"Benevolent, malevolent, what does it matter?" Houdini was saying, making frustrated gestures with his hands. "I just want to know how it was done."

"How what was done?" asked Jack.

"We made the mistake of showing Harry the Serendipity Box," said Twain, "and of course, he opened it straightaway."

"What happened?"

"It vanished," said Doyle. "Disappeared into thin air. He's been trying to suss out what happened. I keep telling him it was the faeries who took it."

"Oh, spare me," said Houdini. "They'd have returned it by now if they had."

A deep compulsion for finding things out was a trait shared by the Caretakers and members of the Society, and it had served them all well in various circumstances-but in none of them was the compulsion as deeply rooted as it was in Harry Houdini. He simply could not tolerate not knowing how a trick was done-even a trick involving time and space.

"All tricks involve time and space," Houdini huffed. "Any decent illusion is nothing but the manipulation of the viewer's perceptions. That's it, and that's all."

"What do you think, Bert?" John asked as they moved from the reception hall into the banquet room, where the rest of the Caretakers and their guests were waiting.

"I think," said Bert as he and Verne opened the great double doors, "that it gave him exactly what he needed. It's just going to take him a while to realize it."

Two of the special guests at Tamerlane House were among those the companions most wanted to see: Laura Glue, the Lost Girl who had grown up to become the leader of the flying Valkyries; and the badger Fred, who was Charles's apprentice Caretaker. Both completely ignored decorum and bounded across the table the minute they saw their friends.

"Hello there, Laura dear!" Jack exclaimed as the girl threw herself into his arms and hugged him tightly.

"That's Laura Glue," she chided gently. "I'm so happy to see you all!"

Fred was only slightly less reserved and couldn't stop himself from hugging Charles before he stepped back to offer a more dignified handshake.

"Good to see you, Scowler Charles," he said, still beaming. "I've kept my watch in good order."

"I have no doubt," Charles said, beaming. "And how are your father and grandfather?"

"Tummeler is well, but not fit to travel out of Paralon," replied Fred. "As for Uncas, he and Don Quixote are off on some secret mission for the Prime Caretaker, or else you know they wouldn't have missed you."

"I know it," Charles said as he led them to their seats. "You're a good fellow, Fred."

"Where's Archie?" John asked Rose as they sat at the table. "I would have expected he'd be here too."

"He usually is," Rose answered, "but he hates it when all the Caretakers are present for a big party, so he stays in my attic. He says the proportion of authors to scientists fills the room with the stench of arrogance."

"From which side?"

"He never really clarified that," said Rose, "but then again, I'm not sure it matters."

The celebration was in full swing. All of the Caretakers Emeritis had come out of their portraits for the party-including, John noted, one who had gone renegade while still a Caretaker.

"So," he said to Bert, "you decided to let Lord Byron out, did you?"

"Yes," Bert said, sighing. "After the truce with the Society, we couldn't exactly treat him like a traitor any longer, so we took a vote. He managed to squeak through, so he's here. But on probation," he added. "Mary and Percy keep threatening to set him on fire again."

True to form, the contentious friends were already bickering when John, Rose, and Bert sat down across from them. "We haven't met," he said, offering his hand. "I'm John."

"George Gordon, Lord Byron," the Caretaker-on-probation said amiably. "A pleasure, I'm sure."

"Your attire is atrocious, George," sniffed Percy Shelley. "Also, you smell of smoke."

"Brilliant deduction, Watson," Byron shot back.

"Manners," said Doyle, who had taken a seat next to Bert. "At least I'm still in print. No need to show your temper."

Byron scowled at the Detective. "But," he continued, undeterred, "might it not be because one of my closest friends, someone with whom I have shared-"

"Mind the young ladies," said Houdini. Rose giggled, and to everyone's surprise, Byron reddened.

"-practically everything," he ad libbed, "tried to murder me by burning my portrait? Isn't that a good reason to be a bit testy?"

"There'll be no arguments here today," Verne said, holding up a glass. "Today we mourn old friends who are lost and celebrate the victory that was won at dearest cost. But above all, we're here to celebrate the new freedom we have as Caretakers. ..."

Burton cleared his throat loudly at this, which got a scowl from Twain.

"The freedom," Verne went on, "to begin the process we have hoped for, been divided over, and thought might never be a reality-the reunification of the Archipelago and the Summer Country. Today is, as Jack named it, truly our Day of Independence."

To this, all the celebrants raised their glasses and let out a resounding cheer.

"Independence Day?" Charles whispered to John.

"Jack's way of tweaking our American counterparts," John answered. "I don't think he intended for it to stick. Did you know he was going to say all that?" he whispered to Jack.

"Not exactly," said Jack. "It's certainly a long-term goal for the New Society."

"Which you are in charge of at Cambridge," Charles whispered. "No pressure, Jack."

During dessert, which Rose had designed herself with the aid of the Feast Beasts and Alexandre Dumas, who was a surprisingly good cook, another guest dropped in, much to the relief of John, Jack, and Charles.

"So sorry I'm late!" Hank Morgan exclaimed as he strolled in and grabbed a sandwich from one of the trays. "It seems I've missed dinner, but the dessert looks exceptionally good."

"They're called beignets," Rose said proudly. "They're a sort of French doughnut, except for these, we've added a special touch-each one you eat will suddenly be filled with something you love. Something delicious. Alex and I made the beignets, and the Feast Beasts arranged the filling."

