Memoirs of a Time Traveler by Doug Molitor

Author:Doug Molitor
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Third Street Press

17

The State House, 1776 A.D.

In the dark gray flickering, the flames vanished. The Hall stayed the same, but around it I saw the steampunk Philadelphia deconstructed from industrial city to agricultural-era town, as a series of trees retracted limbs, and shrank into the ground, abruptly replaced by huge versions that likewise dwindled into saplings, then vanished into the earth. After four or five of these cycles, we returned to the full-color world.

It was sunny and bright, not terribly hot yet. It felt around 75 degrees Fahrenheit…a pleasant late morning for the Atlantic seaboard in July. The trees were generally smaller than they had been in 1976. Most of the big brick buildings of the alternate 1976 had vanished, along with the railroad bridge, the tracks, and the paved streets. Independence Hall, known in the Colonial era as the Pennsylvania State House, was intact. In fact, it was in fairly good shape, being only thirty years old.

The town was not quite silent: Cocks crowed, cattle lowed, insects buzzed, a dog barked here and there, but compared to my automobile-humming West L.A. neighborhood, it was as quiet as a tomb.

A farmer was leading his cow down the road. He glanced back at us, and nearly got trampled by the animal. He hurried on, with many an anxious backward glance.

“At least this looks like 1776,” I observed. “But we’re not exactly dressed for it.”

“I won’t be a minute,” winked Ariyl. Then she touched her shoulder and murmured, “Philadelphia, 1776 A.D., something casual.”

In a second, Ariyl’s jacket morphed into a shawl, her hairband into a bonnet, her top and bellbottoms into longer, homespun Colonial clothes. She still looked fairly spectacular, but no longer anachronous.

I looked down at my own modern (and bloodstained) shirt, pants and shoes. “Great. Now it’s just me who looks like a freak.”

“Yeah,” said Ariyl, plainly not impressed with the attire of her escort. “Wait a sec.” Before I could object, she sprinted around the back of the State House. Oh, no, I thought to myself. I rushed to the window on the left side—the room where the Continental Congress met—with fingers crossed that there were no witnesses around. Luckily, the room was deserted. Somewhere within, I could hear Ariyl breaking down a door.

I was quite a nut on American history when I was a kid, and on my bedroom wall I’d hung a copy of the famous John Trumbull painting of the presentation of the Declaration. I was disappointed to see now that Trumbull, who began painting the scene a decade after it happened, had gotten the room wrong. Instead of Trumbull’s restrained white walls and mounted flags, the 1776 room was tarted up with paneling and faux Roman columns.

Ariyl came back to my side, holding a brown frock coat and a tricorn hat. She started helping me into the coat.

“Ariyl, where’d you get these?”

“Jeez, quit bitching. It nearly fits. And the color really sets off your eyes.”

“Don’t you get it?” I protested. “Stealing even this coat could change history!”

“I told you about the inertia thing.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.