Santangel thought himself a Christian, but he never was sure what Perez meant. He thought of all sorts of possibilities, but they all sounded ludicrous because no man could possibly dream of accomplishing such lofty purposes.

Then again, no man could possibly dream of getting monarchs to agree to a mad voyage into unknown western seas with no high probability of success. And yet Coln had achieved it. So if he had dreams of reconquering the Roman Empire, or liberating the Holy Land, or driving the heathen Turk from Byzantium, or making a mechanical bird to fly to the moon, Santangel would not bet against him.

There was famine now, only in North America, but there was no surplus food anywhere else to relieve it. To send help required rationing in many other places. The tales of bloodshed and chaos in America persuaded the people of Europe and South America to accept rationing so that some relief could be sent. But it would not be enough to save everyone.

This hopeless inadequacy came to humanity as a terrible shock, not least because they had believed for two generations that at last the world was a good place to live. They had believed theirs was a time of rebirth, rebuilding, restoration. Now they learned that it was merely a rear guard action in a war whose conclusion was already decided before they were even born. Their work was in vain, because nothing could last. The Earth was too far gone.

It was in the midst of the agony of this realization that the ftrst news came out about the Columbus project. The discussion was grim. When the choice came, it was not unanimous, but it was overwhelming. What else was there, really? To watch their children die of hunger? To take up arms again, and fight for the last sc.r.a.ps of food-producing land? Could anyone happily choose a future of caves and ice and ignorance, when there might be another way, if not for them and their children, then for the human race as a whole?

Manjam sat with Kemal, who had come to wait out the voting with him. When the decision came, and Kemal knew that he would indeed be taking the voyage backward in time, he was at once relieved and frightened. It was one thing to plan one's own death when the prospect was still remote. Now, though, it would be a matter of days before he went back in time, and then no more than weeks before he would stand scornfully before Columbus and say, "Did you think Allah would let a Christian discover these new lands? I spit on your Christ? He had not the power to sustain you against the power of Allah! There is no G.o.d but Allah, and Muhammad is his Prophet!"

And then someday perhaps, a future searcher in Past.w.a.tch would see him standing there, and would nod his head and say, That was the man who stopped Columbus. That was the man who gave his life to create this good and peaceful world we live in. That was the man who gave the human race a future. As much as Yewesweder before him, this man chose the course of humanity.

That would be a life worth living, thought Kemal. To earn a place in history that could be spoken of in the same breath with Yewesweder himself.

"You seem melancholy, my friend," said Manjam.

"Do I?" said Kemal. "Yes. Sad and happy, both at once."

"How do you think Tagiri will take this?"

Kemal shrugged with some impatience. "Who can figure out this woman? She works all her life for this, and then we have to practically tie her down to keep her from going out urging people to vote against the very thing she worked for!"

"I don't think it's hard to understand her, Kemal," said Manjam. "It's as you said - it was the force of her will that caused the Columbus project to reach this point. She was responsible for it. That was too much of a burden for her to bear alone. Now, though, she can be satisfied inside herself that she opposed the destruction of our time, that the final decision was taken away from her, was forced on her by the will of the vast majority of humankind. Now her responsibility for the end of our time is not hers alone. It will be shared by many, borne on many shoulders. She can live with it now."

Kemal chuckled grimly. "She can live with it - for how many days? And then she will wink out of existence along with all the rest of humanity in this world. What does it matter now?"

"It matters," said Manjam, "because she has those few days, and because those few days are all the future she has. She will spend it with clean hands and a peaceful heart."

"And is this not hypocrisy?" asked Kemal. "For she did cause it, just as much as ever."

"Hypocrisy? No. The hypocrite knows what he really is, and labors to conceal it from others in order to gain from their misplaced faith in him. Tagiri fears the moral ambiguity in something that she knows she must do. She cannot live with not doing it, and yet fears she cannot live with doing it, either. So conceals it from herself in order to proceed with what she must do."

"If there's a difference there, it's d.a.m.ned hard to see," said Kemal.

