Time Travelers Strictly Cash by Spider Robinson Read Free Book Online Page A

body. He may end up ma crib in Bombay this time. She smiled. But sooner or later I’ll get him.
    “Seńora, It would be well to do it now.”
    The smile vanished and she turned to the chief surgeon. “Doctor Ruiz-Sanchez, I said 1200 hours. To the second. You have made me repeat myself.”.
    Her voice was quite gentle, and a normal man Would have gone very pale and shut up, but good doctors are not normal men. “Senora, the longer he is on machine life-support-“
    “HUMOR ME!” she bellowed, nd he sprang back three steps and tripped over a power cable, landing heavily on his back. Technicians jumped, then went expressionless and looked away. Ruiz-Sanchez got slowly to his feet, flexing his fingers. He was trembling. “Si, seńora.”
    She turned away from him at once, returned to contemplation of her beloved. There was dead silence in the cryotheater, save for the murmur and chuckle of life-support machinery and the thrum of powerful generators. Cryotechnology was astonishingly power-thirsty, she reflected. The “restart.. er” device alone drank more energy than hez4esk, though it delivered only a tiny fraction of that to the pineal gland. She disliked the noisy, smelly generators on principlel but a drain this large had to be unmetered. Especially if it had to be repeated several times. Mass murder is easy, she thought.
    All you need is a good mind and unlimited resources. And one trusted friend.
    She checked the wall-clock. It lacked-five minutes of noon. The tile floor felt pleasantly cool to her bare feet; the characteristic cryotheater smell was subliminally invigorating. “Maybe this time, love,” she murmured to the half-living body. “Maybe not. But soon.”
    The door banged open and a guard hurled backward into the room, landing asprawl. Dimsdale stepped over him, breathing hard. He was wild-eyed and seemed drunk.
    Only for the barest instant did shock paralyze her, and even for that instant only the tightening of the corners of her mouth betrayed her fury at his imprudence.
    “Seńor,” Ruiz-Sanchez cried in horror, “you are not. sterile!”
    “No, thank God,” Dimsdale said, looking only at her.
    “What are you doing here, John?” she asked carefully.
    “Don’t you see, Reb?” He gestured like a beggar seeking alms. “Don’t you see? It’s all got to mean something. If it is true, there’s got to be a point to it, some kind of purpose. Maybe we get just a hair smarter each time round the track. A bit more mature. Maybe we grow. Maybe what you’re trying to do is get him demoted. I’ve studied all three of them, and so help me God every one of them is making more of his childhood than Archer did. They may not grow up to be as successful as he was. But they’ll be happier.”
    Her voice cracked like a whip now. “John! This room is not secure.”
    He started, and awareness came into his eyes. He glanced around at terrified doctors and technicians.
    “Rebecca, I studied them all first hand. I made it my business. I had to. Three eleven year old boys, Rebecca. They have parents. Grandparents. Brothers and sisters, playmates, hopes and dreams. They have futures,” he cried, and stopped. He straightened to his full height and met her eyes squarely. “I will not murder them, even for you. I can’t.”
    “Madre de dios, no!” Ruiz-Sanchez moaned in terror.
    The anesthesio1ogist began singiig his death-song softly and to himself. A technician bolted hopelessly for the door.
    Rebecca Howell screamed with rage, a hideous sound, and slammed her hands down on the nearest console. One hand shattered an irrigator, which began fountaining water. “You bastard,” she raged. “You filthy bastard!”
    He did not flinch. “I’m sorry. I thought I could.”
    She took two steps backward, located a throwable object and let fly. It was a tray of surgical instruments.
    Pimsdale stood his ground. The tray itself smashed into his mouth, and a needle-probe stuck horribly in his shoulder. Technicians