Stephen and Helen Tamberly, both of the Time Patrol, live in London in the late nineteenth century. Stephen departs on 27 October 1885, intending to spend six years in the sixteenth century. Does this mean that he must return home in 1891? No. He can return on 27 October 1885. Does he return on that date? No. Helen explains:
"'Stephen was only supposed to be gone three days. Six years for him, three days for me. He wanted that much time merely to reaccustom himself to this milieu. He meant to wander about incognito, getting back into Victorian habits, so he wouldn't absent-mindedly do something that would surprise the servants or our local friends. It's been a week!'" (p. 673)
Stephen had failed to report to the Patrol outpost in Lima, 1535:
"'Discrete inquiries turned up the fact that the friar Esteban Tanaquil vanished mysteriously two years before, in Cajamarca.'" (p. 669)
Thus, Stephen/Esteban fails to return home in 1885 because he had failed to report in in 1535 because he had disappeared (kidnapped by Exaltationists) in 1533. However, later in this story, the Patrol undoes Stephen's disappearance - and I think that that intervention causes problems for this sequence of events.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
This might have been one of the surprisingly few rare weak spots in any of the Time Patrol stories.
Ad astra! Sean
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