“On our side?” Bliss sputtered. “The Communists? That’s impossible; they’ve got that pact with the Nazis.”
“Germany will violate that pact,” Joe said. “Hitler will attack the Soviet Union in June 1941.”
“And wipe it out, I hope.”
Startled out of his preoccupations, Joe turned to look closely at Mr. Bliss driving his nine-year-old Willys-Knight.
Bliss said, “Those Communists are the real menace, not the Germans. Take the treatment of the Jews. You know who makes a lot out of that? Jews in this country, a lot of them not citizens but refugees living on public welfare. I think the Nazis certainly have been a little extreme in some of the things they’ve done to the Jews, but basically there’s been the Jewish question for a long time, and something, although maybe not so vile as those concentration camps, had to be done about it. We have a similar problem here in the United States, both with Jews and with the niggers. Eventually we’re going to have to do something about both.”
“I never actually heard the term ‘nigger’ used,” Joe said, and found himself appraising this era a little differently, all at once. I forgot about this, he realized.
“Lindbergh is the one who’s right about Germany,” Bliss said. “Have you ever listened to him speak? I don’t mean what the newspapers write it up like, but actually-” He slowed the car to a stop for a semaphore-style stop signal. “Take Senator Borah and Senator Nye. If it wasn’t for them, Roosevelt would be selling munitions to England and getting us into a war that’s not our war. Roosevelt is so darn interested in repealing the arms embargo clause of the neutrality bill; he wants us to get into the war. The American people aren’t going to support him. The American people aren’t interested in fighting England’s war or anybody else’s war.” The signal clanged and a green semaphore swung out. Bliss shifted into low gear and the Willys-Knight bumbled forward, melding with downtown Des Moines’ midday traffic.
“You’re not going to enjoy the next five years,” Joe said.
“Why not? The whole state of Iowa is behind me in what I believe. You know what I think about you employees of Mr. Runciter? From what you’ve said and from what those others said, what I overheard, I think you’re professional agitators.” Bliss glanced at Joe with uncowed bravado.
Joe said nothing; he watched the oldtime brick and wood and concrete buildings go by, the quaint cars – most of which appeared to be black – and wondered if he was the only one of the group who had been confronted by this particular aspect of the world of 1939. In New York, he told himself, it’ll be different; this is the Bible Belt, the isolationist Middle West. We won’t be living here; we’ll be on either the East Coast or the West.
But instinctively he sensed that a major problem for all of them had exposed itself just now. We know too much, he realized, to live comfortably in this time segment. If we had regressed twenty years, or thirty years, we could probably make the psychological transition; it might not be interesting to once more live through the Gemini spacewalks and the creaking first Apollo flights, but at least it would be possible. But at this point in time-
They’re still listening to ten-inch 78 records of “Two Black Crows.” And Joe Penner. And “Mert and Marge.” The Depression is still going on. In our time we maintain colonies on Mars, on Luna; we’re perfecting workable interstellar flight – these people have not been able to cope with the Dust Bowl of Oklahoma.
This is a world that lives in terms of William Jennings Bryan’s oratory; the Scopes “Monkey Trial” is a vivid reality here. He thought, There is no way we can adapt to their viewpoint, their moral, political, sociological environment. To them we’re professional agitators, more alien than the Nazis, probably even more of a menace than the Communist Party. We’re the most dangerous agitators that this time segment has yet had to deal with. Bliss is absolutely right.
“Where are you people from?” Bliss was asking. “Not from any part of the United States; am I correct?”
Joe said, “You’re correct. We’re from the North American Confederation.” From his pocket he brought forth a Runciter quarter, which he handed to Bliss. “Be my guest,” he said.
Glancing at the coin, Bliss gulped and quavered, “the profile on this coin – this is the deceased! This is Mr. Runciter!” He took another look and blanched. “And the date. 1990.”
“Don’t spend it all in one place,” Joe said.
