Time's Last Gift Part 24

'How are you, Rachel? And you, Drummond? And you, Robert?

'Strange to speak to the unborn. I have gotten accustomed to speaking with the long dead. But the unborn - Well, I won't take up the valuable recording s.p.a.ce in the ball to talk about the paradoxes of Time. That could go on and on.

'Robert, I know that the expedition of 8000 B.C. located your pre-Indo-Hitt.i.te speakers. I was one of the informants, None of the expedition suspected that I had already recorded the pre-I-H dialects in far more detail than they would ever be able to do with their limited time. And they were looking for me, too. I suppose they were looking for me because of this message. But they failed. I won't tell you why, of course, because then the expedition would be able to identify me. Ever if, in a sense, the expedition has already occurred. Well, I said I'd not get into the paradoxes.

'You'll find, Robert, that your pre-Indo-Hitt.i.te speech of 8000 B.C. arose from the very last place you would have, suspected.

'Our two tribes, the Wota'shaimg and the Shluwg, eventually abandoned their original tongues and adopted the pidgin. The result was a simple a.n.a.lytical system. But over the course of six millennia, it became a polysyllabled synthetic speech which eventually developed into the pre-Indo-Hitt.i.te the second expedition studied. And this, of course, became the Germanic, Balto-Slavic, Indo-Iranian, Greek, Italic, Celtic, and a dozen other language families which were not recorded or even heard of by civilized peoples. Until now.'

Gribardsun chuckled and said, 'So if it hadn't been for time travel, Robert, Indo-Hitt.i.te, and hence, German, Yiddish, English, French, and all those other related tongues would never have existed.

'Yes, I know you're going to say that our tribes had different blood groups than the Indo-Hitt.i.te speakers. But many invasions - migrations, rather - occurred from the East, and our tribe, which had become rather large between 12,000 B.C. and 8000 B.C., absorbed so many of the newcomers, and imposed their language on so many, that the original blood group was largely lost.'

Von Billmann had turned pale shortly after Gribardsun started talking. He sat down. He seemed to be having trouble getting his breath. Rachel brought him a drink of water, and he sat up and looked around as if he hoped someone had strength to give him.

'Do you realize what he's saying? I won't be on the 8000 B.C. expedition! But why? Was I dead before it could be launched? Or - why?'

Anderson, the project head, turned on the recorder again, since no one could give an answer and they did not want to dwell on the subject.

'There was one other expedition, that which was sent in 3500 B.C. to the Mesopotamian area. The others that had been planned were not realized. I waited for them, but they did not show. I wonder why. Something catastrophic prevented them? I don't know, and you, of course, won't know why until it happens.

'Be that as it may, here are the collections I made. The expedition would never have been made if it had not been for me, as you now know. But I still feel a sense of obligation to the people who gave me this chance to live when the world was fresh. And I have had so much scientific training that I do appreciate what this collection will mean. So, throughout the millennia, I have cached artifacts and specimens and made notes. There are at least a hundred thousand photographs here, since I kept back some of the b.a.l.l.s for this purpose. You will find photographs, surrept.i.tiously taken, of course, of the original historical Hercules - myself - Nebuchadnezzar, the historical Moses - not myself - Julius Caesar, Shakespeare, Eric the Red, whom I took from behind a bush, having been waiting for six months for him to land, the historical Odysseus, the real city of Troy, the first Pharaoh, several of the first emperors of China and Kublai Khan and Marco Polo. There are also photos of the historical Jesus, Gautama, and Mohammed, Charlemagne, Saladin, the historical Beowulf, a group photograph of the actual founders of the city of Rome. No Romulus and Remus existed, I am sorry to say. 'I could go on, but you'll find everything catalogued. 'I was a merchant-ship captain supplying the Achaean army, and I am mentioned in Homer, though not exactly in the role of a merchant. But I stayed away from the fighting there, as I stayed away from most fighting. As I stayed away from most centers of civilization. I decided that if I was going to survive for a long time, I would have to live a backwoods, backcountry life. I spent altogether a thousand years in the wilds of Africa and another in Asia and the pre-Columbian Americas, though not in a continuous stretch, of course.

'Still, I got hungry for city life now and then, and I did want to keep watch on the rise of civilizations. So I spent time in Egypt and Mesopotamia and along the Indus and the Yellow River and in ancient Crete and Greece. And I was once Quetzalcoatl, the details of whose story you will find here. 'I have been everywhere a dozen times and seen everything. I was the first human to set foot on the island of Tahiti; the second time I went there, I beat the first raftload of Polynesians by a week.

'But all this is in the records.

'I have been married many times and fathered many children. Each of you is my descendant. I would say that almost every human being that has lived since 5000 B.C. is my descendant. I am my own ancestor many times over.

'I could talk forever. I could reveal what lay behind many of the great mysteries of history and I could solve many of the lesser, but just as intriguing, mysteries. For example, I was on the Marie Celeste.

I will be sitting under this overhang when my moment of conception comes. What will happen then? I suggest you researchers read the newspaper accounts and determine if the body of a man six-foot-three, with black hair and gray eyes, was found on this ledge. If it wasn't, then I may just have disappeared. Or perhaps I was found only after I'd become a skeleton. Or some body s.n.a.t.c.her took me away. The possibilities within Time's fold are many.

'Whatever happens, I am grateful that I have lived a life such as no man has lived.

'And now, Rachel, for you. You will be on the 3500 B.C. expedition. And we will be married in Ur of the Chaldees. You will decide to stay behind when your colleagues return to their time.

'And there we two will live as Terah and his wife, and you will bear Abraham.

'I tell you this because, of course, the time came when we had to part again. You never got the elixir because I never had a chance to a.n.a.lyze it and so make some more. So you died.

'I am telling you this so that you may try to change the course of Time. If you decide not to go on the expedition, then something will happen contrary to my experience, to my knowledge of Time as it happened.

'Is this possible? I don't know. I'll know the day the expedition arrives.

'But I did come to love you, Rachel. And you were the ancestress of Moses and King David and, of course, of yourself. And of me.

'But perhaps you do not want this.

'We shall see.

'In the meantime, here is my collection, the secrets of the ages revealed, art objects that were thought lost forever. Knowledge that mankind would never have possessed otherwise.

'Time's last gift.

'Goodbye, my friends. h.e.l.lo, Rachel. Perhaps.'

There was an uproar when the voice ceased.

Rachel was weeping.

But she was happy.

End.