"That's right," said Manjam. "There's a difference. And it's d.a.m.ned hard to see."

From time to time, as he rode toward Palos, Cristoforo pressed his hand to his chest, to feel the stiff parchment tucked into his coat. For you, my Lord, my Savior. You gave this to me, and now I will use it for you. Thank you, thank you, for granting my prayer, for letting this also be a gift to my son, to my dead wife.

As he rode long into the day, Father Perez fell silent beside him, a memory came into his mind. His father, stepping forward eagerly toward a table where richly dressed men were seated. His father poured wine. When would that have happened? Father is a weaver. When did he pour wine? What am I remembering? And why does it come to me now of all times?

No answer came to his mind, and the horse plodded on, pounding dust up into the air with every step. Cristoforo thought of what lay ahead. Much work, outfitting a voyage. Would he even remember how, all these years since the last voyage he was really a part of? No matter. He would remember what he needed to remember, he would accomplish all he needed to accomplish. The worst obstacle was past. He had been lifted up by the arms of Christ, and Christ would carry him across the water and bring him home again. Nothing would stop him now.

Chapter 9 - Departures.

Cristoforo stood near the helm, watching as the sailors readied the caravel for departure. A part of him longed to skim down from his lofty station and join in, to handle the sheets and sails aloft, to carry the last and freshest of the stores aboard, to be doing something with his hands, his feet, his body to make him a part of the crew, part of the living organism of the ship.

But that was not his role here. G.o.d had chosen him to lead, and it was in the nature of things that the captain of a ship, let alone the commander of an expedition, had to remain as aloof and unapproachable to the crew as Christ himself was to the Church he headed.

The people gathered at the sh.o.r.e and on the hills overlooking the sea were not there to cheer on his mission, Cristoforo knew. They were there because Martin Pinzn, their favorite among sailors, their hero, their darling, was taking a crew of their sons and brothers and uncles and cousins and friends out into the open ocean on a voyage of such bravery as to seem madness. Or was it of such madness as to seem bravery? It was Pinzn in whom their trust resided, Pinzn who would bring their menfolk home if anyone did at all. What was this Cristobal Coln to them, except a courtier who had w.a.n.gled his way into the favor of the Crown and won control by fiat of what he could never have earned through seamanship? They knew nothing of the boy Cristoforo's years haunting the docks of Genova. They knew nothing of his voyages, nothing of his studies, nothing of his plans and dreams. Above all, they had no idea that G.o.d had spoken to him on a beach in Portugal, not that many miles to the west of them. They had no idea that this voyage was already a miracle which could never have taken place were it not that it had G.o.d's favor and therefore could not fail.

All was ready. The frenetic activity had settled to languor, the languor to waiting, as eyes that had before watched the work now turned to look at Coln.

Watch me, thought Cristoforo. When I raise my hand, I change the world. With all their labors, not one of these other men can do that.

He closed his fist. He lifted it high above his head. The people cheered as the men cast off and and the caravels; slipped away from land.

Three hollow grey hemispheres formed a triangle, like three serving bowls laid out for a feast. Each was filled with equipment for the different missions that Diko, Hunahpu, and Kemal would carry out. Each had a portion of the library that Manjam and his secret committee had collected and preserved. If any one of them reached the past and changed it so that the future was obliterated, then that one portion of the library would contain enough information that someday the people of the new future would be able to learn of the future that had died for them. Would be able to build on their science, wonder at their stories, profit from their technologies, learn from their sorrows. It is a sad sort of feast these bowls contained, thought Tagiri. But it is the way of the world. Always something must die so that another organism can live. And now a community, a world of communities must turn their dying into a banquet of possibilities for another.

