He had no choice, and was not in the least daunted by the walk. He knew he could count on his sturdy legs and stamina to complete the marathon journey without weakening.
During his long trudge to the author’s house, while he watched night spread itself lazily over the landscape, and glanced over his shoulder every now and then to make sure neither Murray’s thugs nor Solomon were following him, Tom Blunt toyed with different ways of introducing himself to Wells. In the end, the one he decided was the cleverest also sounded the most far-fetched: he would introduce himself as Captain Derek Shackleton. He was sure the saviour of mankind would be far better received at any time of day than plain old Tom Blunt, and there was nothing to stop him successfully playing the role offstage as he had already done with Claire.
As Shackleton, he could tell the author the same tale he had told the girl, and show him the letter he had found when he came through the time hole on his first visit to their time. How could this Wells fellow not be taken in if he himself had written a novel about time travel? If, though, he were to make his story believable, Tom would need to think up a good reason why neither he nor anyone else from the future was able to write the letter. Perhaps he could explain that by the year 2000 man had fallen out of the habit of writing, because the task had been given to automaton scribes. In any event, introducing himself as Captain Shackleton still seemed like the best plan: it seemed preferable for the famous hero of the future, rather than a nobody, to beg the famous author’s help in getting out of the predicament into which lust had got him.
When he arrived in Woking in the early hours, the place was immersed in an idyllic calm. It was a cold but beautiful night. Tom spent almost an hour reading letterboxes before he came to the one marked ‘Wells’. He was standing in front of a darkened three-storey house enclosed by a not-too-high fence. He took a deep breath and climbed over it. There was no point in waiting.
He crossed the garden reverentially, as though he were walking into a chapel, climbed the steps to the front door, and was about to ring when his hand stopped short of the bell. The echo of a horse’s hoofs, shattering the nocturnal silence, made him freeze. He turned slowly as he heard the animal draw near, and almost immediately saw it stop outside the fence. A shiver ran down his spine as he watched the rider, barely more than a shadow, dismount and open the gate. Was it one of Murray’s thugs?
The fellow made a swift gesture that left him in no doubt: he pulled a gun from his pocket and pointed it straight at him. Tom instantly dived to one side, rolling across the lawn and disappearing into the darkness. Out of the corner of his eye he watched the stranger try to follow his sudden movement with the gun. Tom had no intention of making himself an easy target. He leaped to his feet and, in two strides, had reached the fence. He was convinced he would feel the warm sting of the bullet entering his back at any moment, but apparently he was moving too quickly, and it did not happen. He clambered over the fence and pelted down the street until he reached the fields. He ran for at least five minutes.
Only then, panting, did he allow himself to stop and look behind him to see whether Murray’s thug was following him. All he could see was black night enfolding everything. He had managed to lose the man. He was safe, at least for the moment, for he doubted that his killer would bother looking for him in that pitch blackness. He would go back to London to report to Murray. Feeling calmer,
Tom found a place behind some bushes and settled down for the night. The next morning, after making sure the thug had really gone, he would return to the author’s house and ask for his help, as planned.
Chapter XXIX
‘You saved a man’s life using your imagination,’ Jane had said to him, only a few hours earlier, and her words were still echoing in his head as he watched the dawn light flood in through the tiny attic window, revealing the contours of the furniture and their two figures intertwined on the seat of the time machine. When he had suggested to his wife they might find a use for the seat, this was not exactly what he had had in mind, but he had thought it best not to upset her, and especially not now.
Wells gazed at her tenderly. Jane was breathing evenly, asleep in his arms, having given herself to him with renewed enthusiasm, reviving the almost violent fervour of their first months together. Wells had watched this passion ebb with the resigned sorrow of one who knows only too well that passionate love does not last for ever, merely transfers to other bodies. But there was no law, apparently, against its embers being rekindled by a timely breeze. This discovery had left a rather foolish grin on the author’s face, which he had not seen reflected in his mirror for a long time. And it was all due to the words floating in his head – ‘You saved a man’s life using your imagination’ – words that had made him shine once more in Jane’s eyes, and which I trust you have also remembered, because they link this scene and Wells’s first appearance in our tale, which I informed you would not be his last.
When his wife went down to make breakfast, he decided to remain sitting on the machine a while longer. He took a deep breath, contented and extraordinarily at ease with himself. There were times in his life when Wells considered himself an exceptionally ridiculous human being, but he seemed now to be going through a phase where he was able to see himself in a different, more charitable and – why not say it? – a more admiring light. He had enjoyed saving a life, as much because of Jane’s unexpected offering as for the fantastic gift he had been given as a result: this machine that had arisen from his imagination, the ornate sleigh that could travel through time – or that was what they had made Andrew Harrington believe. Contemplating it now by daylight, Wells had to admit that when he had given it that cursory description in his novel, he never imagined it might turn out to be such a beautiful object if someone decided to build it.
Feeling like a naughty child, he sat up ceremoniously, placed his hand with exaggerated solemnity on the glass lever to the right of the control panel and smiled wistfully. If only the thing worked. If only he could hop from era to era, travel through time at his whim until he reached its furthest frontier – if such a thing existed – go to the place where time began or ended. But the machine could not be used for that. In fact, the machine had no use at all. And now he had removed the gadget that lit the magnesium, it could not even blind its occupant.
‘Bertie,’ Jane called from downstairs.
Wells started. He stood up, straightened his clothes, rumpled from their earlier passionate embraces, and hurried downstairs.
‘There’s a young man to see you,’ she said, a little uneasily. ‘He says his name is Captain Derek Shackleton.’
Wells paused at the foot of the stairs. Derek Shackleton? Why did that name ring a bell?
‘He’s waiting in the sitting room. But he said something else, Bertie . . .’ Jane went on hesitantly, unsure what tone she should adopt to express what she was about to say. ‘He says he’s from .. . the year 2000.’
From the year 2000? Now Wells knew where he had heard that name before.
‘Ah, in that case it must be very urgent,’ he said, grinning mysteriously. ‘Let’s hurry and find out what the gentleman wants.’
With these words, he strode towards the tiny sitting room. Next to the chimneypiece, too nervous to sit down,
