Satan was awaiting him back in his mansion. “Did you enjoy your visit, Chronos?”
It took Norton a moment to collect himself. “I confess it was quite an experience! I did not realize your power extended so far!”
“My power is damn near universal,” the Prince of Evil said smugly.
“but one thing perplexes me. You know I live backward, so outside my mansion here I have to make a special effort to align myself with normal people, if I want to interact with them. But in the Glob that was not the case.”
“Astute of you to notice,” Satan said.
“But how, then-?”
The Father of Lies smiled winningly. “Elementary, My dear associate. That is a CT globular cluster.”
“Cee Tee?” Norton asked blankly.
“Contraterrene. Antimatter. Where the atoms are made up of negatrons in the nucleus and orbiting positrons, the precise opposite of the local persuasion.”
“Oh. I’ve heard of it. But isn’t such matter instantly annihilated by contact with normal matter?”
“Not when it’s isolated. In a CT galaxy, our type of matter is abnormal. This happens to be a CT globular cluster orbiting our terrene-matter galaxy. No actual contact.”
“Very interesting. But since I belong to this galaxy- “
“You are a special case, Chronos. A very special case. You are an Incarnation, and not just a garden-variety one at that. You are the Incarnation of Time.”
“Yes, and I live backward. Which is why- “
“But you see. My dear sir, contraterrene matter, being opposite in charge, is also opposite in time. Therefore its frame is yours. That is why you, alone of all of us, are able to relate normally there.”
“Oh.” Norton would have to think about that. “You mean that human beings have evolved there, just like us, though there has never been any connection between us? With the same language and everything?”
“It is called convergent evolution,” Satan said. “And this is what I offer you, sir: a pleasant visit there whenever you choose.”
“A pleasant visit!” Norton exploded. “I almost got wiped out!”
“Oh? I doubt it. As an Incarnation, you are fairly comprehensively protected from incidental mischief.”
“A Bern was going to eat me!”
“Bern?”
“Bug-Eyed-Monster, as if you didn’t know! I was lucky to escape with my feet intact!”
“Oh, that kind of Bern. I assure you, you could not have been in genuine danger. The worst that could have happened would have been a premature termination of your visit. You would have returned here when your situation there became unplayable. I thought you understood that.”
“Now he tells me,” Norton muttered. But he had to admit, to himself, that it had indeed been an exciting adventure and change of pace. His wanderlust had always taken him to new sides of new mountains, and that CT Glob had been a really different mountain! “You have other visiting spots?”
Satan gestured expansively. “An entire universe of them, sir! A good many of them CT, aligned with your natural inclination, perfectly safe for you. Some are scientific, some fantastic, some mixed like our present world. There is some very nice material in the Magic-Lantern Clouds. And all I ask in return is this one trifling little favor.”
Norton still did not trust the motive of the Father of Lies, but found himself tempted. An entire CT framework to explore, with all types of people and cultures and planets, and no problem about reversed time! In retrospect, he discovered he had enjoyed the little adventure with Bat Dursten and the Bems, though it helped to know that he had not actually been in danger. If he ever returned there, he might use his power as Chronos to go back to the instant before Dursten released the planetbuster bomb and save the Bern planet from destruction. The least he could do now was listen to Satan’s plea. “Do you care to provide a little detail on that favor?”
“Certainly,” Satan said briskly. “I would like to do a favor for a man about twenty years ago. I am in a position to know, because of hindsight, that a single choice of his had profound effects on his life. He made the wrong choice, and it led to his early demise. Had he made the right choice, it would have led to love and life with a beautiful and wealthy heiress, and phenomenal well-being for him. So now I would like to correct My error of omission and send a minion back to advise that man of the correct choice.”
“Why should you, the Prince of Evil, care to do a good deed for a mortal man?” Norton asked suspiciously.
Satan grinned disarmingly. “I have My favorites, too, Chronos. I try to reward those who help Me, and I am generous when pleased. In death, this man impressed Me favorably and rendered good service; now I wish to reward him by granting him, retroactively, the one thing he thought forever beyond his reach-an excellent life. He will probably go to Heaven thereafter, and so I shall lose him- but as I said, I am generous and I keep My promises.”
