The Best of Intentions
The mysterious, foreign-looking man in the dark suit keenly eyed the group of Harvard students that had walked into the coffee shop and taken up residence at the large corner table. As was their habit, the young people met in this gathering place every Friday night after work or after an evening of studying for a cup of cappuccino, a plate of Lucia's homemade biscotti and a friendly debate on politics, religion or any other subject one of them cared to introduce.
On this particular occasion, their conversation began with a discussion on what each considered the best movie set in Boston. Robin Mott immediately nominated Good Willing Hunting, in part because Matt Damon and Ben Affleck were two of her favorite actors.
"No way," Dexter Farnham argued. "I'd have to say it was Mystic River. Shawn Penn and Tim Robbins were terrific in that film."
Dave Williams, the group's maverick, insisted The Boondock Saints, both one and two, deserved the honor. He then pretentiously quoted the young Irish vigilantes' prayer, the Trinitarian formula, in Latin: "In nomeni patri et fili et spiritus sancti."
On the other hand, Lauren Palmer insisted The Departed was by far the best.
"Come on, guys. It won the Academy Award for Best Picture of the year. It had a stellar cast; we're talking Jack Nicholson, Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Martin Sheen, and Alec Baldwin, not to mention Mark Wahlberg's performance as Sgt. Dignam. And it won Martin Scorsese an Oscar for best director."
"Don't forget the soundtrack includes the Dropkick Murphys' 'I'm Shipping up to Boston,'" Dave added.
Once the students had exhausted that subject, Robin asked, "Did you see on the news that that murderer in Texas got the death sentence?"
That controversial subject brought up a host of differing opinions on capital punishment. The students, as a group, seemed to be equally divided between those who favored the old "eye for an eye" school of thought and those who supported the more liberal "it's inhumane to kill for any reason" philosophy.
"I can't believe it! This is the twenty-first century, and our society still condones executions. I think it's downright barbaric!" Lauren cried as she reached for another slice of still-warm biscotti. "Thank God Massachusetts abolished capital punishment in 1984."
Lauren planned to study law and hoped to someday champion the cause of civil liberty and defend the rights of persecuted minorities and the downtrodden poor. Dexter, a pre-med student, stared at her with mild contempt.
"If you want to talk about barbarism," he said, "why don't we discuss how that animal bashed in the heads of those three old ladies after he robbed them of their social security checks."
"Come on, Dex," Lauren countered. "I know what that man did was reprehensible, but I don't feel that the government has the right to play God. Taking a life is morally wrong, whether a criminal does it or it's sanctioned by the state."
"So, what is to be done with all these violent criminals then?" Robin asked. "Are we to lock them up and throw away the key? Or do you propose we let them back out to kill again?"
"I believe in rehabilitation. The government ought to concentrate less on punishing criminals and more on educating them and giving them the tools to become assets to society."
"Right!" Dexter laughed. "And maybe one day pigs will fly, or better yet, all the lawyers in the world will suddenly care more about justice and morality than about lining their pockets."
Lauren didn't find his joke at all amusing, and retaliated by saying, "That will be about the same time that doctors start treating their patients' illnesses regardless of their ability to pay their bills."
"Touché," Dexter said, raising his coffee cup in a mock toast. "All kidding aside though, do you honestly believe that viscious sociopaths can be rehabilitated?"
"Yes. I don't believe in the existence of evil. I think all people are capable of doing good if given the opportunity. I'm sure that with the proper therapy, a great many criminals can lead normal, productive lives."
"I don't agree," Dexter declared emphatically. "If history has taught us nothing, it has at least shown us just how evil men can be."
The other students—not to mention the foreign-looking man with the dark suit sitting at a nearby table—were closely following the argument between Lauren and Dexter, who seemed to represent polar opposite views.
"You make it sound as though mankind is inherently evil. I don't agree. Just look at all the great men and women in history who have made valuable contributions to humanity: Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. The list goes on and on."
