"Science-_fiction_," I corrected him. "There's quite a difference, you
know."
"Is there?" He frowned. "Oh, yes. I see. Please forgive me. Well,
Clinton--" The professorial stamp was upon him; quite unconsciously he
addressed me as if I were one of his students. "Well, Clinton, I came
to ask a favor of you. I want you to transmit a message to a certain
man. I want you to write the message in such a form that it will not be
lost--in the form of a fictional narrative."
It takes all kinds to make a world. I gazed at him thoughtfully. I
said, "Don't look now, but isn't that doing it the hard way? I'll be
glad to help you out. But putting a simple message into story form
is--well, why not just let me _tell_ the guy? By word of mouth?"
"I'm afraid," he said soberly, "that is impossible. You see, the person
to whom this message must go will not be born until the year 1942."
"Nineteen--!" It worked. It threw me off balance for a minute. Then
came the dawn. It _was_ a gag, after all. My pal Ross being funny
from out Chicago way, maybe? Or Palmer, deserting Tark long enough to
joyride me over the well-known hurdles? I chuckled. I said, "That's all
right, Professor. I'm young; I can wait. Just tell me the name of this
unsprouted seedling, and I'll stick around till he gets old enough to
talk to. Only the good die young; I expect to live to a ripe old age."
He glanced at me slowly, and a bit sadly, I thought. "I'm sorry,
Clinton," he said, "but that won't do. It won't do at all. It will have
to be written. You see--you won't be here then...."
* * * * *
You know, it should have been funny. Uproariously, screamingly funny.
I should have laughed my crazy head off, given my obviously screwy
visitor a smoke and a drink and a clap on the back and said, "Okay,
pal. You win the marbles. Come clean, now. Who put you up to this
crystal ball stuff? What's the payoff?"
But I didn't, because somehow it wasn't funny after all. There was a
deadly seriousness to my visitor's manner; the knuckles of his hands
were white upon his knees, his icy blue eyes burned with a tortured
regret that was like a dash of water to my mirth.
"I'm sorry, Clinton," he said. "I'm really dreadfully sorry."
I lit a cigarette carefully. In as even a voice as I could muster, I
said, "Perhaps you'd like to tell me more? Perhaps you'd better start
from the beginning?"
"Yes," he said. "Yes, I think that would be best." He fingered the
thick brown envelope nervously. "The story begins," he said, "and
ends--with this manuscript...."
* * * * *
"As I have already told you," said Dr. Winslow, "my profession is
teaching. Psychology is my field. Recently I have given much of my
time to research into the lesser-known faculties of the human mind.
Experimental psychical research such as that investigated by Prof. J.
B. Rhine of Duke. You are undoubtedly familiar with his work?"
"Extra-sensory perception?" I nodded. "Yes. Most fascinating.
The results are far from satisfactory, though. And some of his
conclusions--"
"You make a common error," said my visitor gravely. "Dr. Rhine has not
assumed to draw any conclusions--as yet. He offers only a few, and
completely logical, presumptions.
"Dr. Rhine's studies to date, however, have been in the field of
extra-sensory perception only. There are other fields of psychical
research quite as untouched, and, I have reason to believe, even more
important and--fruitful.
"It is in one of these companion fields that I have been laboring. I
have been investigating the phenomenon you may know as 'telaesthesia.'"
"You mean," I asked, "telepathy?"
"There is a difference between the two. Telepathy, as defined by Myers
in 1882, is 'the communication of impressions of any kind from one mind
to another, independently of the recognized channels of sense.' It
implies a deliberate, recognized contact between two minds existent at
one time.
"Telaesthesia is a more complex meeting of entities. If A, let us
say, reaches out and helps himself to the contents of B's mind
_without_ the knowledge or assistance of B, that process will be
called 'telaesthesia.' Unlike telepathy, it knows no barriers of Time.
There are hundreds of recorded case histories from which we learn of
men of our time who have established telaesthetic contact with former
forgotten eras.
"And of days to come, as well!" Here Winslow's eyes literally gripped
me. "But never, until now, has anyone succeeded in gaining more than a
fleeting glimpse into the Time stream of the future. Never before has
a man established a contact so deep, so strong, that he could read not
one sentence or one paragraph of that which is to be--but an entire
chapter, decades long...!"
