Dimension of Miracles

by Robert Sheckley

  ‘How did you get me out of his mouth?’ Carmody asked.

  ‘I hastily fabricated a lure,’ Maudsley told him. ‘It looked just like you, but I built it a little larger than life-size and gave it a bit more vitality. The predator dropped you and bounded after it, dribbling saliva. But we can’t try that again.’

  Carmody preferred not to ask if the lure had felt any pain. ‘I’m ready,’ he said. ‘But where am I going, and what is going to happen?’

  ‘You are going to an Earth, almost undoubtedly the wrong one. But I will send a letter to a person I know who is very clever at solving temporal problems. He’ll look you up, if he decides to take your case, and after that … well, who can say? Take it as it comes, Carmody, and be grateful if anything comes at all.’

  ‘I am grateful,’ Carmody said. ‘No matter what the outcome, I want to thank you very much.’

  ‘That’s quite all right,’ Maudsley said. ‘Don’t forget my message to the old fellow if you ever do get back home. All set to go? The machine is right here beside me. I didn’t have time to make it visible, but it looks almost exactly like a Zenith battery-operated shortwave radio. Where the hell did it go? Here it is. Got your Prize?’

  ‘I’ve got him,’ the Prize said, holding on to Carmody’s left arm with both hands.

  ‘Then we’re ready. I set this dial here and then this one, and then these two over here … You’ll find it pleasant to be out of the macrocosm, Carmody, and back on a planet, even if it isn’t yours. There’s no qualitative difference, of course, among atom, planet, galaxy or universe. It’s all a question of what scale you live on most comfortably. And now I push this –’

  Bam! Pow! Crrrrunch! Slow dissolve, quick dissolve, lap dissolve, electronic music denoting outer space, outer space denoting electronic music. Pages of a calendar flip, Carmody tumbles head over heels in simulated free fall. Kettledrums sound ominous note, ominous note sounds kettledrums, bright flash of colours, woman’s voice keening in echo chamber, laughter of children, montage of Jaffa oranges lighted to look like planets, collage of a solar system lighted to look like ripples in a brook. Slow the tape, speed the tape, fade out, fade in.

  It was one hell of a trip, but nothing Carmody hadn’t expected.

  PART THREE

  When is Earth?

  CHAPTER 18

  With the transition completed, Carmody took stock of himself. A brief inventory convinced him that he still had all four limbs, one body, one head, and one mind. Final returns were not in, of course, but he did seem to be all there. He also noted that he still had the Prize, which was somehow recognizable even though it had undergone its usual metamorphosis. This time it had changed from a dwarf into a badly constructed flute.

  ‘So far, so good,’ Carmody said to nobody in particular. He now surveyed his surroundings.

  ‘Not so good,’ he said at once. He had been prepared to arrive at the wrong Earth, but he hadn’t expected it would be quite so wrong as this.

  He was standing on marshy ground at the edge of a swamp. Miasmic vapours rose from the stagnant brown waters. There were broad-leaved ferns, and low, thin-leaved shrubs, and bushy-headed palms, and a single dogwood tree. The air was blood-warm and heavily laden with odours of fertility and decay.

  ‘Maybe I’m in Florida,’ Carmody said hopefully.

  ‘Afraid not,’ said the Prize, or the flute, speaking in a low melodious voice but with an excess of vibrato.

  Carmody glared at the Prize. ‘How come you can speak?’ he demanded.

  ‘How come you didn’t ask me that when I was a cauldron?’ the Prize replied. ‘But I’ll tell you, if you really want to know. Affixed up here, just inside my mouthpiece, is a CO2 cartridge. That serves me in place of lungs, though for a limited time only. The rest is obvious.’

  It wasn’t obvious to Carmody. But he had more important matters on his mind. He asked, ‘Where am I?’

  ‘We,’ said the Prize, ‘are on the planet Earth. This moist bit of ground upon which we are standing will become, in your day, the township of Scarsdale, New York.’ He snickered. ‘I suggest you buy property now, while the real-estate values are depressed.’

  ‘It sure as hell doesn’t look like Scarsdale,’ Carmody said.

  ‘Of course not. Leaving aside for a moment the question of Whichness, we can see that the Whenness is all wrong.’

  ‘Well … When are we?’

