“It was, yes. But that’s all ancient history.”
Her face rose toward his. “Come have some tea with me.”
“Laliene—”
Softly she said, “I wanted you to come to me so very badly. That was why I did it. You were ignoring me—you’ve ignored me ever since this trip began—oh, Thimiroi, Thimiroi, I’m trying to do the right thing, don’t you see? And I want you to do the right thing too.”
“What are you trying to tell me, Laliene?”
“Be careful, is what I’m trying to tell you.”
“Careful of what?”
“Have some tea with me,” she said.
“I’ll have some tea,” he told her. “But not, I think, with you.”
Tears welled in her eyes. She turned her head to the side, but not so quickly that Thimiroi did not see them.
That was new, he thought. Tears in Laliene’s eyes! He had never known her to be so overwrought. Too much euphoriac, he wondered? She kept her grip on his arm for a long moment, and then, smiling sadly, she released him and moved away.
“Thimiroi!” Lesentru called, turning and grinning broadly at him and waving his long thin arms. “How absolutely splendid to see you! Come, come, let’s sip a little together!” He crossed the room as if swimming through air. “You look so gloomy, man! That can’t be allowed. Lutheena! Fevra! Everybody! We must cheer Thimiroi up! We can’t let anyone go around looking as bleak as this, not tonight.”
They swept toward him from every direction, six, eight, ten of them, laughing, whooping, embracing him, holding fragrant cups of euphoriac tea out at him. It began almost to seem that the party was in his honor. Why were they making such a fuss over him? He was starting to regret having come here at all. He drank the tea that someone put in his hand, and almost at once there was another cup there. He drank that too.
Laliene was at his side again. Thimiroi was having trouble focusing his eyes.
“What did you mean?” he asked. “When you said to be careful.”
“I’m not supposed to say. It would be improperly influencing the flow of events.”
“Be improper, then. But stop talking in riddles.”
“Are they such riddles, then?”
“To me they are.”
“I think you know what I’m talking about,” Laliene said.
“I do?”
They might have been all alone in the middle of the room. I have had too much euphoriac, he told himself. But I can still hold my own. I can still hold my own, yes.
Laliene said in a low whisper, leaning close, her breath warm against his cheek, “Tomorrow—where are you going to go tomorrow, Thimiroi?”
He looked at her, astounded, speechless.
“I know,” she said.
“Get away from me.”
“I’ve known all along. I’ve been trying to save you from—”
“You’re out of your mind, Laliene.”
“No, Thimiroi. You are!”
She clung to him. Everyone was gaping at them.
Terror seized him. I have to get out of here, he thought.
Now. Go to Christine. Help her pack, and go with her to the airport. Right now. Whatever time it is, midnight, one in the morning, whatever. Before they can stop me. Before they change me.
“No, Thimiroi,” Laliene cried. “Please—please—”
Furiously he pushed her away. She went sprawling to the floor, landing in a flurried heap at Antilimoin’s feet. Everyone was yelling at once.
Laliene’s voice came cutting through the confusion. “Don’t do it, Thimiroi! Don’t do it!”
He swung around and rushed toward the door, and through it, and wildly down the stairs, and through the quiet hotel lobby and out into the night. A brilliant crescent moon hung above him, and behind it the cold blaze of the stars in the clear darkness. Looking back, he saw no pursuers. He headed up the street toward Christine’s, walking swiftly at first, then breaking into a light trot.
As he reached the corner, everything swirled and went strange around him. He felt a pang of inexplicable loss, and a sharp stab of wild fear, and a rush of anger without motive. The darkness closed bewilderingly around him, like a great glove. Then came a feeling of motion, swift and impossible to resist. He had a sense of being swept down a vast river toward an abyss that lay just beyond.
The effect lasted only a moment, but it was an endless moment, in which Thimiroi perceived the passage of time in sharp discontinuous segments, a burst of motion followed by a deep stillness and then another burst, and then stillness again. All color went from the world, even the muted colors of night: the sky was a startling blinding white, the buildings about him were black.
His eyes ached. His head was whirling.
He tried to move, but his movements were jerky and futile, as though he were fighting his way on foot through a deep tank of water. It must be the euphoriac, he told himself. I have had much too much. But I have had too much before, and I have never felt anything like—like—
Then the strangeness vanished as swiftly as it had come.
Everything was normal again, the whiteness gone from the sky, time flowing as it had always flowed, and he was running smoothly, steadily, down the street, like some sort of machine, arms and legs pumping, head thrown back.
Christine’s house was dark. He rang the bell, and when there was no answer he hammered on the door.
“Christine! Christine, it’s me, Thimiroi! Open the door, Christine! Hurry! Please!”
There was no response. He pounded on the door again.
This time a light went on upstairs.
“Here,” he called. “I’m by the front door!”
Her window opened. Christine looked out and down at him.
“Who are you? What do you want? Do you know what time it is?”
“Christine!”
“Go away.”
“But—Christine—”
“You have exactly two seconds to get away from here, whoever you are. Then I’m calling the police.” Her voice was cold and angry. “They’ll sober you up fast enough.”
“Christine, I’m Thimiroi.”
“Who? What kind of name is that? I don’t know anybody by that name. I’ve never seen you before in my life.” The window slammed shut. The light went out above him. Thimiroi stood frozen, amazed, dumbstruck.
Then he began to understand.
Laliene said, “We all knew, yes. We were told before we ever came here. Nothing is secret to those who operate The Travel. How could it be? They move freely through all of time. They see everything. We were warned in Canterbury that you were going to try an intervention, and that there would be a counter-intervention if you did. So I tried to stop you. To prevent you from getting yourself into trouble.”
“By throwing your body at me?” Thimiroi said bitterly.
“By getting you to fall in love with me,” she said. “So that you wouldn’t want to get involved with her.”
He shook his head in wonder. “All along, throughout the whole trip. Everything you did, aimed at ensnaring me into a romance, just as I thought. What I didn’t realize was that you were simply trying to save me from myself.”
“Yes.”
“I suppose you didn’t try hard enough,” Thimiroi said. “No. No, that isn’t it. You tried too hard.”
“Did I?”
“Perhaps that was it. At any rate I didn’t want you, not at any point. I wanted her the moment I saw her. It couldn’t have been avoided, I suppose.”
“I’m sorry, Thimiroi.”
“That you failed?”
“That you have done such harm to yourself.”
He stood there wordlessly for a time. “What will happen to me now?” he asked finally.