The Coils of Time

by A Bertram Chandler

  “Christopher! Are you mad?”

  “No. I’m not mad.” He added, immediately regretting his cheap attempt at humor, “At least, I’m not running around like a refugee from a nudist colony.”

  “And how else would any sane person be dressed on this hothouse planet? Frankly, I’ve been wondering why you were keeping that absurd clothing of yours on.”

  She stood there, looking down at him. She could not conceal the disappointment and worry in her voice. “You’re Christopher — but you’re not. They’ve done something to you.” She went on, her face strained and desolate. “Believe me, Chris, I’d do anything to help you, to bring you back to me. But there are Hardcastle and Moira Simmons. They mustn’t get you. They mustn’t. So leave me, Chris. I want to keep you, but….” She turned away from him in an attitude of utter dejection.

  Wilkinson got to his feet, put out his right hand to grasp her smooth shoulder. He turned her gently, so that she was facing him. “Vanessa,” he said to her gently, “let me explain. Please let me explain. And prepare yourself for a shock.”

  She demanded, not without bitterness, “To find you again — and then, almost at once, to lose you…. What other shocks can there be?”

  He told her quietly, striving to instill conviction into his voice, “You are Vanessa, but not my Vanessa …” He corrected himself. “But you are. You always will be. What I mean is — you are not the Vanessa I used to know, the Vanessa who was lost in a shipwreck between Earth and Mars.” He added parenthetically, “Earth and Mars are planets of the System from which I come.” He saw that she was about to interrupt him, but went on hurriedly, “And I am not the Christopher Wilkinson whom you knew, whom you lost. But I am Christopher Wilkinson, and I love Vanessa Raymond, and I always shall.”

  She regarded him in silence, her face and her manner a vivid portrayal of puzzlement, but the doubt and the suspicion seemed to be vanishing. He waited for her to speak, but she said nothing.

  So he asked, “Tell me, what world is this?”

  “Venus, of course,” she said.

  IX

  WILKINSON WAS shocked into silence.

  Slowly he turned his head and looked all around him — at the river of steaming mud, at the lush, gaudy vegetation, at the hovering, darting flying creatures that were like oversized and improbably brilliant versions of Terran insects. Finally his regard turned to the girl.

  He thought — but without emotion, without conviction — she’s mad.

  But there were no indications of insanity on her face, in her eyes, troubled though they were. She was naked, but she was one of those women who look impeccably groomed no matter what they are or are not wearing. And Wilkinson knew that clothing was not worn in many communities in Earth’s Tropics and sub-Tropics. It could well be argued that the wearing of clothing in conditions of extreme heat and humidity was itself a symptom of insanity.

  He asked himself, am I sane?

  What was it that the psychologist had said when he recovered consciousness after his first experience with Henshaw’s machine? Hadn’t the man suggested that all that he had seen, all that he had experienced, had been dredged up somehow from his own memory, his own subconscious? But then both Henshaw and Titov had assured him that an actual physical journey had taken place; but to where? to when?

  He asked, “Is this Venus?”

  Vanessa’s expression reflected her own doubt, her own worry. “Of course it is,” she said. Then, “Christopher! What’s wrong with you? You must have been brainwashed.”

  “I’m getting to the stage where I’m not sure of anything anymore,” he muttered. “But tell me, is the central body of this planetary system called the Sun? And are the planets called Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars? And the Asteroids? And then Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto?”

  She was looking at him intently, her brows creased. “Of course. What else would they be?”

  He told her, speaking slowly and carefully, “Where I come from, or when I come from, we have the same planets as you. But our Venus isn’t like this. It’s an almost lifeless dust-ball of a planet, with a poisonous atmosphere. There’s a small colony there, of Terran scientists. I agreed to act as a guinea pig for one of them. He was supposed to be sending me a few years into the past so I could do something to avert the disaster in which you were killed….” He paused, then asked, “Tell me, Vanessa, what year is this?”

  “Twenty-one ten,” she replied.

  “But it doesn’t make sense,” he muttered. “It was twenty-one oh nine — July 15, according to the Terran calendar — when I left Science City on Venus. My Venus.” He paused again. “This date of yours, is it Terran Standard or some cock-eyed local time?”

