I climb the steps hesitantly, wondering if it isn’t too late to find the door to the servants’ hall. But before I have a chance to retreat, the front door swings open and the new butler, Rupert, stands before me.
“Irving! Isn’t this the nicest Christmas treat to have you back,” he says happily.
I embrace him warmly. It’s difficult to see anyone else in the position my father always held, but Rupert is like a godfather to me. He is in large part responsible for my change in circumstances. After my father died of a heart attack when I was a boy of thirteen, Rupert—then Mr. Windsor’s valet—took me upstairs to see the master, holding a copy of my father’s most recent will, written two years earlier. Mr. Windsor read the paper several times over, squinting in disbelief.
“How in the world did he amass this kind of money?” he demanded.
“Byron saved up all of his wages, sir, all these years he’s been here,” Rupert had explained, his voice breaking as he spoke of my father, his friend. “I knew him well and he rarely ever spent a penny; he invested everything with the bank. He told me he was saving for Irving to go to university. He wanted his son to be a gentleman.”
Mr. Windsor was silent for a moment, then turned to give me a serious look. “I will take you to the bank tomorrow, Irving. Once we verify the funds, I’ll have you enrolled in a fine boarding school. You have no family named in this will, so you may return here for your winter and summer holidays for as long as you are in school. You can help the footmen with their duties in exchange for room and board.”
I’d nodded with gratitude, though at thirteen years old I was unable to comprehend what this rapid change in my circumstances meant.
The final paragraph of the will was something none of us had understood. “Equally if not more important than the funds for Irving’s university education is the key that I leave for him, an heirloom that was very precious to me and will be to him as well. Please keep it for life, my son, only passing it to one of your children when it is time.”
But none of us ever found a key, not even after searching and emptying my father’s room and his deposit box at the bank. I’d never heard Father even speak of a key, and I wondered if that part of the will was some sort of metaphor, a symbolic message that I have yet to understand. I ponder it often. The words of his will sounded so urgent, how could the meaning behind them be so obscure?
I force my mind back to the present. “It’s grand to see you too, Rupert. This new house is …” I shake my head, unable to find the words.
“Just wait, you haven’t seen anything yet.” Rupert grins. “Let me show you to your room.” He takes my trunk from me, and as I start to protest, Rupert holds up his hand firmly. “The Miss wants you treated like a guest this holiday, and so you will be.”
I sheepishly follow Rupert into the main entrance vestibule, which is enough to stop me in my tracks.
“It’s a palace!” I exclaim, walking around the open-air indoor courtyard, which is decorated with marble columns, lush carpets, dazzling chandeliers, and silk draperies. A ten-foot-tall Christmas tree stands in full splendor in the center of the room, lavished with hundreds of twinkling lights and enchanting ornaments. As I breathe in its piney scent, I glance up and see the hallways of the second and third floors, framed by bronze railings and marble pillars.
“A palace is a very fitting description,” Rupert agrees. “This room is called the Grand Hall. It is the central reception area of the house.”
He leads me to the sprawling marble staircase and up two flights until we reach the rooms on the third floor. A dark wood balcony overlooks the floors below, and I stop to look down on the Christmas tree in the Grand Hall before following Rupert to my guestroom.
“The family’s rooms are on the left, guest rooms to the right,” Rupert directs. We walk through a long red-carpeted corridor until he finally stops in front of a white doorframe. “Here are your guest quarters.”
I step inside, and for a moment I am too overwhelmed to speak. It’s the nicest room I’ve ever had, with a colorful carpet filling the vast space, a double bed that looks cozier than anything I’ve ever slept on, a wooden chest of drawers, a bedside table with its own gas lamp, two plush armchairs, and various objets d’art.
“I never thought I’d stay in a room like this,” I admit. “Bless Rebecca for her kindness.”
“I don’t know that anyone could accuse Miss Rebecca of kindness,” Rupert replies, his tone sharper than I’ve ever heard it. I look up, startled.
