Murray Leinster

“ Coghlan said, "We talk nonsense all the time!"
Ghalil thought, again. "Could refrigeration be a lost art of the ancients?" he asked with a faint smile, "and if so, what has it to do with you and Mr. Mannard and this—Appolonius?"
"There aren't any lost arts," Coghlan assured him. "In olden times people did things at random, on what they thought were magical principles. Sometimes they got results. On magical reasoning, they used digitalis for the heart. ”

“ Mannard said satisfiedly: "That's sense! Refrigeration that yields energy! Power from the tropics! Running factories from the heat of the Gulf Stream!"
"But," said Ghalil, "does not that sound as improbable as that a gadget should have a ghost?"
"No," said Mannard firmly. "That's science! I don't understand it, but it's science! And Laurie wants to marry him, besides. And anyhow, I know the boy! He'll manage it!"
The telephone rang. It rang again. They heard Coghlan answer it. ”

“ Mannard. You have no scar upon your thumb, nor any expectation of one. And the existence of—let us say—a 'gadget' at 80 Hosain is not in your memory. Right?"
"Quite right," admitted Coghlan.
"Now if you are to acquire the scar," observed Ghalil, "you will make—or have made, I must add—those fingerprints at some time in the future, when you will know of danger to Mr. Mannard, and of a gadget at 80 Hosain. This—"
"Ce n'est pas logique!" protested Duval bitterly.
"But it is logic," said Ghalil calmly. "The only flaw is that it is not common sense. ”

“ The yacht ploughed through the water back toward Istanbul. The sun shone brightly on the narrow blue sea. The hills on either side seemed to shimmer in the heat. But the atmosphere on the yacht was far from relaxed. The sailors bore high interest beneath a mask of discretion, most of them managing to occupy themselves near the Turkish guests, who huddled together and talked excitedly.
Laurie put her arm in Coghlan's.
"There's such a thing as courage, Tommy," she said, "and such a thing as recklessness. You took chances, searching on shore. I wouldn't like you to be killed." ”

“ Perhaps Nostradamus compiled his rhymes after spelling through a crumbling book of paper—they had no paper in Byzantium or later in Europe itself!—and startlingly foretold the facts narrated in a book our friend Duval sent back to ancient Istanbul!"
Then Ghalil sat down on the foot of the cot, almost calmly.
"Knowledge of the future, in a superstitious age, would make the future. This event, Mr. Mannard, did not come about to save your life, but to direct the history of the world through the Dark Ages to the coming of today. ”

“ Coghlan did not comment. Ghalil rose.
"But—come and examine this refrigeration-apparatus of ancient days, please! After all, it is undoubtedly mentioned in a memorandum in your handwriting of seven-hundred years ago! And—Mr. Coghlan, will you be careful?"
"Of what?"
"For one, Mr. Mannard." Ghalil's expression was wry. "I do not believe in things from the past any more than you do, but as a philosopher and a policeman I have to face facts even when they are impossible, and possibilities even when they are insane. There are two things foretold which disturb me. ”

“ His tone was unbelieving.
"There is refrigeration?" asked Ghalil.
"There's nothing!" protested Coghlan. "There's no possible explanation for a cold space in the middle of air!"
"Ah!" said the Turk in satisfaction. "Then we progress! Things which are associated with the same thing are associated with each other. This associates with the impossibility of your fingerprints and your handwriting and the threat to Mr. Mannard!"
"I'd like to know what does this trick!" said Coghlan, staring at the hole. "The heat's absorbed, and there's nothing to absorb it!" ”

“ Mannard shook his head.
"You're saying now," he said flatly, "that if Tommy doesn't write down what you showed me, all this won't happen because Duval won't find the writing. If he doesn't find the writing, the books won't go back to the past. All history will be different. My great-grandfather and yours, maybe, will never be born and we won't be here. No! That's nonsense!"
Coghlan looked at the book in Laurie's hand. He took it from her. "This is exactly like Duval's book," he said.
"It is the same book," said Ghalil, with confidence. "And I think you know what you will do." ”

