“Okay, this is interesting and all, not to mention really creepy. But why do you think it has anything to do—”
“They died from some sort of bacterial agent, Kate. The best official guess is that it was something in the well and they knew they were dying and gathered in the church to go out together.”
“Do they know what type of bacteria?”
“No clue, although I doubt there’d be a very rigorous investigation in rural Georgia in 1911, especially for a group with few ties to the outside world. They assume that it hit fast—there’s one grave dug in back of the church but no one in it. So one of the articles is thinking they gathered for the funeral of the first victim and then it hit the rest of them. But there’s no coffin, no body laid out at the front, ready for burial, unless it’s the old lady slumped off in the corner. The story got a bit of coverage, because it’s creepy, but it dropped off the radar pretty fast.”
“What bacterial agent would act that quickly?”
“I don’t know. I’m guessing it doesn’t occur naturally. And . . . I’ve seen bodies like that before. Around 2070, on my little tour through time with Simon.”
I pull a few more articles out of the box. “And you just happened to stumble on this, what—six years into the future? That’s . . .”
He glances down at the floor. “No. I was looking. I really didn’t have much to go on, just something Simon said one night in New Orleans, back before I met you. He was angry at Saul for chewing him out about something. About ten drinks in, Simon starts ranting about Saul not having room to talk after his screwup at Six Bridges. He got really nervous when I asked him about it later. Of course, he denied ever having said anything about Six Bridges. When he could see I didn’t buy it, he told me it happened when Saul was younger and suggested that I shut the hell up if I didn’t want my ass kicked. As if he could.”
“Why didn’t you mention this to me before?”
He rocks his chair onto its back legs. “Because it was a dead end. Kate asked Katherine about it, before, and Katherine said that if it was something that Saul did, it would probably have been in the 1850s, probably in Massachusetts, Illinois, or Ohio. They searched all of those areas and came up with nothing. Katherine even looked in Georgia around the time the FWP was there, because she said Saul was at that site at least once, but she came up blank. And when they expanded the search, they still didn’t find anything called Six Bridges, aside from a beer, a movie from the 1950s, and a bike trail somewhere. The problem is only the locals call it Six Bridges, because that’s how many bridges you cross to get there. It’s not an actual town or anything. And it doesn’t even exist in 1938, when Katherine was looking through the Georgia maps. I’d almost forgotten it until Charlie, the chatterbox who helped me put in the water heater, said something about going duck hunting with his brother out on Six Bridges Road.”
“So what do you think we should do? We don’t know that this was caused by Saul, and if it was, we don’t know what he used. I don’t think we can just drop in and wait for him to show up. What if it’s airborne?”
“True,” he says. “But we don’t have to watch in person if we go in and set up stable points in advance, like I did when I was looking for Pru and Simon at Norumbega. Six Bridges is maybe an hour from here. We go down there a week or so ahead, set up our ‘cameras,’ so to speak, and leave. Then I’ll watch those points from here in the cabin. If Saul shows up and puts something in the well, then we go in. If this is what he’s planning to use for the Culling, we need a sample.”
My eyes widen. “There’s no way I’m taking something that’s potentially that lethal back with me.”
“It’s not like we really have a choice, Kate. If Saul has an antidote for his Chosen, someone else needs to start working on an antidote as well.”
He has a point, but I still don’t like it. “You do realize we can’t stop this from happening, right? If we change anything at all, it could tip Saul off, and that could have repercussions on the only timeline where we know for certain we’re here to stop him. And, yes, I’m well aware that I sound like Katherine, but we both know it’s true.”
“I know,” he says, glancing back down at the photos. “I’d do this on my own, but I’ll attract more attention by myself. Like you said, it’s mostly women. If we go in together, we’re just a couple out for a weekend ride. We can pretend there’s a problem with one of the bikes, maybe. Even if we only have time to set up one or two stable points, I can jump back in later, in the middle of the night or something, and add more in the specific spots we need to watch.”
I guess he’s right. We need to check this out. The only question is whether I should jump back and discuss this with Katherine and Connor. But we’re only setting up stable points, so I’m not sure what purpose would be served by an hour-long meeting to hash through these new developments.
I toss Kiernan the leather helmet. “See if you can get that clean while I go wash the rest out of my hair. I take it there’s a dress for 1911 in the closet?”
“Yes. But maybe you should learn how to ride the motorcycle first?”
“Kiernan, those things are not motorcycles. They’re barely even mopeds. I drove a scooter around campus for over a year before we moved from Iowa. I have a license to prove it, so maybe I should be the one teaching you.”
GREENE COUNTY, GEORGIA
September 7, 1911, 10:00 a.m.
The farm looks a bit livelier when we step out the back door into 1911. The field behind the house was planted with corn, but I assume it’s been harvested already, because it’s just dry brown stalks, some of which have already been cut down. The shed has had a recent coat of paint, and maybe a few boards were added—it looks more substantial than the lean-to construction I saw during our target practice. Behind the shed, a row of about a dozen peach trees stretches off in the direction of the farmhouse. I catch a faint whiff of fermenting fruit from the carcasses of overripe peaches scattered in the grass.
As it turns out, I may have overstated the similarities between this bike and the scooter I rode in Iowa. It’s about the same height, but it’s twice the weight. Still, it only takes ten minutes or so before I’m able to keep up with Kiernan, and he isn’t handicapped by an outfit that has to be constantly watched to make sure the fabric doesn’t get caught in the spokes or catch fire on the motor, which gets really hot after a few miles.
Rural Georgia roads aren’t exactly biker friendly. We draw hoots and hollers from drivers who clearly don’t get the concept of sharing the road. I suspect most of the catcalls are due to the fact that I’m a female riding in a split skirt. It looks like a normal long skirt when I’m standing, but now that I’m astride the bike, it’s obvious that I—gasp—have legs that actually connect somewhere in the middle. I saw women riding bikes on the streets in Boston and even back at the World’s Fair, so apparently Georgia is a decade or so behind the rest of the country on this issue. It’s not like you can ride a bike sidesaddle.
Each time a horn honks, Kiernan looks back like he’s going to turn the bike around and go teach someone a lesson.
“Would you just ignore them?” I decide not to point out that it’s really all he can do, when they’re zipping by at forty-five miles an hour and we’re tooling along at twenty-five or even less if we’re going uphill.
Idiot drivers aside, the ride was actually kind of pleasant back on the main road—I haven’t been out in open air for more than a few minutes at a time for ages, so it’s a nice change of pace. Now that we’ve turned onto Six Bridges Road, I’m wishing this thing had a gel-padded seat like Mom’s bike. It’s becoming painfully clear that the name Six Bridges Road is truth-in-advertising only in the sense that there are Bridges, presumably Six by the time we get there. The Road part is deceptive—it’s more of a bumpy, rutted trail through the woods, dotted with the occasional puddle that could double as a kiddie pool.