The Sapphire Brooch by Katherine Logan (reading eggs books .TXT) 📗

“It puts me to sleep. I want to be awake in the event I’m crushed beneath a pile of metal and glass,” Braham said without humor. The scenery flying by made him dizzy. He needed another distraction. He opened what Jack had referred to as the glove compartment and removed the manual he had mentioned earlier.

Twenty minutes later Braham closed the book and put it back.

“A bit overwhelming,” Jack said.

Braham closed the compartment door. “I know all the parts now, but I’m not sure, if I disassembled the vehicle, whether I could put it back together again.”

Jack drew in his eyebrows, looking skeptical. “Twenty minutes and you know all the parts?”

Braham shrugged at Jack’s disbelief. “I have a good memory.”

Jack pointed to the roof. “What’s this called?”

“Full size panoramic roof.”

He pointed to Braham’s head restraint. “And this?”

Braham fired right back with the correct answer.

Jack pointed to the multimedia instrument panel. “And this?”

“Hard disk navigation system, Bluetooth phone connection, eight-inch touch-screen, MP3 compatible audio disk.”

Jack was slack-jawed. “How—”

“I told ye. I have a good memory.” God forbid, if Charlotte’s brooch didn’t work the way Kit’s did and he was forced to remain in the future, all he had to do was observe, read, and listen. If he did, he’d quickly learn all he needed to know about life in the twenty-first century.

“That’s not a good memory,” Jack said. “That’s an eidetic memory. Do you retain everything you read?”

“Shakespeare, Plato, legal treatises, I retain after one reading. A technical or ordinance manual similar to the Land Rover’s I would read again to confirm my knowledge.”

Jack gave him an incredulous glare. “Only one person has been tested and proven to have long-term eidetic memory. I have an excellent memory, but I can’t do what you do. Scientists would have an orgasm studying a time traveler with an eidetic memory.”

Braham turned to look out the window, managing a grim smile. “I won’t be here long enough to be studied.”

Jack turned onto an open stretch of country road. “We’re about ten minutes from the plantation.”

“Beautiful country,” Braham said. “I see the telegraph is still widely used. There are poles on every road.”

“The poles actually hold lines for power and communication, not telegraph. The telegraph is mainly used these days for text telephone machines operated by the deaf.”

A list of questions concerning the use of the telegraph immediately came to mind, but when he smelled brackish water and fish, it reminded him he was hungry, and he shoved the questions out of the way. “We must be close to the river.”

Jack pointed off into the distance. “The James River is about a half mile away. The house backs up to the river. Beautiful view. I think you’ll appreciate it after a week in the hospital.”

Jack turned off the road onto a tree-lined drive and drove past a handful of brick outbuildings leading to a three-story Georgian white-brick manse with double-sided porticos, looking like an elegant fortress.

“Welcome to Mallory Plantation,” Jack said. “My ancestors founded the place a few years after the settlers arrived in Jamestown in 1607. Charlotte and I are the tenth generation to live here.” He pulled to the front of the house, cut the engine, and pointed toward the residence. “Flemish bond brick, dormers, even a three-foot welcoming pineapple on the peak of the roof.”

“How’d it survive the war?”

“The pineapple? I guess no one was hungry for fruit?”

Braham frowned, once again stymied by the man’s unusual sense of humor.

Jack rested his arm on the back of his seat and turned to face Braham. “If you posed your question to a resident of New York, they’d assume you were asking about the Revolutionary War. But if you posed the question to a person from the south, like me, I’d say, ‘You mean the War of Northern Aggression?’”

Braham tensed, preparing for the same arguments he’d listened to for the last three years. “New Yorkers are fighting in the rebellion, too.”

“Granted. But the south never—” Jack stopped and took a deliberate breath. “Never mind. We don’t need to have this discussion. The short answer to your question is the house sits way back off the main road. Soldiers making the trek in here would have to have come specifically to burn it down. They never did.”

“Charlotte said Sheridan threatened.”

“Obviously he never carried out the threat. Come on. I have orders to feed you lunch, guide you on a short tour if you’re up for one, then make sure you rest.”

“Don’t ye have a mystery to write?”

“I’ve got some ideas I’m tossing around for a new novel, but nothing has grabbed me so far. Got any suggestions?”

Braham limped toward the house, grimacing from the pain in his abdomen. “How about a time-traveling doctor and a beat-up old soldier? An old, decrepit soldier.” He gingerly climbed five stone steps, cursing under his breath. He reached the portico, latched onto one of the support columns, and assessed the property.

A light breeze ruffled his hair. He breathed deeply, inhaling the crisp scent of autumn. A large oak tree standing between the house and river had to be three hundred years old. Its yellow and orange leaves swayed in the wind and rained down in a sudden gust of cool air. Falling leaves cascaded into one another as they rustled against piles accumulating on the ground. Squirrels bounced and darted in all directions, searching for acorns.

Jack bounded up the stairs behind Braham.

Braham searched the gray-tinted sky. The clouds were moving from the west. “Charlotte said she was driving out here tonight? It’s going to storm. She should stay in Richmond.”

“Weather never stopped her from doing anything she had a mind to do.”

“She shouldn’t be out by herself. It’s dangerous. What if her conveyance breaks down?”

“She’ll call Triple A.” Jack put his arm across Braham’s shoulders and led him toward the front door. “Let’s get you settled. If you’re not tucked in when she arrives, I’ll lose our bet, and she’ll win a thousand shares of my Apple stock.”

If Braham