"Don't mind if I do," said Hank, taking one from the overflowing tray. He bit into it. "Mmm," he said with real admiration. "Hazelnut."

"Mine's chocolate cream," said Charles. "Well done, Rose!"

"Mine's plain," said Fred, "but I like 'em plain."

"Eww," said Byron. "Is this spinach?"

"You must have gotten a faulty one," Dumas said, winking at Mary. "Try another."

"This is ...," said Byron, making a face. "Is this wax?"

"A shame," said Dumas. "Ours are delicious."

"Jules," Morgan said, stepping to the door. "A word, if I may?"

"Of course," Verne said with a glance at Bert and Twain. "We'll be back shortly. Carry on with the party!"

When the dinner had concluded, the Caretakers and their guests retired to one of the great libraries of Tamerlane House to have a smoke, drink brandy, and generally catch up on the affairs of the two worlds. Fred, Rose, and Laura Glue decided to forgo the cigars, pipes, and brandy in favor of aged Vernor's Ginger Ale and some warm Mexican pastries.

The library was shaped like a star, with fireplaces at the center and at each point. This allowed for an expansive meeting space that at the same time offered the opportunity for smaller groups to congregate.

For the first time, John realized that one of the Caretakers had not been present, either to greet them at the door, or at the banquet. "Samuel," he said, pulling Twain aside, "Poe hasn't come down yet. I know he rarely does, but for today I thought ... Is everything all right?"

"We're trying to discover that," Twain answered ominously. "At any rate, we'll discuss it with you when Jules returns."

"I don't remember being in this library before," said Jack as he scanned the walls. "Of course, the last time I was here, we were rather preoccupied."

"This is the Library of Lost Books," Twain said proudly. "I've assembled much of it myself."

"What kind of books are lost books?" asked Jack. "If they're lost, who would know about them at all?"

"Ah," said Twain, "so you understand the challenge I had. Originally this was a repository of our own lost or unfinished works. Charles finished Edwin Drood, and I wrote a sequel to A Connecticut Yankee, among others, but mostly it contains books that were mentioned only once, in some obscure text, and never again."

He pointed with his cane at a leather-bound book just above their heads. "That one, there? It's a defense of Christianity written by Origen, who wrote it as a rebuttal to an anti-Christian Platonist named Celsus."

"Ah," Jack said, looking at Origen's book. "A kindred spirit."

"Don't relate to him too closely," said Twain. "He also grossly misinterpreted a verse in the Gospel of Saint Matthew and castrated himself. It was a terrible way for him to learn about metaphor and allegory."

"I'll keep that in mind," said Jack.

After an hour had passed, Verne came into the library still deep in discussion with Morgan.

"It's nice to see Hank in the flesh," Charles whispered to John, "and still younger than us."

"That's not so hard to do these days," John whispered back as Verne and Morgan approached them.

"Sorry I was late," Morgan said again. "It couldn't be avoided, I'm afraid. There's been a lot to do to get ready for your return."

"If we hadn't had obligations and family to return to," said John, "we might just as well have stayed to help you out with things here, then gone back to our proper time later."

"No," said Verne. "You couldn't have."

"Why not?" asked John.

As he spoke, Hawthorne and Fred came back into the library with trays of fruit that they set on the table.

"Because you are still alive, in what we have come to call your, ah, 'Prime Time,'" said Verne. He took an apple from one of the trays and began to munch on it as he explained further.

"You have an allotted span within which you are meant to achieve certain things," he said, sitting. "An allotted lifetime, if you will. You've already experienced how dangerous and difficult it is to go skipping around in time-and those occasions have been of brief duration. If you were gone for a more extended time, it would be even more so."

"The difficult part probably has to do with explaining one's whereabouts to the wife," said Hawthorne.

"Actually, I was thinking that's the dangerous part," said John. "But why couldn't we have stayed, especially if we could return to whenever we wanted, ah, whenever we wanted?"

"Because," said Verne, "you'd have started to burn more quickly through the years of your own Prime Time. And you can't afford to spare even one."

"If we can't, how is it that you can?"

"Easy," Verne replied as he began to devour the apple's core. "We're already dead. We have no more obligations to our natural span, and can therefore operate outside the bounds of Prime Time.

"Come with me," he went on as he grabbed a pear from the tray. "I want to show you something."

"For a professed dead man," Charles said as the companions followed the Prime Caretaker out of the library, "he certainly can put away the fruit."

"You'd be surprised," said Burton, "how much sweeter it tastes when you're living on borrowed time."

Verne led them all into the center of Tamerlane House, to a room that stood under the tallest of the minarets. In the center of the room stood a massive clock of stone, wood, and silver. It reached high into the room, standing some four stories taller than the ground floor, and it fell away below their feet into a vastly deep subbasement.

"How far down does it go?" John asked, leaning over the balustrade. "I can't see the bottom."

"We don't keep the lower floors lit, unless the clock needs maintenance," said Verne, "but it goes down some dozen stories. The house was built around it, in fact."

"Poe calls it the Intuitive Clock," said Bert, "although Jules added his own unique touch to it." He pointed at a plate that had been mounted on the clock at eye level. It read: The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit,

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,

Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.

-Omar Khayyam