When the Willys-Knight reached the Simple Shepherd Mortuary the service had already ended. On the wide, white, wooden steps of the two-story frame building a group of people stood, and Joe recognized all of them. There at last they were: Edie Dorn, Tippy Jackson, Jon Ild, Francy Spanish, Tito Apostos, Don Denny, Sammy Mundo, Fred Zafsky and – Pat. My wife, he said to himself, impressed once again by the sight of her, the dramatic dark hair, the intense coloring of her eyes and skin, all the powerful contrasts radiating from her.
“No,” he said aloud as he stepped from the parked car. “She’s not my wife; she wiped that out.” But, he remembered, she kept the ring. The unique wrought-silver and jade wedding ring which she and I picked out… that’s all that remains. But what a shock to see her again. To regain, for an instant, the ghostly shroud of a marriage that has been abolished. That had in fact never existed – except for this ring. And, whenever she felt like it, she could obliterate the ring too.
“Hi, Joe Chip,” she said in her cool, almost mocking voice; her intense eyes fixed on him, appraising him.
“Hello,” he said awkwardly. The others greeted him too, but that did not seem so important; Pat had snared his attention.
“No Al Hammond?” Don Denny asked.
Joe said, “Al’s dead. Wendy Wright is dead.”
“We know about Wendy,” Pat said. Calmly.
“No, we didn’t know,” Don Denny said. “We assumed but we weren’t sure. I wasn’t sure.” To Joe he said, “What happened to them? What killed them?”
“They wore out,” Joe said.
“Why?” Tito Apostos said hoarsely, crowding into the circle of people surrounding Joe.
Pat Conley said, “The last thing you said to us, Joe Chip, back in New York, before you went off with Hammond-”
“I know what I said,” Joe said.
Pat continued, “You said something about years. ‘It had been too long,’ you said. What does that mean? Something about time.”
“Mr. Chip,” Edie Dorn said agitatedly, “since we came here to this place, this town has radically changed. None of us understand it. Do you see what we see?” With her hand she indicated the mortuary building, then the street and the other buildings.
“I’m not sure,” Joe said, “what it is you see.”
“Come on, Chip,” Tito Apostos said with anger. “Don’t mess around; simply tell us, for chrissakes, what this place looks like to you. That vehicle.” He gestured toward the Willys-Knight. “You arrived in that. Tell us what it is; tell us what you arrived in.” They all waited, all of them intently watching Joe.
“Mr. Chip,” Sammy Mundo stammered, “that’s a real old automobile, that’s what it is; right?” He giggled. “How old is it exactly?”
After a pause Joe said, “Sixty-two years old.”
“That would make it 1930,” Tippy Jackson said to Don Denny. “Which is pretty close to what we figured.”
“We figured 1939,” Don Denny said to Joe in a level voice. A moderate, detached, mature, baritone voice. Without undue emotionality. Even under these circumstances.
Joe said, “It’s fairly easy to establish that. I took a look at a newspaper at my conapt back in New York. September 12th. So today is September 13th, 1939. The French think they’ve breached the Siegfried Line.”
“Which, in itself,” Jon Ild said, “is a million laughs.”
“I hoped,” Joe said, “that you as a group were experiencing a later reality. Well, so it goes.”
“If it’s 1939 it’s 1939,” Fred Zafsky said in a squeaky, highpitched voice. “Naturally, we all experience it; what else can we do?” He flapped his long arms energetically, appealing to the others for their agreement.
“Flurk off, Zafsky,” Tito Apostos said with annoyance.
To Pat, Joe Chip said, “What do you say about this?”
She shrugged.
“Don’t shrug,” he said. “Answer.”
“We’ve gone back in time,” Pat said.
“Not really,” Joe said.
“Then what have we done?” Pat said. “Gone forward in time, is that it?”
Joe said, “We haven’t gone anywhere. We’re where we’ve always been. But for some reason – for one of several possible reasons – reality has receded; it’s lost its underlying support and it’s ebbed back to previous forms. Forms it took fifty-three years ago. It may regress further. I’m more interested, at this point, in knowing if Runciter has manifested himself to you.”