”

  Paul and Kelly just smiled.

  ~

  They were some time working out the details of their planned entry to 1799. Nordhausen nailed down the situation they were likely to find, and dreamt up a reason for their need to observe the activities at Rosetta.

  “The history is not very detailed,” he complained, “but we know that a French officer in the Corps of Engineers, one Bouchard or Boussard, was responsible for the find, in August 1799. They were improving fortifications against an expected invasion from the sea by the Turks, at a place called Fort Julien, Rosetta.”

  “August?” Maeve questioned. “I’ve got a better reference than that. The RAM bank has two references that show the stone was discovered by a Captain Pierre Bouchard on July 15, 1799. It was unearthed during a demolition of a wall at the fort you mentioned.”

  “That’s odd,” said Nordhausen. “All my references indicate August. And none of them have that level of detail.”

  “Captain Pierre François Xavier Bouchard, to be more precise.” Maeve smiled.

  “Very well,” said Nordhausen. “What else did you find?”

  “Well, the stone was sent to the Savants in Cairo, so it probably arrived there in August. This other article says that it was received there by Jean-Joseph Marcel and Remi Raige, and they identified the middle script as Demotic. An article publicizing the incident was published in the Courrier de l’Egypte in September of 1799.”

  “You’ve done your research,” said Nordhausen.

  “Details,” Maeve winked. “I’m betting July 15 is good data. If you go with August there simply isn’t enough time to get it to Cairo, study it, and put out an article by September. Besides, when in doubt we have to begin at the earliest possible target date. In fact, I’ll wager that the trip from Rosetta to Cairo would have been the ideal time to damage the stone—assuming it is unearthed with the hieroglyphics intact as you are obviously hoping.”

  “Hummm… Then we’ll have to arrive July 15—perhaps even a day earlier.”

  “Guys—” Kelly gave them a frustrated look. “Make up your mind. I’ve got the prelims in for August and now I need to shift everything two or three weeks.”

  “It can’t be helped,” said Nordhausen. “Go with July 14, 1799. We’ll linger in the vicinity of the fortification and see what we can learn—that is if you can at least get us to within a few million years of the target this time.”

  “Very funny.” Maeve was quick to defend Kelly. “Remember, he got you back, and Paul as well—and that was no small feat.”

  “I was only kidding. OK, we’ve got our breaching point. Now what about language? Your take on us being Americans is a great way to cover for our English without being taken for the enemy. I can manage a little French, but not enough to converse fluently.”

  “I’m good for some French as well… and of course, German,” said Maeve.

  “Not very useful in this instance, I’m afraid.”

  “Then we’ll just have to keep our conversation to a minimum, won’t we? The less you say the better, if you want my opinion.”

  “And I don’t.”

  “Then we’ll just have to rely on your French, if we must. Kelly, how long before we have good numbers?”

  “Give me a few minutes to program this change, and then I can send the file over a secure line to the Arion system for processing. I would guess it might take another couple of hours before we get a solution firmed up for the targeting vectors.”

  “Good,” said Maeve. “That’s enough time for some more food, coffee, and costume inspection.”

  The professor looked over his shoulder. “Inspection?”

  “That’s right. No PDAs, cell phones, wrist watches, Parker Pens—you get my drift?”

  Robert rolled his eyes and walked off.

  12

  The numbers came back just under two hours later, and they looked very good. The entry variance data showed a discrepancy factor of only 0.00017, and that was clean as far as Paul was concerned. He was satisfied that they would hit the target date, assuming all went well with the equipment.

  Robert and Maeve were already decked out in costume. Maeve wore a blue silk corset undergarment with hand sewn stay pockets and an accent of lovely mustard colored thread about the buttonholes. A Tonder lace was added to the chemise and was matched with embroidered stockings with a similar pattern. The outer garment was a simple dress of striped Poplin with a quilted petticoat, more suitable for travel, and she selected skirts that would not need hoops, thinking more of comfort than fashion at this point. She had spent some time curling her auburn hair and topped it all off with a lovely hat.

  “I could add a waistcoat,” she said as much to herself as anyone else. “Being July in Egypt I would imagine the temperatures will be somewhat fierce. The silk is fine in the undergarments, but I won’t be lacing my corset very tightly.”

  Paul was taking the spectacle in as she paraded about the room. “What about a wig, hats, a parasol?”

  “I’m afraid I just couldn’t bear up under a wig,” said Maeve. “A parasol is a good idea, and I managed to find something appropriate—see?” She opened a small blue parasol and spun it about, delighted with herself. “And I’ve a nice beaded purse to finish the whole thing off.”

  “But won’t that linen be a bit warm?”

>   “Possibly. If I can’t take the heat I’ll just shed a layer or two. There wasn’t a hard distinction between outer and underwear at certain levels of society in the Eighteenth Century. We have decided to go as landed gentry, but not high society. A working woman might shed her outer layer, her gown or jacket, in certain circumstances, and work in her shift, stays and petticoat. I suppose it all depended on the public space she was in and by whom she expected to be seen. Under the circumstances I’ve chosen a rather plain waistcoat on the middle ground between outer and underwear. I can’t imagine exposing myself too much with the Moslem culture thing. I’ll be accompanying the good Professor Nordhausen as his sister—strictly middle class with this outfit.”

  The professor wore a gentlemen’s suit of pale blue silk, with nicely brocaded cuffs and collar. Maeve found him comfortable boots, knee socks and a matching set of trousers that fit just right. He plopped on a white styled wig and was laughing at himself in the mirror when Paul saw him. A carved walking stick completed his accessories.

  There were just a few more details to work out on the spatial placement before Paul would be satisfied and give a final go for the mission. Maeve went off to confer with Kelly, and Paul pulled Robert aside in the auxiliary room. “Where are you manifesting at the target milieu? What time of day will it be, and how can we minimize observation by locals?”

  “We’ll be northwest of the town,” said Nordhausen, “on the road that runs along Aboukir Bay towards Alexandria. We’ll arrive in the pre-dawn hour, 5:00 AM, so observation should not be a problem.”

  “You’re sure about those coordinates?”

  “As sure as I can be under the circumstances. We won’t really know what’s there until we manifest… What’s wrong, Paul?”

  “Well, it’s just that all the other breaching points were quite remote from populated areas. What if you were to appear right in front of some passer by, or a French soldier patrolling the road?”