“This area must be pretty well picked over,” Matt said. “Lot of people live out here?”
“When it’s warm, yeah, gettin’ out of the city. Churches here expect almost two thousand today, plus some people go into town for the day. Maybe twenty-two hundred in Arlington, till October, November.”
“You know how many people live in Boston, the Boston area?”
“Huh-uh. Feelslike a million in the winter.”
“No heat out here?”
“Only what you make.” He arranged the rest of the wood around the blaze and sat back. “How did it used to be?”
Matt pointed at the apartment building. “My mother used to live right here, on the lake, year-round. In the wintertime her place was usually so hot I couldn’t stand it.”
“She had electricity?”
“And a fireplace, too, for special occasions. That was in the 2050s.”
He shook his head. “No good with numbers.”
Matt added and subtracted in his head. “That would have been about 130 years before Jesus came back.”
“Long time.” His face pinched in concentration. “My gran’ther was born about twenty years before, B.S.C. So his grandfather . . .” He tried to do it on his fingers but shook his head again and let his breath out in a puff.
“Well, if you count twenty-five years per generation, that would be hisgrandfather’s father.”
Mose looked up, his eyes shining. “And you were around back then.”
“Yeah.” Something suddenly drained out of Matt. Energy, hope.
Mose saw it. “Will you get back?”
He cleared his throat. “I . . . I don’t know. I think so.” Someone had to make his bail 293 years ago.
Ruth came over carrying the fish and two metal grates, which looked like refrigerator shelves. She peered at the fire. “Ready in about ten minutes, Moses?”
“Ready when it’s ready, woman.” She shrugged and set the fish down on the table.
He placed a few small sticks in with the larger ones and blew gently until they were blazing. “If you don’t get back, stuck here, you want to join a church. I mean you have to. What were you back then?”
“You mean religion?” Mose nodded, not looking at him. Ex- Reform Jew atheistwould probably be a bad answer. “Guess I’m sort of a Methodist. Church wasn’t so . . . central to our lives.”
“As it was written,” he said. “And so you were laid down low. Wewere, humanity.” Matt couldn’t think of a safe response to that. “Meth-o-dist,” Mose said softly. “That was like the old Catholics?”
“They split off from the Catholics long before I was born.” They were something else in between, he vaguely knew from his childhood friends. Lutherans or something.
“Hope they don’t give you trouble about that at MIT. They shouldn’t, since you were born before the Second Coming and then sort of hop-frogged over it. But those religious people are unreasonable sometimes, you know what I’m sayin’?”
“I should be careful what I say around them.”
“Say and do. Really careful.”
“I will, Mose. Thank you.”
“They’re scientific, so they might give you some room. Like any reasonable person would. But they’re all priests, too, or most of them.”
The fire was going well now, hot enough that both men moved a little away from it. “Let it burn down a bit.”
“So . . . there aren’t any Methodists anymore?”
“Not around here. Down south they still have Church-o’-Christs and Baptists and what all. Here we’re just Christians.”
“Everyone?”
“Oh yes.” He said that a little too quickly. “You would be about twenty-two?”
“I’m older than I look. Twenty-seven—or two hundred-some, if you count from date of birth.”
“They might make you spend some time in service.”
“In the military?”
“Military? No, just in service to the Lord. I was in service from eighteen to twenty, which is usual. But if you’re in school a grown-up, they wait till you’re out.”
“What do you do in service?”
“Whatever you’re best at. You’d probably be a mechanic or some scientist’s assistant.” He laughed, shaking his head. “Might just make you a scientist and give youan assistant. You probably have enough school to be a scientist.”
“Old-fashioned stuff, though. Science goes out of date.”
“Maybe so. I never heard of your chronochemistry. Maybe they don’t do it anymore.”
“Chronophysics, but you’re right. That would be a . . . a shame.” Not to say a goddamn kick in the balls.
Matt was wondering what would be the best way to approach MIT. Probably best not to walk in and say, “Hi! I’m the chrononaut you’ve all been waiting for.” The fact that there had been nobody waiting for him up at the New Hampshire border spoke volumes. He should try to sneak in and get the lay of the land before he identified himself. It might save him from being ridiculed, or burnt at the stake.
Abraham had come to whisper something to his father. “Ask him,” Mose said.
He came over. “Father said I could ask you could we look in the car.”
“Sure. I’ll go over with you, unlock it.” Matt stood up and fished in his pocket for the thick bunch of keys on the taxi driver’s ring. Mostly plastic electronic keys, with a few old metal ones. One of the plastic ones said MIT-SUBISHI. He clicked on it as they approached the car and the key blinked red twice. Of course, out of power. The doors unlocked one last time, with a slow thunk.
The two girls had tagged along, and now they all piled into the cab and bounced around. The musty old thing was probably the newest car in the state, or the East Coast. Let them play, though; there was no way they could do any harm.
“What’s this, mister?” Abraham had found a .357 Magnum cartridge on the floor.
“Here, I’ll take it.” Matt reached for it.
“Is that a bullet?” Mose said, behind him.
Matt paused. A cartridge, actually. “Looks like.” He passed it to Mose.
The black man pushed it around on his palm. “Never seen one like this. Not a rifle?”
Could they have peeked into his bag? “It’s for a hand-gun. ” He didn’t look in the bag’s direction. “You have rifles but not pistols?”
“Not since my father’s time. They’re illegal.” He looked through the car window. “You be careful, Abraham.” He glanced at Matt. “No pistol in there?”
“Not that I know of. I haven’t looked all through it.”
“Children, go back to the fire.” They protested. “Abraham, see if the coals are ready.”
The kids moped away from their forbidden toy. “You weren’t surprised,” Mose said. “At this.” He handed Matt the cartridge.
“No. Plenty of guns back in my time.”
He nodded. “Be careful. They’re big trouble here.”
“Thanks. I have a lot to learn.”
Abraham was calling that the fire was ready.
Lunch was polite but strained. They gave profuse thanks to both God and Matthew for the fish, but the adults were obviously glad to see him go. Mose asked him to lock the car, but the key didn’t work; not enough power. They gave it a thorough search and didn’t find any contraband or anything useful.
A bike path still ran by the lake to the subway stop he’d last used to bring his mother wine and groceries. Mose warned him away from the subway, home to “tunnel rats,” vagabonds who lived there year-round. It was relatively cool in the summer, and survivable in the winter, but a haven for the lawless, and unsafe even for them.
Matt said good-bye and walked up the hill to Mass Ave. He’d never walked from here to MIT, but it couldn’t be more than six or seven miles. He’d biked it a couple of times.
It was pretty grim. The street was a ruin of frost heaves, unmaintained for decades. Shop fronts were decrepit, signs faded out, painted over. There were brick-and-board tables along the sidewalk where people sold food and drink or had stacks of worn clothes and junk for sale or trade. Matt got a questionable glass of homemade beer, warm and sour, for a quarter. One fourth of his contemporary money.