Bearing An Hourglass Norton wasn’t sure he believed that, but he doubted there was any percentage in arguing with the Father of Lies. “Give me his spacetime address.”
“Certainly!” Satan conjured a scroll on which was written neatly in blood a place and time.
“Kilvarough,” Norton read, taking the scroll. “The Mess o’Pottage shop.” He looked up. “What’s that man’s name?”
Satan scratched his head, a bit like Bat Dursten. “Did I omit that detail? How silly of Me! The name escapes Me at the moment-I do have countless clients, you know-but I will have My minions research it before we meet again. You will, of course, want to verify the situation yourself before you act on this and you can find the shop with the present information.”
“Yes,” Norton agreed. “Understand, Satan-I’m making no promise. If I don’t like the deal, I won’t take your minion.”
“Understood, of course. I know better than to attempt to deceive a person of your perspicacity.” Then Satan raised his finger, marking an afterthought. “But until I locate that specific name, there could be confusion. Allow Me to provide you a ready way to contact Me, in case of need.” He curved his fingers, and abruptly a thin chain was there, anchored to an amulet. “Accept this, sir, and blow it to summon Me. I will hear it, wherever and whenever, and come to your aid.”
“Well, I really don’t think- “But already Satan was pushing it into his hand. The amulet was a little horn with a flared rim, made of brass. Norton shrugged and put the chain on over his head. He didn’t anticipate needing Satan’s aid in anything, but there was no point in antagonizing him. He could simply ignore the amulet.
Sning squeezed twice, not liking even this gesture, but Norton felt that in this case expedience was preferable to affront. Let it be, he thought, and, reluctantly, Sning shut up.
Satan stood and saluted with one hand. “Farewell, sir!” He vanished in a small puff of smoke.
Before Norton could organize his thoughts, the butler appeared. “Another visitor, sir.”
“Who?” Norton asked shortly. He did not seem to be physically tired from the adventure in the CT Glob, but a great deal had happened recently, and he was about ready to call it a day.
“Clotho, sir.”
“Who?”
“An aspect of Fate, sir.”
“Oh.” Now it registered. He had seen only a flash of the youngest form of Fate and had been impressed, but the name had not made the same impression her body had. “Show her in.” Fate was a remarkable woman, with her three forms.
Clotho stepped daintily in. She was not only young, she was lovely. She had done something to her hair so that it fell loosely to her shoulders in a gleaming cascade, and her dress was alluring. It was bright blue, with a peeka-boo bodice that offered a startlingly intimate peek. “Ready for this day’s work, Chronos?” she asked.
“I think I’ve already had a day’s work,” he replied.
“Oh? Will we do this tomorrow? It’s my future and your past, remember. I assume I’m doing things in proper order for you, but it’s easy to get confused.”
Norton laughed, relaxing. “No, it’s my confusion, not yours. You introduced me to my office and showed me how to function, and now we’ll do more substantial work together as I learn the details of my job. I’m sure I’ll get it all straight in due course. What I meant was that Satan has been here this morning-it is morning?”
“Midday,” she said. “Time is normal for you, here in your mansion. But when I depart here, it will be earlier than I arrived. I’ll have to avoid meeting myself, to prevent needless confusion.”
“I know the feeling!” Then something else occurred to him. “It was afternoon when Satan came to visit me, and then-why did I think it was morning? It should be evening’
“Probably you have spent the night,” she suggested.
“I plan to come to orient you tomorrow, in my Lachesis aspect, as that is your last day of office.”
“Yes, then a day has passed for me,” he agreed. “But I don’t remember it! Satan sent me to an-an alternate universe for an adventure, but- “
“How long were you there?”
“It’s hard to tell. It seemed like an hour, but things fuzzed out when I was traveling, so- “
“So it could have been a day,” she finished. “Satan is the master of deception. He can make an instant seem like an eternity, and vice versa. It is illusion, of course; only you can truly control time. But Satan’s illusions can be doozies.”
