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Five

FOR LUNCH I fried up two of the morning's eggs with some of the last earthly remains of Tricky and Dicky, the pigs I had slaughtered the previous October. I half expected the smell to wake her, but no dice. I ate in the living room, watching her. I caught myself becoming irritated at her. I hate houseguests who sleep late; I yearn so badly to sleep late myself, and a country householder can't. Even a time traveler ought to have enough manners to grab forty winks before coming to work, I heard myself think, and that sounded so stupid I grinned at myself. I dislike grinning at myself, so I started getting irritated again—

There's one thing even better than contemplation of the Bay of Fundy for calming me down, so I got out Gertrude and a handful of Ernie Ball fingerpicks. As usual, the song chose itself without conscious thought on my part; as usual I couldn't have improved on it with a week's thought. Beloved Hoagy (still alive then) and Johnny Mercer: "Lazy Bones."

I try to do that song as close as possible to the definitive version Amos Garrett laid down on Geoff and Maria Muldaur's Sweet Potatoes album. I'm not fit to change Garrett's strings, I'm just barely good enough to get by professionally, but the tune is so sweet it almost plays itself. That afternoon it seemed to come out especially well. I watched her splendid chest rise and fall, and told her softly that sleeping in the sun was no way to get her day's work done. (What was her day's work? And what day, in what year?) For the first time in a while I attempted an instrumental chorus before the second bridge, and to my immense satisfaction it came off just fine. I grinned and finished the song, warned her that if she slept away the day, she was never going to make a dime. (Where would she have put a dime?) I even managed to stumble through the Beiderbecke riff (from a tune charmingly entitled "I'm Coming, Virginia") that Garrett quotes to close the song, and let the final G chord ring in the room while I admired myself.

In the last line of that song the narrator offers to wager that his listener has not heard a thing he's said, and I believed as I sang it that such a bet would be a boat-race—had she not slept through the repeated filling of a toploader stove?—so when she opened her striking blue eyes and said, "That's not true," I started so sharply my thumbpick flew off.

I left it on the floor. I had already mentally prepared some sort of welcoming speech, designed to show in as few words as possible that I was clever enough to know what she was and ethical enough to pose no danger—but it flew right out of my head. I put Gertrude carefully back in her case, to give myself time to think. "I stand corrected," is what I finally said.

She sat up, and I thought of a Persian cat I had once loved named Rainy Midnight. "That was very beautiful." Her voice was a smoky alto. It came out so flat and expressionless that it put me in mind of Mister Spock. I found it oddly attractive.

I thanked her with only a shadow of my usual wince. It hadn't been too bad. Her next line was very interesting.

"Do you know what I am?"

I liked that question. In the rush of the moment, I had forgotten my earlier fear that she might be a telepath, it had not been in my conscious mind. I remembered it when she asked the question—and so her question was probably genuine. Unless, of course, she could somehow read thoughts below the conscious level, or was very clever. . . .

My voice came out steady. "I know that you are a very beautiful bald lady who blew up one of my best birch trees. I believe that you are a time traveler. If so, I will do my best not to screw things up for you."

"You're very quick," she said calmly. "You understand the dangers, then?"

This was great. "I doubt it. But my guesses scare me pretty good. Changing history and so forth. What year are you from?"

"That I will not tell you."

"Okay. Why are you here?"

She hesitated slightly; I thought she was going to refuse to answer that question too. "Think of me as—" She looked quizzical, then tried comically to look up at her own forehead, where her crown-thing should have been. "Can I have my ROM? I keep some specialized vocabulary in there." She touched her bald skull. "And I'll need it to start growing hair."

I blinked. ROM meant Read-Only-Memory. The damned thing was an overgrown IC chip! Stored computer data! "Direct brain-computer interface—"

She smiled. It was a nice smile, but somehow it looked like something she had just learned to do. "You read science fiction!"

I had to smile myself. "They still have it in your time, eh?" I'd always been a little afraid they'd run out of crazy ideas one day.

"You'd love it." She frowned slightly. "If you could understand it."