Diko and Hunahpu stood beside each other as they listened to the final explanation from Sa Ferreira; Kemal was by himself, listening attentively enough but obviously not a part of what was going on. He was already gone, like a dik-dik in the jaws of a cheetah, past fear, past caring. The Christian martyrs must have looked like this, thought Tagiri, as they walked into the lion's den. It was not the look of sullen despair that Tagiri had seen on the faces of slaves being chained below decks in the ships of the Portuguese. Death is death, someone had said once to Tagiri, but she had not believed it then and did not believe it now. Kemal knows he is walking toward death, but it will mean something, it will achieve something, it is his apotheosis, it gives his life meaning. Such a death is to be not shunned but embraced. There is an element of pride in it, yes, but it is an honorable pride, not a vain one, that glories in sacrifice that will achieve a good end.

It is how we all should feel, for we all are being killed this day, by these machines. Kemal feels in his heart that he will die first, but it is not so. Of all the people in the world on this day, in this hour, he will be one of only three who do not die when the switch is thrown and the cargo and pa.s.sengers of these hollow hemispheres hurtle back in time. Only two people alive today have a future longer than Kemal's.

And yet it was not wrong of him to relish his death. He would die surrounded by hate and rage, killed by those who did not understand what he was doing, but their hate would be a kind of honor, their rage a fitting response to his achievement.

Sa was nearly finished. "From the serious to the ba.n.a.l," he said. "Keep all your body parts inside the sphere. Don't stand up, don't raise your hands until you can see that you have arrived."

He pointed at the wires and cables dangling from the ceiling directly over the center of each hemisphere. "Those cables that hold up the field generators will be severed by the successful generation of the field. Thus your separation from the flow of time will have almost no duration. The field will exist, and in the moment it comes to exist, the generator will lose all power and the field will cease to exist. You'll be aware of none of that, of course. The only thing you will know is that the generator will suddenly drop. Since no part of your body will be under the generator - I'm hoping you will not risk breaking an ankle by testing whether I'm right or not ..."

Diko laughed nervously. Hunahpu and Kemal were impa.s.sive. "You will be in no danger from the fall of the generator. However, it will whip the cables down with it. They are heavy, but fortunately the fall is short and there won't be that much force in them. Still, you must be aware of the possibility of being struck with some violence by the cable. So even though you may wish to strike some gallant pose, I must beg you to a.s.sume a covered, protected position so that you do not jeopardize the success of your mission by exposing yourself to the risk of personal injury."

"Yes yes," said Kemal. "We will curl up like infants in the uterus."

"Then we're done here. Time to go."

There was only a moment's hesitation. And then the last goodbyes began. Almost in silence, Hunahpu was embraced by his brothers, and Ha.s.san and Tagiri, and their son Acho, held and kissed Diko for the last time. Kemal stood alone until Tagiri came also to him and kissed him lightly on the cheek, and Ha.s.san gripped his shoulders and murmured something to him, words from the Quran, and then kissed him on the lips.

Kemal climbed alone into his hemisphere. Hunahpu walked with Diko to hers, and just before she climbed the ladder he embraced her and kissed her gently. Tagiri did not hear the words that pa.s.sed between them, but she knew - they all knew, but did not speak of it - that Hunahpu and Diko had also made a personal sacrifice, perhaps not as complete as that of Kemal, but one with its own kind of pain, its own sweet bitterness. It was possible that Kemal and Diko might see each other again, for they were both going to the island of Hispaniola - no, the island of Haiti, for it was the native name for it that would survive now. But Hunahpu was going to the swamps of Chiapas in Mexico, and it was quite likely that either he or Diko would die during the long years before their paths could cross.

And that was a.s.suming that all three hemispheres would arrive. The problem of simultaneity had never been overcome. Even though the wiring had been carefully measured so that it should take exactly as long for the signal to go from the switch to the three computers and from the computers to the three field generators, they knew that no amount of careful measurement could possibly make the signals arrive with true simultaneity. There would be some tiny but real difference in time. One of the signals would arrive first. One of the fields would exist, even if it was for just one nanosecond, before the others came into existence. And it was possible that because of the changes caused by the first field, the other fields would never come into being at all. The future in which they existed would have been obliterated.

Thus it was determined that each of the three must act as if the other two had already failed. Each must carry out the mission with as much care as if everything depended on him or her alone, for it very well might be true.

