“Great Snell!” he gasped. “So that was it! I ran into a temporal snag!” With a startled glance around, he fled to the storeroom from which he had first emerged. The overalls he took off and returned to their hook. Arter that, Joe went over to a corner, felt around in the air, nodded with satisfaction and seated himself on nothing, three feet above the floor. Then Joe vanished.
“Time,” said Kerry Westerfield, “is curved. Eventually it gets back to the same place where it started. That’s duplication.” He put his feet up on a conveniently outjutting rock of the chimney and stretched luxuriously. From the kitchen Martha made clinking noises with bottles and glasses.
“Yesterday at this time I had a Martini,” Kerry said. “The time curve indicates that I should have another one now. Are you listening, angel?”
“I’m pouring,” said the angel distantly.
“You get my point, then. Here’s another. Time describes a spiral instead of a circle. If you call the first cycle ‘a’, the second one’s ‘a plus i’-see? Which means a double Martini tonight.”
“I knew where that would end,” Martha remarked, coming into the spacious, oak-raftered living room. She was a small, dark-haired woman, with a singularly pretty face and a figure to match. Her tiny gingham apron looked slightly absurd in combination with slacks and silk blouse. “And they don’t make infinity-proof gin. Here’s your Martini.” She did things with the shaker and manipulated glasses.
“Stir slowly,” Kerry cautioned. “Never shake. Ah-that’s it.” He accepted the drink and eyed it appreciatively. Black hair, sprinkled with gray, gleamed in the lamplight as he sipped the Martini.
“Good. Very good.”
Martha drank slowly and eyed her husband. A nice guy, Kerry Westerfield. He was forty-odd, pleasantly ugly, with a wide mouth and with an occasional sardonic gleam in his gray eyes as he contemplated life. They had been married for twelve years, and liked it.
From outside, the late, faint glow of sunset came through the windows, picking out the console cabinet that stood against the wall by the door. Kerry peered at it with appreciation.
“A pretty penny,” he remarked. “Still—”
“What? Oh. The men had a tough time getting it up the stairs. Why don’t you try it, Kerry?”
“Didn’t you?”
“The old one was complicated enough,” Martha said in a baffled manner. “Gadgets. They confuse me. I was brought up on an Edison. You wound it up with a crank, and strange noises came out of a horn. That I could understand. But now-you push a button, and extraordinary things happen. Electric eyes, tone selections, records that get played on both sides, to the accompaniment of weird groanings and clickings from inside the console-probably you understand those things. I don’t even want to.
Whenever I play a Crosby record in a superduper like that, Bing seems embarrassed.”
Kerry ate his olive. “I’m going to play some Debussy.” He nodded toward a table. “There’s a new Crosby record for you. The latest.”
Martha wriggled happily. “Can I, maybe, huh?”
“Uh-huh.”
“But you’ll have to show me how.”
“Simple enough,” said Kerry, beaming at the console. “Those babies are pretty good, you know.
They do everything but think.”
“I wish they’d wash the dishes,” Martha remarked. She set down her glass, got up and vanished into the kitchen.
Kerry snapped on a lamp nearby and went over to examine the new radio, Mideastern’s latest model, with all the new improvements. It had been expensive-but what the hell? He could afford it. And the old one had been pretty well shot.
It was not, he saw, plugged in. Nor were there any wires in evidence -not even a ground. Something new, perhaps. Built-in antenna and ground. Kerry crouched down, looked for a socket, and plugged the cord into it.
That done, he opened the doors and eyed the dials with every appearance of satisfaction. A beam of bluish light shot out and hit him in the eyes. From the depths of the console a faint, thoughtful clicking proceeded. Abruptly it stopped. Kerry blinked, fiddled with dials and switches, and bit at a fingernail.
The radio said, in a distant voice, “Psychology pattern checked and recorded.”
“Eh?” Kerry twirled a dial. “Wonder what that was? Amateur station-no, they’re off the air. Hm-m-m.” He shrugged and went over to a chair beside the shelves of albums. His gaze ran swiftly over the titles and composers’ names. Where was the Swan of Tuonela? There it was, next to Finlandia. Kerry took down the album and opened it in his lap. With his free hand he extracted a cigarette from his pocket, put it between his lips and fumbled for the matches on the table beside him. The first match he lit went out.
He tossed it into the fireplace and was about to reach for another when a faint noise caught his attention. The radio was walking across the room toward him. A whiplike tendril flicked out from somewhere, picked up a match, scratched it beneath the table top-as Kerry had done-and held the flame to the man’s cigarette.
Automatic reflexes took over. Kerry sucked in his breath, and exploded in smoky, racking coughs.
He bent double, gasping and momentarily blind.
When he could see again, the radio was back in its accustomed place.
Kerry caught his lower lip between his teeth. “Martha,” he called.
“Soup’s on,” her voice said.
Kerry didn’t answer. He stood up, went over to the radio and looked at it hesitantly. The electric cord had been pulled out of its socket. Kerry gingerly replaced it.
He crouched to examine the console’s legs. They looked like finely finished wood. His exploratory hand told him nothing. Wood-hard and brittle.
How in hell- “Dinner!” Martha called.
Kerry threw his cigarette into the fireplace and slowly walked out of the room. His wife, setting a gravy boat in place, stared at him.
“How many Martinis did you have?”
“Just one,” Kerry said in a vague way. “I must have dozed off for a minute. Yeah. I must have.”
“Well, fall to,” Martha commanded. “This is the last chance you’ll have to make a pig of yourself on my dumplings, for a week, anyway.”
Kerry absently felt for his wallet, took out an envelope and tossed it at his wife. “Here’s your ticket, angel. Don’t lose it.”
“Oh? I rate a compartment!” Martha thrust the pasteboard back into its envelope and gurgled happily. “You’re a pal. Sure you can get along without me?”
“Huh? Hm-m-m-I think so.” Kerry salted his avocado. He shook himself and seemed to come out of a slight daze. “Sure, I’ll be all right. You trot off to Denver and help Carol have her baby. It’s all in the family.”
“We-ell, my only sister—” Martha grinned. “You know bow she and Bill are. Quite nuts. They’ll need a steadying hand just now.”
There was no reply. Kerry was brooding over a forkful of avocado. He muttered something about the Venerable Bede.
“What about him?”
“Lecture tomorrow. Every term we bog down on the Bede, for some strange reason. Ah, well.”
“Got your lecture ready?”
Kerry nodded. “Sure.” For eight years he had taught at the University, and he certainly should know the schedule by this time!
Later, over coffee and cigarettes, Martha glanced at her wrist watch. “Nearly train time. I’d better finish packing. The dishes—”
“I’ll do ’em.” Kerry wandered after his wife into the bedroom and made motions of futile helpfulness. After a while, he carried the bags down to the car. Martha joined him, and they headed for the depot.
The train was on time. Half an hour after it had pulled out, Kerry drove the car back into the garage, let himself into the house and yawned mightily. He was tired. Well, the dishes, and then beer and a book in bed.