Dexter looked at her coolly, and responded, "Joseph Stalin, Charlie Starkweather, Ted Bundy, Pol Pot, Idi Amin ...."
"You can't condemn the entire human race because of a few madmen."
"I don't want to condemn everyone," Dexter shouted angrily. "I agree there are good people in the world. I'm only saying that there are also those who, for the protection of innocent men, women and children, deserve to die."
Robin handed Dexter a fresh cup of cappuccino and suggested, "Why don't we change the subject? We've all been friends since freshman year, and I'd like to see us remain that way."
Dexter hung his head and said sheepishly, "I guess I did get a little hot under the collar. I'm sorry if I said anything that might have offended you, Lauren."
"That's all right. I could never be upset by a sweetheart like you. Besides, you're entitled to your opinion." Then she added with a playful wink of her eye, "Even if it is wrong!"
As the night wore on, the conversation took a lighter turn, and there was a good deal more laughter. They were only college students, after all, and were not yet ready to take on the problems of the world. Then, one by one, the young people at the table left the coffee house and returned to their homes or dormitories. Finally, only Dexter and Robin remained.
"You don't think I was too hard on Lauren tonight, do you?" Dexter asked.
"Don't be silly. It was just a harmless difference of opinion between friends. Besides, if she persists in going through life wearing those rose-colored glasses, she's bound to run up against greater opposition than you."
"I suppose you're right. In a way, though, I envy her for having that optimistic outlook. I wish I could always see the good side of people and situations the way she does. Sometimes I fear I'm becoming too cynical."
"I certainly don't envy her. That girl is in for one rude awakening, Dex, especially if she goes into criminal law as she plans to do. She's going to see just how noble her fellow man can be!"
So saying, Robin grabbed the handbag beneath her chair and added a twenty to the pile of bills on the table.
"Are you leaving already?" Dexter asked with disappointment.
"Yeah. I have to get up early tomorrow. It's my mother's birthday, and I'm going to drive home and visit her."
"It must be nice to have a family," Dexter said, more to himself than to his companion.
Robin then remembered that Dexter was an orphan with no siblings. Having come from a large family, she couldn't imagine how it felt to grow up without parents, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles and cousins.
"Sometimes it is," she admitted truthfully, "but there are also times when it can be a real hassle. Well, I gotta go. Have a good weekend. I'll see you in class on Monday."
After Robin left, Dexter pulled a paperback book out of his backpack and started to read while he finished his third cappuccino. The foreign-looking man in the dark suit, who had overheard every word spoken at the corner table, got up and approached him.
"Mind if I join you?" he asked in a pronounced but indistinguishable accent.
Dexter looked up and replied, "Not at all. Have we met before?"
"No. My name is Luther Murdock," the man said, shaking hands with the young student. "I couldn't help overhearing your earlier conversation with your group of friends, and I'd like to discuss something with you."
"What conversation is that?"
"The one about your believing certain people deserve to die."
Apprehension struck Dexter like a punch in the stomach. He rose unsteadily to his feet, mumbling, "It was nice meeting you, Mr. Murdock, but I really have to be going."
"Relax, Dexter. I'm not about to offer you a contract to hit someone," he laughed. "I only want to have a philosophical conversation."
Dexter looked closely at Luther Murdock and saw an elderly, soft-spoken and apparently well-mannered gentleman who more closely resembled an English professor than a Mafia don. Hastily judging the man to be of sound mind and innocent intentions, Dexter sat down again.
"So, what exactly did you want to talk about, sir?"
"First, I would like to say that I am in complete agreement with you. There are some people who, for the sake of the rest of humanity, should not be allowed to live—men such as the esteemed Führer, for instance."
"I think that's one idea most civilized people would agree with," Dexter concurred. "Adolf Hitler did the world a favor when he took his own life."
"Yes," Murdock said contemptuously, "so like him to take the coward's way out."
