The STAR reappeared in the cellar. Slowly Cordelia switched off the systems and sat staring at the black monitor in front of her in silence. It was a silence that seemed to jump at her out of nowhere. This evening with David had been so wonderful, exciting even because of the fight, and now she was here. Alone. In the cellar of her house. Even some remark from Norbert would have been good but the system intelligence remained silent.
"Okay then..." Cordelia got up, looked at the seat where David had been and left the time machine. She climbed the stairs and closed the door behind her. Norbert would manage the light in the basement so she didn't have to think about that.
A little later, the time-traveller lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. "Get some sleep, woman," she mumbled to herself. She closed her eyes and waited for sleep to come. Instead of sleep, she saw David in the suit before it had been ruined. David talking and laughing. At least that was better than the images from her past when Monroe Branson had come after her.
It was past midnight when she was awake. She had no idea if it was still or again but that made little difference. She got up, put on her warm slippers and went downstairs to the STAR.
"Why are you here?" Norbert didn't sound surprised.
"I can't sleep. Because of last night. It was too much fun and now I want to go back to David and curl up with him." She sighed. "And you don't understand that and he would probably get a heart attack, seeing where he comes from." She loved his family, but she hated their background as that wouldn't really allow any kind of intimacy before marriage.
"Whoa. Wait. Where did that thought come from?" Cordelia rubbed her cheeks. "I'm not marrying anyone."
"You should go back to bed. I could sing to you."
"No. Don't do that." Cordelia had hidden a small speaker in her bedroom. It was connected to Norbert in the case of an emergency, so he could warn her. "You can sing pretty well but the speaker makes a mess of the sound. It's made for beeps and screams, not for music."
She got up. "Thanks for listening."
"You are most welcome. I was awake anyway." Norbert sounded like himself, but again it felt to Cordelia as if he was trying to make a joke. It probably sounded like it because she was so tired.
"Okay. Catch you tomorrow morning when we go to London."
"You don't seem very excited about it."
"True. The first time was cute but..." Cordelia shook her head. "They expect a bitch with a ton of guns hanging around her. I hate that." But she would do it anyway. As she left, Norbert dimmed the lights of the STAR's cabin. She dragged herself to her bedroom and dropped into bed. Oddly enough, she was asleep in seconds.
~
Cordelia woke up early and felt as if she could do with a lot more sleep, but that wasn't in the cards today. Location C was waiting for her and she always wanted to get there early to avoid as much as possible that anyone saw or heard her arrive. It was something she felt strongly about, just as she did about coffee on such mornings, or rather the lack of it. Maybe she would find some coffee in Lexington after all. Bad coffee was better than none at all, and strong tea simply didn't do it.
She went to her wardrobe and had a look. On some of her journeys to the relative future, she had gotten her hands on contemporary clothing, so she had a nice selection to choose from. She picked some blue-jeans, black boots and a black shirt with a strange symbol on it. Nothing like weird symbols to make people respect you, she thought.
After dressing, she tied a knife to her right calf and took a rifle from the 22nd century. She didn't know how to use it but it looked impressive, which was just what she needed. Decked out like that, she went to the STAR, copied the coordinates for Location C from her notebook and moved to the other cellar.
The new one was a lot larger than her own. To her relief, there was no one. She left the STAR and closed the door. No need for curious people to peek in there. As usual, there was a chair and a table, so she sat down. On the table, breakfast was laid out. The bread was getting hard, which meant it had been out here for at least an hour, and the tea was lukewarm, but that didn't stop her. She liked this detail and enjoyed the food, almost feeling at home in this sombre place lit by many oil lamps.
After a while, there was a knock on the massive door. They always knocked, which was a nice touch, Cordelia thought. Even when this wasn't her cellar.
"I'm here. You can come in."
The door opened and two soldiers entered, carrying lamps. As was the custom, they inspected the room almost without acknowledging Cordelia's presence. One of them went out, to return with a man Cordelia had seen several times before but whose name she didn't know.
"Miss Lexington."
Cordelia got up, the rifle hanging from her shoulder. "Sir."
"It is good to see you are still dedicated to the Realm." He always said that and it always made her feel itchy. She was dedicated to herself and David. The man's face became far more serious than it usually did. "What I am about to tell you needs to be secret, Miss Lexington. Can I trust you?"
Well, this was new. Cordelia assured him she was trustworthy.
"Very well. Word reached us that the Treasurer of the Household is going to bring some disturbing news to the Queen," the man said. "News that will put his life in danger."
Cordelia frowned. Who was this treasurer, and how could a bookkeeper get in lethal trouble? Had he found some royal nephew grabbing into a treasure chest? "His life? Not that of Queen Victoria?"
"Exactly. We may need your assistance in temporarily 'securing' the Treasurer on short notice."
