Asher's Dilemma Read online

  Asher’s blood started to hum. For a moment he contemplated thrusting past the Amazon and forcing his way in. But that would guarantee Minerva’s eviction, and how would he be able to explain himself in the subsequent hullabaloo?

  Harrumphing in frustration, he turned away just as the mischievous wind picked up his hat and bowled it down the street.

  Chapter Four

  Minerva emerged from Mrs. Pettigrew’s house, her head swimming with ideas. She now knew why her widowed client had requested she travel to London, and she fervently hoped she’d be able to help her. Mechanical hands, arms and feet she had constructed before, and once even an artificial nose, but this would be the first time she’d be building a substitute eye. False eyes had been around for centuries, but Mrs. Pettigrew required more than just a glass eyeball. Ten years ago, her deranged and jealous husband had shot her in the head and then turned the pistol on himself. He’d meant to kill her, but the poor woman had survived, albeit with a gaping hole in her head.

  It had taken Minerva considerable self-control to examine the injury without flinching, but sympathy had outweighed delicacy. In the end, Mrs. Pettigrew’s shocking disfigurement was no more than flesh and bone, and Minerva had quickly begun to see ways of designing a headpiece which would transform the mutilation into a thing of beauty. Mrs. Pettigrew had long wanted such a disguise, but had been reticent to approach a male craftsman. Eager to end her confinement, she had seen Minerva off with a handsome bank check to be used on the purchase of materials.

  Minerva started off down the road, leaning into a stiff headwind. Overnight, the winds from the north had strengthened to gales, and the blustery street was aswirl with dead foliage and detritus. Minerva pushed on. She would return to her lodgings and flesh out the design she’d sketched out for Mrs. Pettigrew, and then—

  “Minerva.”

  The familiar voice stopped her in her tracks. She glanced up to see Asher alongside her, seated in a carriage. Opening the door, he beckoned towards her.

  “Will you ride with me? I have something of great importance to tell you.”

  Minerva’s meeting with Mrs. Pettigrew had distracted her from the tribulations she’d endured the previous day, but now the memories came thundering back. She stared at Asher. He looked so different from yesterday, so beseeching and anxious. But he’d been so cruel. She tipped her chin. “So important you feel the need to accost me in the middle of the street?”

  “I came by your lodgings yesterday evening, but your landlady is something of a dragon.” He gestured towards her again. “Please come with me, Minerva. I will explain everything.”

  He seemed so stirred up she couldn’t find it in her to refuse him. Cursing her weakness, she climbed into the carriage beside him. At least she was out of the wind for a while. As the carriage moved on, he drew down the blinds so no passers-by could see them, and the dimness made the cramped interior even more intimate.

  Minerva gulped, suddenly reminded of another carriage they’d shared not long ago when they’d been in hot pursuit of the man who’d tried to kill both her and her father. On that occasion Asher had just rescued her, and their emotions had boiled over. Fervently they’d kissed and embraced, overwhelmed by rekindled passion sharpened by the tang of danger. But this time, though her feelings were roiling, Asher seemed more discomfited by her presence than aroused.

  He brooded over her, his eyes peridot-green and uneasy. “Who is this Mrs. Pettigrew you’ve just visited?” he asked eventually. She opened her mouth to ask how he knew the widow’s name, but he forestalled her by adding, “I had the cab driver make some enquiries while I was waiting.”

  While he was waiting? She frowned. “You’ve been following me?”

  “What is your business with Mrs. Pettigrew?”

  He’d almost pleaded for her company, but now he was treating her like a suspect in the witness box. “Mrs. Pettigrew is a client of mine,” she retorted.

  “Oh.” His shoulders relaxed a fraction. “So that’s why you’re in London.”

  “But I already explained all of this to you yesterday. Did you not believe that either?” she asked bitterly. “Is that why you’re following me?”

  He grew very still. The carriage jounced over a deep pothole as he continued to stare at her. “You explained all this to me yesterday,” he repeated in a stunned monotone. “You called round at my house?”

