I looked at my shoes._A Place so Foreign

"Oh, a secret. I see. Well, I won't pry. Does your mother know about this?"

I felt like kicking myself. If I said no, he'd have to tell her. If I said yes,

I'd only have myself to blame if he spilled the news to her. I looked at him,

and he blew a streamer of smoke into the sky. "No, sir," I said. "No, Robert."

He looked at me. He winked. "Better keep it to ourselves, then," he said.

The ticket-girl at the Castro Theatre wasn't any older than I was, but she wore

her hair shorter than some of the boys I'd known back home, and more makeup than

even the painted ladies at the saloon. She looked at me like I was some kind of

small-town fool. It was a look I was getting used to seeing.

"Reddekop only plays for the _evening_ shows, kid. No organ for the _matinee_."

"Who you calling a kid?" I said. I'd kept a civil tongue ever since debarking

the train, treating adult and kid with equal respect, but I was getting sick of

being treated like a yokel. I'd been farther than any of these dusty slickers

would ever go, and I was grown enough that I'd told my Mama and Mr Johnstone

that I was going off on my own, instead of just leaving a note like I'd

originally planned.

"You. Kid. You want to talk to Reddekop, you come back after six. In the

meantime, you can either buy a ticket to the matinee or get lost."

On reflection, telling my Mama was probably a mistake. It meant that I was

locked in my room for two consecutive Wednesdays so that I couldn't catch the

train. On the third Wednesday, I climbed out onto the roof and then went down

the rope-ladder I'd hidden behind a chimney. The Wells Fargo notes I'd started

with were almost gone, mostly spent on the expensive food on the train -- I

hadn't dared try to sneak any food away from home, my Mama was no fool.

I thought about buying a ticket to the matinee. I still had almost five dollars,

but a quick look at the menus in the restaurants had taught me that if I thought

the food on the train was expensive, I had another think coming. I shouldered my

rucksack and wandered away, taking care to avoid the filth from dogs and people

that littered the sidewalks. I told myself that I wasn't homesick -- just tired.

"October 29, 1929, huh?" Reddekop was a small German with a greying spade beard

and a heavily oiled part in his long hair. His fingers were long and nimble, but

nearly everything else about him was short and crude. He made me nervous.

"Yes, sir. Mr Nussbaum thought you'd know what it meant."

Reddekop struck a match off the side of the organist's pit, lighted a pipe, then

tossed the match carelessly into the theatre seats. I winced and he chuckled.

"Not to worry, kid. The place won't burn down for a few years yet. I have it on

the very best authority.

"Now, Nussbaum says October 29, 1929. What else does he say?"

"He said that you'd take care of me."

He gripped the pipe in his yellow teeth and hissed a laugh around the stem. "He

did, did he? Well, I suppose I should. Of course, I won't know for sure for more

than 25 years -- I don't suppose you want to wait that long?"

"No, sir!" I said. I didn't like this little man -- he reminded me of some kind

of musical rat.

"I thought not. Do you know what a trust is, James?"

We'd covered that in common law -- I could rattle off about thirty different

kinds without blinking. "I have a general idea," I said.

"Good, good. What I'm thinking is, the best thing is for me to set up a trust

through a lawyer I know on Market Street. He'll make sure that you're always

flush, but never so filthy that someone will take a notice in you. How does that

strike you?"

I thought it over. "How do I know that the trust fund won't disappear in a few

years?"

"You're nobody's fool, huh? Well, how about this -- you find your own advocate:

a lawyer, a bondsman, someone you trust, and he can look over all the books and

papers, make sure it's all square-john. How does that strike you?"

Reddekop knew I was a stranger in town, and maybe he was counting on my not

being able to find anyone qualified to audit the trust, but I had an ace up my

sleeve. I wasn't anybody's fool.

"That sounds fair," I said.

Back at my Mama's I'd had long hard days, doing chores: chopping wood, stacking

hay, weeding the garden, carrying water. I'd go to bed bone-tired, limp as a rag

and as exhausted as I thought I could be.

Boy, was I wrong! By the time I found Mr Adelson's rooming house, I could barely

stand, my mouth was dry as a salt-flat, and it was hard to keep my eyes open.

They've got hills in San Francisco that must've been some kind of joke God

played. His landlady, a worn-out grey woman whose sour expression seemed

directed at everything and anything, let me in and pointed me up three rickety

flights of stairs to Mr Adelson's room.

I dragged my luggage up with me, bumping it on the stairs, and rapped on the

door. Mr Adelson answered in the same shirtsleeves and suspenders I'd seen him

in that Christmas, an age ago, when my Mama dragged me to his cottage. "James!"

he said.

"Mr Adelson," I said. "Sorry to drop in like this."

He took my bag from me and ushered me into his room, pulling up a chair. "What

on earth are you doing here?" he said. "Do your parents know where you are? Are

you all right? Have you eaten? Are you hungry?"

"I'm pretty hungry -- I haven't eaten since supper last night on the train," I

tried to make it sound jaunty, but I'm afraid it came out pretty

tired-sounding."

"I'll fix us sandwiches," he said, and started fishing around his sea-chest. I

watched his shoulders move for a moment, and then my eyes closed.

"Well, good morning," Mr Adelson said, as I sat bolt upright, disoriented in a

strange bed with a strange blanket. "Coffee?"

He was leaning over a little Sterno stove, heating up a small tin pot. Morning

sun streamed in through the grimy window.

"I wrapped your sandwich up from last night. It's there, on the dresser."

I stood up and saw that except for my shoes, I was still dressed. The sandwich

was salt beef and cheese, and the sourdough was stale, and it was the best thing

I'd ever eaten. Mr Adelson handed me a tin cup full of strong coffee, and though

I don't much like coffee, I found myself drinking it as fast as I could.