“ The Greeks made a steam turbine in the classic age. It's more than likely that they made a magic lantern. But there could be no science without scientific thinking. They got results by accident, but they didn't know what they were doing or what they'd done. They couldn't think technically ... so there are no lost arts, only redefinitions. We can do everything the ancients could."
"Can you make a place that will stay cold for sixty years—let alone seven hundred?"
"It's an illusion," said Coghlan. "It must be! You'd better ask Appolonius how it's done. ”

“ Coghlan had no inkling of what was to come. He said, puzzledly:
"Fingerprinting is pretty modern stuff. So I suppose it's remarkable to find prints so old. But—"
Duval, pacing up and down the room, uttered a stifled exclamation. He stopped by Coghlan's desk. He played feverishly with a wooden-handled Kurdish dagger that Coghlan used as a letter-opener, his eyes a little wild.
Lieutenant Ghalil said resignedly:
"The fingerprints are not remarkable, Mr. Coghlan. They are impossible. I assure you that, considering their age alone, they are quite impossible! ”

“ Gadget at 80 Hosain, second floor, back room.
Coghlan stared at the sheet. He found his glass and gulped at it. On more mature consideration, he drained it. The situation seemed to call for something of the sort.
There was silence in the room, save for the drowsy sounds of the night outside. They were not all drowsy, at that. There were voices, and somewhere a radio emitted that nasal masculine howling which to the Turkish ear is music. Uninhibited taxicabs, an unidentifiable jingling, an intonation of speech, all made the sound that of Istanbul and no other place on earth. ”

“ Duval interposed: "The Byzantine Empire imported its finer swords."
"Yes," agreed Coghlan. "Religion wouldn't let them use the best process for tempering steel."
"Religion?" protested Mannard. "What did that have to do with tempering swords?"
"Magic," said Coghlan. "The best temper was achieved by heating a sword white-hot and plunging it into the body of a slave or a prisoner of war. It was probably discovered when somebody wanted to take a particularly fancy revenge. ”

“ There was a dagger with an ivory handle. There were three books. All were quite new, but they were not modern printed books: they were manuscript books, written in graceless Middle Greek with no spaces between words or punctuation or paragraphing. In binding and make-up they were exactly like the Alexiad of seven-hundred years ago. Only—they were spanking new.
Coghlan picked up one of them. It was the Alexiad. It was an exact duplicate of the one containing his prints, to the minutest detail of carving in the ivory medallions with which the leather cover was inset. ”

“ Then Ghalil nodded his head. He looked approvingly at Mannard.
"An honest man!" he said. "I can answer it, Mr. Mannard. Duval had his history-books here. Some were modern Greek and some were French. And if the preposterous is true, and Mr. Coghlan has described the fact, then the man who made this—this 'gadget' back in the thirteenth century was an alchemist and a scholar who believed implicitly in magic. When Duval offered to trade books, would he not agree without question because of his belief in magic? He would have no doubts! What Duval sent him would seem to him magic. ”

“ Mannard chuckled. Appolonius the Great was almost openly a fake; certainly he told about his "people" with the air of one who does not expect anybody to take him seriously. The story was that somewhere in Arabia there was a group of small, obscure villages in which the doctrines of Neoplatonism survived as a religion. They were maintained by a caste of philosopher-priests who kept the population bemused by magic, and Appolonius claimed to have been one of the hierarchy and to be astonishing all Europe with the trickery which was the mainstay of a cult. ”

“ Ghalil opened the car-door for the others to emerge.
"I impose myself upon you also," he said politely. "I shall stay on watch until affairs mature."
They entered the lobby, went toward the lift, only slightly reassured by bustle and bright lights. Coghlan said suddenly:
"Where's Duval? He's in this too!"
"He remains at 80 Hosain," said Ghalil briefly. "Poor man! He is wedded to logic and in love with the past. He is sorely tempted to a crime of passion! But I have left men with him."
They crowded into the lift. It rose. There was a man polishing woodwork in the hall outside Mannard's suite. ”

“ He brushed plaster dust off his fingers.
"That's all we can do without more apparatus. Now—"
He picked up the alnico magnet and moved it across all the cleared space. An oblong pattern of silveriness appeared at the nearest part of the wet place to the magnet. It followed the magnet to the edge, and ran abruptly off into nothingness as the magnet passed an invisible boundary.
"At a guess," said Coghlan thoughtfully, "this is the ghost, if you want to call it that, of what the ancients thought was a magic mirror—to look into the future with. Right, Duval?" ”