"I'm sorry about your ROM. It's not here now. I can get it in ten minutes' time."

She nodded. "For all you knew it was a weapon. I understand. All right, what is the current term for people who study people of the past?"

"There are several kinds. Historians study events in the relatively recent past, and try to interpret them. Archaeologists dug up evidence of the distant past, and anthropologists use the evidence, and observation of surviving primitive cultures, to make guesses about human social and cultural development throughout history. Then writers relate all that to the present."

"Think of me as a combination of all of those. The human race has come so far, its past has begun to seem unreal to it. I'm here to learn."

"How can I help you?"

"By keeping my secret, and by introducing me plausibly to your community. I promise that I will not harm anyone in any way."

"You aren't afraid of accidentally changing the past? Your past?"

"Not unless my secret becomes general knowledge."

"One other person knows. He'll keep his mouth shut," I added hastily, seeing her dismay. "He's smart enough to understand why. He's actually sold some science fiction to a magazine."

She looked dubious. "He might think it's good story material."

"Maybe—as fiction. Who'd believe a guy who's written science fiction? I'm not sure I'd believe this myself—if I hadn't seen you appear in blue fire."

"I'm sorry about your tree."

"That's okay. I'm surprised materializing where another mass already existed didn't kill you—or worse."

"So am I." I held a blink, and then stared. "That was a very bad mistake—somehow that clearing is closer to the path than the records indicate."

"Maybe I see your problem, if your fix was based on the path. The land slopes to the west just there. I wouldn't be surprised if over the next fifty years or so that section of trail just naturally migrates a few meters downhill."

"That could account for it." She shivered. "Perhaps I should not have come. That was a very dangerous error." She paused, acquired a strange expression. "I ask your pardon for having endangered you by my recklessness." She seemed to wait warily for my answer.

"Hell, that's okay. How were you to know?"

She relaxed. "Precisely my error. Thank you for pardoning it. How long was I unconscious?"

I calculated. "Maybe fourteen hours. You don't snore."

"I don't know the term."

Oh. "You sleep beautifully. And soundly."

"Thank you. I haven't had much practice."

Oh. "That must be nice."

"I have nothing to compare it to, but I suppose it is. Do you want me to put on clothes?"

"If you wish. There is a nudity taboo in this place and time, but I heed it only when others do or the weather insists. If I'd known when you were going to wake up, I'd have stripped myself to put you at ease: it's warm enough right here by the fire."

"Does it not cause you tension to be in the presence of a naked woman?" There was something odd about her voice. The subtext don't you find me attractive? was in there—but I sensed she had no ego involvement in the answer, was simply curious. That implied to me a cultural advantage at least as startling as time travel.

"Yes it does! And the day I stop enjoying such tension will be the day they plant me. Don't dress on my account."

"Thank you."

"But if any neighbors drop by, you'd better scamper upstairs. Oh, the nudity wouldn't cause too much talk, indoors, but women bald to the eyelashes are fairly scarce on the Mountain these days. Mind your head if you do; the wall sort of leans out at you at the top of the stairs. I think the upstairs was built by a dwarf who leaned to the left at a forty-five degree angle. You'll find clothes in the bedroom to the right. Some may fit you—and of course a robe fits any size."

"Thank you."

"Are you hungry?"

"Thank you." They were the most emotionally charged words she had spoken so far. "Yes. But . . . but first, can you get my ROM back? I'm uncomfortable without it: a lot of what I know about this here/now is in it."

"I can start getting it back at once; it'll arrive after breakfast. Can you walk?"

She could walk. We went to the kitchen. I warned her to expect a loud noise, stepped outside and let off a round of birdshot. Then I whipped up a scratch brunch. She said she could eat anything I could. The coffee and porridge were hot; eggs, bacon, orange juice and toast took perhaps ten minutes. I had to show her how to use a knife and fork. That was excellent bacon, I'd fed Tricky and Dicky real well; the toast was fresh whole wheat, with fresh-churned butter from Mona Bent's cow; my coffee is famous throughout the North Mountain; the eggs were so fresh the shells still had crumbs of chickenshit clinging to them. She demolished everything, slowly. Oddly, she ate it all impassively, displaying neither relish nor distaste. She used no salt, no pepper, no tamari, no cream, no sugar. Toward the end she did think to say, "This is delicious," but I noticed she said it while she was eating a burnt piece of crust. I wondered how I would have behaved if suddenly dropped into, say, a medieval banquet. I also wondered how—and what—they ate where she came from.

