"Beloved-"

"Yes, Lazarus?"

"Does Ira close his eyes? Refuse to see you?"

"No."

"Does Justin? Or Galahad? If you can stand my homely face, I surely can stand your lovely one-and, with any luck, she'll look more like you than me. Let's go back to the house."

Her face lit up. "What's wrong with this little stand of trees?"

"Mmm. Yes. Now."

VARIATIONS ON A THEME-XVII

Narcissus

"Let's run over it again, girls," said Lazarus. "Both the time markers and the rendezvous landmarks. Dora, can you see the globe?"

"I can if you'll keep your hands out of the way, Ol' Buddy Boy."

"Sorry, dear. Call me Lazarus; I'm not your brother."

"When Lazi and Lori made me their adopted sister, you got in free. Logical? Logical. Don't fight it, Buddy; you like it." "Okay, I like it, Sister Dora," agreed Lazarus. "Now shut up and let me talk."

"Aye, aye, Commodore," the pilot computer answered. "But I've got it all on tell-me-three-times. Not that I need those clumsy time markers-I'm calibrated, Buddy, calibrated."

"Dora, assume that something happens to that calibration."

"Can't. One bank goes out of whack, I fall back on tell-me-twice while I fall back on tell-me-twice while I wipe that bank and restore it."

"So? You've been euphoric ever since the twins adopted you. I taught you to be a pessimist, Dora. A pilot who is not a pessimist isn't worth a hoot."

"I'm sorry, Commodore. I'll shut up."

"Speak up if you have anything to say. But not to disparage safety precautions. It's my own precious skin I'm trying to protect, Dora, so please help me. I can think of a dozen ways your gizzards could be damaged, either by error or by natural catastrophe-and so can you but there is no point in worrying. But there is point in trying to anticipate what can be done about it.

"Take a case in which you are working perfectly but the twins can't use you. By schedule, after you drop me, you all go back to base-time framework and to New Rome and the twins inquire for Delay Mail at the Archives. Who knows?- there may be some waiting there right now."

"Brother," put in Lorelei, "'now' doesn't mean anything. We've been in irrelevant phase ever since we lifted off."

"Don't quibble, dear. The 'now' I mean is 2072 Diaspora, or 4291 Gregorian, your adulthood year. If it is."

"Laz, did you hear that?"

"You asked for it, Lor. Pipe down and let Brother talk."

"The trouble is with the words themselves, Lorelei. You gals-you three gals-might spend part of the reach to Earth in inventing new language and appropriate syntax for space-time travel. But this imaginary case- You ground on Secundus, go to the Archives, and ask if any Delay Mail has been unsealed that has your name on it. Or Justin's, or Ira's. Or even addressed to me, as Lazarus Long, or as Woodrow Wilson Smith. I may try several ways, as I'll be attempting it from a 'now' some centuries before Delay Mail became a routine way to preserve papers.

"So you pick up whatever there is and go back to the 'Dora'-and find her lock sealed and a sheriff guarding it. Confiscated."

"What!"

"Dora, please don't yell in my ear. This is a hypothetical case."

"That sheriff had better be able to shoot straight," Lapis Lazuli said grimly.

Her brother answered, "Lazi, you've heard me say nine thousand and nineteen times that we do not carry weapons to give us Dutch courage. If a gun makes you feel three meters tall and invulnerable, you had better go unarmed and let your sister do any shooting that's necessary. Now tell me why you don't shoot at the sheriff."

"Yes!" said Dora. "I want to be rescued!"

"Quiet, Dora. Laz?"

"Uh...we don't shoot cops. Ever."

"Not quite. We don't shoot cops if there is any way to avoid it. Safer to kiss a rattlesnake. In two thousand years and some I've always found a way to avoid it-although I did shoot kind o' close to one once, to divert his attention. Unique circumstances. But in this hypothetical case shooting one cop is worse than useless; the Chairman Pro Tem has confiscated your ship."

"Help," Dora whispered.

"Why, Madam Barstow would never do anything that nasty!"

"I didn't say it was Susan Barstow. But Arabelle, had she lasted, would have enjoyed pulling that sort of stunt on the Longs. Let's say Susan has dropped dead and the new CPT is as bad as Arabelle. No ship and no assets-what do you do? Remember, I'm depending on you-or I'm stuck back in the Dark Ages. What do you do?"

"'When in danger or doubt-...Run in circles, scream and shout,'" recited Dora.

"Oh, stop it, Dora," said Lapis Lazuli. "We don't panic, that's certain. We have ten years in which to figure out a- Hey! - Wait a moment; I'm using the wrong framework. We could take a hundred years if necessary. Or longer."

"A hundred years is plenty," said Lorelei. "In less time than that we can steal another ship."

"Thank big," advised Lazarus. "Steal the Pleiades. Far better not to steal anything, Lor."

"You stole a starship once."

"Because there was no time to do anything else. But with plenty of time at your disposal, it's better to be reasonably honest-not break rules you can get caught breaking. Money is the universal weapon; to acquire it merely takes time and ingenuity, and sometimes work. Raise enough money and you might be able to buy the 'Dora' back. If that's impossible, with much less money you could get to Tertius, where Ira and the family could find some way to lay hands on a starship. Then you could program it with the stuff Dora left in Athene-and come get me."

"Isn't anybody going to come rescue me?"

"Dora dear, this hasn't happened, and it's extremely unlikely to happen. But if it did and the twins weren't able to rescue you-say that your new owner has you halfway across the Galaxy-"

"I'll crash him the first time he tries to land!"

"Dora, stop being a nitwit. If we ever did lose you-most unlikely-and the twins could not rescue you but could rescue me-then if you've taken care of yourself, no crash landing or any other foolishness-we'll find you, we'll get you back. All three of us. No matter how many years it takes. Laz? Lori?"

"You bet! 'One for all, all for one!' And it's not just us-four, Dora; it's the whole family-all the adults, all nine kids-might be more by then-and Athene. Brother, when Ira moved that we all take the last name of 'Long,' I liked it so much I couldn't cry hard enough. Sis, you're 'Dora Long'- and the Longs don't let each other-down!"

"I feel better," the computer admitted, with a sniffle.

"You never had anything to feel bad about, Dora," Lazarus continued. "You started this by insisting that my precautions were unnecessary. So I dreamed up a situation in which they would be necessary...especially so if the twins could not get at the programs you left with Athene-in which case they might have to fall back on time markers and recalibrate. So I had 'em stuck on another planet and flat broke...so the first problem is to lay hands on money. Think you could do it, girls? In a hundred years? Without being caught in something that would put you in still more of a jam?"

The twins glanced at each other. "Lor?"

"Of course, Laz. Brother, that's when we open our hook shop over a pool hall. Or somewhere."

Lazarus said, "I don't think you two have the true vocation. And your noses are regrettably like mine. Homely, that is."

"Our noses are an asset-"

"-because they do make us look like you-"

"-so what is common gossip by now but unbelievable-"