When Bran looked at me, I could see the bewilderment hiding behind the anger. “It has come to this. Aside from Jasper Flint, I am now the only person my mother trusts. And isn’t that just a sad state of affairs?”
Mac broke the silence that followed. “Do you believe this enhancement will actually work, lad?”
“Blasi is convinced.”
Collum stood up and scrubbed both hands back over his bristly hair. Like a great cat sensing prey, he paced back and forth. “If this thing does what Cameron claims, do you realize what it could mean?” His voice rose, his gestures growing animated. “Think what we could do with even three more days. How often have we seen the Dim open to England in the right time but not the right location? With extra days, we could do a proper search and still get back in time.” I jumped as he slammed his palms down on the tabletop. “My God! We could find him. We could finally bring Da home.”
“Bran.” Moira spoke in a quiet voice. Her eyes were shut, as though in pain. “If Celia were to get this device . . . this enhancement . . . what do you think she’d do?”
“Mrs. MacPherson,” Bran replied, “for once, my mother’s actions are not the most concerning. I came to speak with you today because of how badly Gunnar Blasi wants this. I don’t know why, and that is what scares me more than anything.”
“Well, that settles it then,” Phoebe said. “We have to go.”
“Hang on a tic.” Doug reached down to pull his phone from his sporran. After jabbing at the screen a few times, he looked up. “I, ah, I’ve built an app that links into the computer and displays the upcoming passages.” He swallowed. “It appears that when you factor in the—”
Phoebe grabbed his large wrist and tilted the phone toward her. “Longitude and latitude, blah blah,” she read, scrolling down. “Numbers, numbers, numbers. Hey!” Her blue eyes widened as they skimmed down the page. “Well, Bran. Looks like your lot won’t be all alone in the Big Apple.”
Collum made a grab for the phone but Phoebe was quicker. Doug put an arm around her and squeezed her to him as she scrolled again. She stopped, head tilting. “Hmm,” she said. “Better warm up your sewing machine, Gran. We’ve got less than four days to prepare.” She was squirming now, practically dancing with excitement. “I’ve always wanted to do the Victorian era. I only wish it were Christmastime and not March. No one did Christmas like the Vickies.”
Caught up in her own excitement, Phoebe didn’t notice the way Doug’s shoulders fell. I tried to catch her eye, but she had already passed the phone back to him, mumbling to herself about which gowns could be altered.
Doug hesitated before punching a few numbers into the phone. “Actually,” he said, “it is three days, sixteen hours, and twenty-two minutes. Tuesday, at 8:23 a.m., the Dim will open.”
“And to which exact date, Douglas?” Moira asked.
Doug held out the phone but Collum took it first. Sitting next to his grandmother, he tilted it so that he, Moira, and Mac could all view it at once. As Moira slipped a pair of readers from their usual spot on top of her graying black hair, Mac’s head tilted against his wife’s as all three read the words together.
Mac read it aloud to the rest of us. “March eleventh, 1895.” His head rose to level a look at Bran. “That concur with your dates, Bran?”
Bran hesitated. “Yes. The same. Though I believe our arrival is some two hours earlier. Looks like we’ll get to do a bit of sightseeing before you all arrive.”
My brain began to pound, to fill with every political, social, and civil event that had occurred in and around the New York area on the three days following March 11, 1895.
I forced most of it back. I already knew there was only one sentinel event—one historical occurrence too well known to ever be revocable—that really mattered. One reason and one reason alone that the Dim would open to that specific date and time and location.
“The thirteenth,” I spoke up. “It’s all about the thirteenth.”
Doug was already nodding as Mac said, “March thirteenth, 1895?” A million wrinkles formed around his eyes as he squinted, head cocked. “The date does ring a bell. Why is that?”
“March thirteenth, 1895,” I said as I turned back to the others, “was the night Nikola Tesla’s Fifth Avenue lab burned to the ground. It’s the night he lost everything.”
Chapter 8
MAC STRAIGHTENED. “WE NEED TO RELAY ALL THIS TO Lucinda and I don’t want to do it over the phone. We’ll have little enough time to prepare, and so must leave at once.”
My stomach sank into my feet. We’re leaving? But . . . but that’s not fair.
Bran got up when Moira stood. Mac gripped his shoulder in thanks. Moira gave him a hearty embrace, speaking loudly over Phoebe’s groans of protest.
“Thank you for coming to us, Brandon. And we won’t be forgetting it. But Mac’s right. Lu has to know, and we’ve decisions to make. Hope, you stay, but say your goodbyes quickly.” With a wave, she motioned for the others to rise. “The rest of you, no more bellyaching. You heard your grandfather. Get to the tent and get everything packed up. We leave in ten.”
Collum was the only one who lingered at the picnic table while Bran and I stayed put, staring remorsefully down at the hundreds of carved initials.
“I think you’re holding out on us.” Collum rose slowly, gaze narrowed on Bran. “There’s more to this than you’re saying, Cameron. You know it. I know it.”
Knuckles pressed to the tabletop, Collum loomed over us. Behind him, the mist-shrouded Highland peaks rolled on and on, as unchanged and unyielding as the people who lived there.
“Make no mistake: If anyone gets hurt because of something you concealed, you’ll answer to me.”
With that, Collum wheeled about and stomped away, kilt swinging, broad shoulders rigid with tension.
“Never thought I’d miss the dear lad.” Bran’s natural good humor was trying to return. His grin flashed, revealing that one crooked eyetooth. “But damn if he doesn’t grow on you.”
“Bran.”
As he turned on the bench toward me, the grin slowly faded.
“There’s never enough time, is there?” he said. “For us, I mean. It seems to have become something of a pattern.”
“No,” I said. “Never enough. And we’re time travelers, no less. Seems like that ought to afford us some kind of privilege.”
He huffed a chuckle. “You know, things have been . . . difficult at home. Worse than you could imagine.”
I watched as his fingertip traced the carved hearts on the table. He had such graceful hands, though they were scarred, callused from riding and swordplay. And as he went on all I could think about was having those hands on my skin.
“I wanted to leave, you know? Started to run a hundred different times. But then, I’d think of that day when my stupid horse tossed me into the river. And there you were, standing in the freezing water and glaring down at me, shivering but so fierce. Or I’d remember how you looked with the snow falling all around you as you melted iron bars to save a friend. And I would tell myself that if you could possess that kind of courage,” he said, “then I could stand it a little longer.”