Chapter Four - The Inquisition

Mr. Withers moved one of the pulpit chairs so it would be directly facing
the front pew.  They asked me to sit in that chair, and the rest of them sat
on the front pew facing me.  Rev. Vick acting as the master of ceremonies
asked me to begin by telling my story.  They would then comment and ask
questions.

My response: “I am Frank Wilkinson, age 65, and recently retired.  I live in
Greensboro.  I left my home and my lovely wife early this August morning
in the year of our Lord 2007.  I went to Cary, near Raleigh, looking for a
side road that I remembered when I was thumbing my way back and forth
to college over forty-five years ago.  When I finally found and drove down
the road, it brought me into Rockingham where it appears to be 1954.  I
didn’t plan or expect this.  I have no earthly idea how I was able to
accomplish this feat.  After driving around town twenty minutes or so, I
called my father, Mr. Michael Wilkinson, sitting there among you.  I do
have a strange feeling that I can’t stay here very long.  I feel that I must
soon return the same way I came or I may be trapped here in the mid-
twentieth century.  I’m not sure I can return.  I might just disintegrate if I
stay here too long.”

Rev. Vick responded:  “What do you want us to do?  Not that we believe
you or even come close to believing you.”

My response:  “I don’t want anything.  I just want to say hello and goodbye
to all of you.  I can tell you fantastic details about yourselves and your
futures.  Mr. Withers, do you remember the time I called you an S.O.B.
right over there in this very church, and your response was to tell my
father?  I later apologized to you.  Do you remember the time you took
your Sunday School class to a lake of some sort north of here on a fishing
trip?  Mr. Jurgens went with us.  We didn’t catch anything.  We would have
been out of luck for dinner, but Mr. Jurgens had the foresight to bring
some fish from the fish market with us.  He built a nice campfire and we
had a great lunch.”

Mr. Withers:  “All that’s true, but that don’t prove nothing.”

I continued:  “Mr. Wilkinson, I assume I should not call you father.  Do you
remember the car wreck we had at the Old Hundred railroad bridge?  You
were on one of your sales trips with Sunshine Biscuits.  I often went with
you on these trips even though that was against Company policy.  About
two miles from the bridge, an ambulance passed us heading to an accident
that had happened at the same bridge just moments before ours.  We
could see the other car overturned and down the embankment on the
right.  We hit an ice spot on the bridge, and you lost control.  We rolled
over three times as we went down the left side and crashed sideways into a
pine tree.  We both walked away with minor scratches.  We both expressed
relief as we climbed up the embankment that neither of us were hurt
except for a few minor scrapes.  I did loose a small watch in the mishap.  
Later the man at the Ford place returned it to me after they had pulled the
car into their repair shop here in Rockingham.  Some nice gentleman who
had stopped to help at the wreck site offered to take us into Rockingham
since he was going that way anyhow.  We went with him before you talked
to the Highway Patrolman.  The patrolman later came to our house to fill
out his accident report.  Should I continue?”

My father:  “No.  You sure do know a lot about us, but still that doesn’t
prove anything.”

Then Young Frank spoke:  “Sir, do I understand you to say you think you
went through some type of time warp to get to us here in this time period?”

I responded: “Yes, that is correct.  As I’ve been saying, I’m afraid I can’t
stay long.  I’ll have to leave sooner than I would like.  I can tell you a few
things about you.  You have seven little tiny warts on your left knee that
look like the Big Dipper.  By the way, they went away several years later.  
You’ve been sneaking around with the kid next-door smoking cigarettes.  
You always buy the Cavalier brand since you and your Dad saw a man
dressed up as a cavalier near the Strand Theatre about a year or so ago.  
Luckily, you decided you didn’t want to be a smoker by the time you are
fifteen.  You never inhaled anyhow.  When you worked as a carrier for the
Richmond County Journal, you would take an early-run copy that the
pressmen would throw away and sell it to the man at the Post Dispatch,
which operated in the back and basement of the Hough’s Hardware store.  
Do you want to hear more?”

Young Frank:  “No.  You obviously know a lot about us.  I was impressed
with your futuristic car, your unusual driver’s license in color with your
picture, and the funny money with the pictures to one side.  I do have
some questions for you.  First, did you ever have memories of this meeting
we are having right now?  That is, will I remember this meeting when I am
your age?”

My response: “No, I don’t have nor have I ever had any memories of this
meeting we are having today.”

Young Frank: “Albert Einstein’s Relativity Theories predict that time is not
the same for everyone particularly if one is traveling at a very fast speed
that approaches the speed of light.  That is, if I were to go on a long space
voyage, when I returned I would find that the friends I left behind had
aged differently from me.  I could be fifty years younger than they are.  
However, there is nothing in his Theories that would allow someone to
actually go back in time like you claim to have done.”