But they hoped that all three time machines would work, that all three travelers would reach their separate destinations. Diko would arrive in Haiti in 1488, Kemal in 1492; Hunahpu would reach Chiapas in 1475. "There is a certain sloppiness in nature," Manjam had told them. "True precision is never achieved, is never even possible, and so everything that happens depends on a certain amount of probability, has a little leeway, a bit of room to compensate for lapses and mistakes. Genetic molecules are filled with redundancy and can cope with a certain amount of loss or damage or extra insertions. Electrons moving through their quantum sh.e.l.ls have a certain range of unpredictability about their exact location, for all that matters is that they remain at the same distance from the nucleus. Planets wobble in their orbits and yet persist for billions of years without falling into their motherstars. So there should be room for microseconds or milliseconds or centiseconds or even deciseconds of difference between the beginnings of the three fields. But we have no way of experimenting to see just what the tolerances are. We may have far exceeded them. We may have missed by a fraction of a nanosecond. We may have been so far from success as to have made this whole venture wasted time. Who can know these things?"

Why is it, thought Tagiri, that even though I know that within a few minutes I and my dear husband and my precious son Acho will almost certainly wink out of existence, it is Diko that I am grieving for? She is the one who will live. She is the one with the future. Yet the animal part of me, the part that feels emotion, does not comprehend my own death. It is not death, when the whole world dies with you. No, the animal part of me only knows that my child is leaving me, and that is what I grieve for.

She watched as Hunahpu helped Diko up the ladder, then walked to his own hemisphere and climbed.

And now it was Tagiri's own turn. She kissed and embraced Ha.s.san and Acho, and then climbed her own ladder, up to the locked cage. She pressed the b.u.t.ton to open it as Manjam and Ha.s.san also pressed their widely separated b.u.t.tons, as Diko and Hunahpu and Kemal pressed the b.u.t.tons on their field generators. The lock clicked and she pushed open the door of the cage and stepped inside.

"I'm in," she said. "Release your b.u.t.tons, travelers."

"Get in position," called Sd.

Tagiri was now above the hemispheres and could see as Kemal and Diko and Hunahpu curled up on top of their equipment and supplies, making sure that no part of their bodies was under the field generator or extending beyond the boundaries of the sphere that the field generator would create.

"Are you ready?" called Sa.

"Yes," answered Kemal at once.

"Ready," said Hunahpu.

"I'm ready," said Diko.

"Can you see them?" called Sa, now talking to Tagiri and to the other three watchers who were in position to see. All of them confirmed that the travelers seemed to be in a good position.

"When you are ready, Tagiri," said Sd.

Tagiri hesitated only a moment. I am killing everyone so that everyone can live, she reminded herself. They chose this, as much as anyone with imperfect understanding can ever choose. From birth we all were fated to die, and so it is good that at least we can be sure our deaths today might bring about a good end, might make the world a better place. This litany of justification pa.s.sed quickly, and again she was left with the pain that had gnawed at her for the weeks, the years of this project.

For a fleeting moment she wished that she had never joined Past.w.a.tch, rather than to face this moment, to have it be her hand that pulled the switch.

Who else's hand? she asked herself. Who else should bear this responsibility, if I cannot bear it? All the slaves waited for her to bring them freedom. All the unborn children of countless generations of humanity waited for her to save them from the withering death of the world. Diko waited for her to send her out into the great work of her life. She grasped the handle of the switch. "I love you," she said. "I love you all."

She pulled it down.

Chapter 10 - Arrivals.

Did the Lord say that Cristoforo would be the first to see the new land? If he did, then the prophecy must be fulfilled. But if he did not, then Cristoforo could allow Rodrigo de Triana to claim credit for seeing land first. Why couldn't Cristoforo remember the exact words the Lord said? The most important moment in his life until now, and the wording escaped him completely.

