Timeline. Part 21

"With all due respect, Ms. Kramer, you're not facing up to the situation here," Baretto said stubbornly. "You've already lost two people. Three, if you count Traub."

"No, Victor. We've never lost anybody."

"You certainly lost Traub."

"We didn't lose Dr. Traub," she said. "Traub volunteered, and Traub was depressed."

"You a.s.sume he was depressed."

"We know he was, Victor. After his wife died, he was severely depressed, and suicidal. Even though he had pa.s.sed his trip limit, he wanted to go back, to see if he could improve the technology. He had an idea that he could modify the machines to have fewer transcription errors. But apparently, his idea was wrong. That's why he ended up in the Arizona desert. Personally, I don't think he ever really intended to come back at all. I think it was suicide."

"And you lost Rob," Baretto said. "He wasn't any d.a.m.n suicide."

Kramer sighed. Rob Deckard was one of the first of the observers to go back, almost two years earlier. And he was one of the first to show transcription errors. "That was much earlier in the project, Victor. The technology was less refined. And you know what happened. After he'd made several trips, Rob began to show minor effects. He insisted on continuing. But we didn't lose him."

"He went out, and he never came back," Baretto said. "That's the bottom line."

"Rob knew exactly what he was doing."

"And now the Professor."

"We haven't lost the Professor," she said. "He's still alive."

"You hope. And you don't know why he didn't come back in the first place."

"Victor-"

"I'm just saying," Baretto said, "in this case the logistics don't fit the mission profile. You're asking us to take an unnecessary risk."

"You don't have to go," Kramer said mildly.

"No, h.e.l.l. I never said that."

"You don't have to."

"No. I'm going."

"Well, then, those are the rules. No modern technology goes into the world. Understood?"

"Understood."

"And none of this gets mentioned to the academics."

"No, no. h.e.l.l no. I'm professional."

"Okay," Kramer said.

She watched him leave. He was sulking, but he was going to go along with it. They always did, in the end. And the rule was important, she thought. Even though Doniger liked to give a little speech about how you couldn't change history, the fact was, n.o.body really knew-and n.o.body wanted to risk it. They didn't want modern weapons, or artifacts, or plastic to go back.

And they never had.

Stern sat with the others on hard-backed chairs in a room with maps. Susan Gomez, the woman who had just returned in the machine, spoke in a crisp, quick manner that Stern found rushed.

"We are going," she said, "to the Monastery of Sainte-Mere, on the Dordogne River, in southwestern France. We will arrive at 8:04 a.m. on the morning of Thursday, April 7, 1357-that's the day of the Professor's message. It's fortunate for us, because there's a tournament that day in Castelgard, and the spectacle will draw large crowds from the surrounding countryside, so we won't be noticed."

She tapped one map. "Just for orientation, the monastery is here. Castelgard is over here, across the river. And the fortress of La Roque is on the bluffs here, above the monastery. Questions so far?"

They shook their heads.

"All right. The situation in the area is a little unsettled. As you know, April of 1357 puts us roughly twenty years into the Hundred Years War. It's seven months after the English victory at Poitiers, where they took the king of France prisoner. The French king is now being held for ransom. And France, without a king, is in an uproar.

"Right now, Castelgard is in the hands of Sir Oliver de Vannes, a British knight born in France. Oliver has also taken over La Roque, where he is strengthening the castle's defenses. Sir Oliver's an unpleasant character, with a famously bad temper. They call him the 'Butcher of Crecy,' for his excesses in that battle."

"So Oliver is in control of both towns?" Marek said.

"At the moment, yes. However, a company of renegade knights, led by a defrocked priest called Arnaut de Cervole-"

"The Archpriest," Marek said.

"Yes, exactly, the Archpriest-is moving into the area, and will undoubtedly attempt to take the castles from Oliver. We believe the Archpriest is still several days away. But fighting may break out at any time, so we will work quickly."

She moved to another map, with a larger scale. It showed the monastery buildings.