“Yes, that must be it. I spent a day there, all told, and returned here. Anyway, Satan wants a favor, and- “
“Don’t trust Satan!” Clotho said. “He is the most sinister and devious of the Incarnations! He is always concocting mischief.”
“I don’t plan to take anything he tells me at face value. But he has been helpful, so I will at least give him a hearing.”
“Well, leave me out of it,” Clotho said. “I suppose we all have to learn about Satan in our own fashions. Now- let’s get to work. Do you know how to use your Hourglass to read individual threads?”
“Not yet,” Norton admitted.
“Well, you were good enough at it yesterday, so I know you’ll catch on readily.” She proceeded to teach him how to orient on the particular life-thread of a person, and how to fix on the exact place that thread had to be started, kinked, and cut. He was interested, but he kept being distracted by her peek-a-boo display that served as a backdrop for the threads as she held them up between her hands, and feared he seemed inattentive at times.
The start of each thread was a mortal birth, each kink was a key event in that life, and the cut end marked the termination of that life. These were only the special lives, Clotho explained; his staff and hers did most of the routine planning. Norton found it confusing at first, but soon he had the Hourglass ticking off indications rapidly. Each minuscule grain of sand, it seemed, was something like a mortal life, matching each of Fate’s fine threads.
He glanced at his Hourglass with new appreciation. All those fine grains of sand-all of humanity, represented in this one instrument! Each single grain too small to perceive by itself, yet of total significance for its person. Did the cosmos care about any single grain of life-sand? About when or where it flowed, or the satisfaction of its tiny existence?
After several hours, Clotho paused and stretched, flexing the peek-a-boo. “All work and no play,” she said and moved into his arms.
Startled, Norton froze. “Is something wrong?” he asked.
“Oh, haven’t we done this before, in your scheme?” she asked. “I keep forgetting-you’re coming from the other direction. This is new to you, isn’t it?”
“Everything is new to me,” he agreed.
“Well, I think this is the time to begin, then, because in the recent past we have- “She paused. “But why should I spoil it for you by my memories? Come on, I’ll lead you through.”
“Through what?”
“Silly boy! Why do you think I came as Clotho? I am the young man’s- “
“Oh. You-Lachesis-did say something about- “
She cut him off with a kiss. She was a most attractive woman in this guise, but his painful memory of Orlene remained, and he wasn’t ready for this. He drew away. “I hardly know you!” he protested.
She laughed, unrebuffed. “With any other person, I’d say you were joking! But that’s all in your future, isn’t it? Very well-what do you think is holding you back?”
Norton pondered. “I don’t suppose you’d care to believe anything about my not being a casual sort of person?”
She laughed merrily. “You? You forget that I measured your thread before you assumed this office! You’re fully casual with women!”
“You know me too well!” he agreed ruefully. He kept allowing himself to be deceived by appearances, when by now he ought to know better. Clotho had those deep eyes of Fate and she was no young or innocent damsel. No, indeed! She was an Incarnation, with all the subtle power that implied. “But all that stopped when I met Orlene. She was the first true love I experienced, and- “
“Oh, yes, of course-that’s still fresh in your mind! How silly of me to forget! It is my position to help you get over that so you can focus without reservation on your office. Very well-we’ll take time off to go see your mortal woman.”
“We?”
“Well, you could take me with you if you chose; it’s in your magical power to do so. But I agree: for this, you’d better go alone.” She fished in her dark hair and drew forth a single strand. “Here is Orlene’s thread. Truncated, as you can see; only a third as long as it should have been. You can, of course, restore the full length, if you wish. The powers of the Incarnations are great, but none are absolute where they overlap those of other Incarnations. Orient your Glass on this, and you’ll find her anywhere you choose.”
Norton had been learning the technique of thread orientation. He touched the Hourglass to the thread, then willed the sand blue.
The mansion vanished. He was zooming along the thread as if riding a cablecar. Events of the world rushed past, glimpsed momentarily. Slow, he thought, and progress eased, the glimpses becoming longer.