No mistaking it, though. In the moonlight seeping through the clouds everyone could see the land; sharp-eyed Rodrigo de Triana had first seen it an hour ago, at two in the morning, when it was nothing but a different-colored shadow on the western horizon. The other sailors were gathered around him now, offering their congratulations and cheerfully reminding him of his debts, both real and imaginary. As well they should, for the first to see land had been promised a reward of ten thousand maravedis a year for life. It was enough to keep a fine household with servants; it would make de Triana a gentleman.

But what was it, then, that Cristoforo had seen earlier tonight, at ten o'clock? Land must have been close then, too, scarcely four hours before de Triana saw it. Cristoforo had seen a light, moving up and down, as if signaling him, as if beckoning him onward. G.o.d had shown land to him, and if he was to fulfill the words of the Lord, he must lay the claim.

"I'm sorry, Rodrigo," called Cristoforo from his place near the helm. "But the land you see now is surely the same land I saw at ten o'clock."

A hush fell over the company.

"Don Pedro Gutierrez came to my side when I called him," said Cristoforo. "Don Pedro, what did we both see?"

"A light," said Don Pedro. "In the west, where the land now lies." He was the King's majordomo - or, to put it bluntly, the King's spy. Everyone knew he was no particular friend to Coln. Yet to the common sailors, all gentlemen were conspirators against them, as it certainly seemed to them now.

"I was the one cried 'land' before anyone," said de Triana. "You gave no sign of it, Don Cristobal."

"I admit that I doubted it," said Cristoforo. "The sea was rough, and I doubted that land could be so near. I convinced myself that it could not be land, and so I said nothing because I didn't want to raise false hopes. But Don Pedro is my witness that I did see it, and what we all see now bears out the truth of it."

De Triana was outraged at what seemed to him to be plain theft. "All those hours I strained my eyes looking west. A light in the sky isn't land. No one saw land before I did, no one!"

Sdnchez, the royal inspector - the King's official representative and bookkeeper on the voyage - immediately spoke up, his voice whipping sharply across the deck. "Enough of this. On the King's voyage, does anyone dare to question the word of the King's admiral?"

It was a daring thing for him to say, for only if Cristoforo reached c.i.p.angu and returned to Spain would the t.i.tle Admiral of the Ocean-Sea belong to him. And Cristoforo well knew that last night, when Don Pedro had affirmed that he saw the same light, Sdnchez had insisted that there was no light, that there was nothing in the west. If anyone was going to cast doubt on Cristoforo's claim to first sighting, it would be Sanchez. Yet he had supported, if not Cristoforo's testimony, then his authority.

That would do well enough.

"Rodrigo, your eyes are indeed sharp, " said Cristoforo. "If someone on sh.o.r.e had not been casting a light - a torch, or a bonfire - I would have seen nothing. But G.o.d led my eyes to the sh.o.r.e by that light, and you merely confirmed what G.o.d had already shown me."

The men were silent, but Cristoforo knew that they were not content. A moment ago they had been rejoicing in the sudden enrichment of one of their own; as usual, they had seen the reward s.n.a.t.c.hed out of the hands of the common man. They would a.s.sume, of course, that Cristoforo and Don Pedro lied, that they acted from greed. They could not understand that he was on G.o.d's mission, and that he knew G.o.d would give him plenty of wealth without his having to take it from a common sailor. But Cristoforo dared not fail but to fulfill the Lord's instructions in every particular. If G.o.d had ordained that he be first to lay eyes upon the far-off kingdoms of the Orient, then Cristoforo could not thwart G.o.d's will in this, not even out of sympathy for de Triana. Nor could he even share some portion of the reward with Triana, for word would get out and people would a.s.sume that it was, not Cristoforo's mercy and compa.s.sion, but rather his guilty conscience that made him give the money. His claim to have seen land must stand una.s.sailed forever, lest the will of G.o.d be undone. As for Rodrigo de Triana, G.o.d would surely provide him with decent compensation for his loss.

It would have been nice if, now that all the struggle was near fruition, G.o.d had let something be simple.