  ‘A good question,’ the Prize replied, ‘but one to which I can only make an approximate and highly qualified reply. Obviously enough, we are in the Phanerozoic Aeon, which in itself covers one sixth of Earth’s geological time. Easy enough; but what part of the Phanerozoic are we in, the Palaeozoic or the Mesozoic Era? Here I must hazard a guess. Just on the basis of climate, I rule out all of the Palaeozoic except, just possibly, the end of the Permian Period. But wait, now I can rule that out, too! Look, overhead and to your right!’

  Carmody looked and saw an oddly shaped bird flapping awkwardly into the distance.

  ‘Definitely an Archaeopteryx,’ the Prize said. ‘You could tell at once from the way its feathers diverged pinnately from its axis. Most scientists consider it a creature of the upper Jurassic and the Cretaceous Periods, but certainly not older than the Triassic. So we can rule out the entire Palaeozoic; we are definitely in the Mesozoic Era.’

  ‘That’s pretty far back, huh?’ Carmody said.

  ‘Quite far,’ the Prize agreed. ‘But we can do better than that. I think we can pinpoint what part of the Mesozoic we are in. Let me think for a bit.’ He thought for a bit. ‘Yes, I think I have it. Not the Triassic! That swamp is a false clue, I fear. However, the angiospermous flowering plant near your left foot points an unmistakable direction, periodwise. Nor does it constitute our sole evidence. You noticed the dogwood tree in front of you? Well, turn around and you will see two poplars and a fig tree in the midst of a small group of conifers. Significant, eh? But did you notice the most important detail of all, so commonplace in your time that you would be apt to overlook it? I refer to grass, which we see here in abundance. There was no grass as late as Jurassic times! Just ferns and cycadeoids! And that decides it, Carmody! I’d wager my life savings on it! We are in the Cretaceous Period, and probably not far from its upper limit!’

  Carmody had only the vaguest remembrance of the geological periods of the Earth. ‘Cretaceous,’ he said. ‘How far is that from my time?’

  ‘Oh, about a hundred million years, give or take a few million,’ the Prize said. ‘The Cretaceous age lasted for seventy million years.’

  Carmody had no difficulty in adjusting to this concept; he never even tried. He said to the Prize, ‘How did you learn all of this geology stuff?’

  ‘How do you think?’ the Prize replied spiritedly. ‘I studied. I figured, since we were going to Earth, I’d better find out something about the place. And it’s a damned good thing I did. If it weren’t for me, you’d be stumbling around here looking for Miami Beach, and you’d have probably ended up being eaten by an allosaurus.’

  ‘Eaten by a who?’

  ‘I refer,’ the Prize said, ‘to one of the uglier members of the order Saurischia, an offshoot of which – the sauropoda – culminated in the renowned brontosaurus.’

  ‘You mean to tell me there are dinosaurs here?’ Carmody asked.

  ‘I mean to tell you,’ the Prize said in obbligato, ‘that this is the one and original Dinosaursville, and I would also like to take this opportunity to welcome you to the Age of the Giant Reptiles.’

  Carmody made an incoherent noise. He noticed a movement to his left and turned. He saw a dinosaur. It looked about twenty feet high, and might have stretched fifty feet from nose to tail. It stood erect on its hind legs. It was coloured slate-blue, and it was striding rapidly towards Carmody.

  ‘Is that a tyrannosaurus?’ Carmody asked.

  ‘Yes, it is,’ the Prize said. ‘Tyrannosaurus rex, most highly respected of the saurischians. A true deinodon, you will note, its upper incisors
running half a foot in length. This young chap coming towards us must weigh upwards of nine tons.’

  ‘And he eats meat,’ Carmody said.

  ‘Yes, of course. I personally think that tyrannosaurus and other carnosaurs of this period feasted mainly on the inoffensive and widely distributed hadrosaurs. But that is only my own pet theory.’

  The giant creature was less than fifty feet away. There was no refuge on the flat, marshy land, no place to climb, no cave to scuttle into. Carmody said, ‘What should I do?’

  ‘You must change into a plant at once!’ the Prize said urgently.

  ‘But I can’t!’

  ‘You can’t? Then your situation is serious indeed. Let me see, you can’t fly or burrow, and I’d wager ten to one you’d never outrun him. Hmm, this becomes difficult.’

  ‘So what do I do?’