  “Yes!” What was wrong? Was he ailing from something which caused memory loss? Her distress mounted as the events of yesterday re-assaulted her. “And you have some explaining to do yourself, Mr. Asher Quigley. Because I know full well why you were so keen to get rid of me yesterday afternoon. Oh yes. I saw your mysterious visitor entering your house, and what’s more I waited for her to exit and I followed her home too!”

  Eyes flaring, Asher plunged his fingers through his hair. “Oh God.”

  “Yes, I am referring to Mrs. Nemo!” Minerva’s chest heaved. “You must know who she is in relation to me! What I do not know, and am very keen for you to elucidate upon, is what she is to you?”

  As her chin started to quiver, she clamped her jaw tight. Asher lifted a hand towards her, but then dropped it. “Is that all you did, follow her home?”

  “I spoke to her, of course. And she introduced me to Herr Schick.”

  His face grew ashen. “Promise me you will not contact Mrs. Nemo or go near Schick’s house again.”

  She gaped at him. “I can’t do that. She’s my mother—”

  “I’m sorry, but she has a less than savory reputation. The same goes for Schick. You must avoid both of them.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I won’t—”

  “Minerva.” He grasped her by the arms, his entire being burning with a white-hot intensity. “I am about to tell you something that will sound extremely ridiculous. Something that will have you doubting my sanity. But you must listen and not interrupt until I’m finished. Will you promise me that at least?”

  The hairs on the back of her neck rose. She’d never seen Asher like this before. The compulsion gripping him seemed to flow through his hands into her, infecting her with his agitation. Numbly she nodded her agreement.

  He didn’t speak at once, instead releasing her to rub his face and neck. The tension emanating from him was palpable. As if to buy some time he flicked the blinds open a crack. They were passing through a park now, she surmised from the glimpses of bare trees and brown grass she caught. The howling wind battered the trees, jostled the carriage and jingled the horse’s harness.

  He began to speak, his voice tight and staccato. “You know how dear to my heart the millennium machine is, how much time and effort I’ve devoted to it. When your father stole the concept from me, it made me even more determined to solve the problems, to complete it, to claim it as mine. Well, you know I did, just three weeks ago, though I never admitted as much to you. I hinted that my invention would attract the wrong sort of people, that it was more of a curse than a help. That was because I’d discovered something wholly unexpected about my millennium machine.”

  He paused to rasp his jaw, which was not as immaculately shaven as usual.

  “You’re familiar with the basic concept of my machine. A ring of promethium magnets, properly arranged in the right position, produces a magnetic field which harnesses the energy of the aethersphere in the form of an endless supply of electro-magnetic current. Well, what if the process were reversed? What if an electro-magnetic current was passed through the ring of magnets? What would happen then?

  “The aethersphere is a great unknown to us. It fills every corner of the universe, yet we can neither see it nor measure it. Still, many scientists have tried. Some mathematicians describe it as a multi-dimensional space, the so-called Riemannian manifold or hyperspace. In this hyperspace, time is just one of many dimensions, which means once you enter the hyperspace you can travel through time just as easily as we are now travelling through this park.”

  He hesitated, and she sensed him ga
thering all his resolve to utter his next words.

  “It’s not just a hypothesis, Minerva, because I myself have travelled through this hyperspace. I am not the Asher you called on yesterday.” He drew in a breath. “I am the Asher from the future. From eight months in the future, to be exact.”

  In the ensuing silence the clip-clopping of the horse’s hooves drummed against the inside of Minerva’s skull. She felt her body swaying with the motion of the carriage, felt her fingers curling into the folds of her skirt, felt a shivering rage boil up from within her.

  “You expect me to believe such folderol? Do I strike you as such an imbecile I’d swallow any codswallop you dream up? Stop the carriage. I won’t sit here a moment longer.”

  She made to bang on the ceiling, but Asher grabbed her arm.