"We arrive approximately here, at the edge of the Foret de Sainte-Mere. From our arrival point, we should be able to look right down on the monastery. Since the Professor's message came from the monastery, we will go directly there first. As you know, the monastery takes its main meal of the day at ten o'clock in the morning, and the Professor is likely to be present at that time. With luck, we'll find him there and bring him back."

Marek said, "How do you know all this? I thought n.o.body's ever gone into the world."

"That's correct. No one has. But observers close to the machines have still brought back enough that we know the background at this particular time. Any other questions?"

They shook their heads no.

"All right. It is very important we recover the Professor while he is still at the monastery. If he moves to either Castelgard or La Roque, it will be much more difficult. We have a tight mission profile. I expect to be on the ground between two and three hours. We will stay together at all times. If any of us is separated from the others, use your earpieces to get together again. We will find the Professor, and come right back. Okay?"

"Got it."

"You'll have two escorts, myself and Victor Baretto, over there in the corner. Say h.e.l.lo, Vic."

The second escort was a surly man who looked like an ex-marine-a tough and able man. Baretto's period clothes were more peasantlike, loose-fitting, made of a fabric like burlap. He gave a nod and a slight wave. He seemed to be in a bad mood.

"Okay?" Gomez said. "Other questions."

Chris said, "Professor Johnston has been there three days?"

"That's right."

"Who do the locals think he is?"

"We don't know," Gomez said. "We don't know why he left the machine in the first place. He must have had a reason. But since he is in the world, the simplest thing for him would be to pose as a clerk or scholar from London, on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. Sainte-Mere is on the pilgrimage route, and it is not unusual for pilgrims to break their trip, to stay a day or a week, especially if they strike up a friends.h.i.+p with the Abbot, who is quite a character. The Professor may have done that. Or he may not. We just don't know."

"But wait a minute," Chris Hughes said. "Won't his presence there change the local history? Won't he influence the outcome of events?"

"No. He won't."

"How do you know?"

"Because he can't."

"But what about the time paradoxes?"

"Time paradoxes?"

"That's right," Stern said. "You know, like going back in time and killing your grandfather, so that you can't be born and couldn't go back and kill your grandfather-"

"Oh, that that." She shook her head impatiently. "There are no time paradoxes."

"What do you mean? Of course there are."

"No, there aren't," came a firm voice behind them. They turned; Doniger was there. "Time paradoxes do not occur."

"What do you mean?" Stern said. He was feeling put out that his question had been so roughly treated.

"The so-called time paradoxes," Doniger said, "do not really involve time. They involve ideas about history that are seductive but wrong. Seductive, because they flatter you into thinking you can have an impact on the course of events. And wrong, because of course, you can't."

"You can't have an impact on events?"

"No."

"Of course you can."

"No. You can't. It's easiest to see if you take a contemporary example. Say you go to a baseball game. The Yankees and the Mets-the Yankees are going to win, obviously. You want to change the outcome so that the Mets win. What can you do? You're just one person in a crowd. If you try to go to the dugout, you will be stopped. If you try to go onto the field, you will be hauled away. Most ordinary actions available to you will end in failure and will not alter the outcome of the game.

"Let's say you choose a more extreme action: you'll shoot the Yankee pitcher. But the minute you pull a gun, you are likely to be overpowered by nearby fans. Even if you get off a shot, you'll almost certainly miss. And even if you succeed in hitting the pitcher, what is the result? Another pitcher will take his place. And the Yankees will win the game.

"Let's say you choose an even more extreme action. You will release a nerve gas and kill everyone in the stadium. Once again, you're unlikely to succeed, for all the reasons you're unlikely to get a shot off. But even if you do manage to kill everybody, you still have not changed the outcome of the game. You may argue that you have pushed history in another direction-and perhaps so-but you haven't enabled the Mets to win the game. In reality, there is nothing you can do to make the Mets win. You remain what you always were: a spectator.

"And this same principle applies to the great majority of historical circ.u.mstances. A single person can do little to alter events in any meaningful way. Of course, great ma.s.ses of people can 'change the course of history.' But one person? No."