* * * * *
It was spring in Roanoke. Outside, warm April sunshine poured down
luxuriant gold upon the faint, green buds. My place, _Sans Sou_, lies
in a quiet fold between two rolling hills. There was nothing to disturb
that quiet now save the boastful warble of a redbird, "Purty! Purty!"
and the petulant complaint of a chipmunk in the sycamore.
The sky was a pale, soft blue, cloudless and serene. There were no
clouds, and even the delicate fronds of the weeping willow drooped
motionless. So it could not have been a storm I heard. Yet as he spoke,
a dark shadow seemed to scud across the sky, veiling the sunlight, and
the gods made portent in the swell of distant thunder. I felt the short
hairs stiffen on my neck, and despite the warmth I shivered.
I said, and why I spoke in a whisper I cannot tell, "Never before ...
until ... _now_?"
"Until now!" he repeated. And suddenly his fingers were swift with
eagerness, he fumbled with the flap of the envelope while words
raced from his lips. "Several months ago I began to experiment with
automatic writing, one of the means by which telaesthetic contact is
authenticated.
"At first the results were--as might be expected--faulty. From the
autohypnotic syncopes into which I was able to project myself, I woke
to find nothing on the sheets before me but meaningless scribbles.
"And then, suddenly, I woke one day to find that in my period of
subliminal usurpation I had achieved a definite result. I--or
someone--had written four full pages. The first four pages of this
manuscript!"
Here he handed the manuscript to me. I had time to notice that the
writing was full-bodied, flowing. Then Dr. Winslow's words claimed my
attention again.
"That was but the beginning. Once having established contact, it was
as though I became the _alter ego_ of this mysterious correspondent.
From that time on my experiments were graced with success. Whenever I
resumed contact, pages were added to the manuscript. By the periodicity
of these, I am led to believe that Brian O'Shea is a diarist, and that
through some inexplicable phenomenon, it is given to me to be able to
set down, telaesthetically, the very words he writes in his diary--"
"You said," I interrupted, "Brian--?"
"O'Shea," nodded Winslow. "Brian O'Shea. A soldier in the army of the
Americas, Clinton--in the year 1963 A.D.! His diary is a history of the
things to come!"
* * * * *
What I would have said then, I do not know. Maybe I would have said
something bitingly scurrilous--which I most certainly would have
regretted later. Or perhaps, as is most likely, I was momentarily
stunned into speechlessness. But I was spared the necessity of
speaking. Dr. Winslow had risen; eyes glowing strangely, he touched my
shoulder.
"I am going to leave you now, so you may read this manuscript in peace.
When you have finished, you will understand why I came, and know that
which must be done.
"You will find that the manuscript begins abruptly at the moment when
first I 'contacted' O'Shea. It ends with equal abruptness. There
are fragments missing; these may be filled in or rounded out as you
consider necessary for the purpose of story-telling. I have made a few
slight changes in spelling. Whether O'Shea was--or should I say 'will
be?'--a poor scholar, I do not know. The spelling of some words may
have changed over a period of trouble-swept decades....
"But whatever surprises lie in store for you, whatever conclusions
you draw from the manuscript you are about to read, I beg of you that
you play the game of caution. If you end by doubting O'Shea's story,
_still_ you must convey to him the message the manuscript demands. It
is the only way. We must take no chances. I will leave my address--"
Here he scribbled a few words on his card; I noted subconsciously that
his own handwriting was tiny, crabbed, angular. "When you have finished
reading, get in touch with me. No, don't get up!"
For a long moment I stared after him. Is there any way I can tell you
how I felt? I, who have written fantasies woven of thin air, now thus
to be suddenly thrust into a fantasy beyond my own wildest imaginings?
Even more important, is there a way I can make you believe that this is
not merely another amusing tale, to be read today and forgotten soon?
The structure of this narrative is mine. I supplied the story form. But
is there any way I can convince you that the words which follow are not
my own? _I did not write this story!_ It is the story of a man who is
not yet born, who will not live these happenings for twenty years.
Here is the story of Brian O'Shea, soldier....