It was Orlene’s life he was following, backward. Her individual motions were too rapid for him to focus on, but her surroundings had more staying power. A building she had spent time in-perhaps a school-abruptly vanished. It had been unconstructed, and she moved on to a lesser school, more crowded. Trees around her home slowly shrank, their foliage flickering on and off through the seasons, the deciduous trees becoming suddenly clothed in bright leaves which then faded to green and eventually sucked back into the twigs and branches. The lawn grass kept jumping high, then smoothing down till nearly bald, then being mowed high again. The house became brightly painted, then abruptly turned dull.
He brought himself to a random halt. He was in a school class, looking at a girl about ten years old. The scene was strange; in a moment he realized this was because he was viewing it backward. He had halted himself, not time, and now was living normally, for him. No one here was aware of him-but if he changed to match the world’s time flow, he would become visible, disrupting the scene, so he let it be.
This was evidently a cooking class, with the teacher demonstrating how to bake a pie by using pyro-magic. Under her reversed guidance, the demonstration pie proceeded from brown to gold and on into pasty white. Norton watched the young Orlene, a pretty girl even at this age. Alas, she was not paying full attention, but was whispering with a female companion in girlish fashion. Her pie would probably be botched.
He turned the sand red and moved a few years into this Orlene’s future, then watched her backward again. This time she was lying on her bed at home, in jeans and a man’s shirt-what was there about men’s shirts that caused girls to prefer them to their own?-chatting into her holophone. It was a boy in the image, tousle-haired, animated, obviously full of the enthusiasm of the moment. Orlene was now about fifteen, and was assuming much of her adult beauty; he recognized some of her little mannerisms, as yet unperfected. He felt a surge of nostalgia; this girl was in the visible process of becoming the woman he had loved.
He moved three more years along her life, to her age eighteen. Now she was playing squash with a young man. It was a game that brought the active players into close proximity, since they shared the court as they slammed the ball against the wall, and therefore seemed to be popular for mixed couples. The man was obviously beating her, but the motions of her body as she strove for points were beautiful. The ball rebounded and flew at her, and she swung her racket backward to intersect it, whereupon it flew back from her while she wore a look of expectant concentration. Orlene had matured into a healthy, lovely young woman, and it was sweetly painful for Norton to look at her. Those limbs, that torso, that face with the backward-flying hair-he had known them all intimately, in her present future. Those lips-he had kissed them, years hence. Orlene-he would love her and loved her still.
He followed her through to the beginning of the game, when she was fresh, clean, unglowing, and ready for anything. She bade hello to her opponent-date and strode backward away from him to the female changing room. Norton hesitated, then decided not to pursue her there; he knew what her body was like, but this was inappropriate peeking.
He was not doing this just to be a voyeur. He wanted to rescue the woman he loved from her dreadful fate. Now he knew he could do it; his experience in rescuing himself from the Bern in the Glob had proved that. He was immune from paradox; he could change his own past and those of others without nullifying his present. He did not intend to abuse this power, but he did intend to spare her.
Where was the best place to act? When was best? Probably before he, Norton, had met her, so he would not have to interfere openly with himself. Would this nullify his association with her? Yes, surely it would-but that would be replaced by a new association, a better one. In fact, he could void the whole ghost marriage and marry her himself.
But first he had better make sure of his power. He wanted to interact with her in a noncritical period of her life, not to change anything, just to be sure he knew what he was doing. This was no ordinary person; this was Orlene!
He moved back along the thread to her childhood, to the time when she was seven years old, on her summer vacation after her first year of formal school. Now she was not using a holophone, because that instrument had not yet been commercially developed; the old sonic ones were still extant. Anyway, she was too young for social interchanges with interested boys; she was a wild-honeyhaired spirit, running through one of the early city rooftop parks. The trees were still in big pots, and ramparts showed; true wilderness was a thing of future parks. A lot of the bad old pollution and messiness remained in the world; soon the political climate would change, greatly facilitating improvement, but it had not happened at this moment.
