The Pale Horse Has Two Legs (Ch29)

On a snowy night in 1946, Jackson and Conlin first travel in time. But in 1918, they've both been sent to accomplish the same task, even if they have very different ideas of how to do it.

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Late November, 1946.

A pack of stray dogs trot around the garbage area behind Grand Central Terminal, their paws leaving various size prints in the gathering snow, their noses trailing the street. Instinct indicates that it’s time for the early evening dump of Oyster House garbage which unfortunately for them, contains hundreds of empty shells. But a kind hearted busboy tends to leave a pile of steak fat and scraps in between the cans and they picked up that aroma on Forty-Fourth Street.

The largest one, a German shepherd and bloodhound mutt who was called King before a mishap with a neighborhood cat got him turned out to the streets, snags a pork chop bone and then the others dine. When he’s done, King rises on his hind legs to inspect the cans when a sound knocks him on his side. The other two cringe and whine, lowering their heads. King shakes his long ears and whimpers, lifting his head to howl like his ancestors did a thousand years ago. The three abandon their free meal and gallope down Forty-Third Street. No human hears the sound that chases them away.

The heavy snow falls and each sparkling flake mutes the voice of the city. The glistening swarm flashes red in the traffic light beam at Lexington Avenue and the only sound that rises is the metallic chimes of chained tires as the yellow cabs crawl down Forty-Second Street, emptying their last passengers. Snow is the ultimate silencer of  New York City: the evening deepens to night while lines of cars trudge through the mounting white, their drivers concentrating on getting to the outer boroughs or New Jersey before the roads become impassable.

Three men, their faces concealed by thick scarves and low fedoras, exit one of the cabs and enter the doors of Grand Central Terminal. They move fast across the main floor and past the famous Clock at the information booth. The men pause, and to anyone else, they are simply stopping to observe the time. What no one could have known was that the four faces of the Clock were made from the finest opal which emits waves and the three men feel something in the primitive place in their minds that is connected to an ancient, nameless force.

When the minute hands sweep in perfect unison across the four opal faces to just two minutes of nine o’clock, they head toward Vanderbilt Avenue and disappear into the stairwell under the words LOWER LEVEL etched into the stone archway. On the far wall, the sign that says NEW YORK & HARLEM LINE flips to 9:03. The men don’t need this information. They already know it.

They stride through the tunnels until they get to the Harlem Line platform. Not speaking, they wait away from the rest of the travelers. There is a black family with a sharp dressed father and a white gloved mother holding the hand of a little boy wearing a Brooklyn Dodgers cap. Patrick Conlin tilts his hat as far down his face as he can. That family lives in his Harlem neighborhood and today, he cannot run into anyone who knows him. If he does, the plans are instantly called off.

The tracks rumble. A bright spark of light grows from the tunnel. Conlin glances down. Near the wall at the end of the platform is a white handkerchief that a moment ago was motionless, but now the train headwind lifts it like a small ghost from the platform and it sails along the tile floor until it stops by his wing-tip loafers.

The tall man who had been slouching, creating a nondescript presence that no one paid a second glance to, straightens to his full height. The Ghost. His name is Asa Jackson and Conlin doesn’t like him. He doesn’t quite know why, and his best instincts can’t seem to parse it out. He’s more handsome than anyone out of Hollywood and he’s smart. He misses nothing and indeed, his eyes catch the white handkerchief and he smiles at Conlin. Jackson bends down and grabs the cloth before it floats onto the tracks and hands it to the third man, Dr. Michael Andersen, who tucks it in his coat pocket. It is his, which is funny because these men, himself included, have not been here yet today.

But we have been, Conlin thinks with wonder. We will be.

“Are you ready to do the extraordinary?” The squeal of the train’s breaks drowns Dr. Andersen’s quiet voice. “Are you ready to see the Shadowtime?” The men nod.

The train comes to a full stop and the exiting passengers exchange places with the entering ones. The little boy with the Dodgers cap waits behind his mother and watches the three men at the end of the platform. This is the second time today he’s seen them. Earlier that day, his family exited the train in the same place where they waited now, and the boy had skipped with excitement on their way to see his Aunt Martha in her new Turtle Bay apartment. The boy wondered where that black cat was going with those white boys. Now, he watches them walk to the end of the platform and behind the last train car. His large brown eyes widen as they jump behind the train and onto the tracks.

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“Patrick!”

