Saving An Important Life

"As the clock approached the appointed hour, my attention became more and more focused on Carrell, and not on the subject at hand. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Finally, at the exact time of the “previous” assassination … nothing happened."

[Believe it or not, this story is a dream I had last night. I thought I should write it down. Don’t ask me where the Secret Service was or why I dreamed a twist on the “save Lincoln” theme!.

The year is 2011 and we are being given a second chance. We know that Professor Carrell had shot and killed President Abraham Lincoln at our University seminar this afternoon. This time we will have a chance to stop him.

About six of the twenty attendees, including me, have been made aware that we are reliving this day a second time for the sole purpose of saving Lincoln.

None of us understands the science by which we will have the chance to live this day again, but we have been given some guidelines: we can’t stop either Lincoln or Carrell from attending the meeting, nor can we cancel it. We cannot line the room with police. In fact, we can’t do anything to anyone physically like tying down Carrell or giving Lincoln a bullet-proof suit of armor. I guess something about altering the timeline or whatever - did not make sense to me, since just saving Lincoln should be a major alteration of the timeline anyway. Ours was not to reason why, ours was but to do or die.

But with even those restrictions, that left plenty of leeway to prevent the assassination from happening a second time. We knew the exact time of the gunshot. We knew where Carrell had found the gun and could make sure it was not there.

The attendees had been researching a matter of great national interest and were scheduled to discuss it seminar-fashion with the President this afternoon. The conference was to take place in our University library, a large room that takes up much of the fifth floor. Although there were many bookshelves lining the walls, we had rearranged the area so that about 20 classroom-type desks fit into an irregular pattern facing each other in the middle. On one side were the elevators and on the far side, about 20 feet behind the furthest desks, was a large glass window that overlooked the university square. Outside it was a warm day and the grass on the square shone a bright green. The peace and quiet surrounding the statue in the middle of the square belied my anxiety.

From the perspective of the elevator, I was to sit on the left side of the arrangement, and Carrell would be across the way to my upper right. Lincoln would sit all the way to my left, among the seats nearest the window and facing the far elevators. Carrell did not have a great shot at Lincoln from where he sat – the President was about twenty-five feet to Carrell’s right, and one of the bookshelves would partially block his line of sight.

All morning we had intense, impromptu discussions considering our options. The decision was made that talking to Lincoln would be counterproductive, but a probing chat with Carrell – without giving away too much - might serve to dissuade any hidden motives and ensure that he was in a good mood before the meeting. I would remain seated across from Carrell, but Professor Martin and one of the others would be seated on either side of the would-be killer, ready to act if anything dangerous should occur.

Martin, much more of a psychologist than I, was the one designated to talk with Carrell. Their offhand chat, about an hour before the scheduled meeting, had gone as planned. Nothing. No motive, just good old Carrell as we had always known him. The tall professor indeed seemed to be in a good mood, and Martin could detect nothing out of the ordinary, no matter what related subject he brought up.

We checked the room again. We had no scanning equipment, but there was no weapon where it had been the first time. Everything seemed in place.

I was extremely nervous. I tried to run through as many possible scenarios in my mind, working out what I would do in each case. Anything or nothing might happen. Obviously if Carrell did anything suspicious during the meeting, we would overreact. Better safe than sorry. I considered what actions might be available – we could physically restrain Carrell, block access to Lincoln, change the previous timeline in some way. However, I did not get the sense that we would inevitably succeed nor that we were doomed to failure, like in so many “save Lincoln” stories. This uncertainty made the wait even more nerve-wracking, and I was quite uncomfortable as the meeting time approached.

Finally it was time. Our formal discussion began like any other important briefing. However, the discussions and presentations were strained, as the artificiality of what we were discussing hung over me like a dream you could not wait to end. The content no longer mattered – the only thing that did was what Carrell would do and how we would react when the time came.

As the clock approached the appointed hour, my attention became more and more focused on Carrell, and not on the subject at hand. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Finally, at the exact time of the “previous” assassination … nothing happened.

I had just begun to feel much better, when Carrell suddenly stood up, the force of his movement sending his chair over backward. There was a crazed look in his eye – it seemed as though he was having some type of seizure. Before Martin or the others could stop him, Carrell whirled around and grabbed a shoebox-looking container on one of the high bookshelves behind him. As the others rushed toward him, he flipped open the box and pulled out – a handgun!

As planned, however, we were not going to let Carrell get an easy shot. Before the lanky professor could pivot to face Lincoln, the others were upon him. A struggle broke out but, by that point, the other attendees had all jumped up to help or run, and in the confusion my line of sight was blocked.

A gunshot fired.

I had a horrible feeling and spun toward Lincoln, who was still seated, unbelievably calm, at his small desk. Seemingly no harm had come to the great man. I rushed to him and asked if he was all right. In that same calm manner he assured me that he was fine. After briefly confirming that this was so, I went over to where the skirmish had occurred.

Apparently the gun had gone off without harming anyone. Thank goodness. Carrell was being held on the floor, face up, by Martin and the others. The prostrate figure seemed quite out of his mind, but other than that no great harm seemed to be done. A few took the nearby elevator to go for help.

For the second time I felt relief coming to me – this time hopefully for good. Whatever had come over Carrell would be addressed and the President had been saved.

Lincoln approached and thanked the saviors as he headed for the elevator.

Then, in a twinkling of an eye, the President grabbed the gun and, to my eternal astonishment, shot me point blank in the chest!

In agony I crumpled and heard Lincoln calmly tell my colleagues:

“It had to be done. He knew too much. He was an enemy of the state.”

The last thing I thought before I lost consciousness was that saving Lincoln had killed me.