“ Ghalil finished the brushing process. He said with a sigh:
"When M. Duval first brought me that incredible book, I put routine police inquiries through on everyone who might be involved. You, Mr. Mannard. Mr. Coghlan. Of course M. Duval himself. And even Appolonius the Great. The last information about him came only today. It appears that in Rome, in Madrid, and in Paris he has been the close friend of three rich men of whom one died in an automobile accident, one apparently of a heart attack, and one seemed to have committed suicide. ”

“ Mannard chuckled once or twice as Coghlan's story unfolded.
"Clever!" he said when Coghlan finished. "How do you suppose they did it, and what do they want?"
Appolonius the Great wiped his mouth and topmost chin.
"I do not like it," he said seriously. "I do not like it at all. Oh, the book and the fingerprints and the writing ... one can do such things. I remember that once, in Madrid, I—but no matter! They are amateurs, and therefore they may be dangerous folk."
Laurie said, "I think Tommy'd have seen through anything crude. ”

“ Coghlan didn't have any money, anyhow, for them to be scheming to get. The only man a swindling scheme could be aimed at was Mannard. Mannard had money. He'd made a fortune building dams, docks, railroads and power installations in remote parts of the world. But he was hardly a likely mark for a profitable hoax, even if his name was mentioned in that memorandum so impossibly in Coghlan's handwriting. He was one of the major benefactors of the college in which Coghlan taught. He had at least one other major philanthropy in view right now. He'd be amused. But there was Laurie, of course. ”

“ Everywhere except in the wet spot the wall had the normal temperature of a plaster coating. The change of temperature was exactly what would have been apparent if a square-shaped freezing unit had been built into the structure. The plaster was rotten from long soaking. Coghlan took out a pocket-knife and dug carefully into it.
"What rational connection can this have with that stuff in the book, and with somebody trying to kill Mannard?" he demanded as he worked.
"No rational connection," admitted Ghalil. "A logical one. In police work one uses reason oneself, but does not expect it of events." ”

“ It was already late dusk, and Coghlan had just gotten back from the American College, where he taught physics. He relaxed in his chair and waited. He was to meet Laurie later, at the Hotel Petra on the improbably-named Grande Rue de Petra, and hadn't too much time to spare; but he was intrigued by the unexpected guests he had found waiting for him when he arrived. Duval, the Frenchman, haggard and frantic with impatience; Lieutenant Ghalil, calm and patient and impressive in the uniform of the Istanbul Police Department. ”

“ It was dark in the back of the car. Laurie settled down beside Coghlan. He was distinctly aware of her nearness. But he frowned uneasily as the car rolled away. His own handwriting in the book from ancient days had said, "Make sure of Mannard. To be killed." And Mannard had just had a good chance of a serious accident.... Coghlan felt uncomfortably that something significant had taken place that he should have noticed. ”

“ A tradition of centuries of the development and worship of the art of hocus-pocus was not too credible. And now, it seemed, Appolonius was claiming that somebody had put up money to bribe some Arab government and secure safety for the villagers in revealing their existence and at-least-eccentric religion.
"I'd some visitors today," said Coghlan, "who may have been using some of your Neoplatonistic magic." He turned to Mannard. "By the way, sir, they told me that I am probably going to murder you." ”

“ And making the connection is as far from making the gadgets as drawing a copper wire is from making a telephone exchange! All I know is that an alnico magnet will act as one instrument, so that the connection can exist!"
Mannard growled: "What the hell is all this? Stick to facts! What happened to Duval?"
"Tomorrow," said Coghlan in angry calm, "he's going to tell us that he heard faint voices through the silvery film when he played with the magnet. He's going to say the voices were talking in Byzantine Greek. ”

“ He believed, he said, that there might be some ancient manuscripts turned up when enlightenment swept over the furtive villages of his people. Coghlan gathered that he claimed as many as two or three thousand fellow-countrymen.
The car was reported as ready.
"I shall walk down the stairs!" announced Appolonius, with a wave of his pudgy hand. "I feel somehow grand and dignified, now that someone has given me money for my people. I do not think that anyone can feel dignified in a lift."
Mannard grunted. They moved toward the wide stairs, Appolonius in the lead. ”