Jackson’s voice cut through Conlin’s memory. The snowy night in New York dissipated like a fine mist and he was back in 1918, in Jackson’s drafty cabin by the river in Kansas. Exhaustion creeped into every muscle and he would have given anything for a real bed, but since there were only two cots and they had let Miss Evora and Van Horn have them, it was going to be another sleepless night on watch, gun in hand and skimming sleep.

“Don’t fall asleep yet, bud. You and I need to talk.” Jackson flipped open the chamber on the .45 he had just taken from the hiding place in the floor and one by one loaded the bullets.

“Not sleeping,” Conlin replied, leaning against the wall next to the tiny fireplace built from river stones. He had been reluctant to let Jackson build a fire, insisting that the smoke would give them away, but Jackson snapped that the northern wind would blow the smoke south where the land stretched for hundreds of miles before the next installment of civilization. There was nothing to worry about.

Jackson had lit the kerosene lamp when the four of them arrived, but then turned the key it to its dimmest setting. Now his watch hands joined each other on the twelve but there would be no sleep tonight. He and Jackson agreed to take turns standing guard. Just like in the war, Jackson had said. Van Horn gave them a puzzled look. “Were you both already in Europe?” he had asked. Yes, Conlin replied, and technically, it wasn’t a lie. We were both in Europe.

“I’m glad you returned alive,” Van Horn said in his gentle tone that sounded eerily like his father’s. Conlin just nodded. One side of Theda’s mouth turned up in a half smile.

After Theda and Van Horn settled down and fell asleep, Jackson sat next to Conlin and stretched out his long legs, laying the hand with the gun across his thighs. He was still wearing his banged up military uniform, but when he opened the trap door on the floor to get his gun and dagger, he laid a suit from 1946 across a chair. The suit made Conlin’s stomach turn and he closed his eyes. All he wanted was to make it back home.

“I lied,” Jackson said.

“About what?”

“Not knowing that Andersen was dead. I knew. I saw him shot in the street.”

“What?” Conlin turned toward him. “Why’d you lie?”

“Because I was afraid you’s shoot me. Was I right?”

When Conlin said nothing, Jackson grunted. “And you just stood there and watched?” Conlin asked.

Jackson spat, “I was at that thrilling dance and got into a hassle with Billy and Cyril. I got away and by the time I landed outside, it was happening. There was nothing I could’ve done.”

“Did you see me?”

“If I’d’ve seen you, we’d probably be somewhere else right now, don’t you think? Ever see those guys in that black car before?”

“No.” Conlin fished a pack of Camels from his pocket and shook two out, lighting them both at the same time. He handed one to Jackson, who inhaled deeply, then let the smoke out in a steady stream. “Thanks,” he said. “I need two packs of cigarettes to get the smell of that cellar out of my nose.”

“After we banged that Cyril over the noggin, I looked at his chest. He got a tattoo. Did you see it?”

“No, I was too busy getting thrown from my motorcycle to notice.”

“The tattoo is New York City. Empire State Building and all.” He dragged on his smoke.

Jackson turned to him. “What? Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. You think I can’t recognize my own city? And there’s a date, too. August 14^th, Oh-three.”

Jackson blew the smoke toward the ceiling. “Empire State Building wasn’t around in 1903.”

“No, it wasn’t.” He didn’t want to say it, because despite what he and Jackson had done, despite the extraordinary nature of leaving 1946 for 1918, there were still things that seemed impossible. But he said it regardless. “Maybe it meant two-thousand and three.”

Jackson held his breath for a few seconds, then let the smoke out slowly. “Either way, he’s not from 1918. He came here with Thrax. Those men who shot Dr. Andersen may have, as well.”

Conlin nodded. “I didn’t recognize any of them. But if Cyril is a Traveler, then it’s possible they are, too. If he’s got a tattoo with a date that’s eighty-five years in the future, then he certainly isn’t from the 1940’s.”

Jackson smoked and didn’t say anything. Conlin watched the orange light of his cigarette move like a small comet as Jackson pointed towards the cots. “Why did you bring her into this?”

“Andersen said he saw her. In another time. She’s a part of this somehow, but he didn’t tell me exactly how, and now we’ll never know.”

“When did he see her?”

“I don’t know. He was so sick at the end he never told me. But I’ll tell you the rest.” Jackson listened while Conlin told him of the papers in Dr. Andersen’s folder.

When Conlin was done, Jackson stubbed out the cigarette in a rusted old bean can. “There’re smoke butts in here. My father’s.”

Conlin closed his eyes. “And you not even born yet.”

“Not yet. But soon. And my mother is going to die of this flu.”

