Gregory Benford - Timescape

He’d had this idea on his own and rather liked it. If what Markham said was right, it was possible to reach someone in the past and change the present. But precisely how this action affected the present wasn’t clear. Since the past viewed now might well be the one Renfrew had created, how could they tell it from some other past that never happened, but might have? This whole way of looking at it was a mistake, Markham said, since once you passed a tachyon beam between two times they were forever linked, a closed loop. But to Peterson it seemed essential to know if you had in fact got through. In Markham’s idealized experiments, with flipping light switches and toggles moving back and forth between pegs and all, the whole question was confused. So Peterson had proposed a check, of sorts. True enough, you had to send back the preliminary ocean data and so on. But you could also ask the past to set aside some kind of road marker. One clear sign that the signals had been received—that would be enough to convince Peterson that these ideas weren’t drivel. So two days before leaving London he’d called Renfrew arid given him a specific message to send. Markham had a list of the experimental groups who could conceivably receive a tachyon message on their nuclear magnetic resonance devices. A message was addressed to each site—New York, La Jolla, Moscow. Each was requested to establish a clearly labeled safety deposit box in Peterson’s name with a note inside. That should be enough.

Peterson couldn’t reach Moscow without explaining to Sir Martin why he wanted to go. New York was out of the question, temporarily, because of the terrorists. That left La Jolla.

Peterson felt his pulse quicken as the catch on the safety deposit box came free with a click. When the lid of the box tilted back he saw only a sheet of yellow paper folded in thirds. He picked it up and carefully flattened the creases. It crackled with age.

MESSAGE RECEIVED LA JOLLA

That was all. It was quite enough. Instantly Peterson felt two conflicting emotions: elation, and a sudden disappointment that he had not asked for more. Who had written the note? What else did they receive? He realized ruefully that he had assumed the sod getting the signal would obey the instruction and then go on and tell how he got it, what he thought it meant, or at least who he buggering well was.

But no, no, he thought, sitting back. This was enough. This proved the whole colossal business was right. Incredible, but right. The implications beyond that were unclear, granted—but this much was certain.

And as well, he thought with a touch of pride, he had done it all himself. He wondered for a moment if this was what it was like to be a scientist, to make a discovery, to see the world unlocked if only for an instant.

Then the bank manager knocked hesitantly on the door, the mood was lost, and Peterson pocketed the sheet of yellow.

He stayed at the Valencia Hotel in a suite overlooking the cove. The park below was part gnawed away by the encroaching surf, as evidenced by the sudden termination of some walkways. All along the coast the waves had undercut the conglomerate soil. Shelves stuck out above the surf, ready to topple. No one seemed to notice.

He told his security men and limo to clear off for the night. They made him conspicuous and he had been under the limelight quite enough for one day. His mind was churning with the success at the bank. He dissipated some of the energy with thirty laps in the hotel pool, and then with unsuccessful forays into

the shops near the hotel. The clothing stores interested him most, but they were the sort which could not simply display their wares and stand aside, but set them in scenes of English manor houses or French chateaux. There was still money here, though most of it seemed misdirected. The people were bright and clean and glossy. At least being prosperous set one apart in England; here it guaranteed nothing, not even taste.

The sidewalks thronged with old people, some quite rude if you didn’t step aside for them. The younger men, though, were bright and athletic. The women interested him more, crisply fashionable, immaculately groomed. There was a certain blandness to them, though, an indefinable stamp of prosperous neutrality. Part of him envied this life. He knew that these people striding so confidently along Girard were hemmed in by as many restrictions as the English—Southern California was a mass of limits on immigration, buying houses, water use, changing jobs, automobiles, everything—but they looked free. There was still not much of the worldweariness here which Europeans often equated with maturity. He had always missed a certain complexity among the women, as well. They seemed interchangeable, their faces carefully smooth and open. Sex with them was healthy, competent, and matter-of-fact. If one propositioned them, they were never surprised or shocked. Their no meant no and their yes meant yes. He missed the challenge of the no that meant maybe, the elegant game of seduction. These Americans didn’t play games; they were energetic and skillful but never devious or secret or subtle. They preferred direct questions, gave direct answers. They liked to be on top.

At this point in his musings, he stopped before a wine store, and decided to see if he could get a few cases of good California wine flown back to England. One never knew when the chance would come again.

He was waiting in the bar for Kiefer when the thought struck him. What if he’d simply sent a letter to Renfrew, with the message inside? Given the post these days, it might not have even reached him by now, never mind being acted upon. In that case, after he’d got the yellow paper today, he could’ve rung up Renfrew and ordered him not to send the message. What would Markham make of that?

He finished his gin and then remembered the business about the loops. Yes, the scheme he’d just devised would have thrown everything into an indeterminate state. That was the answer. But what kind of answer was that?

“Damn streets,” Kiefer complained. “Getting like a slum.” He wrenched the steering wheel around a sharp curve. Tires howled.

For Peterson this change of topic was a decided improvement. Kiefer had been reciting the virtues and benefits of eating fresh vegetables brought in at something approximating the speed of light from “the valley,” a cornucopia needing no further name.

To encourage this new line of discussion Peterson ventured mildly, “It all looks very prosperous to me.”

“Yes, well, of course, you don’t see it if you keep to the avenues. But it’s getting harder to maintain standards. Look around you here, for instance. Notice anything?”

They were high in the hills now, on winding narrow roads that afforded glimpses of the ocean between Spanish ranches and miniature French chateaux.

“See how they’re walled in? When we first came here, oh, almost twenty years ago now, they were all open. Great views from every house. Now you can’t even call on your neighbor without standing out in the street pushing buttons and talking into an intercom. And frap, you should see the antiburglar networks! Electronics worth a hundred German shepherds. Backup batteries for brownouts, too.”

“The crime rate is bad, then?” Peterson asked.

“Terrible. Illegal aliens, too many people, not enough jobs. Everybody feels he has a right to a life of luxury—or at least comfort—so there’s a lot of frustration and resentment when the dream craps out.”

Peterson began to replan his schedule. He would leave time to find the best electronic security system he could. Stupid of him, not to think of it before. That sort of thing was precisely where the Americans excelled. He would have use for a good system, adaptable and rugged. If possible, he would carry it back with him on the plane. Again he wished for a private jet.