  “Put aside your feminine outrage for one minute and utilize that keen logic of yours,” he retorted. “Think of everything about me ever since that day a fortnight ago when I stalked out of your house after you’d refused my marriage proposal. Think, Minerva. Are there not things that strike you as incongruous? Have I not behaved oddly at times, almost as if I am not the same man?”

  “Behaving oddly is nothing new with you! You take pride in flouting conventions.”

  “Oh, come now, Minerva. I know I am a vexatious man, but I’m never capricious. How did I behave towards you yesterday?”

  “You know very well how you behaved.” She jerked her arm free and scowled at him. “You were cold and distant. You denied writing me all those letters—”

  “Ah, because he didn’t write those letters, I did. Just as a fortnight ago he was the one who stormed out in righteous anger because you valued your independence, and I was the one who came rushing back minutes later begging forgiveness.”

  A shocking possibility snagged in her thoughts and refused to be dislodged. Preposterous though it sounded, what if he was telling the truth? Hadn’t he been behaving strangely, out of character?

  Fear and disbelief hitched her breath. She gulped once, twice. “That night in Manchester…you—you said, if need be, you would wait for me forever.”

  The force in his eyes melted and became a hot glow. “Yes, I will.”

  His face blurred; she bit her lip to stop the tears. “But yesterday you accused me of having another secret beau.”

  “The bounder!” His expression altered. “You must make allowances for him, Minerva. He loves you passionately, but his pride has always been his downfall.”

  “Stop it! Stop it!” Shielding her ears, she squeezed her eyes shut. “Stop talking as if…as if—” The frantic beat of her heart echoed in her ears. Choking, she dropped her hands to her lap. “I must be losing my grip on reality, because I’m starting to believe you.”

  “Sweetling, I wish I didn’t have to burden you like this, but time is running out. I need your help.”

  Sweetling. His endearment, which he used in all his letters, made her heart tumble over. She gazed at him anew, noting the subtle differences between this Asher and the man whom she’d surprised yesterday. Feature by feature they were identical, but when she looked into his eyes the distinction was unmistakable. In this man she saw poignant regret in his gaze, the look of an injured soldier returning from the battlefield.

  Reaching out, she brushed the tips of her fingers over the roughness of his cheek. It couldn’t be true. It had to be madness. Her rational brain railed against the impossibility, but in the end logic was no match against the heart.

  “How can I help?”

  * * *

  As Asher spoke of what had to be done, Minerva’s face drained of all color. When he was finished, she protested. “I cannot ask him to do that. It’s too much! This is something he’s been laboring over for years. How can I ask him to throw it all away?”

  Her blue eyes flashed with indignation. How she must care for the man, Asher thought. His jaw hardened against the unexpected pang of jealousy. Utterly ridiculous to be envious of himself. But there it was. He couldn’t deny it. She still loved that pig-headed man despite everything.

  “You forget it’s my work too. I know full well how much blood, sweat and tears I’ve poured into it. How much it’s cost me—” He broke off, reminded of how his invention had come between him and Minerva when he’d falsely accused her of colluding with her father to steal his idea. Five years he’d spent separated from her. Blasted invention! How much more pain would it engender?

  Minerva sat clasping and unclasping her fingers, her brow wrinkled in thought. “There must be another solution, some way in which Asher can continue—”

  “No, this is the only way.” He grasped her hand urgently. “The safest way.”

  Even through the glove her hand felt cold. “But why must it be this way? You haven’t fully explained the consequences. What will happen in eight months’ time if we do nothing?”

  For a brief moment he shut his eyes. Weariness gnawed at him like a rat. During the past fortnight he’d barely slept, and he found himself longing to gather Minerva into his arms and fall into a deep slumber.

  He shook his head. “I can’t tell you.”

  “But why? Is it so terrible? Does…does something happen to you?”

  Sweet Minerva, always concerned about others. No, he couldn’t bring himself to tell her the full horror of the future from whence he came. She deserved the truth, but he was too much of a coward to reveal it.