"Maybe so," Stern said, "but I can can kill my grandfather. And if he's dead then I couldn't be born, so I would not exist, and therefore I couldn't have shot him. And that's a paradox." kill my grandfather. And if he's dead then I couldn't be born, so I would not exist, and therefore I couldn't have shot him. And that's a paradox."

"Yes, it is-a.s.suming you actually kill your grandfather. But that may prove difficult in practice. So many things go wrong in life. You may not meet up with him at the right time. You may be hit by a bus on your way. Or you may fall in love. You may be arrested by the police. You may kill him too late, after your parent has already been conceived. Or you may come face to face with him, and find you can't pull the trigger."

"But in theory in theory ..." ..."

"When we are dealing with history, theories are worthless," Doniger said with a contemptuous wave. "A theory is only valuable if it has the ability to predict future outcomes. But history is the record of human action-and no theory can predict human action."

He rubbed his hands together.

"Now then. Shall we end all this speculation and be on our way?"

There were murmurs from the others.

Stern cleared his throat. "Actually," he said, "I don't think I'm going."

Marek had been expecting it. He'd watched Stern during the briefing, noticing the way he kept s.h.i.+fting in his chair, as if he couldn't get comfortable. Stern's anxiety had been steadily growing ever since the tour began.

Marek himself had no doubts about going. Since his youth, he had lived and breathed the medieval world, imagining himself in Warburg and Carca.s.sonne, Avignon and Milan. He had joined the Welsh wars with Edward I. He had seen the burghers of Calais give up their city, and he had attended the Champagne Fairs. He had lived at the splendid courts of Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Duc de Berry. Marek was going to take this trip, no matter what. As for Stern- "I'm sorry," Stern was saying, "but this isn't my affair. I only signed on to the Professor's team because my girlfriend was going to summer school in Toulouse. I'm not a historian. I'm a scientist. And anyway, I don't think it's safe."

Doniger said, "You don't think the machines are safe?"

"No, the place. The year 1357. There was civil war in France after Poitiers. Free companies of soldiers pillaging the countryside. Bandits, cutthroats, lawlessness everywhere."

Marek nodded. If anything, Stern was understating the situation. The fourteenth century was a vanished world, and a dangerous one. It was a religious world; most people went to church at least once a day. But it was an incredibly violent world, where invading armies killed everyone, where women and children were routinely hacked to death, where pregnant women were eviscerated for sport. It was a world that gave lip service to the ideals of chivalry while indiscriminately pillaging and murdering, where women were imagined to be powerless and delicate, yet they ruled fortunes, commanded castles, took lovers at will and plotted a.s.sa.s.sination and rebellion. It was a world of s.h.i.+fting boundaries and s.h.i.+fting allegiances, often changing from one day to the next. It was a world of death, of sweeping plagues, of disease, of constant warfare.

Gordon said to Stern, "I certainly wouldn't want to force you."

"But remember," Doniger said, "you won't be alone. We'll be sending escorts with you."

"I'm sorry," Stern kept saying. "I'm sorry."

Finally Marek said, "Let him stay. He's right. It's not his period, and it's not his affair."

"Now that you mention it," Chris said, "I've been thinking: It's not my period, either. I'm much more late thirteenth than true fourteenth century. Maybe I should stay with David-"

"Forget it," Marek said, throwing an arm over Chris's shoulder. "You'll be fine." Marek treated it like a joke, even though he knew Chris wasn't exactly joking.

Not exactly.

The room was cold. Chilly mist covered their feet and ankles. They left ripples in the mist as they walked toward the machines.

Four cages had been linked together at the bases, and a fifth cage stood by itself. Baretto said, "That's mine," and stepped into the single cage. He stood erect, staring forward, waiting.

Susan Gomez stepped into one of the cl.u.s.tered cages, and said, "The rest of you come with me." Marek, Kate and Chris climbed into the cages next to her. The machines seemed to be on springs; they rocked slightly as each got on.

"Everybody all set?"

The others murmured, nodded.