Andronicus entered the breach in the wall and let out a terrible howl. A moment later I peered in.
Pulcheria, naked, her tunic down near her ankles, stood in the classic position of modesty, with one hand flung across her budding breasts and the other spread over her loins. Next to her was Sauerabend, with his clothes open. He had his tool out and ready for business. I suppose he had been in the process of maneuvering Pulcheria into a suitable position when the interruption came.
“Outrage!” cried Andronicus. “Foulness! Seduction of a virgin maiden! I call you all to witness! Look at this, this monstrosity, this criminal deed!”
And he caught Sauerabend by one hand and his sister by the other, and tugged them both out into the open.
“Bear witness!” he bellowed. We got out of the way before Sauerabend could recognize us, although I think he was too terrified to see anyone. Pitiful Pulcheria, trying to hide all of herself at once, was huddled into a ball at her brother’s feet; but he kept pulling her up, exposing her, crying, “Look at the little whore! Look at her! Look, look, look!”
And a considerable crowd came to look.
We moved to one side. I felt like throwing up. That vile molester of children, that Humbert of stockbrokers — exposing his swollen red thing to Pulcheria, involving her in this scandal—
Now Andronicus had drawn his sword and was trying to kill either Sauerabend or Pulcheria or both. But the onlookers prevented him, bearing him to the ground and taking away his weapon. Pulcheria, in frantic dismay at having her nakedness exposed to such a multitude, grabbed a dagger from someone else and attempted to kill herself, but was stopped in time; finally an old man threw his cloak about her. All was confusion.
Metaxas said calmly, “We followed the rest of the sequence from here before you arrived, then doubled back to wait for you. Here’s what happened: The girl was engaged to Leo Ducas, but of course it was impossible for him to marry her after half of Byzantium had seen her naked like this. Besides, she was considered tainted, even though Sauerabend didn’t actually have time to get into her. The marriage was called off. Her family, blaming her for letting Sauerabend charm her into taking off her clothes, disowned her. Meanwhile, Sauerabend was given the choice of marrying the girl he dishonored, or suffering the usual penalty.”
“Which was?”
“Castration,” said Metaxas. “And so, as Heracles Photis, Sauerabend married her, changing the pattern of history at least to the extent of depriving you of your proper ancestral line. Which we’re now going to correct.”
“Not me,” said Jud B. “I’ve seen all I can stand. I’m going back to 1204. I’m due there at half past three in the morning to tell this guy to come back here and watch things.”
“But—” I said.
“Never mind figuring out the paradoxes,” Sam said. “We’ve got work to do.”
“Relieve me at quarter to four,” said Jud B, and shunted.
Metaxas and Sam and I coordinated our timers. “We go up the line,” said Metaxas, “by exactly one hour. To finish the comedy.” We shunted.
60.
And with great precision and no little relief, we finished the comedy.
In this fashion:
We shunted to noon, exactly, on that hot summer day of the year 1100, and took up positions along the wall of Constantinople. And waited, trying hard to ignore the other versions of ourselves who passed briefly through our time level on snooping missions of their own.
The pretty little girl and the watchful duenna came into view.
My heart ached with love for young Pulcheria, and I ached in other places as well, out of lust for the Pulcheria who would be, the Pulcheria whom I had known.
The pretty little girl and the unsuspecting duenna, keeping close together, strolled past us.
Conrad Sauerabend/Heracles Photis appeared. Discordant sounds in the orchestra; twirling of mustaches; hisses. He studied the girl and the woman. He patted his bulging belly. He drew forth a snubby little floater and checked its snout. Leering enthusiastically, he came forward, planning to thrust the floater against the duenna’s arm and, by giving her an hour of the giggling highs, to gain unimpeded access to the little girl.
Metaxas nodded to Sam.
Sam nodded to me.
We approached Sauerabend on a slanting path of approach.
“Now!” said Metaxas, and we went into action.
Huge black Sam lunged forward and clasped his right forearm across Sauerabend’s throat. Metaxas seized Sauerabend’s left wrist and bent his entire arm backward, far from the controls of the timer that could whiz him from our grasp. Simultaneously, I caught Sauerabend’s right arm, jerking it up and back and forcing him to drop the floater. This entire maneuver occupied perhaps an eighth of a second and resulted in the effective immobilization of Sauerabend. The duenna, meanwhile, had wisely fled with Pulcheria at the sight of this unseemly struggle.
Sam now reached under Sauerabend’s clothing and deprived him of his gimmicked timer.
Then we released him. Sauerabend, who undoubtedly thought that he had been set upon by bandits, saw me and grunted a couple of shocked monosyllables.
I said, “You thought you were pretty clever, didn’t you?”
He grunted some more.
I said, “Gimmicking your timer, slipping away, thinking you could set up in business for yourself as a smuggler. Eh? You didn’t believe we’d catch you?”
I didn’t tell him of the weeks of hard work that we had put in. I didn’t tell him of the timecrimes we ourselves had committed for the sake of detecting him — the paradoxes we had left strewn all up and down the line, the needless duplications of ourselves. I didn’t tell him that we had just pinched six years of his life as a Byzantine tavernkeeper into a pocket universe that, so far as he was concerned, had no existence whatever. Nor did I tell him of the chain of events that had made him the husband of Pulcheria Botaniates in that pinched-off universe, depriving me of my proper ancestry. All of those things had now unhappened. There now would be no tavernkeeper named Heracles Photis selling meat and drink to the Byzantines of the years 1100-1105.
Metaxas produced a spare timer, ungimmicked, that he had carried for the purpose.
“Put it on,” he said.
Sullenly, Sauerabend donned it.
I said, “We’re going back to 1204, more or less to the time you set out from. And then we’re going to finish our tour and go back down the line to 2059. And God help you if you cause any more trouble for me, Sauerabend. I won’t report you for timecrime, because I’m a merciful man, even though an unauthorized shunt like yours is very definitely a criminal act; but if you do anything whatever that displeases me in the slightest between now and the moment I’m rid of you, I’ll make you roast for it. Clear?”
He nodded bleakly.
To Sam and Metaxas I said, “I can handle this from here on. Thanks for everything. I can’t possibly tell you—”
“Don’t try,” said Metaxas, and together they shunted down the line.
I set Sauerabend’s new timer and my own, and drew forth my pitch-pipe. “Here we go,” I said, and we shunted into 1204.
61.
At quarter to four on that very familiar night in 1204 I went once more up the stairs of the inn, this time with Sauerabend. Jud B paced restlessly just within the door of the room. He brightened at the sight of my captive. Sauerabend looked puzzled at the presence of two of me, but he didn’t dare say anything.
“Get inside,” I said to him. “And don’t monkey with your goddam timer or you’ll suffer for it.”
Sauerabend went in.
I said to Jud B, “The nightmare’s over. We grabbed him, took away his timer, put a regulation one on him, and here he is. The whole operation took just exactly four hours, right?”