  ‘Well, under the circumstances, I think you should be stoical about the whole thing. I could quote Epictetus to you. And we could sing a hymn together if that would help.’

  ‘Damn your hymns! I want to get out of this!’

  The flute had already begun to play ‘Nearer My God to Thee.’ Carmody clenched his fists. The tyrannosaurus was now directly in front of him, towering overhead like a fleshed-out and animate derrick. It opened its awesome mouth.

  CHAPTER 19

  ‘Hello,’ said the tyrannosaurus. ‘My name is Emie and I am six years old. What’s your name?’

  ‘Carmody,’ said Carmody.

  ‘And I’m his Prize,’ said the Prize.

  ‘Well, you both look very strange,’ said Emie. ‘You don’t look like anybody I’ve ever met before, and I’ve met a dimetrodon, and a struthiomimus, and a scolosaurus, and lots of others. Do you come from around here?’

  ‘Well, sort of,’ Carmody said. Then, reflecting on the dimensionality of time, he said, ‘But not really, actually.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Emie. Childlike, he stared at them and fell into a silence. Carmody stared back, fascinated by that huge, grim head, larger than a slot machine or a beer keg, the narrow mouth studded with teeth like rows of stilettos. Fearsome indeed! Only the eyes – which were round, mild, blue and trusting – refuted the rest of the dinosaur’s ominous appearance.

  ‘Well, so,’ Emie said at last, ‘what are you doing here in the park?’

  ‘Is this a park?’ Carmody asked.

  ‘Sure, it’s a park!’ Emie said. ‘It’s a park for kids, and I don’t think you’re a kid, even though you are very small.’

  ‘You’re right, I’m not a kid,’ Carmody said. ‘I stumbled into your park by mistake. I think perhaps I should speak to your father.’

  ‘Hokay,’ Emie said. ‘Climb on my back and I’ll take you to him. And don’t forget, I discovered you. And bring along your friend. He’s really strange!’

  Carmody slipped the Prize into his pocket and mounted the tyrannosaurus, finding hand and foot holds on the folds of Emie’s iron-tough skin. As soon as he was securely in place on the dinosaur’s neck, Emie wheeled and began to lope towards the southwest.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Carmody asked.

  ‘To see my father.’

  ‘Yes, but where is your father?’

  ‘He’s in the city, working at his job. Where else would he be?’

  ‘Of course, where else indeed?’ Carmody said, taking a firmer grip as Emie broke into a gallop.

  From Carmody’s pocket, the Prize said, in a muffled voice, ‘This is all exceedingly strange.’

  ‘You’re the strange one around here,’ Carmody reminded him. Then he settled back to enjoy the ride.

  They didn’t call it Dinosaursville, but Carmody could think of it in no other way. It lay about two miles from the park. First they came to a road, a wide trail, actually, stamped to the firmness of concrete by countless dinosaur feet. They followed it and passed many hadrosaurs sleeping beneath willow trees by the side of the road and occasionally harmonizing in low, sweet voices. Carmody asked about them, but Emie would only say that his father considered them a real problem.

  The road went past groves of birch, maple, laurel and holly. Each grove had its dozen or so dinosaurs, moving purposefully beneath the branches, digging at the ground or pushing away refuse. Carmody asked what they were doing.

  ‘They’re tidying up,’ Emie said scornfully. ‘That’s all that housewives ever do.’

  They had come to an upland plateau. They left the last individual grove behind and plunged abruptly into a forest.

  Evidently it was not a natural growth; it showed many signs of having been planted purposefully and with considerable foresight. Its outer trees consisted of a broad belt of fig, breadfruit, hazelnut and walnut. Past that there were several nicely spaced rows of tall, slim-trunked gingkos. Then, there was nothing but pine trees and an occasional spruce.

  As they moved deeper into the forest, it became more and more crowded with dinosaurs. Most of these were theropods – carnivorous tyrannosaurs like Emie. But the Prize also pointed out several ornithopods, and literally hundreds of the ceratopsia offshoot represented by the massively horned triceratops. Nearly all of them moved through the trees at a canter. The ground shook beneath their feet, the trees trembled, and clouds of dust were flung into the air. Flank scraped against armoured flank, collisions were avoided only by quick turns, abrupt halts and sudden accelerations. There was much bellowing for right-of-way. The sight of several thousand hurrying dinosaurs was almost as fearsome as their smell, which was overpowering.