"How short would that notice be?" Cordelia hoped this wouldn't mess up her picnic in Lexington.
"Maybe tomorrow afternoon or evening. If the need arises, our mutual acquaintance will bring you a telegram. If you have not heard from him by Tuesday, there is no more need for you to be accessible so urgently."
"I see. Yes, your Lordship, that shouldn't be any problem. If anything is the matter, our mutual friend is able to find me and I'll follow up the instructions you send." The friend, of course, was Mr Barting.
"Very good. We all hope this is not going to be necessary of course, but it is advisable to be alerted." The man didn't blink an eye as she called him Lordship, so she might be quite close to his title or he was a very good actor. "We will see to it that your time will be adequately compensated, Miss Lexington."
Why was it that each time he called her by her name, she had the feeling he didn't sound genuine? Would he know or suspect it wasn't her real name? Not that it mattered, but the feeling was odd.
"I appreciate that, sir. Thank you for letting me know ahead of time. I will be prepared."
"Very good. Have a nice day, miss." The man nodded and walked off, leaving with the guard. The big door was closed and bolted from the other side.
"Wow. That is something, Norbert," she said as she was inside the STAR again. "Some high-up animal might be in trouble soon." She told the system intelligence about the Treasurer of the Household. "Do you have anything on him? Or her?" She asked the latter against knowing better. Women were so underrated in this era.
"Of course. The current Treasurer of the Household is Henry George Percy, seventh Duke of Northumberland. Birthdate: May 29, 1846. Birthplace: London. Death: May 14, 1918. He will die at Alnwick Castle, Alnwick, Northumberland. He is the husband of Lady Edith Campbell, Duchess of Northumberland. Together they will have thirteen children, one of which will be the eighth Duke of Northumberland. Five of these children have already been born."
"Thirteen kids? Holy shit, his wife must feel like a breeding machine!"
"Not yet." Norbert sounded quite certain of that, which made her grin.
"So he's a Duke who's duking around." Cordelia set the coordinates to go home.
"Dukes don't duke," Norbert lectured her. "Dukes go about their affairs."
"Right. What does a household treasurer do?"
"That is someone who oversees the financial state of the Royal Household. Basically, he is the master accountant to the King or Queen. It's a position that shows trust as it brings the Treasurer in direct contact with the royals of England."
"Wow, so Henry is indeed an expensive person... Is there anything more I should know?"
"The Treasurer reports directly to the Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli. There is no direct indication as to why the Duke left the position later this year."
Cordelia looked at one of the cameras inside the STAR. "You know that sounds weird, don't you? Why he left the position later this year. Well, we're here so maybe we'll find out and we can add that to the history books." She grinned and knew that wouldn't happen, or the history books would have indicated that already. Some things shouldn't be known. She pressed the button that got the STAR into motion. Soon she was back in her own cellar.
Her hand hovered over the switches to power down the system when a thought hit her. "Maybe we should go exploring first."
"Exploring?" It was as if Norbert didn't like the sound of that. Maybe the previous explorations he'd been on with Cordelia had to do with that, she mused.
"Yeah. I mean, suppose we do get a call to get this man to safety, then it is good to have a spot to drop him off for a while, right? So we should find a place where and when we can leave him without damaging history."
"Or him," Norbert agreed.
"True. He would probably appreciate that." Cordelia pulled up a few maps of places that she could think of to be safe. "How about second century Hawaii? According to the information, Hawaii was only getting its first occupants around 400 C.E. so that should be safe." She checked the temporal coordinates a few times before entering them. It paid to be careful with islands since STARs weren't made to float. A tiny mistake could land them in the ocean. "And Go."
The shudder in her seat told her they had arrived. A time-jump always felt a bit different from just a location displacement. A quick check of the outside camera told her they were among trees. In the distance, she saw a sandy beach and a giant ocean. "Do you detect people outside?"
Norbert reported no life except the local wildlife, so Cordelia opened the door and walked into the sunshine. The pure, salty air was a welcome change for her nose and she walked out to the beach. This was a place she should bring David to someday, she thought. They could bring food and spend a wonderful day here, swimming, talking and... perhaps something else. The idea made her grin. Then she returned to the reason for coming here in the first place so she scouted the area for a while to make sure that the island was indeed void of people.
"This looks like the perfect spot, Norbert," she said as she returned from her excursion.
"I am glad you approve." The voice didn't sound sincere, but it never did.
"I do think there is one thing I need to check..."
Norbert asked what that was but she had already left the cabin and was on her way to the beach again where she stripped off all her clothes. Totally naked she ran into the ocean and screamed for joy. She missed swimming so much, so how could she pass up on this opportunity.
Cordelia didn't stay in the water very long, but she was glad she'd done this. She let the warm sun dry up most of the water and then returned to the STAR. "I'm ready to go home. I think I first need to bring some supplies here. Then I will go for a picnic in Lexington."