  “Terran Standard, of course.”

  “It doesn’t make sense!” he almost shouted.

  “But it must,” she insisted, the feminine practicality strong in her voice. “It must. I lost you, Christopher, and now I’ve got you back. And you lost me, you say — and now you’ve found me again. There’s a pattern of sorts, and I’ve no quarrel with it. Don’t let’s worry about it, darling. We’ll get everything sorted out in time.”

  “In Time …” echoed Wilkinson.

  She looked at him intently, worriedly. “But before I take you back to the camp we shall have to concoct some sort of story for Hardcastle and Moira Simmons. I believe what you told me — but will they?”

  “They’ll have to,” he said.

  “But they won’t. They’re hard, suspicious. They must be, I suppose. I should be the same way, but …”

  “This is my story,” said Wilkinson stubbornly. “In my Universe I’m a spaceman. My ship was on the run between Earth and Venus. On Venus I picked up an unpleasant and dangerous virus infection and I was put ashore sick. After my recovery I was approached by a certain Dr. Henshaw, who wanted a guinea pig for his Time Travel experiments. I had my reasons for volunteering — as you know — so I volunteered. The first session with his Time Twister was a brief one — and I had to stand helplessly in the river bed to watch your rocket plane crash and to see you dragged from the wreckage by a man whom I almost recognized. All right, then — by myself. The second time, you found me.

  “And then, after I’ve told my tale, your Mr. Hardcastle and Miss Simmons can tell me theirs. It had better be a good one. Damn it all — I still can’t believe in this crazy world!”

  “Then you’d better start right now, Wilkinson,” interjected a strange voice.

  Wilkinson spun around, saw that a tall, naked man had emerged from behind the trees. He was holding what looked like some sort of gun and, as he spoke, he raised the stock to his shoulder, taking aim.

  The spaceman’s hand fell to the butt of his pistol.

  “Better not, Wilkinson,” advised the other. “Better not. My bolt’ll beat you to the draw. And you, Vanessa, get that belt off him. There’s far too much lethal ironmongery dangling from it.”

  “But …” she began.

  “Jump to it!” snapped the stranger.

  “Better do as he says,” murmured Wilkinson. He could see now what the odd-looking weapon was. It was an arbalest, a crossbow. After the first shot the bowman would have to reload; but, meanwhile, the bolt would have made a nasty hole in the target. At this range it could hardly miss.

  Another man stepped from the concealment of the trees, then two women. All of them were young and tough-looking, and all of them were armed as was the first one. One of the women would have been beautiful but for the burn scar that ran down the side of her face and puckered the skin of her right shoulder.

  The first man said, “Wilkinson’s back. So they didn’t kill him, only brainwashed him.”

  “So I see,” remarked the scarred woman. “Shall we do away with him now? It’ll be kinder ‘than letting Hardcastle and Moira try their own brainwashing techniques on him.”

  Wilkinson stood there helplessly, trying to think of something to say to the newcomers. He felt Vanessa’s hands busy with the
fastenings of his belt. And then he heard a warning cry from one of the two women and saw the first man’s crossbow shift, heard the twang of the suddenly released string. Behind him Vanessa screamed and, disregarding the leveled weapons, he turned around and saw her nursing her right hand, from which blood was dripping. At her feet lay his pistol.

  He acted instinctively, dropping to his knees, and heard the whirr as two of the bolts barely missed his head, and felt the jar of a glancing blow on his right shoulder. He dimly realized that the missile must have been deflected by his light armor — but all that mattered was that his right arm and hand were still in working order. He scooped up the pistol from the moss, juggling it for a brief, desperate second, and then its butt was fitting snugly into his palm and his index finger was on the trigger.

  He said coldly as he turned to face the others, “Don’t bother to reload. I can loose off four rounds, one for each of you, while you’re still fumbling.”

  “But they’re friends, Chris,” Vanessa was saying. “But they’re friends.”

  “They didn’t act in a very friendly manner. But what about you?”

  “I’m all right. It’s only a graze. Malcolm shot the pistol out of my hand.”

  “I should have shot you, Wilkinson,” growled the big man.