"Dead is dead, be it suicide or a death sentence handed down at Nuremberg."
"True. But it is the time of death rather than the method that is all-important in his case."
"I'm afraid I don't follow you, Mr. Murdock."
"To use an old cliché, Hitler killing himself after the fall of the Third Reich was like shutting the barn door after the horses escaped."
"I'm sure the Allies would have loved to have killed him and ended the war sooner, but they had their work cut out for them."
"You could hardly expect anyone to get to the Führer once he'd already come into power, as Stauffenburg discovered after his failed attempt to assassinate Hitler in the Wolf's Lair. No, Dexter. The best thing would be to kill him before he became a Nazi."
"That's a novel idea in justice. Kill the criminal before he commits a crime." Dexter chuckled at the ludicrous suggestion.
"I'm glad you find me so amusing."
"I apologize, Mr. Murdock. I didn't mean to laugh."
"Young man, I have a question to put to you. Suppose you could journey back in time to say, the early 1920s. You and Adolf Hitler are alone in a room. You have got a gun, but Hitler is unarmed and completely at your mercy. Knowing what you do about his military exploits and the atrocities committed at the concentration camps, would you kill him?"
"But if it's the early 1920s, then those things hadn't happened yet, so I'd be killing an innocent man."
"Not true! Let's hypothesize for a minute. Suppose Hitler hadn't killed himself but had escaped to Argentina or some other country and was later discovered, say, sometime in the early 1970s. He's brought to trial and convicted in 1975, and after years of legal battles and international diplomacy, he is executed in 1988."
"But he would still have been guilty of committing the crimes, not so if he were killed in the 1920s," Dexter persisted.
"Don't you understand? You would be dispensing judgment this year for the crimes he committed more than half a century before, although the execution would take place in the past. Not only would you be dispensing justice, you just might save the lives of millions of people."
"And by saving their lives, I absolve Hitler of their deaths, and I become a murderer."
Dexter was by now enjoying the myriad possibilities in Luther Murdock's hypothetical proposition.
"Murderer? No. The way I see it, young man, you'd be a saint and a savior if you rid the world of that monster."
"I guess I would."
The legal ramifications and scientific logistics aside, the question boiled down to being one of simple mathematics: the life of one sadistic madman pitted against the lives of between fifty and eighty million civilians and military personnel.
Dexter finished his fourth cappuccino, put down the cup and said, "With all the caffeine I've consumed this evening, I may be awake for the next three weeks."
"You're a young man; you can afford to lose a night of sleep."
"Thank God tomorrow is Saturday; I can sleep late."
He then rose from his chair and offered his hand to Luther Murdock.
"It was nice to meet you, sir. I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation. Tell me, you wouldn't by any chance write science fiction for a living, would you?"
"No, I'm not a writer; I'm a scientist. My comments were not exactly idle chatter," Murdock explained. "I wanted to see if you would be susceptible to my idea before I made the actual offer."
"And what offer is that, Mr. Murdock?"
Perhaps the man wasn't quite as harmless as Dexter had hoped.
"I propose to send you back in time, and while you're there, you will kill Adolf Hitler."
Dexter was speechless and could only stare openmouthed at the older man.
"I'm quite sane, Mr. Farnham—just in case you're wondering."
Murdock handed Dexter a manila file folder. Inside were the scientist's impressive credentials. Schooled at M.I.T., he often served as a consultant to NASA, Bell Labs, Microsoft and countless other high-tech organizations and government agencies.
"Even if such a feat were possible ...?"
"Oh, it's possible, I assure you. I have spent years perfecting a way for man to move through time as well as space."
"Why me?"
Murdock shrugged his shoulders.
"I consulted with a psychologist who put together a profile for the type of person who could be counted on to do the job. Then I fed his data into a computer. I came up with several candidates, but you are the only one who passed my test."
"I don't know what to say."
