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The Bird of Time
by George Alec Effinger
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Copyright ©1986 by George Alec Effinger
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The Bird of Time
by George Alec Effinger
Other works by George Alec Effinger also available in e-
reads editions
Dirty Tricks
The Nick of Time
What Entropy Means to Me
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The Bird of Time
by George Alec Effinger
For their advice and encouragement over the years, this book
is for Robert Silverberg and Edward L. Ferman and Shawna
McCarthy.
The only way to predict the future is to have power to shape
the future. Those in possession of absolute power can not
only prophecy and make their prophecies come true, but they
can also lie and make their lies come true.
—Eric Hoffer
"Fiddle-dee-dee. War, war, war. This war talk's spoiling all the
fun at every party this spring. I get so bored I could scream.
Besides, there isn't going to be any war!”
—Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara
Gone With the Wind
You can't sort jam and marbles.
—Walt Kelly
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The Bird of Time
by George Alec Effinger
CHAPTER ONE
BEARS BITTER FRUIT
You know the shock of utter terror just as you're about to
hand over a large sum of money for something you're no
longer sure you really want. Hartstein felt it. He felt it in his
stomach, and he felt his hand give a peculiar reluctant quiver
as he gave his card to the man behind the counter.
The man smiled, not pleasantly. He was dressed in the
uniform of the Agency, the silver-and-blue tunic with the
leatherneck collar. There were five rows of ribbons on his
breast, signifying one thing and another, all mysterious and
unknown to Hartstein. The man was evidently a hardened
veteran of the Agency; it seemed odd to Hartstein to see him
behind the counter, like a travel agent or an airline ticket
clerk. “Second thoughts?” said the Agency man.
“Well,” said Hartstein, “no.” He wasn't going to let this
veteran see that the notion of a vacation in time made him
just a little uneasy. It did, but not enough to make him
change his mind. Really, it was the expense that staggered
Hartstein more than the danger. But possibly, down
underneath, buried successfully beneath rocky strata of more
mundane worries, there was the tickling fear that he might be
one of the 2 percent that never came back.
Hartstein was a young man, recently graduated from
college in Mississippi, about to begin a new life as an
employee in a doughnut shop, who had been given a large
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