I had made enough for Snaker; I expected him to arrive before the food was ready to eat, and I knew he had not broken his fast. But he didn't get there until we were done eating—and she had not left anything unconsumed. "Goddamn transmission," he muttered as he came through the door, and then stopped short. He stared at her for a long moment, then became extremely polite. "Beautiful lady, good morning to you," he said, in a much deeper voice than usual, bowing deeply. Basic North Mountain Hippie bow, palms together before chest, not the punch-yourself-in-the-belly kind. She watched it, paused for an instant and then imitated it superbly, sitting down. It looked a lot better on her than it had on him. Snaker turned to me. "Oh sweet Double-Hipness," he said, quoting Lord Buckley, "straighten me . . . 'cause I'm ready."

"Groovy," I agreed. "Snaker O'Malley, I would like you—"

—and I skidded to a halt, feeling like a jerk, and waited—

—and waited—

—growing more embarrassed by the second. I hate that, starting to introduce two people whose names you should know and realizing too late that you're shy one name, and it seems to happen to me about every other time I have to make introductions. Okay, I hadn't thought to ask her name, which probably wasn't very polite—but I'd been busy, and anyway I hadn't needed a name for her, there was only the one of her—and dammit, she had demonstrated repeatedly that she was clever and quick, she had learned how to bow and extrapolated it to a sitting position at a single glance, why the hell wasn't she letting me off the hook?

After five seconds, beginning to blush and just hating it, I had to say, "I'm sorry; I didn't ask your name."

She should then have understood why I was blushing, realized she'd been leaving me hanging, and been a little embarrassed herself. When I'm in a strange place with strange customs and realize that I've embarrassed my host, I become embarrassed. What she said, in that cool Lady Spock voice, was, "That's all right." And then she stopped talking.

Snaker's bushy eyebrows lifted, and he gave me a glance which seemed to say, and we thought she might be a telepath.

So I played straightman. "What is your name?"

"Rachel."

"Snaker, this is Rachel; Rachel, Snaker; consider yourselves married in the eyes of God." It's a gag line I probably use too often, but the reaction this time was novel. She got up, went to the Snaker, wrapped him up in those big muscular arms and purely kissed the hell out of him.

I expected him to hesitate momentarily, then talk himself into it and cooperate. I guess he trusted my friendship; he skipped the preamble. Enthusiasm was displayed by both halves of the kiss. Gusto. Joie de vivre. For something to do I rolled a joint. When it ended, the Snaker had the grace to shoot me a quick apologetic glance before saying, "Rachel, your husband will be one hell of a lucky gent—but I'm afraid my pal was joking. I am already engaged to be married, and . . ." He glanced down at what was flattening the fur on his coat. ". . . and much as I might regret it, I don't regret it. If you follow me. But thank you from the bottom of my—thank you very much."

"You're welcome, Snaker. Thank you."

"Welcome to our little corner of space-time. I hope you'll like it here."

"Thank you again. I hope so too."

Dammit, I'd done all the work, and he was getting all the good lines.

She turned to me. "I don't know your name."

"Sam. Sam Meade."

"Sam, in several of the things you said earlier I found ambiguity which I took to be whimsy. May I ask you to refrain from that? I understand that you mean to put me at ease, but it will confuse rather than amuse me."

Jesus.

"In particular, reversed or multiple meanings will badly disorient me—"

Snaker and I exchanged a glance. Half the fun of being his friend is that we can both volley puns back and forth all night, an exercise which both sharpens, and displays, the wits.

