queried.
“Well, perhaps they are an adventurous type with a devil-may-care attitude. If they are interfered with, they may become suspicious of others and alter history by shying away from crowds. What if George Washington had become suspicious of his troops? Would he have been able to lead them if he had shunned them? Would he have been able to persuade them to stay at Valley Forge for that long, cold winter? See what I mean? That’s why we are so meticulous about the people we choose to take a trip.“
“Trip? You mean like we just did?” Bill asked.
“More, much more. I’m talking about mingling with the people from 1800s. You know, Bill, to you they were just people long dead. Just written pieces of history. But you go through that door and you are with living, breathing everyday people. They eat and drink, have likes and dislikes just as we do. That’s the real purpose of this club. To find the person who fits easily into another time, without anyone from that selected period ever suspecting a thing. Do you feel you can do that, Bill?”
“Heck, yes! What do I have to do?”
Prescott offered him a cigar and then lit it. He sat back and puffed it to life and as he looked at Bill through a ring of smoke, said, “What do you have to do? Simple. You have to give the Gettysburg Address. Do you know it?”
Bill looked back, stunned. “Do I know the Gettysburg Address? No. Who really can recite the entire address? No one I know.”
Prescott pointed to the bookcases that lined the walls. “It’s all in there,” he said.
“Wait a second,” Bill said. “What do you mean give the Gettysburg Address? Are you or the group trying to . . . to . . . change history?”
Prescott tapped some ash from his cigar as he shook his head. “No, we want to get history back on course. You see, history tells us that Lincoln was a very depressed man. What wasn’t known was that when he was in his depressed state, he would sleep for hours at a time even during the day, and forget many things he did when he was awake. He just could not function. There were times when his bouts of depression had him down for weeks at a time.”
Prescott flicked some ash off his jacket and continued, “Well, one of our probes showed that he never made the Gettysburg Address. It seems that when he was supposed to give the famous speech, he was in the grip of depression. He never got to give it, and that was just one of many reasons that the British felt they could enter the war on the side of the South, and the North had to settle for a stalemate. The United States of 2066 would be a split union. Not still at war, of course, but with different trading partners, politics, money system and many other things. The U.S. of the North would not have been the superpower we see today. This and many other things have made the group decide to send someone back to take Abraham Lincoln’s place and make the famous speech.”
Bill asked in a low voice, “And you think I’m that guy?”
“Yes, we do,” Prescott answered.
“You’re crazy,” Bill said emphatically. “I’d never pull it off. Why his Secret Service guys . . . “
“First, there wasn’t any Secret Service at that time. The U.S. Army protected him. However, he did have a private detective of sorts that looked after him, and he’s in on it.”
Bill was stunned once again. “He’s in on it? What do you mean?”
“We simply had to tell him. I can take you back, but you still have to get into the White House and switch places with the President of the Union. We had to tell him.”
“Tell him what? That I’m going to take the President’s place?”
Prescott nodded. “Yes, of course. They know how he gets. It’s their job to keep it a secret. It’s their sworn duty to protect the President and the Union. Knowing that the country is being run by a person who suffers from depression, they are protecting him from being looked upon as a weakling by the world.”
“So you told the top security guy?”
“Yes, in fact, I dined with the head of White House security last night.” He held a hand up as he corrected himself, “Well, actually last night, one hundred and forty years ago.”
Bill took a drink of his brandy. “This is too much,” he said.
“You can handle it, Bill. I have faith in you.”
“I still can’t believe this.” He sat forward. “What did the security guy say when you said you were from the future? I mean did he freak out?”
“Why? Why would he, ‘freak out,’ as you say? The only thing different between him and you is the one hundred plus years. He’s a smart man, and after I took him through the door to this period, he was in all the way. So, to answer your question, no, he didn’t freak out. He was happy to know that his generation was being watched and helped from a future time.”
“So, 1984 hadn’t been written yet.”