  Wilkinson sat there on the soft moss, looking at the two men and the two women. They looked at him. He wondered how long this impasse would last; already the gun was heavy in his right hand. Inside his suit he was soaked with sweat; the built-in air conditioner had, of course, ceased to function as soon as he removed his helmet.

  “Stalemate,” observed the scarred blonde, grinning not unpleasantly.

  “Not quite,” Wilkinson told her. “In a matter of seconds I can kill all of you.”

  “But you wouldn’t, Chris!” cried Vanessa. Then, doubtfully, “You wouldn’t?”

  Wilkinson tried hard to make his voice sound vicious. ‘Wouldn’t I?”

  “Then — then you are from them after all….”

  “Damn it all, girl, I’m not from them — whoever they are when they’re up and dressed. But I don’t like seeing you shot at, and I don’t like being shot at myself.”

  “Vanessa was going to shoot at us,” said the blonde reasonably.

  “I wasn’t, Claire.”

  “Then what the hell were you doing with his pistol, Duckie?”

  “This won’t get you anywhere, Wilkinson,” said the big man, Malcolm.

  “Or you,” said Wilkinson.

  “There’s something odd about this,” said Malcolm.

  “You’re telling me,” agreed Wilkinson.

  “Can’t we talk things over?” asked the blonde.

  “That’s what I’ve been wanting to do all along,” Wilkinson told her, “if only you people would let me.”

  “You are Chris Wilkinson?” asked Malcolm.

  “I am — but not the Chris Wilkinson you knew.”

  “This is getting crazier and crazier,” said the blonde.

  “Isn’t it? Meanwhile, I’d like one of you to do something about Vanessa’s hand.”

  He heard Vanessa’s voice. “It’s nothing serious, Chris. Really it’s not.” She moved to the fringe of his field of vision, and he saw that she had bound a papery leaf from one of the plants about the wound. Already it had stopped bleeding.

  “Of course,” said the blonde, “you don’t know that goldflower leaves possess excellent antiseptic and coagulant properties.”

  “I don’t,” he said. “Or I didn’t. I suppose that I know now.”

  “It’s a good act,” said the blonde. “We were listening to the tail end of your intimate talk with Vanessa, before we came out from the trees. Just whom do you hope to fool?”

  He said, “I’m not trying to fool anybody.” Then, speaking to Vanessa, “Try to open my haversack without pushing me off balance. Maybe something in it will convince these friends of yours that I’m a stranger to this world.”

  He felt her gentle touch at his back, tried to ignore it as he held his weapon steady. Then she had moved again into his field of vision, and was holding up for inspection a small packet. “Cigarettes?” she was asking. “What are they?”

  “Cigarettes?” echoed the blonde. “I’ve read about them. They were a dangerous vice that was stamped out towards the close of the Twentieth Century. It was proved that tobacco smoking was the cause of lung cancer.”

  “Yes,” agreed Wilkinson. “But in my world, ways were found to remove the carcinogenic agents from tobacco. There are even tobacco plantations on Mars.”

  Malcolm said, “I’m almost convinced. After all, the stories we heard about our Chris Wilkinson’s death were rather more than mere rumors. And Wallenstein actually saw the body before it was disposed of.”

  Said the blonde, “But they’re clever, and this business of faking that archaic vice is all part and parcel of their cleverness.”

  “I’m tired of sitting here,” complained Wilkinson. “I don’t want to have to shoot you, no matter what your feelings are about me. I suggest that you take me to your Mr. Hardcastle so we can get things ironed out.”

  “But you’re armed,” said Malcolm.

  “So he’s armed,” agreed Claire. Then to the other woman, a short, slightly built redhead, “You’re fast on your feet, Suzie. Run on ahead and warn Hardcastle, so that he can have the laser projectors manned and ready.”

  “Do you agree, Wilkinson?” asked Malcolm.

  “Yes. I agree.” He turned to Vanessa. “Here. You’re more or less neutral. Take the gun and give me those cigarettes.”

  He sat and smoked contentedly while the naked men and women, their weapons dangling unheeded from their hands, watched him with amazement.