Suddenly I remembered the time I had unthinkingly dropped a pun in conversation with old Lester Sabean, my nearest neighbor (perhaps a mile to the west). " 'Scuse me, Sam," he'd said mildly, chewing on his ratty pipe. "Was that one o' them plays on words there?" When I allowed that it had been, he looked me in the eye and arranged his leathery wrinkles into a forgiving smile. "Might just as well save them around me, I guess," he said. I've never punned in Lester's presence since. Flashing on that now, I lost a little of my irritation with Rachel. That kiss had been my own dumb fault—

—except that she kept on chattering. And she was starting to gesture, to take little steps, to glance around at things. Until now she had projected the kind of Buddhist serenity that every freak on the North Mountain was trying for. All of a sudden she was hyper, giving off sparks, spilling energy like city people when they first get here. "—inherent in the nature of humor, even though one would think the matrix itself was intrinsically—"

Well, I knew how to deal with that. I lit the joint.

She trailed off and stared at it. "This," I said from the back of my throat, holding the smoke in, "is marijuana, or reefer. Its active ingredient is delta-niner tetrahydrocannabinol. It is made of dried flowers. I grew it myself, and it will not do you any harm."

She looked dubious. "Thank you, Sam. I know that I ought to partake of all your native refreshments—"

I exhaled. "It is nonnarcotic, nonaddictive, habituating with prolonged use. It contains much more tar than processed tobacco. It is just barely illegal. It cures nausea, cramps, anxiety and sobriety. You are under no slightest obligation to accept it, and if the waste smoke bothers you we'll open the stove door and let the draft take it."

"—Thank you Sam I would prefer that please you see I am responsible to many people and drugs which cure anxiety dull alertness and that's—"

"They don't have coffee when you come from, do they?" Snaker asked.

"Beg pardon?"

Oh, hell. Of course. The half a pot she'd accepted from me had probably been the first coffee she'd ever had. I wasn't so sure I would like the future if it didn't have coffee in it. . . .

"I'm not trying to change your mind," he said. He came over by the stove and took the joint, had a toke. "But you've already ingested a mild psychedelic, and this might help counteract it. The hot black drink in your cup over here contains a stimulant called caffeine. It's legal and very common, but quite strong and fiendishly addictive. It makes you hyper, speedy—do you know those words?"

She looked dismayed. "I think I understand them."

"If you're not used to it, especially, it can make you paranoid. Anxious and uneasy. It revs you up too fast. This—" He took another hit. "—cools you out." He was trying to avoid speaking Hippie, but of course it's difficult to discuss subjective biochemical states in any other language.

"That sounds like what I am experiencing. Dammit, it's hard to stay stable in this environment. Cold I was prepared to deal with, but for vegetable poisons I expected more warning. And it seems so sensible to be this afraid. You're right, I must correct it. But I would rather do it myself, thank you." She looked at him and waited expectantly.

Snaker and I exchanged the joint and a glance.

"I'll need my ROM," she told him.

He sprayed smoke, thunderstruck. "They have Krishna in the future?"

Now she was baffled.

I lost my own toke laughing. "Spelled R-O-M, Snake."

"Read-Only-Memory-oh. Oh. I see." His eyes widened. "Wow." He frowned suddenly, glanced at me. "Yes, Sam?"

"Go ahead, man." I sucked more smoke in, feeling the buzz come on. I grow good reefer if I say so myself.

He shucked his coat, produced the crown/headband from a capacious inside pocket. He held it in his hands and gazed at it a minute. "Fucking fantastic. Smaller than that Altair is supposed to be, no moving parts, direct brain interface, no visible power source—how many bytes?"

"Beg pardon?"

"How much data can it hold?"

"I can't say until I access it. May I, please?" She looked like a cat that's heard the can opener working, as though she were fighting the impulse to take the crown by force.

"I'm very sorry," he said, and handed it to her at once.

"Thank you, Snaker O'Malley!"

I watched the way she put it on. The rear locking pin snapped in first, then she pulled out the other two, settled the golden ellipse down over her forehead, moved it slightly to seat the pins and let them slide home. Almost at once her face began to visibly change, in a way I found oddly difficult to grasp.

 

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