"Thank you, Mr Adelson," I said.

"Robert," he said, and sat down on the room's only chair. I perched on the bed's

end. "Well, you seem to have had quite a day! Let's hear about it."

I told him as much as I could, fudging around some of the details -- my Mama

surely did know where I was, even if she wasn't very happy about it; and of

course, I couldn't tell him that I'd met Nussbaum in 1975, so I just moved the

locale to France, and caged around what message he'd asked me to deliver to

Reddekop. It still made for a pretty exciting telling.

"So you want me to go to this lawyer's office with you? To look over the papers?

James, I'm just a sailor, I'm not qualified."

I'd prepared for this argument, on the long slog to the rooming house. "But _I_

know something about this; they won't believe it, though, and will slip all

kinds of dirty tricks in if they think that the only fellow who'll be looking at

it is just a kid."

"Explain to me again why you don't want to wire Mr Johnstone to come and look it

over? It sounds like an awful lot of money for him not to be involved."

"He's not my Pa, Robert. I don't even _like_ him, and chances are, he'll hide

away all that money until I'm eighteen or _twenty-one_, and try to send me off

to school."

"And what's wrong with that? You have other plans?"

"Sure," I said, too loudly -- I hadn't really worked that part out. I just knew

that the next time I set foot in New Jerusalem, I'd be my own man, a man of the

world, and not dependent on anyone. I'd take Mama and Mr Johnstone out for a big

supper, and stay in the fanciest room at the Stableman's hotel, and hire Tommy

Benson to carry my bags to my room. "Besides, I'm not asking you to do this for

_free_. I'll pay you a -- an administrative fee. Five percent, _for life_!"

He looked serious. "James, if I do this -- mind I said _if_ -- I won't take a

red cent. There are things here that you're not telling me. Now, that's your

business, but I want to make sure that if anyone ever scrutinises the affair,

that it's clear that I didn't receive any benefit from it."

I smiled. I knew I had him -- if he'd thought it that far through, he wasn't

going to say no. Besides, I hadn't even played my trump card yet: that if he

didn't help me, I'd be out on the streets on my own, and I could tell that he

didn't like that idea.

Mr Adelson wore his teacher clothes for the affair and I wore the good breeches

and shirt I'd packed. We stopped at a barber's before, Mr Adelson treated me to

a haircut from the number-two man while he took a shave and a trim. We boarded

the cablecar to Market like a couple of proper gentlemen, and if I thought

flying in a jetpack was exciting, it was nothing compared to the terror of

hanging on the running-board of a cablecar as it laboured up and then --

quickly! -- down a monster hill.

The lawyer was a foreigner, a Frenchie or a Belgian, and his offices were grubby

and filled with stinking cigar smoke and the din of the trolleys. He asked no

embarrassing questions of me. He just sized up Mr Adelson, then put away the

papers on his desk and presented a set from his briefcase, laying out the terms

of the trust, and retreated from the office. I read over Mr Adelson's shoulder,

the terms scribbled in a hasty hand, but every word of it legal and binding,

near as I could tell.

The amounts in question were staggering. Two hundred dollars, every month!

Indexed for inflation, for seventy years or the duration of my natural life,

whichever was lesser. The records of the trust to be deposited with the Wells

Fargo, subject to scrutiny on demand. Mr Adelson looked long and hard at me.

"James, I can't begin to imagine what sort of information you've traded for

this, but son, you're rich as Croesus!"

"Yes, sir," I said.

"Do these papers look legal to you?"

"Yes, sir."

"They seem legal to me, too."

A bubble of excitement filled my chest and I had to restrain myself from

bouncing on my heels. "I'm going to sign it," I said. "Will you witness it?"

"I've got a better idea. Let's get that lawyer and take this down to the Wells

Fargo and have the President of the Bank witness it himself."

And that's just what we did.

Mr Adelson had spent the previous night on the floor, while I slept in his bed.

My first month's payment was tucked carefully in my pocket, and over his

protests, I pried loose a few bills and took my own room in the rooming house,

and then the two of us ate out at a restaurant whose prices had seemed

impossibly out-of-reach the day before. We had oysters and steaks and I had a

slab of apple pie for desert with fresh ice cream and peach syrup, and when I

was done, I felt like new man. Mr Adelson had a bottle of beer with dinner, and

a whiskey afterwards, and I insisted on paying.

"Well, then," he said, sipping his whiskey. "You're a very well-set-up young

man. What will you do now?"

All throughout my scheming since my second return from 75, the prospect of what

to do with all the money had niggled away at the back of my mind. All I knew for

sure was that I didn't want to grow up in New Jerusalem. I wanted adventure,

exotic places and people, danger and excitement. Over dinner, though, a plan had

been forming in my head.

"Does the _Slippery Trick_ need a cabin-boy?"

He shook his head and smiled at me. "I was afraid it was something like that.

Son, you could pay for a stateroom on a proper liner with all the money you

have. Why would you want to be in charge of chamber-pots on a leaky old tub?"

"Why do you want to sail off on a leaky old tub instead of teaching in Utah, or

working on the trolleys here?"

It took me most of the night to convince him, but there was no doubt in my mind

that I would, and when the ship sailed, that I'd be on it, with a big,

leather-bound log, writing stories.

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<dc:title>A Place So Foreign</dc:title>

<dc:date>2000-2-1</dc:date>

<dc:description>A science-fiction short story by Cory Doctorow about time-travel between 1902 and 1975, from the short story collection "A Place So Foreign and Eight More," published by Four Walls Eight Windows press in September, 2003 (ISBN: 1568582862)</dc:description>

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<dc:title>Cory Doctorow</dc:title>

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<dc:title>Cory Doctorow</dc:title>

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