The Seeds of Time Read Online Free PDF

we’ve got, darling. I’ve been trying to remember ever since I got here what the date was on your letter, and I can’t – even though I remember you underlined it. I know there’s a record that your first wife deserted you – “deserted”, isn’t that a dreadful word to use: as if I would, my sweet – but it doesn’t say when. So I must get you properly briefed on this because there’d be the most frightful chronoclasm if you failed to invent it.’
    And then, instead of buckling down to it as her words suggested, she became pensive.
    ‘As a matter of fact,’ she said, ‘I think there’s going to be a pretty bad chronoclasm anyway. You see, I’m going to have a baby.’
    ‘No!’ I exclaimed delightedly.
    ‘What do you mean, “no”? I
am
. And I’m worried. I don’t think it has ever happened to a travelling historian before. Uncle Donald would be terribly annoyed if he knew.’
    ‘To hell with Uncle Donald,’ I said. ‘And to hell with chronoclasms. We’re going to celebrate, darling.’
    The weeks slid quickly by. My patents were granted provisionally. I got a good grip on the theory of curved-beam transmission. Everything was going nicely. We discussed the future: whether he was to be called Donald, or whether she was going to be called Alexandria. How soon the royalties would begin to come in so that we could make an offer for Bagford House. How funny it would feel at first to be addressed as Lady Lattery, and other allied themes …
    And
then came that December afternoon when I got back from discussing a modification with a manufacturer in London and found that she wasn’t there any more …
    Not a note, not a last word. Just the open front door, and a chair overturned in the sitting-room …
    Oh, Tavia, my dear …
    I began to write this down because I still have an uneasy feeling about the ethics of not being the inventor of my inventions, and that there should be a straightening out. Now that I have reached the end, I perceive that ‘straightening out’ is scarcely an appropriate description of it. In fact, I can foresee so much trouble attached to putting this forward as a conscientious reason for refusing a knighthood, that I think I shall say nothing, and just accept the knighthood when it comes. After all, when I consider a number of ‘inspired’ inventions that I can call to mind, I begin to wonder whether certain others have not done that before me.
    I have never pretended to understand the finer points of action and interaction comprehended in this matter, but I have a pressing sense that one action now on my part is basically necessary: not just to avoid dropping an almighty chronoclasm myself, but for fear that if I neglect it I may find that the whole thing never happened. So I must write a letter.
    First, the envelope:
To my great, great grandniece,
    Miss Octavia Lattery.
    (To be opened by her on her 21st birthday. 6 June 2136.)
    Then the letter. Date it. Underline the date.
My sweet, far-off, lovely Tavia,
    Oh, my darling …

Time to Rest
I
    The view was not much. To eyes which had seen the landscapes of Earth it was not a view at all so much as just another section of the regular Martian backdrop. In front and to the left smooth water spread like a silk sheet to the horizon. A mile or more to the right lay a low embankment with yellow-red sand showing through rush-like tufts of skimpy bushes. Far in the background rose the white crowns of purple mountains.
    In the mild warmth of noon Bert let his boat carry him along. Behind him, a fan of ripples spread gently and then lapsed back into placidity. Still further back the immense silence closed in again, and nothing remained to show that he had passed that way. The scene had scarcely changed for several days and several hundred miles of his quietly chugging progress.
    His boat was a queer craft. There was nothing else like it on Mars – nor any other place. For he had built it himself – and without knowing anything about