Time Travelers Never Die Part 17

"What were you doing out there?"

He was trying to remember when the cop holding his wallet extracted his driver's license. He held it up to the light, made a face, and handed it to the booking officer. There was some whispering. Then the booking officer stared suspiciously at him. "What's this?" he asked.

"It's my license."

He rubbed it, frowned. Showed it to a fat, bald-headed guy with sergeant's stripes. "Look at this, Jay."

Jay took it, tapped the edge of it on the counter, and turned back to David. "Pennsylvania's doing plastic plastic licenses now?" licenses now?"

Plastic licenses? Sure. Oh, wait. It was 1965. "Yes," he said. "Started this year."

Jay's frown deepened. "Mr. Dryden," he said, "I see you're a joker."

"I don't know what you mean." Most of it came back to him with the query about the license. Selma, the Brown Chapel, and the march. He couldn't remember anything, though, after walking up the incline on the bridge. Never got to the top.

Jay put the license back on the counter where the booking officer could see it, and pointed at it. The booking officer broke into a large smile. Shook his head. Jay turned back to David. "Tell me your name again."

"Dryden."

"Your real real name?" name?"

"Dryden's my real name."

"Look, sonny. You have any idea what can happen to you for falsifying state doc.u.ments?"

"I didn't falsify anything."

"This thing says it was issued in 2016."

"Um . . . Oh."

"That all you got to say?"

"I . . ." Dave could think of no way to explain it.

"All right." Jay shook his head. "Get him printed and put him in back. Let me know if he decides to tell us who he is." Jay led him to a desk occupied by a woman. A plate identified her as the property officer. One of the other cops put his personal belongings, including the converter, down in front of her. She took a form from her top drawer and started an inventory.

"Mr. Dryden," she said, examining his cell phone, "what's this?"

Jay was still hanging around. She handed the instrument to him. He looked at it. Looked at Dave. Turned it over and opened it. "I think the officer asked you a question," he said.

The cell phone wasn't going to work in 1965. "It's a tabulator."

"What's that?" she asked.

"It counts things."

"It counts things?"

"It's an adding machine."

Jay sneered at it and put it down. Then he scooped up the converter. "How about this?"

Dave was tempted to tell him to lift the plastic cover and press the black b.u.t.ton. "It's a game box."

"A what what?"

"You can play games with it."

"Sure you can. Like you're doing now." Dave held his breath, fearing that Jay might do something to it. But he only shook his head before putting it back on the table.

The property officer bagged everything and pa.s.sed the inventory sheet to him. "Please sign both copies," she said. She'd dutifully logged a game box and an adding machine, putting both items in quotation marks. Dave signed, she initialed, and she put the papers into a pile at her right hand. Then she dropped the bag into a metal basket.

They fingerprinted him and took him back to the cellblock. Several others, three or four, he couldn't be sure, were locked away. All white males. "Here's one of the sons of b.i.t.c.hes now," said the guard, to n.o.body in particular.

He was guiding Dave toward a cell that held a prisoner who must have weighed four hundred pounds. "Yeah, Charlie," said the prisoner, "put him in here."

Charlie smiled at Dave. "What do you think, Dryden? Want to stay with Arky here? No?"

Arky delivered some comments about Dave's racial preferences, reached through the bars, and laughed when Dave kept his distance.

Charlie shook his head. "You do do have a way of gettin' people riled," he said. "Better put you in a cell by yourself." have a way of gettin' people riled," he said. "Better put you in a cell by yourself."

The cell had two cots. He sank onto one, hoping he hadn't broken a rib.

HE'D been in the cell about five minutes when Charlie and another officer returned. "You're sure?" asked the new cop. been in the cell about five minutes when Charlie and another officer returned. "You're sure?" asked the new cop.

"Absolutely, Al. You can look for yourself."

Al took a quick look around. "Makes no sense."

"I don't know nothin' about it."

"Okay. I guess you're right. But where the h.e.l.l'd he go?"

"You check the break room?"

"Yeah. It's the first place I looked. Harvey said he thought he was coming back here."

"If so, he never got here."

They left. Fifteen minutes later, they were both back looking at Dave. "This the one?" said Al.

"That's him."

Charlie began unlocking the door. "Get up, Dryden," said Al.

"What do you want?"

"Just do what I tell you. Get up."

They opened the cell door and held it for him. Dave climbed painfully to his feet and limped out. His knee had begun hurting, too. Al took him back to the booking area, and he was shown into a side office, where the woman who'd done the inventory waited, along with a guy wearing bars. The sheriff.

"Mr. Dryden." The sheriff had a permanent scowl. He looked worn-out, tired of putting up with troublemakers. The bag with Dave's belongings lay on the desk in front of him, as well as a copy of the inventory. "You had something with you that you described as a 'game box.' "

"Yes, I did. Nothing's happened to it, has it?"

The sheriff ignored the question. "What exactly is it?"

"What do you mean?"

"Let me put it this way. Is it valuable?"

"Yes."

"Why? What was the d.a.m.ned thing?"

Dave s.h.i.+vered at his use of the past tense. "It's an experimental device I was working on," he said.

"What kind of experimental device?"

"It helps people learn languages."

The sheriff's eyes grew hard. "Who exactly are you, Mr. Dryden?"

"My name's David Dryden."

"What do you do for a living?"

"I'm a language teacher."

"Mr. Dryden, I'd like not to waste either your time or mine. I wonder if you'd explain why you're carrying fake doc.u.ments?"

"My driver's license?"

"Yeah."

"That's hard to explain."

"Try."

"It's a bogus license."

"I can figure that out for myself. Did you lose your license?"

"Yes."

"Why?

"Drunk-driving offenses."

"It figures. But if you're going to buy a bogus license, how in h.e.l.l can you be so dumb about the birth date?" He looked at it and shook his head-1989.

"That was the way they did it. I didn't notice it until I got home. The guy who made the thing got in trouble and took off, so I never got it fixed."

"What's your real name?"

"Dryden is is my real name." my real name."

"Are you a communist, by any chance?"

"No, sir."

"You say that game box is valuable."

"Yes, it is."

"How valuable?" valuable?"

"A lot. It's hard to put a price on it."

"You know, Dryden, things are going to go a lot easier for you if you tell us the truth now. About whatever's going on."

"There's nothing going on."

"Okay. Have it your way."

He signaled for one of the cops to open the door. "Take him back inside."

As David was leaving, the sheriff turned to the inventory officer and lowered his voice. "Any sign yet of Jay?"

"Nothin', Sheriff. I'll let you know as soon as he shows up."

CHAPTER 13.

Do not say things. What you are stands over you the while, and thunders so that I cannot hear what you say to the contrary.

-RALPH WALDO EMERSON, LETTERS AND SOCIAL AIMS LETTERS AND SOCIAL AIMS