  X

  As HE CAME to the end of his cigarette Wilkinson was beginning to ponder the wisdom of his actions. But, he told himself, he had to trust somebody. He had to trust Vanessa; he had blandly assumed that she knew how to use a pistol, in spite of the fact that arbalests seemed to be the standard portable armament on this planet; and he had to trust these belligerent friends of hers. He could not take on a whole world single-handed.

  He threw away the butt. “Well?” he asked.

  “I hope, for your sake,” said the woman Claire, “that the carcinogens have been removed from that tobacco. Not that it matters much.”

  “You seem to know plenty about it,” he told her.

  “I should. I’m a doctor — of sorts. I was just about to qualify when I fell foul of the Committee.”

  “I take it,” asked Wilkinson, “that ‘the Committee’ is another way of saying ‘them’?”

  “It is.” The tall blonde glanced at Malcolm, who returned her look but said nothing. She spoke again to Wilkinson, “Come on — since you’re so determined to die messily. Suzie should be at the camp by now.” She added, “You can take off that tin suit of yours if you like. Or do you want a can opener?”

  “I can manage,” said Wilkinson. With a certain amount of contortion he was able to manipulate the fasteners. He stepped out of the armor, and in his plastiweave shirt and slacks he was still hot. After a second’s hesitation he shed the shirt, but decided to retain his boots and trousers. The discarded garments he parceled up, securing them to the top of his knapsack. Without any assistance he managed to get it slung once more to his back. Then he saw his belt on the moss, where Vanessa had dropped it. The holster, of course, was now empty, but the knife was still in its sheath. He stooped to pick it up.

  “Not so fast, Buster,” admonished Claire. While she was talking she had approached Wilkinson and managed to get a toe under the broad strap of plastic webbing. Now, with a graceful movement of her shapely leg and slim foot, she kicked it into the air, catching it with her left hand. “Not so fast, Buster. You can come with us, but you come unarmed. And you, Duckie,” she continued to Vanessa, “had better pass over that popgun to Malcolm before it goes off and hurts somebody.”

  “Shall I, Christopher?”
asked the girl.

  Wilkinson looked at her. She was holding the weapon in her uninjured left hand, but Vanessa had been ambidextrous. In all probability this Vanessa was ambidextrous. The way she was handling the pistol was evidence that she knew how to use it. He looked at the others, and they returned his stare openly. He decided that he had nothing further to fear — not from them, at any rate. The simple action of smoking a cigarette had been far more convincing than all his words could ever have been.

  “Yes,” he told her.

  She gave the gun to Malcolm, who had buckled the belt about his waist. The big man glanced at it, moved the catch to Safety and then tucked it into the holster. “Let’s go,” ordered Claire.

  • • •

  They set off in rough formation — Claire in the lead, then Wilkinson and Vanessa, then Malcolm and the other man, a wiry little fellow who, so far, had not uttered a single word. The spaceman wondered how the blonde woman was navigating; there were surely no signs of a path over the thick moss. Yet she picked her way steadily and surely, skirting closely some of the bushy clumps of fleshy vegetation, giving others a wide berth. After a while Wilkinson began to discern a definite pattern in her leadership — the trees, if such they could be called, that were avoided displayed a foliage of long, purple streamers, undulant ribbons that twitched and stirred even in a complete absence of wind. And then he noticed the debris strewn around the bulbous trunks — broken, gauzy wings, dessicated chitinous exo-skeletons and even, now and again, little piles of whitening bones. The carnivorous trees were, after all, obvious enough hazards, but there must be many other dangers that were far from obvious.

  Claire led the way rapidly and confidently — and then, suddenly, she stopped, standing in an attitude of rigid attention, every muscle of her superb body clearly defined beneath the tanned skin. Then, “Take cover!” she called.

  The party ran for the shelter of a tall copse of huge ferns, of plants that looked like ferns if one ignored the huge, vivid scarlet and purple blossoms. Under the foliage and around the trunks and moss grew waist-high and Claire flung herself into the springy growth, falling full length. Infected by the panic although ignorant of its cause, Wilkinson pushed Vanessa before him, diving with her into the green shelter. He felt the ground quiver as the burly Malcolm thudded down beside him. He felt as much as heard a vibration of the air that deepened to a steady drumming.