“What is it? What’s Rebecca done now?”
Rupert looks as if he regrets his outburst. “She gives the other servants a bad time,” he says haltingly. “It’s strange, when she’s always taken such a shine to you. Though the ladies’ maids have said on a few occasions that your face could make up for anything, even a lower-class birth.” He laughs, and I shake my head with embarrassment.
A few minutes after Rupert leaves the room, I hear the sound of my doorknob turning. I glance at the door and see my oldest friend, Rebecca Windsor, dart inside, gazing at me with the excitable expression of an animal that has found its prey. I find myself taking a step back as I doff my hat.
“Merry Christmas, Rebecca! Jolly good to see you. But if someone were to find you in my room—”
“I don’t care if they do.” She gives a little turn around the room. “What do you think?”
“It’s fantastic!” I enthuse. “I was just telling Rupert that it’s like a palace. You must love living here.”
“I wasn’t asking about the house,” Rebecca says scornfully. “I meant, what do you think of this?” She gestures to herself, dressed up in a cranberry-colored velvet gown with a large bustle.
I struggle for something to say. The truth is, Rebecca has never been pleasant to look at, from the paleness of her severe face to the sharp features below her heavy dark eyebrows, and black hair that always looks rather snakelike. Most people I know find Rebecca fearsome, with her harsh looks and sharp temper. I’m one of only a few who aren’t intimidated by her.
I was just a baby living with my father in the servants’ quarters of Rebecca’s home when she was born. I was there when she walked her first steps, and to the general amazement of the Windsors and their staff, she singled me out to be her one and only friend when we were children. We played together, and then endured adolescence, always set apart by our social standing—though Rebecca never made me feel unimportant for being the butler’s son. Instead she was possessive of me, and I could never help feeling flattered by her attentions.
“Well?” she presses, reaching for a compliment.
“You look lovely,” I lie. “That dress is very becoming.”
She smirks, squeezing my hand. “I have something quite unbelievable to tell you,” she whispers. “It’s a secret. You are likely to be the only person I will tell. It’s the finest secret I’ve ever had.”
My interest is piqued. “Tell me, then.”
“Not yet. The dinner guests will be arriving any minute. No, I think I’ll tell you after the party,” she says with a mysterious smile.
The Christmas Eve festivities last well into the evening, and I nearly forget about Rebecca’s big secret as I experience my first Windsor dinner party abovestairs. It’s a small affair consisting of family and close acquaintances, but there is still an army of servants stationed throughout the mansion to tend to the guests. Mr. and Mrs. Windsor, Rebecca, and her older brother, George, are like the royal family greeting their subjects, standing by the Christmas tree in the Grand Hall to receive each guest before they proceed into the drawing room. Rupert announces their names loudly before they approach the Windsors, and when he calls out “Mr. Irving Henry,” I feel my face turn bright red.
The drawing room looks like a temple of excess, from the fragrant flowers filling every corner to the exaggerated gowns and excessive jewels adorning the women and the gaudy gold pocket watches carried by the men. I stand alone in a corner, feeling uncomfortable and ou
t of place as I watch my footmen friends pouring drinks. After half an hour, Rupert arrives and stands importantly in the doorway.
“Madame, the Christmas Eve dinner is served!”
I take Rebecca’s arm and we follow the procession into the dining room, right behind George and his fiancée, Henrietta. “Isn’t she an awful hag?” Rebecca snickers in my ear as we walk behind the two of them. I cringe, hoping they didn’t hear her words.
The meal is a ten-course feast, beginning with oysters on the half shell followed by turtle soup, then striped bass in a heavy cream sauce and a Christmas turkey stuffed with truffles. Roman punch cleanses the palate before the next round of dishes: canvasback duck and a mixed lettuce salad. The final course is dessert, a tasty Christmas pudding followed by petits fours and plates of cheese and fruit. I only manage a few bites of each dish, never having eaten like this in my life, and I notice that nearly everyone else leaves their plates half-touched too. I suddenly feel queasy as I think of all the food that will be thrown out uneaten at the end of the night.
