1894

9. Albert

He rose shakily on an elbow and blinked in my general direction. “Who are you?” he croaked.

I approached and bowed with dignity. “Sire, my name is Wells. I’m your new medical orderly.”

“I don’t remember…” He peered over to the hall door. “When did you come in?”

“Just now, Highness. But I didn’t come in through the hall door. I entered via your study.”

He passed his hand over his brow. “Wells… The study…?” He gave me a suspicious look and fumbled for the bellpull just over his head.

I rushed forward. “Please, sire. Let me explain.”

“Oh?” He lay back in bed, but his eyes never left me.

I went on hurriedly. “Highness, what I am about to say, I know you will find quite incredible. Yet, if you will permit, I know I can prove it all to your satisfaction. To start, sire, I am from the year 1894. I came here in a Time Machine, which at the moment stands in your study.”

I let him think about that. Clearly, he didn’t believe me. Nor did I expect him to. Not yet, anyway.

“Go on,” he said. “Why did you come? To what end?”

“Sire, it now becomes difficult. For what I am about to reveal to you, I ask your forbearance in advance.”

“I forbear. So tell me.”

“Sire, you are presently in a very rundown condition, compounded by a case of influenza brought on by exposure to rain and cold during your recent visit to Cambridge.”[2]

He looked at me sharply. “So?”

“That’s not the worst of it, sire. In a day or so, indeed, perhaps even as we talk here, you will contract typhoid… and…” I gulped and coughed.

“And I will die?”

I nodded silently. He was taking it very well, perhaps in large part because he didn’t necessarily believe me.

“When?”

There was no gentle way to put it. “You will die the first of December, sire.”

He considered that. I think he almost smiled. “And in your world of 1894, is December first carved on my gravestone?”

“Yes, sire.”

It didn’t seem to bother him. When death is close, everything in life seems to shift focus. Many things once critically important become trivial, and vice versa. I think this was already happening to Albert.

“To survive a dozen assassination attempts,” he murmured, “only to be brought low by an invisible bug.”

The statement about the bug astonished me. But then, I should have recalled that he read all the new science journals. Pasteur had published his seminal papers on microorganisms only three years ago, by the prince’s calendar.

“Wells,” he said, “dying is not such a terrible thing.”

“Sire,” I admonished him, “after your death, her majesty went—or should I say, will go?—into a secluded mourning that was still going on when I left my world of 1894. She still wears black. For her, your death was—will be—a terrible thing.” I paused and took a deep breath. “It is time to state my mission.”

“Yes, Wells, please do.”

“I am here by the queen’s order and request. She thinks I can save your life.”

“She was always overly sentimental,” he muttered. “Do you know she still has all her dolls from childhood, catalogued and stored away?”

“No, sire, I didn’t. But surely you don’t want to die?”

“You’re blunt, Wells. And that’s good. Saves time. So let’s get to the facts. You claim the queen sent you?”

“Yes, sire.”

“That should be easy to verify. I’ll ring for her.”

“That won’t work, sire. Her majesty of 1894 sent me. The present queen never heard of me. She would send for the palace guard.”

“Oh. Hm.” He peered at me quizzically. “We’ll try something else. You claim you came here in some sort of vehicle?”

“Yes, sire. A Time Machine.”

“So you say. And it’s presently sitting in my study?”

“It is, sire.”

“Help me up, Wells.”

“Of course, sire.” I’m not a big man. The prince was not much taller, at five foot seven. He got an arm over my shoulder and we walked slowly, step by step, into the study. I could sense from the contact that he was running a high fever.

When he saw the Machine, his eyes opened wide, and he stumbled. I held him tight. I had a pretty good idea what he was thinking: that thing is too big to come in through the study door. How did it get in here? Is this for real?

He asked in a rasping whisper, “Perhaps the queen gave you a note for me?”

“No, sire.”

“Nothing to prove this was her idea?”

I sighed. “Not exactly. But at least I’ve got the typhoid vaccine… for whatever that proves.”

“Vaccine?”

“Dr. Wright—Sir Almroth Wright—prepared it. If the injection is given in time, it will provide immunity to the disease. Rather like a smallpox vaccine, I’m told.”

He was frowning. “Not even a glove, a ring, a fan…? Most unlike her.”

So that was what was bothering him. “Sire, a moment please.” I bent down into the internals of the Machine, loosened the contacts that held the sapphire brooch, and extracted it with infinite care. I held it up. “Sire, do you recognize this?”

He stared in amazement, then took it with his free hand. “The Juggernaut!” he whispered.

“The… what?”

“Juggernaut, Wells. It wrecked the financial system of my little duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha for a decade. This is the brooch I gave Victoria to wear at our wedding. How did you come by it?”

“We needed it for the piezoelectric unit in the Machine. She gave it. I have to return it when this is over.”

“Yes, of course. All right, Wells, I believe you. I believe everything.” He handed the stone back, and I reclamped it into the core box. He did not raise the question of whether there were now two Juggernauts, this one, and a second in the Windsor strongbox. I would not have known how to answer!

“Wells,” he said, “am I to understand that you risked your life to save mine?”

That was certainly one way to look at it. I shrugged. “Sire, the risk is difficult to assess. Permit me to say, simply, that I was glad to come, and I hope that with my coming your life will be prolonged.”

“Well said. Thank you. Now what?” he asked.

“Three things, sire. First, let’s get you back to bed. Second, I recommend that I administer the vaccine, followed by a cold sponge bath. We need to get your fever down.”

“Yes. I’m very tired, Wells. Let’s get on with it.”

I got him back to bed. A few minutes later I had drawn the required three cc of vaccine from the vial into the hypo, pushed the plunger up to get rid of the air bubble, and thrust the needle into the royal rump. It bothered me that the prince didn’t wince.

I brought a basin of water over to the night stand, found a clean towel by the commode rack, pulled his nightgown up around his armpits, and began to sponge him down, front and back. By the time I had finished not even his mother had ever seen more of Albert than I. Was I really doing him any good? Just then, of course, it was impossible to tell. But I had an uneasy feeling that he had already contracted the disease and that I was too late with the vaccine. I would have to wait for history to give its final judgment. As I pulled down his nightdress he murmured, ‘You said three things, Wells. What’s number three?”

“A ship, sire, the Trent—”

There was a knock on the door. I jerked around guiltily. A little man stood there, age about fifty, with short white hair, razor-sharp nose, gimlet black eyes. I knew him from the major’s description.

“Come in, Dr. Clark,” I said coolly.