  ‘Here we are,’ said Emie, stopping so quickly that Carmody was nearly thrown off his neck. ‘This is my dad’s place!’

  Carmody looked around and saw that Emie had, brought him to a small grove of sequoias. The big trees formed an oasis within the forest. Two or three dinosaurs moved among the redwoods with a slow, almost languid pace, ignoring the turmoil fifty yards away. Carmody decided that he could get down without being trampled upon. Warily he slid off Emie’s neck.

  ‘Dad!’ Emie shouted. ‘Hey, Dad, just look what I found, look, Dad!’

  One of the dinosaurs looked up. He was a tyrannosaur, somewhat larger than Emie, with white striations across his blue hide. His eyes were grey and bloodshot. He turned around with great deliberation.

  ‘How often,’ he asked, ‘have I asked you not to gallop here?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Dad, but look, I found –’

  ‘You are always “sorry,”’ the tyrannosaur said, ‘but you never see fit to modify your behaviour. I have spoken with your mother about this, Emie, and we are in, substantial agreement. Neither of us wishes to raise a graceless, loud-mouthed hot-rodder who doesn’t possess the manners of a brontosaurus. I love you, my son, but you must learn –’

  ‘Dad! Will you please save the lecture for later and look, just look, at what I’ve found!’

  The elderly tyrannosaur’s mouth tightened and his tail flicked ominously. But he lowered his head, following the direction of his son’s outstretched forepaw, and saw Carmody.

  ‘Well bless my soul!’ he cried.

  ‘Good day, sir,’ Carmody said. ‘My name is Thomas Carmody. I am a human being. I don’t think there are any other humans on Earth just now, or even any primates. How I got here is a little difficult to explain, but I come in peace, and – and that sort of thing,’ he finished lamely.

  ‘Fantastic!’ Emie’s father said. He turned his head. ‘Baxley! Do you see what I see? Do you hear what I hear?’

  Baxley was a tyrannosaur of about the same age as Emie’s father. He said, ‘I see it, Borg, but I don’t believe it.’

  ‘A talking mammal!’ Borg exclaimed.

  ‘I still don’t believe it,’ said Baxley.

  CHAPTER 20

  It took Borg longer to accept the idea of a talking mammal than it took Carmody to accept the idea of a talking reptile. Still, Borg finally did accept it. As the Prize remarked later, there is nothing like the actual presence of a fact to make one believe in the existence of that fact.

  The
y retired to Borg’s office, which was under the lofty green foliage of a weeping-willow tree. There, they sat and cleared their throats, trying to think of something to say. At last Borg said, ‘So you’re an alien mammal from the future, eh?’

  ‘I guess I am,’ Carmody said. ‘And you are an indigenous reptile from the past.’

  ‘I never thought about it that way,’ Borg said. ‘But yes, I suppose that’s true. How far ahead in the future did you say you came from?’

  ‘About a hundred million years or so.’

  ‘Hah. Quite a long time away. Yes, a long time indeed.’

  ‘It is quite a long time away,’ Carmody agreed.

  Borg nodded and hummed tunelessly. It was evident to Carmody that he didn’t know what to say next. Borg seemed a very decent sort of person; hospitable, but set in his ways, very much a family man, no conversationalist, just a decent, dull, middle-class tyrannosaur.

  ‘Well, well,’ Borg said, after the silence had become uncomfortable, ‘and how is the future?’

  ‘Beg pardon?’

  ‘I mean, what sort of a place is the future?’

  ‘Very busy,’ Carmody replied. ‘Bustling. Many new inventions, a great deal of confusion.’

  ‘Well, well, well,’ Borg said. ‘That’s very much as some of our more imaginative chaps had pictured it. Some of them have even predicted an evolutionary change in the mammals, making them the dominant species on Earth. But I consider that farfetched and grotesque.’

  ‘I suppose it must sound that way,’ Carmody said.

  ‘Then you are the dominant species?’

  ‘Well … one of the dominant species.’

  ‘But what about the reptiles? Or more specifically, how are the tyrannosaurs doing in the future?’

  Carmody had neither the heart nor the nerve to tell him that dinosaurs were extinct in his day, and had been extinct for sixty million years or so, and that reptiles in general had come to occupy an insignificant part in the scheme of things.