  “Sweetling, I implore you to put your faith in me,” he said softly, “and trust in what I’m asking of you.”

  Solemn-eyed, she regarded him, weighing up his words, and eventually she squeezed his fingers. “You do know that he won’t believe me. He’ll think I’m mad. It would be so much easier if you simply confronted him. Then there could be no argument.”

  “I’m fearful of what might happen if he and I came face-to-face. I’ll be honest with you. The theories of chronometrical travelling are simply that—theories. Untested and unproven. If the Asher of today were to meet me, who knows what cosmological damage we might cause to the aethersphere? I can’t risk that.”

  “But if, as you say, there’s no time to waste, then you may have no choice.”

  “Maybe, but it will only be a last resort.”

  “Should we go to his house now, as it is so urgent?”

  He ought to have agreed, but he found himself hesitating. In all likelihood this would be the last time he’d have Minerva to himself. When they returned to Asher’s house, she would no longer be his. She’d never really been his anyway, deuce take it. He’d just been borrowing her, taking what didn’t belong to him, but demmitall he was only human, and when his mission was completed who knew if he would feel this woman’s love again.

  “Why don’t we enjoy our ride in the park first?” he said.

  She nodded as if she understood his selfish needs. “Yes, why not?”

  He drew up the blinds, and the horse slowed down to bear into the gale. The sky was raw, the winter trees groaning and bending under the scouring wind. Hardly an afternoon to be outdoors. But with Minerva curled up beside him, her arm tucked into his and the cold pinking her cheeks, for the first time in ages he felt peace stealing over him. She began to tell him about Mrs. Pettigrew and the piece she intended to design for the poor lady. The commission would pay her handsomely and enhance her reputation. Everything augured well for her fledgling business. Half an hour flew past. He could have sat all day with her, but eventually he signaled the driver to turn towards Kensington.

  As they drew closer to Asher’s house, Minerva grew quiet and somber. “Where have you been living this past fortnight?”

  He shrugged. “A boarding house not far away.”

  A puzzled look crossed her face. “You could have been in Manchester. With me.” A rosy hue crept over her cheeks.

  His heart skipped a beat as he read the message in her blush. “If I had stayed in Manchester…” Heat warmed his loins. He took a breath to steady himself. “But I could not have deceived you to tha
t extent. You would never have forgiven me.”

  “And yet you made me believe you’d had a change of heart.” White teeth fretted her soft lower lip. “You wrote me love letters every day. Was that not a deception too?”

  Sighing, he lowered his head. How could he convey his desperation for her without betraying the truth? “You’re right. I shouldn’t have done that.”

  “I cherish every one of your letters. Nevertheless, if it weren’t for them, I would never have shown up without warning on your doorstep.” She chewed her lip some more. “And then I would never have seen my mother.”

  His neck cricked as his head jerked up. “I meant what I said earlier, Minerva. Your mother is not someone you would wish to associate with, and you must promise me not to see her anymore.”

  “You haven’t given me a good reason why I should avoid her.”

  “She abandoned you when you were eight and allowed you to think she was dead!” Asher gesticulated with some feeling. “Isn’t that reason enough?”

  The line of her chin grew mutinous. “No matter what she’s done, she is still my mother.”

  “A fact she does not want to be reminded of,” he retorted. “A woman like her would not enjoy being seen in the company of a grown-up daughter who would only highlight her true age.”

  “A woman like her?” Minerva turned to him, glowering. “You look down on her because she’s a mistress? Circumstances must have forced her into such a position. After all, Herr Schick is hardly the most agreeable of men. You’re too harsh on her.”

  Not after what he’d discovered last night. He wavered on the edge of telling her everything he’d found out about Mrs. Nemo but couldn’t do it. The discoveries had disturbed him, a hardened man of the world. How much more upsetting would it be to learn such things about one’s parent? “Let’s not argue over her now,” he compromised. “First, we need to convince Asher.”