"I don't need an answer right now. I want you to give it serious consideration."
Murdock reached into his pocket and took out a business card.
"Here's my number. Call me when you've made up your mind."
* * *
When he was five years old, Dexter lost his father to cancer, only to lose his mother to the same disease three years later. He had decided then to become a doctor and dedicate himself to saving lives. Now he was faced with a decision that would change not only his life but also the past and possibly the future of the entire world. If he accepted Murdock's offer, he could save more lives than any doctor in history.
But at what price? he wondered.
Just as in Newton's physical world where every action had an equal and opposite reaction so, too, do man's deeds have their consequences.
Uncertain of what he should do, Dexter spent the weekend in the college library, thumbing through books on the rise of Adolf Hitler, the atrocities committed by the Third Reich and the victims of the Holocaust. It was the photograph of a dark-eyed young girl named Anne Frank, a child whose life was tragically brought to an end in a concentration camp in Belsen, that finally convinced Dexter of his course of action. He had read Anne Frank's diary when he was in middle school and remembered all too well the account of her living in hiding in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. He had experienced the fear and horror of discovery vicariously through her writings. And to think she was but one of Hitler's many victims!
* * *
The phone rang three times before the scientist picked it up.
"Hello, Mr. Murdock. This is Dexter Farnham."
"Ah, yes, Dexter. Have you come to a decision yet?"
"Yes, I have. When do I go?"
"Whenever you want to, my boy. But, first, why don't you come over to my laboratory? I'd like to show you how the apparatus works."
Dexter had imagined a chair-like vehicle similar to the one used by Rod Taylor to travel to the time of the Morlocks in the original film adaptation of H.G. Wells' The Time Machine. In reality, however, Murdock's invention was more like the transporter room of the Enterprise. Rather than travel into the past on a machine of nuts and bolts, Dexter would be sent as a disembodied mass of cells, to be reassembled in the past.
"Don't let the trip bother you. My time travel device has been tried on quite a few human volunteers, and it's perfectly safe."
Dexter looked at the table on which he'd lay, at the lenses and lasers that would divide his body into billions of particles. The technology didn't worry him as much as the moral implication of what he was being asked to do. Regardless of his noble and humane purpose and the many lives he hoped to save, there was no denying that he planned to commit murder.
"Great. When can I leave?"
"There's really no need to rush," Murdock said, "Hitler is locked in the past. He's not going anywhere."
Dexter turned to Murdock and implored, "I would like to go as soon as possible—before I change my mind."
* * *
Farnham arrived at the laboratory at 9:00 a.m., eager to complete his task, yet also nervous and apprehensive. Murdock gave him one injection to calm his nerves and another to prepare his body for the shock of molecular transport. At 9:15, the young pre-med student lay down on the table. He was dressed in an old-fashioned suit, and he carried a loaded pistol in his jacket pocket.
The scientist turned on the machines, and a steady humming filled the room.
"This is your last chance to back out, young man," he said. "Are you sure you want to go through with this?"
Dexter nodded his head and gave the scientist the thumbs-up signal.
"Remember, you'll be sent back to the year 1919. Hitler will be thirty years old. He will already have suffered through the First World War, and he'll be extremely bitter but powerless to strike back. Try to get him alone and when he's unaware, take him. Be sure to shoot to kill. Don't show any pity. If you feel your resolve start to weaken, just remember those millions of innocent people who died in the death camps."
"Don't worry, Mr. Murdock. I won't chicken out."
The scientist, certain he had chosen the right man, nodded his head.
"Once you've killed him, press the button on your wristband. I'll be able to locate you and return you to the present—to this precise moment in fact. It will be as though you never left."
"Except history will have changed."
"Yes, and for the better, I've no doubt. Good luck, Dexter."
Luther Murdock smiled and activated his time machine.
* * *
Dexter's body materialized in Braunau am Inn, a small town in Austria. He walked along a country road, appalled at the poverty of the peasants. Luckily, he had studied German rather than French or Spanish while in high school and was able to talk to the villagers.