I listen with interest to the dinner conversation, hoping for nuggets of knowledge from the titans of real estate in the family. Yet the conversation is light and breezy, with the Windsors and their guests mainly discussing yachts, horses, and houses. I find myself itching for the company of the servants belowstairs—I know the conversation will be much livelier there!
While I watch the footmen bring round the endless courses, and listen to the chatter at the table, my mind ponders the way people in our Gilded Age equate wealth with freedom. But in this world, the wealthier are all the more trapped—like Rebecca, who I know is under pressure to find some sort of duke or count to marry. The wealthy Americans of our day are ensnared by their rules and rituals, hiding behind the European monarchs that they so desperately copy instead of forging their own identities. I wonder if this will remain the case in the decades to come.
At last, the end of the meal is signaled by the arrival of coffee and sparkling water. Mrs. Windsor leads the ladies into the drawing room, while we men linger at the table to smoke cigars and sip brandy. The men and women reconvene for a private recital of arias from Handel’s Messiah to conclude the evening. Finally, when the last guest has departed and the Windsors are upstairs in bed, Rebecca sneaks into my guestroom to reveal her secret.
I sit in an armchair opposite Rebecca, unable to believe the words that are coming from my friend.
“Irving, I mean it.” Her low voice is filled with excitement. “I can travel into the future! I don’t know how it happened. I must have been chosen for this power.” Her mouth curves into a smug smile. “I’ve done it twice already, and I have so much to tell you. New York in the future, why, it’s even better than all those stodgy professors of yours predicted!”
“Rebecca … I’m afraid this is too much to believe,” I say gently. And to think I’d been afraid that I might be called mad!
“I knew you would say that,” Rebecca says dismissively. “Watch me.”
She reaches up, pressing her hand against the high collar of her neck, and murmurs something inaudible. Suddenly her body hovers above the room. I bite back a scream, watching in utter shock as she spins like a tornado—and then disappears.
“Rebecca!” I whisper, terrified. What is she? My mind suddenly flashes back ten years, unearthing a memory I hadn’t thought about in ages: that curious day in the park when the two of us saw the Vanishing Girl. Was Rebecca one of those?
She returns instantly, smiling triumphantly. Her hands, empty before her disappearance, are now clutching a piece of paper. “Well! Now do you believe me? I just spent two minutes in this same room in the year 1900.”
I stagger backward in shock, unsure of whether Rebecca is the lucky time traveler she claims to be—or some sort of demon. She seems to read the fear on my face and rolls her eyes before handing over the wad of paper. I unfold it and see that it is a square ripped from a calendar. A calendar dated 1900.
I stare at her in stunned silence. This conversation has rocked the world as I know it; it’s opened up endless possibilities, and now I feel my first flame of envy, the sudden all-possessing desire to have what she has. I know in this moment that I will never be the same—that from now on, I’d give anything to share in her power. I am the academic; I’m the one fascinated by the future. I know it’s unkind of me, but all I can think is: It should have been me instead.
“Take me with you,” I plead. “You know how much I long to see the future. Please take me with you.”
Rebecca watches me with a self-satisfied expression. I know that she relishes this moment, the first time I’ve ever begged her for anything. Rebecca has always been power-hungry, with her place in society feeding her obsession. As one of the most prominent heiresses in America, she has all the trappings of power—but being a young woman in our time means she will always be ruled over by someone else, from her parents to her future husband. And so she savors any opportunity to hold others under her thumb, to show the world that she is in control.
“I don’t know that I can,” she answers slowly and deliberately. “I’m not quite sure that’s how it works. But if it does, there’s only one way I would take you with me. As my husband.”
I nearly snort with laughter. She has to be kidding. But as I look at Rebecca’s serious expression and hungry eyes, I realize with alarm that this is no joke.