She was with a party of children, but strayed from them, skipped happily down a bypath, and got lost. Worried, she gazed at the several bifurcations of the paved path, unsure which to take. Norton, having traveled past her immediate future, knew that she would be lost for a good thirty-five minutes, an eternity at that age, and be in tears before a park attendant rescued her from bewilderment and brought her back to her party. This was the appropriate time to approach her.
He tuned in to the beginning other isolation and turned the sand green. Now he was in phase with her.
“Hello, Orlene,” he said gently. He was a grown man and she was a child, but he felt almost shy.
She stopped her nervous ambulation and turned quickly to face him. “Oh-I didn’t see you!” she exclaimed. “Who are you, mister, in that funny dress?”
He was wearing the white robe of his office, of course. “I am- “He hesitated; he hadn’t thought this through. He couldn’t tell her he was Chronos; she would hardly understand. Neither could he tell her he was her future lover. “A friend.”
“Can you tell me how to get back?”
“I’ll try. I think it’s this way.” He gestured toward the correct path, and they walked along it.
“How did you know my name?” Orlene asked brightly.
“I’ve seen you in school.”
“Oh, you’re a teacher!” she exclaimed, as if it were the most important thing in the world.
“Well- “But she was already skipping ahead, her piggybraids flouncing.
I love her even as a child, he thought, surprised and somewhat awed at the extent of his own commitment. He had been, as Clotho had chided him, free with women; this one had chained his soul. He followed after, trying to think of suitable comments to make or questions to ask.
Then Oriene made a glad little cry. “There they are!” She ran to join her group.
The adult guide turned at the sound of her voice. Norton hastily shifted sand and faded out of contemporary view. Oriene was all right; she was an innocent child. She had been spared a bad half hour. He was glad he had been able to do her that small service. But adults were another matter. They would ask the wrong questions.
So his dialogue with Oriene had amounted to nothing. There had been no meaningful personal interaction.
No, not entirely true. She would probably forget the stranger in the white dress, but he had discovered the extent of his captivity. Now he knew he needed to rehearse himself better for questions. It had been a good practice session.
Should he go back those few minutes in time and replay it, trying to effect a more personal contact? He decided not to. He had verified what he wanted to; he could interact with her without wreaking havoc or generating paradox. Now he could proceed with confidence to change her life significantly.
He moved back and forth along her life-thread, sampling it here and there, zeroing in on the appropriate region. He traced, somewhat erratically, her life up to the point at which the family of Gawain the Ghost had contacted her and made her the offer she could not refuse. There had been other men in her young life-Norton spied on these passing relationships with a certain voyeuristic jealousy, though he knew from his own prior experience that she had been a virgin bride. Oriene had been looking for Mister Right and had not been able to choose among those who were handsome and stupid, smart but poor, or rich but degenerate. She, like any sensible girl, wanted perfection in a man, and it was hard to come by. Thus she was the perfect candidate for the ghost marriage: attractive, intelligent, pristine, and reasonably ambitious for security and creature comfort.
There was a period of about three months before Gawain’s family came, when Oriene had no romantic attachment. This was ideal for Norton’s purpose.
He located a day when she was home watching a dull holo rerun and phased in. He knew the young woman of twenty would not be even fractionally as accepting as the girl of seven had been, so he planned his approach more carefully. But he planned no deception; that would be the wrong way to start a relationship as important as this.
He knew she was alone today; that was a major reason he selected this time. Her father was away on a business trip, and her mother was on a shopping spree. So Oriene was minding the house. There would be a good six hours, if he managed it correctly-and if he did not, he would wind it back and try again. That was one huge advantage of his present office: he could replay scenes to correct errors. Of course, he would have to undergo the discomfort of reversing himself also, because he did not want several copies of himself competing for her attention. But with luck he would not make any bad errors, and would not have to run his own line backward for more than a minute or so at a time.
