The Year of the Ransom

18 August 2930 B.C.

Where the river met the sea, the village clustered its houses of clay. Only two dugout canoes lay drawn up on the shore, for fishers were out on this calm day. Most women were likewise gone, cultivating small patches of gourd, squash, potato, and cotton at the edge of the mangrove swamp. Smoke lifted slow from the communal fire that an old person always tended. Other women and aged men had tasks to do in their homes, while small children took care of smaller. Folk wore brief skirts of twisted fiber, ornaments of shell, teeth, feathers. They laughed and chattered.

The Vesselmaker sat cross-legged in the doorway of his dwelling. Today he did not shape pots and bowls or bake them hard. Instead, he stared into space and kept silence. He often did, since he learned the speech of men and began his wondrous labors. It must be respected. He was kindly, but these fits came upon him. Perhaps he planned a beautiful new piece of work, or perhaps he communed with spirits. Certainly he was a special being, with his great height, pale skin and hair and eyes, enormous whiskers. A cape decked him against the sun, which he found harsher than common folk did. Inside the house, his woman ground wild seeds in her mortar. Their two living infants slept.

Shouts arose. The field tillers swarmed into sight. People in the village hurried to see what this meant. The Vesselmaker rose and followed them.

Along the riverbank came a stranger striding. Visitors were frequent, mainly bringing trade goods, but nobody had seen this man before. He looked much like anyone else, though heavier muscled. His garb was noticeably different. Something hard and shiny rested in a sheath on his hip.

Where could he be from? Surely hunters would days ago have noticed a newcomer making his way down the valley. The women squealed when he hailed them. The old men gestured them back and offered seemly greeting.

The Vesselmaker arrived.

For a long while Tamberly and the explorer stood gaze upon gaze. He’s of the local race. Odd how calm the knowledge was in him, now when at last time had brought him to the goal of his yearnings. Would be. Best not to raise extra questions, even in the heads of simple Stone Agers. How’d he plan to explain that sidearm?

The explorer nodded. “I half expected this,” he said in slow Temporal. “Do you understand me?”

The language had rusted in Tamberly. However—“I do. Welcome. You’re what I’ve waited for these past . . . seven years, I think.”

“I am Guillem Cisneros. Thirtieth-century born, but with the Universarium of Halla.”—in a milieu after time travel had been achieved and could therefore be done openly.

“And I, Stephen Tamberly, twentieth century, field historian for the Patrol.”

Cisneros laughed. “A handshake is appropriate.”

The villagers watched in dumbstruck awe.

“You were marooned here?” Cisneros asked redundantly.

“Yes. The Patrol must be told. Take me to a base.”

“Certainly. I hid my vehicle about ten kilometers upstream.” Cisneros hesitated. “My object was to pose as a wanderer, stay for a time, try to solve an archaeological mystery. I suspect you are the answer to it.”

“I am,” Tamberly said. “When I realized I was trapped unless help should come, I remembered the Valdivia ware.”

The most ancient ceramics known in the western hemisphere, as of his home period. Almost a duplicate of the contemporaneous Jomon pottery in archaic Japan. The conventional explanation was that a fishing boat was blown across the Pacific, and the crew found refuge where they landed and taught the art to the natives. It didn’t make much sense. More than eight thousand nautical miles to survive; and those men just happened to possess a set of intricate skills which in their society were the province of women. “So I provided it, and waited for somebody from the future to come looking.”

He hadn’t entirely violated the law for which the Patrol existed. It was necessarily flexible. Under the circumstances, his return was important.

“You were ingenious,” Cisneros said. “How was your life here?”

“They’re sweet people,” Tamberly answered.

It will hurt, saying farewell to Aruna and the little ones. If I were a saint, I’d never have accepted her father’s offer of her to me. Those seven years grew very long, and I didn’t know if they would ever end. My family will miss me, but I’ll leave them with such mana that she’ll soon get a new husband—a strong provider, probably Ulamamo—and they’ll live as well and gladly as any of their tribe. Which in its humble fashion is better than a lot of human beings live much farther up in time.

He could not quite shed doubts and guilt, and knew he never would, but joy awakened. I’m going home.