Prescott grinned. “No, he doesn’t know of ‘Big Brother’ yet. But I feel that he’d be all for it.” He stretched out his legs, as the clock struck again. “When I told him of your pending visit, he said he’d take care of the switch.”
“I guess you were pretty sure I’d be the guy to do it. Even before you told me.”
“As I said, Bill, your temperament showed me you were the right person for this job.”
“But I don’t even look like Lincoln.”
“That’s easy. You are pretty close to his height and from a distance with a little touching up you’ll do fine.”
“Does his wife know?”
“No, she’s going to be out of Washington that day, and Lincoln was to leave for Gettysburg early in the morning before the city really got moving. It’ll be you and the security men.”
“But, his voice! I don’t have a clue what he sounds like. Do you?”
“No, but that day, Lincoln, that is you, will have a cold that will keep him covering his mouth with a handkerchief.”
Bill was becoming more interested. “Well let’s say I’m in, what’s the plan?”
Prescott continued, “We will meet with Kenneth Reilly, his security man, and he’ll brief you as to your mannerisms . . . that is, Lincoln’s mannerisms. He will give us the plan for the switch and we’ll go from there.”
“If I do this, I have a request,” Bill said. “I want to spend some time there. I mean, back there.”
Prescott shook his head vigorously, “No! Too dangerous. You have to operate out of the club and return as soon as possible. Besides, the group in the future would be dead against it.”
“Then I won’t do it.”
Prescott raised one eyebrow. “You won’t do it? Are you telling me you don’t want to walk the streets of 1863 to see what it’s really like? I believe you should rethink it, Bill. This is a once-in-a-lifetime trip. Pass it up and you will live the rest of your life regretting it.”
Bill looked at the door and, after a pause, said, “You’re right. But if I didn’t insist, I’d spend the rest of my life regretting it.”
As both men looked at each other, Prescott grinned. “A modern day Mexican standoff, so to speak.”
Bill finished his drink and put down the glass, signaling his determination. “Prescott, if I’m as good as you think I am, you’ll get me some time back there. You know I won’t mess up.
“Damn, man. You must understand the gravity of the situation. One slip, one ounce of suspicion from any of the locals and . . . and . . . why, we just don’t know what will happen.”
“Know what, Prescott? You said you’re from the 1800s. Am I right?”
Prescott nodded reluctantly. “Yes, yes, I am. 1860 to be exact. But what’s that have to do with . . . “
Bill continued to present his argument. “With me going back for a bit, on my own? Well, you did it. You came forward and didn’t mess up. What makes you think I’ll blow it?”
“Because I had the club to retreat to if I felt out of place. When the fast moving automobiles, high-flying aircraft and loud motorcycles put me in a panic, I simply retreated into the club and settled down. Should you travel on your own and get a sort of panic attack, why, what
would you do?”
“I think there’s a big difference, Prescott, between what you did and what I’m proposing to do. I’ve had the time to study the past while you had no way to prepare for the future. It seems to me that you had a much tougher time of it than I would. Don’t you agree?”
Prescott shrugged. “Yes, I agree you would be more prepared than I was. But they have rules.”
“Then why doesn’t one of them go back and fix it?”
Prescott finished his drink and shook his head. “They can’t. You see, as I said, after years of polluting the air and oceans, mankind smartened up and passed stringent laws against polluting, and enforced them. The laws worked so well that the air that people from your future era breathe is cleaner than it’s been in hundreds of years. Because people from their group were raised in such a clean atmosphere, when they traveled back to my time, or earlier, they felt they were suffocating. So they could bear it for only a short time, not long enough for a mission. To keep history on track, they sent back mechanical probes to check historical facts. When they saw a problem developing, they knew they had to send back someone to help straighten it out. That was another problem. Since none of them could stay back in time long enough to fix it, they decided to seek help from someone of that period. I was selected to be that person. I did some ‘saves’ over the years; but over time, I realized I needed help. People who had various aptitudes were needed to make the missions a success. So I sold the Time Watchers on backing a club for