He phased in outside her house and stepped up to the door. Again he felt something very like stage fright; his pulse was racing. But he kept a rein on himself and held his thumb on the pattern-recognition panel. In a moment Orlene’s image appeared on the doorscreen. “Sorry, we aren’t buying,” she said pertly.
“I am not a salesman,” Norton said. “I am a storyteller.” He had cadged many a meal that way in his past life; he had always told good stories that made people welcome him. This was the age of holo entertainment, but there was a special quality to genuine, live, personal narrative that still attracted people. The machines and the spells could never take over entirely!
“A what?”
“A storyteller. In this futuristic age, I revert to old-fashioned values. I tell stories by hand. By mouth, I mean.”
“You’re selling holotapes?”
“No tapes. Just myself. Every narration an original! If you care to listen, I will- “
“Sorry,” she said, and the screen blanked. He had blown it. She was, of course, not paying much attention to strangers. This was a sensible attitude for young women alone in houses.
He overturned the Hourglass and reversed time for himself and her, unwinding the prior sequence. Naturally she would not be aware of this; her life was erased to that extent.
“You’re selling holotapes?” she asked as he resumed forward motion, thirty seconds back.
“No tapes. Stories. About young women who play pianos with rare skill and squash with lesser skill.”
She hesitated, surprised. He had described her, of course. “What is this?”
“Stories about people who like picture puzzles,” he said. “And walks in parks. And babies.”
She stared at him through the screen. “Who are you, really?”
“I doubt you would believe that.”
“Try me.”
“I am Chronos-the human Incarnation of Time.”
She laughed. “One for one! I certainly don’t believe that!”
“I can show you tricks with time- “
“Don’t bother, thank you.” The screen faded. He rolled time back again. “Try me,” she said. “Your future associate. You will enter into a ghost marriage and- “
The screen faded.
He reversed time again. “Try me,” she said. He held up his left hand. “Sning, show her.” Sning uncoiled and slid into his palm. “Oh, how cute!” Orlene exclaimed. “I’ve got one just like it!”
“You gave me this,” Norton said. “It’s yours.”
“I did not! I have mine right here!” She paused, then brought up a duplicate snake ring.
This made Norton pause. Could Sning meet himself?
Why not? Norton had met himself in the Glob. Sning had probably doubled up that time, too. “Maybe they should meet.”
She put her ring on her finger and paused again, evidently thinking a question at it. After a moment she shrugged and opened the door. “He says you’re okay,” she said, almost apologetically. Norton entered, feeling somewhat the way he had felt when he first met her, almost three years hence. She was so lovely, and he so ordinary, and he wanted so much from her; how could he make known his ambition?
He touched the table with his left hand, and Sning slithered off to join the other snake. Apparently duplication of creatures was no problem, though he was sure paradox lurked in the shadows. How far did his immunity extend?
“May I get you something?” Orlene asked. “No, thanks. I think I’d just better tell you what is on my mind.” He drew out a chair and sat down at the table. She took a chair opposite. “You certainly act as if you know me.”
“Let me show you my nature,” he said. “What I have to say will be more credible, once you understand that.”
“Perhaps,” she agreed noncommittally. He wondered whether she was inspecting him for glow. Perhaps not; she was looking at him as an intriguing stranger, not as a marriage prospect, so the glow might not be in evidence- if, indeed, he was at this stage a good marriage prospect for her. Of that he could hardly be sure. He loved her, yes-but there was already more to this relationship than love.
“I am Chronos, the Incarnation of Time.” This time she did not retreat; she was intrigued enough to listen. “I can reverse the flow of time, in part or in whole. Here.” He fished in his pocket for a pebble he had saved for its Norton started to laugh-and it froze in his throat. What was the distinction between bad intentions and bad results? Now he could tell her the truth-but he found his tongue balking.
If he told her, developed a relationship with her now, married her, and shared her life-ah, such joy in the mere contemplation!-so that the ghost marriage never took place-discounting any paradox, since he was immune- what kind of a life would it be? He was no longer an ordinary man; he was Chronos, living backward, able to relate to ordinary people only by reversing his own life course temporarily. As a normal man, he could have done it; in his present capacity, there was really nothing he could offer her. He had been thinking only of himself, not of her.