Conlin’s eyes snapped open. “What? When?”

“A few months after I’m born. I never knew her. She’s close, too. Across these fields, outside of Junction City. I could go there. I could see her.”

Conlin sat up straight. “You can’t, Jack. That’s not allowed.”

“I know that,” Jackson snapped. “Andersen told me before I left to look for an animal. That the doctors in the General Building were creating this flu in animals.” He ran his hand through his short hair. “But we were the animals. Van Horn. Me. And how many other guys did they do that to? My father worked here. They hauled things from that building. Things he said smelled like dead pig. But now I’m wondering if it were pigs at all.”

“There’s another thing I need to tell you. Something Miss Evora told me last night.”

“What?”

Conlin told him about Theda finding the photographs of the dead men whose names were all very likely Mennonite names, like Van Horn’s. When he came to the part of Dr. Evora burning the photographs, Jackson grew very still. Conlin stopped talking. A log hissed steam in the fireplace.

“It’s him, then,” Jackson said. “Dr. Evora.”

“That’s what I thought at first but think about it, Jack. One man can pull this off himself? No. Even for Thrax that’s impossible. One man pulled those boys into the cellar and did them all in? One guy did the paperwork and told their families that their son died? No. I don’t believe that. Evora knows something, sure, but we can’t just put it all on him. How many other guys are involved over there?”

“I’m beginning to think,” Jackson said quietly, “that Thrax doesn’t matter anymore. If I or Van Horn is sick with it, then it can end with us. We either get sick here and die. Or we’re not sick at all and have to go back and find the link. The first person to have it and be in public. Either way, we can stop it from spreading. Right here.”

“What about Miss Evora and me?” Conlin said.

“It’s already too late for you both, unless you’ve been breathing different air.”

“You feel sick?”

“Not at all. Whatever they did to me may not have worked. But I’m worried about Van Horn. He was there longer. He’s been through a lot so I don’t expect him to be in top shape, but we’ll see. It takes a few days to present. Andersen told me that. If we wake up tomorrow and he’s sick, then we all stay here. Then maybe,” he paused. “Maybe it dies here with us. Maybe my mother makes it through this.”

“You know we can’t do that,” Conlin said. “We took an oath. Not to alter any events. Remember? That’s what we said we’d do.”

“Who made us take it? Andersen? He’s dead. Thrax is still out there and from everything we talked about, he’s got people on his side. What are we worried about?” Jackson wrapped his big hand around the gun again, touching the trigger.

“It’s got nothing to do with Thrax. We change history, it will change everything. It can’t be done.”

“Why can’t my mother live?” Jackson bit off the end of every word. “Why?”

Conlin felt a wave of pity come over him. He thought of his own mother, the most lovely and gentle women he had ever known. He thought of what it would’ve been like had he grown up without her. What was Jackson’s mother like? What would he himself have given to save his own mother’s life? “I’m sorry, Asa,” he said. “I’m sorry. But…” he struggled for the words. “If there is no Spanish flu, then what? We’d have no knowledge of it. But we do have that knowledge. That tells me that there is nothing we can do about it. It’s going to happen. Whether we want it or not.”

Jackson covered his eyes and for a moment, Conlin thought he wouldn’t answer. His face was still bruised and Conlin wondered how he could possibly be going, being as banged up as he was. But this guy was tough. He had been a spy behind the German lines. You couldn’t have a faint heart for that.

“According to the papers, we’re almost to the day when the first man shows up in the Infirmary complaining of the flu,” Conlin said. “Our priority cannot be him. It has to be Thrax. They say Evora is missing. He either isn’t Thrax and knows too much and was made to disappear, or he is Thrax.”

“If he is Thrax, what makes you think he’s still at Fort Riley? That he didn’t go back to 1946 before the flu hits here?”

“Because he wants to see it,” Conlin said, his hand with the smoke shaking slightly. “He wants to see the destruction he created. Andersen said his ego inflated from the first time they traveled to the last time they saw each other. If you had a hand in the deaths of millions of people, you wouldn’t want to stick around and watch the show?”

“I’m going to close my eyes a bit. Wake me in an hour, then you can sleep,” Jackson said and leaned his head back against the rough wall, the gun still in his hand. Conlin stared at the black square of window and listened for engines or approaching humanity.

He ran through Jackson’s words again in his mind and knew that he’d have to watch him closely. And he understood it completely. He’d do anything to save someone he loved. And Jackson was going to do anything as well, even if it meant blowing this whole assignment into oblivion.