The Map of Time (Trilogía Victoriana #1)(94)

“Under a stone next to the grave marked John Peachey, I found a letter. I picked it up and discovered to my amazement it was addressed to me. I stuffed it in the pocket of my disguise and opened it in the year 2000. It was a letter from a woman I’d never met living in the nineteenth century.” Tom paused for dramatic effect, before adding: “Her name was Claire Haggerty, and she said she loved me.” The girl breathed in abruptly, as though gasping for air. Tom watched, a tender smile on his face, as she gulped, attempting to digest what she was hearing, struggling to understand that she was responsible for this whole situation, or would be responsible for it in the future. For if he loved her now it was because she had loved him in the past. Claire stared into her cup, as though she were able to see him in the tea leaves in the year 2000 reading with bewilderment the letter in which a strange woman from another century, a woman who was already dead, declared her undying love for him. A letter she had written. Tom persisted, like the lumberjack who sees the tree he has been hacking away at for hours begin to teeter and despite his exhaustion swings his axe even harder.

“In your letter, you told me we would meet in the future, or more precisely I would meet you, because you had already met me,” he said. “You implored me to write back, insisting you needed to hear from me. Although it all seemed very strange to me, I replied to your letter, and on my next visit to the nineteenth century two days later, I left it beside the same tombstone. On my third visit I found your reply, and that’s how our correspondence through time began.” “Good God,” the girl gasped.

“I had no idea who you were,” Tom continued, not wanting to give her any respite, “but I fell in love with you all the same, with the woman who wrote those letters. I imagined your face when I closed my eyes. I whispered your name in my sleep, amid the ruins of my devastated world.” Claire fidgeted in her seat and gave another long, bitter sigh.

“How many letters did we write to each other?” she managed to ask.

“Seven, in all,” Tom replied randomly, because it sounded like a good number; not too many and not too few. “We hadn’t time to write more before they prohibited the use of the machine, but believe me it was enough, my love.” Upon hearing the captain utter those words, Claire heaved another sigh.

“In your last letter, you named the day we would finally meet. May 20 in the year 2000, the day I defeated Salomon and ended the war. That day I did as you instructed in your letter, and after the duel I looked for a secluded spot among the ruins.

Then I saw you, and, as you had described, you dropped the parasol, which I was to return to you using the time machine.

Once I reached your era I was to go to Covent Garden Market, where we would meet, and then I was supposed to invite you to tea and tell you everything,” Tom paused, before adding wistfully: “and now I understand why. It was so these events would take place in the future. Do you see, Claire? You will write those letters to me in the future because I am telling you now that you will.” “Good God,” the woman repeated, almost out of breath.

“But there’s something else you need to know,” announced Tom, determined to fell the tree with one final blow. “In one of your letters you spoke of how we would love one another this afternoon.” “What?” the girl was scarcely able to stammer in an inaudible voice.

“Yes, Claire, this afternoon we will love one another in the boardinghouse over the road, and in your own words, it will be the most magical experience of your life.” Claire stared at him in disbelief, her cheeks flushing bright pink.

“I can understand why you’re surprised, but imagine how I felt. I was astonished when I read the letter in which you described our lovemaking, because for you it was something we’d already done, but as far as I was concerned it hadn’t happened yet.” Tom paused and smiled sweetly at her: “I’ve come from the future to fulfill my destiny, Claire, which is to love you.” “But, I—” she tried to protest.

“You still don’t understand, do you? We’ve got to make love, Claire,” said Tom, “because in reality we already have.” It was the final axe blow. And, like the oak, Claire teetered on her chair and crashed to the floor.





27


If she had wanted to draw everyone’s attention, thought Tom, she couldn’t have found a better way. Claire’s sudden fainting fit, and the din of the shattering teapot and teacups, dragged with the tablecloth onto the floor, had brought to an abrupt standstill the conversations floating through the air of the tearoom, plunging it into complete, stunned silence. From the back of the room, where he had been relegated during the ensuing commotion, Tom watched the bevy of ladies rallying round the girl. Like a rescue team with years of practice, they stretched her out on a couch, placed a pile of cushions under her feet, loosened her corset (that diabolical item of clothing entirely to blame for her fainting fit as it had prevented her from breathing in the amount of air necessary for such charged conversations), and went to fetch smelling salts in order to bring her round. Tom watched her come to with a loud gasp.

The female staff and customers had formed a sort of matriarchal screen around the girl to prevent the gentlemen in the room from glimpsing more of her flesh than was seemly. A few minutes later he saw Claire stumble through the human wall, pale as a ghost, and peer confusedly around her. He waved at her awkwardly with the parasol. After a few moments” hesitation, the girl staggered towards him through the crowd of onlookers. At least she seemed to recognize him as the person whom she had been taking tea with before she had passed out.