"Do you know where I can find the house of a man named Hitler?" Dexter asked the grocer.
The man knew the name and gave him directions. Dexter walked to the house and knocked on the door. He was shaking as he waited for it to open, expecting any moment to come face to face with arguably the most hated men in history. Instead, a woman answered.
"I'm looking for Hitler," he stammered.
"Ja. I am Frau Hitler," she answered.
"I want to see Adolf."
"My son? What do you want with him?" she asked innocently.
"I have come a long way to meet him, all the way from Vienna."
The woman was impressed by Dexter's fine clothes and what must surely be an important mission to bring him all the way from Vienna.
"Come. I will take you to him."
She led him down a hallway to a nursery. Asleep in a cradle was the woman's infant son.
"This is Adolf Hitler?" Dexter asked, staring down at the sleeping baby in horror.
"Yah, this is my son Adolf."
"There must be a mistake. I was told to expect a grown man, not a child. Forgive me if I have interrupted you," he said and ran from the house.
He walked, or rather staggered, back to the town. In the tavern, he found a four-day-old copy of a Vienna newspaper dated June 12, 1889.
"Mr. Murdock," he moaned, "you've sent me back thirty years too early!"
As Dexter walked aimlessly through the Austrian countryside, he noticed the faces of the children and adults he passed—poor, hardworking, simple people. A young girl ran past him, laughing as she chased her mongrel dog. In his mind, he saw the dark eyes of Anne Frank and behind them the ghosts of the millions of people who died in the camps.
With renewed determination, Dexter walked back toward the Hitler home. This time, however, he did not go to the front door; instead, he forced open the rear window and climbed inside. He stood silently in front of the cradle, his heart hardened against the ruthless dictator this infant would grow up to become. He reached into the coat pocket and took out the pistol. With a steady hand, he pointed the barrel of the gun at the head of the sleeping baby.
The noise of the gun's safety being released awakened the infant. The child shifted in his blanket; his eyes opened and fixed on his would-be assassin. Had the infant cried and screamed and alerted his mother, Dexter would probably have fired in panic, but the young Hitler merely stared innocently and trustingly at the intruder from the future.
Dexter held the pistol steadily in his hand, extending it further from his body as if distancing himself from so heinous a crime as infanticide. As he felt his courage falter, he tried to think of the children and infants who had been victims of this man's brutal Nazi regime. Yet, still before his eyes, all he could see was a helpless child.
As he lowered the gun, he experienced a true epiphany. Murdock's time machine had not malfunctioned. Rather, it was fate that had sent him thirty years further into the past than he and the scientist had intended. Some cosmic force knew that although he had been quite capable of killing an unarmed man if given just cause, nothing on earth could have made Dexter kill an innocent child—even though that child would lose his innocence, his youth and ultimately his humanity.
History was not meant to be changed. Time was a one-way street and would remain so, regardless of the genius of men such as Luther Murdock.
As G.K. Chesterton so wisely wrote, "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on. Not all your piety or wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all your tears wash out a word of it."
Neither Murdock nor Dexter had the right to erase the deeds of the past, regardless of how brutal or unjust those deeds might have been.
Dexter put the gun back in his coat pocket. Then he pushed the button on his wristband. Several moments later Murdock returned him to the present—to the exact moment he left.
Dexter suddenly remembered the words the scientist had spoken before sending him on his journey through time: "It will be as though you never left."
Ironically, Mr. Murdock had been unaware of just how accurate his prediction would prove to be.
Note: I wrote this story in 2001, before the episode of the new "Twilight Zone" in which a young woman goes back to Germany to kill Hitler as a baby. I guess that shows that "strange" minds think alike! Also, references to movies set in Boston were added in a later edition of the story.
Hitler an innocent baby? Why not? Salem was once a cute little kitten.