“I thought I had something,” he said. “I fear I do not.”
“Well, what were you going to tell me before you had second thoughts?”
He breathed deeply. She had asked; he should tell. “I- in the near future-when I was still a normal man-I met you and loved you.” There; it was out.
“I had gathered as much,” she replied. “The way you have been watching me, your possession of my ring, and the way you glow so brightly. It had to be love.”
Her candor set him back. “Don’t love me!” he blurted. “I was the unwitting cause of your death!”
“My death!”
“It-it’s a complicated story. I don’t want that to happen-but the alternative I had in mind, of taking you away from that course now-that’s no good either. I love you, but I can only hurt you.”
“Hurt me? No, you would not do that. The glow- “
“Ask Sning!” She paused. “My ring says no, you would not hurt me.
But your ring says yes, you would.”
“They are the same ring-but mine has more experience. Do not associate with me when you meet me in two years. Then perhaps you will have a better life.”
“But if you are the one I am fated to love- “
“It’s a cursed love!”
She shook her head, perplexed. “You’re not making much sense, you know.”
“Look at my choices. If I-if we have a relationship in two years, you will have a baby who dies and you will suicide. But if we have a relationship now, when I am Chronos-I live backward! I could associate with you only for perhaps half an hour at a time, beginning now, and each time I met you, you would be younger. Not only would you not remember me, you would soon be too young for- “He spread his hands helplessly.
She nodded. “Now you are making sense, and your ring confirms it. I think I would like you, and probably love you, since you do glow; but to keep meeting you for the first time when I was a teenager, and always having it happen when I was younger-I am not at all sure I could handle that. Though I remember meeting a strange man in a white cloak when I was a child, in a park- “
She shook her head. “It is strange enough talking with you now!”
“Yes. If there were some way I could start with you now and continue forward-but the maximum that could last is about four years, because after that I became Chronos and turned backward, and I can’t step physically beyond my living time frame. I could look at you thereafter, but never interact with you, and you would never see me. It’s no good; you deserve so much more! I love you and I want what’s best for you, and your best life is without me.”
Slowly she nodded. “Your ring agrees. I am sorry, but I can’t argue with your case.”
He sighed. “I-I’m sorry I bothered you. I should have left you entirely alone. Let me go now, and never deal with me again.” What a shambles reality had made of his aspiration!
“Here is your ring,” she said, returning one of the Snings.
Norton took the little snake and let him curl around his finger. “Are you my Sning?” he inquired. Would it make any real difference if this were the other?
Squeeze.
Probably the two Snings would merge in Norton’s present, anyway. “Farewell, Orlene.”
She smiled. “I don’t usually do this sort of thing. But this once- “She came to him and kissed him.
The sudden contact was ineffably sweet. Norton held himself frozen, knowing that if he let himself go to the slightest degree, he would enfold her in his arms and babble foolishness about somehow making it work, and thereby do her a colossal disservice. But for this timeless instant, his love was back with him, healing the abyss into which his heart had fallen. Orlene lived and, with luck, would pursue her normal, full life. It was better that she do it without him. Believing that, he could bear it.
She broke away and smiled; he recovered his volition and retreated out the door. Before he could change his mind, he changed the sand and quickly phased away.
“Well, I bungled that,” he muttered aloud. “But I suppose I just had to learn the hard way.”
Squeeze, squeeze. “No?” But as he pondered the implications, he realized Sning was right. He had not handled it as well as he might have-but perhaps he had given Orlene the key that would save her life, and in the process he had immeasurably improved his own outlook.
Squeeze. “Did you enjoy meeting your other self, Sning?”
Squeeze. Norton smiled as he moved forward through time. “So maybe it was worthwhile after all. Now I am ready to accept the new reality and do my job as Chronos.”
Then he remembered the time-space address Satan had given him. He had not kept the parchment on which it was written, but retained the information. He had no intention of helping Satan; the dialogue with Orlene had finned up the resolve. But his curiosity sharpened. Who was this person who commanded a favor from Satan Himself?
