"Charles L. Harness-Child by Chronos" - читать интересную книгу автора (Harness Charles L)

from me. "Mother!" I shrieked. "Give us one last prediction!"
Johnny snorted violently and struggled to sit up.
I launched my soaring dive into time. Mother's reply floated after me, through the lens, and I heard it in
1957.
"You didn't stop him."
***


His real name was James McCarren. He was a genuine Ph.D., though, a physics professor. Age,
about 40. Had I expected him to be younger? He seemed older than "Johnny." And he had two good
eyes. No patch.
He owned Skyridge, all right. Spent his summers there. Liked to hunt and fish between semesters.
And now, my friend, if you'll just relax a bit, I'll tell you what happened on the night of August 5, 1957.
I was leaning over the balcony, staring down at the red-lit tumult of the rapids, when I became aware
that Jim was standing in the doorway behind me. I could feel his eyes sliding along my body.
I had been breathing deeply a moment before, trying to slow down the abnormal surging of my lungs,
while simultaneously trying to push Jim's pistol a little higher under my armpit. The cold steel made me
shiver.
It was too bad. For during the past two months I had begun to love him in a most interesting way,
though, of course, not in the much more interesting way I had loved Johnny. (A few weeks with mother
can really change a man!) In 1957 Johnny-- or Jim-- was quaintly solicitous, oddly virginal. Almost
fatherly. It was too bad that I was beginning to love him as Jim.
Still, there was mother's last prediction. I had thought about it a long time. So far as I could see, there
was only one way to make sure he didn't "go through" to her.
"Come one out," I said, turning my face up to be kissed.
After he had released me, I said, "Do you realize it's been exactly two months since you fished me out
of there?"
"The happiest months of my life," he said.
"And you still haven't asked me how I happened to be here-- who I am-- anything. You're certainly
under no illusion that I gave the justice of the peace my right name?
He grinned, "If I got too curious, you might vanish back into the whirlpool, like a water nymph."
It was really sad. I shrugged bitterly. "You and your magnetrons."
He started. "What? Where did you ever hear about magnetrons? I've never discussed them with
anyone."
"Right here. From you."
His mouth opened and closed slowly. "You're out of your mind!"
"I wish I were. That would make everything seem all right. For, after all, it's only after you get to
thinking about it logically that you can understand how impossible it is. It's got to stop, though, and now is
the time to stop it."
"Stop what?" he demanded.
"The way you and I keep jumping around in time. Especially you. If I don't stop you, you'll go through
the lens, and mother will get you. It was her last prediction."
"Lens?" he gurgled.
"The machine. You know, the one with the magnetrons."
"Huh?"
"None of that exists yet, of course," I said, talking mostly to myself. "At least, not outside of your head.
You won't build the generator until 1977."
"I can't get the parts now." His voice was numb.
"They'll be available in 1977 though."
"In 1977...?"