“But Rebecca, you couldn’t possibly expect your parents to ever let you marry me,” I insist, trying to talk her out of this harebrained idea. “It would kill your mother to see you with anyone less than a baron.”
“I don’t need my parents’ permission anymore, or anything else from them,” Rebecca fires back. “I’ve been to the future, and I can go again and again, discovering inventions and banking secrets that I can bring back to our time. I’ll make us a fortune and we will be independently wealthy, with no need to even be connected to the Windsors.”
“What are you saying, Rebecca?” I stare at her in horror. “You mean to disown your family and make a dishonest living?”
“Only if I have to,” Rebecca replies, shrugging.
I shake my head, aghast. “Why me? Why do all that to be with me, when you could have such an easier time of it with someone in your own station?”
“Because you’re the only one who understands me, who wouldn’t try to control me,” Rebecca answers candidly. “And I’ve always liked your face, ever since we were kids. You’re the only person I’ve ever wanted to have.”
And suddenly, the time-traveling heiress walks up to the middle-class butler’s son … and kisses me boldly on the lips. My heart sinks as I realize I am trapped. I don’t have the slightest romantic feelings for Rebecca, and the sensation of her lips on mine gives me a slight shudder. But then, her friendship certainly made my childhood in the servants’ hall a far brighter experience. I especially remember her kindness after Father died, the way she shared all her newest games in an effort to distract me from my sadness; the way she convinced her parents to let her dress in black mourning clothes for a whole month after he died. There are far worse things than being married to my friend, and being able to travel or maybe even live in an evolved future New York makes it a worthy bargain.
“All right,” I agree. “If you’re sure. But I don’t want us making a dishonest living. So we’ll have to wait to marry until I’ve finished university and started work.”
Rebecca flashes her teeth in a wide smile and pulls me close. It is only later that evening, as I struggle to fall asleep, I realize—I was bribed into making her a proposal. I know I shouldn’t trust her, yet I can’t resist following her lead. She bemuses and fascinates me, and though my pride prickles at the thought, I want to be like her. I want the power she carries: the ability to do the impossible.
Grounders are human beings who cannot travel through time. Ninety-five percent of the population falls into this category, blissfully unaware of the power and ability that forever eludes them. Hence,
we Timekeepers never tell Grounders our secret. No good can come of it—only jealousy, resentment, and the desire to expose our Society.
A Timekeeper is required to keep his or her time-travel ability hidden from one’s own family, waiting to reveal this gift only to the heir of the Key, just before passing away from the physical world. It may sound lonely to keep such a secret all your life, but know this: so long as you are in the Time Society, you are never alone. You’re surrounded by people just like yourself—those who understand you in a way no one else ever could.
—THE HANDBOOK OF THE TIME SOCIETY
7
The chime of the nearby grandfather clock jolted Michele’s mind back to the twenty-first century. She sat still for a long moment, her thoughts swimming with visions of a teenage Irving and Rebecca on their nineteenth-century Christmas Eve. She stared down at the journal, feeling a strange sense of betrayal, knowing that her father had been engaged to someone else in the family before her mother—someone as evil as Rebecca.
She slid the bookcase open and peered to check the time, jumping to her feet when she saw it was six o’clock. Walter and Dorothy would be expecting her for dinner. Gathering Irving’s journals in her arms, about to step out of the passageway, she suddenly had a funny feeling that his box of secrets should remain in the tunnel. The diaries had survived this long in the passage … maybe it was the most secure hiding place, safer than Michele’s bedroom. And what if, by taking the journals away, they would be gone when Irving checked in his Time? Michele couldn’t bring herself to get his hopes up that Marion had finally found them. Reluctantly, she placed Irving’s letter and diaries back inside before closing the panel.
As she made her way from the library to the dining room, her mind consumed by all she’d just read, Michele had a thought so startling, she nearly tripped over her own feet. If all had gone according to her father’s plan, if Marion had been the one to find his journals and use the key … then Michele would have been born in the nineteenth century. In a way, her 1994 birth date was a mistake—a flaw.