Norton traced down the address. It was not in Kilvarough itself, but in a floating city above it, a traveling shopping center and fair. Flying carpets abounded in its vicinity, and the stores glittered with magic items. Below lay the somber metropolis of Kilvarough, evidently one of the stops on the route of the floating complex. Gypsy cities, they were called.
The time was about twenty years before Norton’s “present.” He would be a teenager now-and he had no intention of looking himself up. It had been confusing enough with Orlene! He went to the Mess o’Pottage shop and watched it in his normal mode, the reverse of world time, so that no one was aware of him.
A man was inspecting magic stones. He had evidently decided on a large Wealthstone, the kind with a floating six-rayed star. As Norton watched, the man checked a Lovestone and then a Deathstone, then retreated from the store.
Norton jumped ahead to catch the man’s recent future, after he bought the Wealthstone. By a series of jumps and pauses, Norton traced the man to his somewhat dingy apartment in Kilvarough. There the man discovered that his stone was not as good as represented; it produced only small change, not riches.
Norton jumped ahead three more hours, checked the man’s apartment-and saw his body lying on the floor, blood pooled from a gunshot wound in the head.
So Satan was right. The man had made a bad choice and had therefore taken his own life. He had no future on Earth, literally. Satan planned to give him a better future-and what was wrong with that?
Norton moved back in world time, avoiding the actual suicide; he certainly didn’t need to torment himself with that gory killing! More deeply perplexed at Satan’s motive, he phased himself back to an episode he had only glimpsed in passing. A pretty young woman had had trouble with her carpet near a billboard advertising the supposed delights of Hell-what would Satan think of next?-and the proprietor of the Mess o’Pottage shop had rescued her. Now Norton was able to re-create the detail: the client had spotted the woman by using the Lovestone, but the proprietor had foisted off a worthless stone and taken the woman for himself. It had been a highly profitable bit of flimflam, for as Norton traced their subsequent lives, he verified that the woman had made a significant difference. She was beautiful, wealthy, loving, and loyal-in fact, she was far better than the conniving shopkeeper deserved. If Satan interfered, so that the client chose the Lovestone to buy, the man would gain the woman for himself and have a deservedly better life- the kind of life Norton himself would have liked to have with Orlene.
Now Norton was in doubt. Should he, after all, do Satan this favor? He wanted to be fair, and it certainly seemed that Satan had a good cause this time. Maybe Norton could not grant himself a lifetime of romance, but he could do it for this other man and feel a vicarious satisfaction.
“Should I?” he asked Sning.
Squeeze, squeeze. “Why not? I don’t like Satan, but I do want to be fair.
Shouldn’t I support him when he’s right?”
Squeeze, squeeze, squeeze.
Of course the little serpent could not answer such a comment directly! Well, Norton would think about it. The lives of ordinary people were governed by the threads of Fate; maybe he should ask her why she had allowed so gross an inequity in this case.
He set his Hourglass and traveled back home to his present time. He hoped Clotho would be awaiting him, but she wasn’t. Apparently she had not properly coordinated things this time. Instead, Satan was there.
“Well?” the Prince of Evil asked.
“I checked your situation,” Norton said. “I see nothing wrong with what you contemplate-but I haven’t yet made up my mind.”
“My amulet,” Satan said, peering at him. “Where is it?”
“Oh-it bothered someone I visited, so she destroyed it with holy water. Sorry about that.”
Satan seemed to swell. His face reddened, and a wisp of smoke drifted from one nostril. “Destroyed one of My-!”
Then Satan got control of himself and settled down. “It is of no consequence; it was only a trinket. So you are still considering My errand?”
“Yes.”
“Remember, I am prepared to pay well for such minor favors. Here, I will provide another sample.”
“Oh, you don’t need to- “
But Satan gestured, and suddenly Norton was sailing through space, as he had done before, on his way to a contraterrene frame, where time flowed backward. He hadn’t protested quickly enough, it seemed.