The Shield of Time by Poul Anderson Read Free Book Online Page A

parts of it would hurt too much.
    The arched brows lifted higher. “Your mood has shifted, has it? You seemed amiable a minute ago. I still feel thus. You’ve been a rather exciting enemy, Everard. In Colombia-to-be,” where Varagan came close to taking over Simón Bolívar’s government, “in Perú,” where his gang tried to steal Atahuallpa’s ransom from Pizarro and change the course of the Spanish Conquest, “and now in Tyre,” which they had threatened to blow up, were they not given an instrumentality that could have made themnearly omnipotent, “we have played our game, you and I. Where-when else, less directly?”
    A dull anger had in fact come upon Everard. “It was no game to me, buster,” he snapped, “and you’re well out of it.”
    Irritation flicked back at him: “As you wish. Then kindly leave me to my thoughts. Among them is the reflection that you have not caught the last Exaltationist yet. In a certain sense, you have not caught me.”
    Everard bunched his fists. “Huh?”
    Varagan regained self-possession, the will to cruelty. “I may as well explain. The interrogation machine will bring it out. Among the remnants of us is Raor. She was not on this expedition, because women are hampered in the Phoenician milieu, but she has taken part in others. My clone mate, Everard. She has her ways of finding out what went wrong here. She will be as vengeful as she always was ambitious. Pleasant dreams.” He smiled and turned his back, again gazing out at sea and sky.
    The Patrolman left him but, for a while, sought solitude also. He walked to the other side of the islet, sat down on a rock, brought out pipe and tobacco, got a smoke started.
    Staircase wit,
he thought. I
should’ve retorted, “Suppose she succeeds. Suppose she does blot out the future. You’ll be in it, remember? You’ll stop ever having existed.”
    Except, of course, in those bits of space-time pastward of that change moment, in which he was engaged on his pranks. He’d’ve pointed that out with some glee, maybe. Or maybe not. In any case, I doubt he fears obliteration. The ultimate nihilist.
    To hell with it. Repartee never was my long suit. Let me just go back to Tyre, tie up the loose ends there—
    Bronwen. No. I’ve got to make provision for her, but that’s a matter of common decency, nothing more. After that, we’d better both start learning how to stop missing each other. For me the best place will be my familiar old
twentieth-century USA, where I can put my feet up for a while.
    He often felt that the privilege of an Unattached agent, essentially to make his or her own assignments, was worth the risks and responsibilities that the status entailed. I
might want to pursue this Exaltationist business further, once I’ve had a good rest. I might.
    He shifted about on his rock.
Not too good a rest! Some activity, some fun.
    That girl who got caught in the Peruvian events, Wanda
Tamberly
—Across months of his personal lifespan and three millennia of history, memory rose bright.
Why, sure. No problem. She accepted the Patrol’s invitation to join. If I can catch her between that dinner I took her to and the day she leaves for the Academy
—
Cradle robbing? No, damn it. Just to enjoy myself, giving her a cheerful send-off, and then I’ll get on with the raunchy part of my furlough.

209 B.C.
    At last the teaching of Gautama Buddha would ebb from his native India until there it was all but forgotten. Today it still flourished, and the tide of it flowed strongly outward. Thus far, converts in Bactria were scarce. The topes and stupas whose ruins Everard saw in twentieth-century Afghanistan would not be built for generations. However, Bactra city numbered sufficient believers to maintain a vihara, at which visiting coreligionists usually called and sometimes stayed; and those merchants, caravaneers, guards, mendicants, monks, and other travelers were numerous, hailing from a wide range of territories. Hence it made a