Rev. Vick speaking to Young Frank:  “Where did you find out all that stuff
about Einstein?”

Young Frank: “One of my teachers told me about it.”

Then I responded: “No, that’s not true.  You read it at the county library.  
They didn’t have a book like you wanted at the library, so the librarian, Ms.
Moore, got it from a friend of hers for you to read.  She made you read it at
the library since it was not a library book, and she didn’t want to risk any
damage to it.”

Young Frank:  “How did you know that?  Nobody except Ms. Moore and
me knew about that.”

My father speaking to Young Frank: “That’s not very nice of you to tell a lie
like that especially in front of Rev. Vick and your Sunday School teacher.  
We raised you better than that.”

Young Frank:  “What ever happened to the United Field Theory that
Einstein was working on?  You know… a single set of equations for both
gravity on a large scale and for the nuclear force on the very small atomic
level.  Einstein was an expert mostly on gravity and human-scale things.  
Others had developed Quantum Mechanics Theory for small atomic
particles.  Einstein wanted to combine all these forces into one unified
force.  

My response: “Einstein died without ever developing a United Field
Theory.  In the twenty-first century, some of the new ideas on this subject
involve more than the four dimensions (length, width, height, and time)
with which we are familiar.  I wish we had more time to discuss this.”

Rev. Vick:  “There’s nothing in the Bible about time travel; so, therefore,
there is no such thing.”          

Then I continued:  “I have to leave now.  I’m going to return the way I
came and just hope I can get back to the twenty-first century.  Just a few
parting thoughts:  One, Mr. Wilkinson, you are considering taking a
promotion and moving to Gastonia.  I suggest you not uproot your family
like that.  You should try to find a manager’s job with another insurance
company here in Rockingham.  Second, we finally won the Cold War.  The
Russians threw in the towel in the mid 1990’s.  Third, it turns out that
cigarette smoking does indeed cause cancer and heart trouble, too, for that
matter.  Fourth, the United States put an astronaut on the moon in 1969.  
By 2007, we have sent about fifty unmanned space vehicles all over the
solar system.  And last, they find a vaccine for polio by the end of this
decade.  Gentlemen, I have to leave.  I have a very short time left to return
to my time and place.”

Everyone was cordial as I shook hands with them and headed on my way.  
I drove down Hammer Hill Road and turned right on Lee Street.  When I
arrived at Five Points, I got onto Highway 74 West.  I pulled over until all
the other cars were gone; I didn’t want anyone one from this century
returning with me to my century.  I did go exactly the way I came in, and I
came out of the same road in Cary.  I then drove back into the modern-day
town of Cary and again pulled into the same old parking lot that used to
serve the old Winn-Dixie store.  I stretched and yawned a little.  I wanted
to rest a few minutes before I began my trip back to Greensboro.

I must have dozed off.  Then next thing I knew, a nice Cary Police Officer
was knocking on the outside of my window.  He said he was just checking
to see that I was okay.  He thought I was just sleeping, but I might have
been in trouble.  I thanked the Officer and started my trip back to
Greensboro.


                                                            Epilogue

The day had started with an overcast sky and mild temperatures, but now
the sun had come out and heated things up on this mid-August day.  I
decided to turn on my air conditioner for my return trip to Greensboro.  I
was certainly thinking about this time trip I had just made.  I couldn’t
justify to myself how I found the fork in the road on the fourth try, but not
on the first three attempts.  According to my gasoline indicator, there were
about eighteen gallons in my tank.  If I had really filled up with gas at
Covington’s Amoco in 1954, it would only be down five gallons by the time I
reached Siler City.  If the tank held over ten gallons, then the time trip was
just a dream.  If it held about five gallons, then Covington’s Amoco was
real.  Then I reached in my pocket and took out the $17.80 I had from the
change they had given me in Rockingham.  There were two dollars and a
nickel for gas, a nickel for parking, and a dime for the phone call.  That’s
surely real.  These old coins will go well in my nephew’s coin collection.  
That doesn’t prove my story to others, but it does to me.  One could buy
coins like these from a coin collector.

When I got to Siler City, the gas tank could only hold a little more than five
and one half gallons.  There is no way I could have driven all that way on
such little gasoline.  Then I remembered my video camera in the trunk.  I
pulled away from the gasoline pumps and parked near the store building.  
When I got my video camera, it was dead.  It seemed to be in good shape
when I packed it in the trunk at the old home place.  Maybe there was an
electrical disturbance as I came back through the time warp.  No, if that
were true, my camera wouldn’t have worked after I went through the time
warp on the way into Rockingham.  Also, all the electronics on my car were
in perfect working order.  I sure hope I can find a way to retrieve those
video pictures.  No one would believe me anyhow.