~
Cordelia arrived in Lexington on time. That was easy with her STAR. She left the machine in the barn and started the walk to David's home. She had picked the dress she had bought here in town as this was quite a special occasion. It was something most time-travellers did when they arrived somewhere: buy the clothes from that time-period. The things you could get from a later era would fool people for some time but there was nothing like the genuine article. This dress meant a lot to her because David had gone with her to pick the right one. She also had a little purse with her, one that fitted this time and place.
Upon arriving at the house, Cordelia was shocked to find over two dozen people gathered there. She wondered if anything had happened. Usually a crowd like this meant nothing good, but David located her and told her that all these people were coming with them on the picnic. Cordelia hadn't expected that. She had hoped for something more intimate and perhaps the chance for some privacy. This number of people blew that idea right out of the water. Still, she was here so she would go along and make the best of it.
"Did your family notice the marks on your face?" she asked David as they walked around to find his parents and his sister.
"No. At least they didn't mention them," he said. "And it was a wonderful evening, Cordelia. I enjoyed it very much."
"I agree. We should do it again but without the fighting." They both laughed.
"Cordelia, how nice of you to join us," Jacob Weismeier said as she and David reached him. He put a hand on her shoulder for a moment which, for him, was an outrageous display of affection. His wife also greeted Cordelia warmly.
"Rose is somewhere," the woman said as if apologising for her daughter's behaviour. "I think she has her eye on one of the McKinley boys," she added with a wink. Cordelia had only heard of the McKinley family. Gretchen winking meant she approved. Good for Rose.
"Where will the picnic be held?" Cordelia asked David. He told her they wouldn't go far.
"There's a large lawn west of town, that is where we'll go." They'd walk there since it wasn't far.
It felt odd to Cordelia to walk along in what felt to her like a procession. Most people were in their Sunday best, talk was quiet and she doubted if anything entertaining would happen that afternoon. Seeing the group of people around her, she decided to dump that idea and comforted herself with the thought she and David were there together.
A few people were already present at the field where the massive picnic was going to be held. There were wooden benches laden with food, blankets were spread out in places where people could find a place to sit, and for some reason there was a campfire. Cordelia didn't understand that addition to the picnic but this wasn't the time she'd grown up in. She just accepted it.
For a while the gathering was nice. People came up to talk with her, most of them far too curious about her, where she lived and her background. Cordelia didn't want to lie about things because that would always go wrong somewhere so she limited the amount of information she gave to others and directed the conversations to the town and the people themselves. That usually worked well. People liked to talk about themselves and she would learn lots of specifics about this area.
Cordelia had more fun than she had originally thought. She had just sat down with David to eat something when two men approached the group. Cordelia only needed one look to know this meant trouble. These were agents from her time. From the future. They had done a poor job checking on current fashion; even to her they stood out like two sore thumbs.
Her initial reaction was to get up and walk off, but that would attract attention, so she turned her back to them as well as she could and hoped they wouldn't see her. A few of the picnic organisers walked up to the 'visitors' and asked where they were from.
"We are looking for someone," one of the agents said. Hearing the typical accent from home made Cordelia shiver. They definitely were agents and they were here for her. "A woman. Late twenties. Her name is Cordy Brown."
"Cordelia? Cordy sounds like your name." David was watching the men and he hadn't missed her reaction to them. "Do they know you? Brown isn't your last name, is it?" That was when things went wrong.
"There she is," an agent said. Cordelia turned her head to catch a glimpse of him. The man held a photograph in his hand and pointed at her. "There she is!" She cursed herself. Turning her head had shown him her facial tattoo and that had been a dead giveaway.
One of the agents reached into his long coat. Cordelia knew what he kept there. Skreller-guns were notorious for disabling a person and they could also inflict a lot of pain to destabilise a body for hours. She grabbed her purse and pulled out the stunner she almost always had with her. Before the man had pulled out his Skreller, she'd used the stunner on the two. The effect wasn't as radical as a Skreller but the two men dropped to their knees, holding their heads. The Skreller fell to the ground.
"Cordelia!" Mrs Weismeier called out her name. Cordelia didn't have time to explain what was going on. She ran to the two men and picked up the gun. She wasn't a fan of these things but having one might be a good thing.
She hurried back to the table where David and his family were. "I have to go. I don't know when I can come back. I'm sorry."
David grabbed her arm. "Why? What's wrong? We can help you."
"No. You can't. Please, let me go." Cordelia looked at the agents. The stunner-charge wouldn't keep them down for much longer. "I really need to leave. Now." She pulled her arm free.
"Then I come with you." David got up while his family told him to stay.
Cordelia hated this. This was all her fault. She looked at David. "You will be in danger."
"I will protect you," he said as he took her hand. "Come." While his family called after them, they ran off.