"But at that time I had not even heard of Mike the Computer."
"Best time to kill you, wouldn't you say? Cissy, you are not only beautiful, you are pleasant to have around. Besides your hidden talents. Just put it down; we'll serve ourselves."
"Blagueur et gros menteur. You still must nap. Message from Til. You are not to come to the dinner table until you shave off that beard."
'Tell that baggage that I will starve before I will be henpecked."
"Yes, sir. And I feel the same way she does about it."
"Peace, woman."
"So I volunteer to shave you. And to cut your hair."
"I accept."
"Right after your nap."
"Begone. Jubal, did you have any of this jellied salad? It is something Til does exceptionally well... although all three of my owners are fine cooks."
"Will you put that in writing?"
"I told you to disappear. Jubal, living with three women takes fortitude."
"I know. I did so, for many years. Fortitude plus angelic disposition. And a taste for lazy living. But a group marriage, such as our Long Family, combines the advantages of bachelorhood, monogamy, and polygamy, with the drawbacks of none."
"I won't argue it but I'll stick with my three Graces as long as they'll let me hang around. Now let's see- Enrico Schultz. No such character."
"So?" I answered. "He made some horrid stains on my tablecloth."
"So he had another name. But you knew that. Best hypothesis makes him a member of the same gang as your friend Bill... who was a smiling villain if one ever smiled, as well as a consummate actor. We call them The Revisionists. Motivation had to be Adam Selene. Not Walker Evans."
"Why did he mention Walker Evans?"
'To shake you up, maybe. Dickie, I didn't know about General Evans until you brought the matter up, since that debacle is still in my future. My normal future. I can see how it weighs on your mind. Will weigh on your mind. Remember, I didn't know that you had been invalided out of the Andorran Contract Crusaders until you told me.
"Anyhow- All of the 'Friends of Walker Evans' are dead except you and one who went to the Asteroids and can't be found. This is as of July tenth, 2188, eleven years forward. Unless you want to talk to any alive on some date not quite so forward."
"Can't see any reason to."
"So it seemed to us. Now Walker Evans himself. Lazarus handled this... and a spot of world-changing, partly to show you what can be done. No attempt was made to revise the battle. It would be difficult, in 2177, to revise a battle in 2178 without utterly changing your life. Either kill you that year, or not lose your leg and you stay in the service-yes, I now know about your leg although it's forward from here. Either way, you don't go to Golden Rule, you don't marry Hazel... and we aren't sitting here, talking about it. World-changing is touchy, Dickie-best done in homeopathic doses.
"Lazarus has two messages for you. He says that you should feel no personal guilt over that debacle. To do so would be as silly as a subordinate of Custer feeling guilty over Little Big Horn... to which he adds that Custer was a far more brilliant general than Evans ever was. Lazarus speaks as one who has held every rank from private to commander in chief, in experience spread over many centuries and seventeen wars.
"That's the first message. The second is this: Tell your nephew that, yes, it horrifies nice people. But it happens. Only those who go out beyond the end of street lights and of pavements know how such things can happen. He says that he is certain that Walker Evans would not hold it against you. Dickie, what's he talking about?"
"Had he wanted you to know, he would have told you." "Reasonable. Was General Evans a man of good taste?" "What?" I stared at my uncle-then answered reluctantly:
"Well, no, I would not say so. I found him tough and a bit stringy."
"Now we have it out in the open1-"
"Yes, damn you!" "-and I can tell you the rest, the world-changing. A field operative hid a couple of ration packs under the General's body. When you moved the body, you found them... and it was just enough that none of the Friends of Walker Evans ever reached that degree of hunger necessary to overcome the taboo. So it never happened."
"Then why do I remember it?" "Do you?"
"Why-" "You remember finding jettisoned field rations under the body. And how good you felt!"
"Uncle, this is crazy."
"That's world-changing. For a time, you have a memory. Then a faded memory of a memory. Then nothing. It never happened, Dickie. You went through one hell of an ordeal and lost a leg. But you did not eat your commanding officer."
Uncle went on, "Jubal, what do we have left that's important? Dickie, you can't expect to have all your questions answered; no man can expect that. Mmm, oh, yes, those diseases- You had two of them; the rest was hype. You were cured in about three days; then they kept you in a controlled-memory field and put a new leg on you... and did something else. Haven't you felt better lately? Brisk? More energetic?"
"Well... yes. But it dates from the day I married Hazel, not from Boondock."
"Both, probably. During the month they had you available Dr. Ishtar gave you a booster. I learned that they shifted you from the rejuvenation clinic to the hospital just the day before they let you wake up. Oh, they really swindled you, boy; they gave you a new leg and made you thirty years younger. I think you ought to sue them."
"Oh, knock it off. How about that heat bomb? More hype?"
"Maybe, maybe not. Not decided, just the time tick spiked. The thing is-"
Harshaw intervened. "Richard, we think now that we may be able to finish Task Adam Selene before a heat bomb would be necessary. There are some plans. So the heat bombing right now is in the status of Schrodinger's Cat. The outcome depends on Task Adam Selene. And vice versa. We'll see."
"These plans- You're assuming that I'll come around."
"No. We're assuming that you won't."
"Humm... If you are assuming that I won't, why are you two bothering to tell me all this?"
Uncle said in a tired voice, "Dickie boy, thousands and thousands of man-hours have gone into satisfying your childish demand to have the veil lifted from the unknown. You think we are simply going to burn the results? Sit back down and pay attention. Mmm, stay out of Luna City and Golden Rule after June of 2188; there are warrants out for you for eight murders."
"Eight! Who?"
"Mmm, Tolliver, Enrico Schultz, Johnson, Oswald Progant, Rasmussen-"
"Rasmussen!"
"Do you know him?"
"I wore his fez for ten minutes; I never laid eyes on him."
"Let's not waste time on these murder charges. All they mean is that someone is out to get you, both in L-City and in Golden Rule. With three timejumping groups after you, that's not surprising. You want them cleared up; they can be cleared up later. If needed. If you don't just go to Tertius and forget it. Oh, yes-those code groups. Not a message, just a prop to get you to open that door. But you didn't let yourself be killed quietly the way you were supposed to. Dickie, you're a troublemaker."
"Gosh, I'm sorry."
"Any more questions?"
"Go take your nap."
"Not yet. Jubal. Now?"
"Certainly." Dr. Harshaw got up and left.
"Dickie."
"Yes, Uncle."
"She loves you, boy; she really does. God knows why. But mat does not mean that she will tell you the truth or always act in your interest. Be warned."
"Uncle Jock, it never does any good to warn a man about his wife. Would you accept any advice from me about Cissy?"