No measurements are exact. The temporal field was supposed to form a perfect sphere that exactly scoured the inside of the hemisphere, sending the pa.s.senger and his supplies back in time while leaving the metal bowl behind in the future. Instead, Hunahpu found himself rocking gently in a portion of the bowl, a fragment of metal so thin that he could see leaves through the edges of it. For a moment he wondered how he would get out, for metal so thin would surely have an edge that would slice right through his skin. But then the metal shattered under the strain and fell in thin crumbling sheets on the ground. His supplies tumbled down among the fragile shards.

Hunahpu got up and walked gingerly, gathering up the thin sheets carefully and making a pile of them near the base of a tree. Their biggest fear, in delivering him on land, was that the sphere of his temporal field would bisect a tree, causing the top half of it to drop like a battering ram onto Hunahpu and his supplies. So they had put him as near the beach as they dared without running a serious risk of dropping him in the ocean. But the measurements were not exact. One large tree was not three meters from the edge of the field.

No matter. He had missed the tree. The slight miscalculation in the size of the field had at least been in the direction of including too much rather than slicing off a portion of his equipment. And with luck they would have come close enough to the right timeframe that he would be in good time to accomplish his work before the Europeans came.

It was early morning, and Hunahpu's greatest danger would come from being sighted too soon. This stretch of beach had been chosen because it was rarely visited; only if they had missed their target date by several weeks would someone be within sight of him. But he had to act as if the worst had happened. He had to be careful.

Soon he had everything out of sight among the bushes. He sprayed himself again with insect repellent, just to be sure, and began the labor of carrying everything from the sh.o.r.e to the hiding place he had selected among the rocks a kilometer inland.

It took him most of the day. He rested then, and allowed himself the luxury of pondering his future. I am here in the land of my ancestors, or at least a place near to it. There is no retreat. If I don't bring it off, I'll end up as a sacrifice to Huitzilopochtli or perhaps some Zapotecan G.o.d. Even if Diko and Kemal made it, their target dates were years in the future from this place where I am now. I am alone in this world, and everything depends on me. Even if the others fail, I have it in my power to undo Columbus. All I have to do is turn the Zapotecs into a great nation, link up with the Tarascans, accelerate the development of ironworking and shipbuilding, block the Tlaxcalans and overthrow the Mexica, and prepare these people for a new ideology that does not include human sacrifice. Who couldn't do that?

It had looked so easy on paper. So logical, such a simple progression from one step to the next. But now, knowing no one in this place, all alone with the most pathetic of equipment, really, which could not be replaced or repaired if it failed ...

Enough of that, he told himself. I still have a few hours before dark. I must find out when I have arrived. I have rendezvous to keep.

Before dark he had located the nearest Zapotec village, Atetulka, and, because he had watched this village over and over again on the TruSite II, he recognized what day it was from what he saw the people doing. There had been no important error in the temporal field, so far as date was concerned. He had arrived when he was supposed to, and he had the option of making himself known to this village in the morning.

He winced at the thought of what he would have to do to make ready, and then walked back to his cache in the dusk. He waited for the jaguar that he had watched so many times, dropped it with a tranquilizer dart, then killed it and skinned it, so he could arrive at Atetulka wearing the skin. They would not lay hands readily upon a Jaguar Man, especially when he identified himself as a Maya king from the inscrutable underworld land of Xibalba. The days of Mayan greatness were long in the past, but they were well remembered all the same. The Zapotecs lived perpetually in the great shadow of the Maya civilization of centuries past. The Interveners had come to Columbus dressed up in the image of the G.o.d he believed in; Hunahpu would do the same. The difference was that he would have to live on with the people he was deceiving and continue to manipulate them successfully for the rest of his life.

This all had seemed like such a good idea at the time.

Cristoforo wouldn't let any of the ships sail for land until full light. It was an unknown coast, and, impatient as they all were to set foot on solid earth again, there was no use in risking even one ship when there might be reefs or rocks.

The daylight pa.s.sage proved him right. The approaches were treacherous, and it was only by deft sailing that Cristoforo was able to guide them in to sh.o.r.e. Let them say he was no sailor now, thought Cristoforo. Could Pinzn himself have done better than I just did?