The Edge of the Knife Read online

done something like that threeyears ago.... Think he's going to give you any real trouble?"

  "I doubt it."

  "Well, I'm on your side if he does. I won't be the only one, either."

  "Well, thank you, Leonard. It always helps to know that. I don't thinkthere'll be any more trouble, though."

  * * * * *

  He dined alone at his apartment, and sat over his coffee, outlininghis work for the next day. When both were finished, he dalliedindecisively, Weill's words echoing through his mind and raisingdoubts. It was possible that he had been manufacturing the whole thingin his subconscious mind. That was, at least, a more plausible theorythan any he had constructed to explain an ability to produce realknowledge of the future. Of course, there was that business about the_Kilroy_. That had been too close on too many points to be dismissedas coincidence. Then, again, Weill's words came back to disquiet him.Had he really gotten that before the event, as he believed, or had heonly imagined, later, that he had?

  There was one way to settle that. He rose quickly and went to thefiling-cabinet where he kept his future-history notes and beganpulling out envelopes. There was nothing about the _Kilroy_ in theTwentieth Century file, where it should be, although he examined eachsheet of notes carefully. The possibility that his notes on that mighthave been filed out of place by mistake occurred to him; he looked inevery other envelope. The notes, as far as they went, were all filedin order, and each one bore, beside the future date of occurrence, thedate on which the knowledge--or must he call it delusion?--had come tohim. But there was no note on the landing of the first unmanned rocketon Luna.

  He put the notes away and went back to his desk, rummaging through thedrawers, and finding nothing. He searched everywhere in the apartmentwhere a sheet of paper could have been mislaid, taking all hisbooks, one by one, from the shelves and leafing through them, evenbooks he knew he had not touched for more than three years. In theend, he sat down again at his desk, defeated. The note on the _Kilroy_simply did not exist.

  Of course, that didn't settle it, as finding the note would have. Heremembered--or believed he remembered--having gotten that item ofknowledge--or delusion--in 1970, shortly before the end of the schoolterm. It hadn't been until after the fall opening of school that hehad begun making notes. He could have had the knowledge of the robotrocket in his mind then, and neglected putting it on paper.

  He undressed, put on his pajamas, poured himself a drink, and went tobed. Three hours later, still awake, he got up, and poured himselfanother, bigger, drink. Somehow, eventually, he fell asleep.

  * * * * *

  The next morning, he searched his desk and book-case in the office atschool. He had never kept a diary; now he was wishing that he had.That might have contained something that would be evidence, one way orthe other. All day, he vacillated between conviction of the reality ofhis future knowledge and resolution to have no more to do with it.Once he decided to destroy all the notes he had made, and thought ofmaking a special study of some facet of history, and writing anotherbook, to occupy his mind.

  After lunch, he found that more data on the period immediately beforethe Thirty Days' War was coming into his consciousness. He resolutelysuppressed it, knowing as he did that it might never come to himagain. That evening, too, he cooked dinner for himself at hisapartment, and laid out his class-work for the next day. He'd betternot stay in, that evening; too much temptation to settle himself bythe living-room fire with his pipe and his notepad and indulge in thevice he had determined to renounce. After a little debate, he decidedupon a movie; he put on again the suit he had taken off on cominghome, and went out.

  * * * * *

  The picture, a random choice among the three shows in theneighborhood, was about Seventeenth Century buccaneers; excitingaction and a sound-track loud with shots and cutlass-clashing. He lethimself be drawn into it completely, and, until it was finished, hewas able to forget both the college and the history of the future.But, as he walked home, he was struck by the parallel between thebuccaneers of the West Indies and the space-pirates in the days of thedissolution of the First Galactic Empire, in the Tenth Century of theInterstellar Era. He hadn't been too clear on that period, and hefound new data rising in his mind; he hurried his steps, almostrunning upstairs to his room. It was long after midnight before he hadfinished the notes he had begun on his return home.

  Well, that had been a mistake, but he wouldn't make it again. Hedetermined again to destroy his notes, and began casting about for asubject which would occupy his mind to the exclusion of the future.Not the Spanish Conquistadores; that was too much like the earlyperiod of interstellar expansion. He thought for a time of the SepoyMutiny, and then rejected it--he could "remember" something much likethat on one of the planets of the Beta Hydrae system, in the FourthCentury of the Atomic Era. There were so few things, in the history ofthe past, which did not have their counter-parts in the future. Thatevening, too, he stayed at home, preparing for his various classes forthe rest of the week and making copious notes on what he would talkabout to each. He needed more whiskey to get to sleep that night.

  Whitburn gave him no more trouble, and if any of the trustees orinfluential alumni made any protest about what had happened in ModernHistory IV, he heard nothing about it. He managed to conduct hisclasses without further incidents, and spent his evenings trying, notalways successfully, to avoid drifting into "memories" of thefuture....

  * * * * *

  He came into his office that morning tired and unrefreshed by the fewhours' sleep he had gotten the night before, edgy from the strain, oftrying to adjust his mind to the world of Blanley College in mid-Aprilof 1973. Pottgeiter hadn't arrived yet, but Marjorie Fenner waswaiting for him; a newspaper in her hand, almost bursting withexcitement.

  "Here; have you seen it, Doctor Chalmers?" she asked as he entered.

  He shook his head. He ought to read the papers more, to keep track ofthe advancing knife-edge that divided what he might talk about fromwhat he wasn't supposed to know, but each morning he seemed to haveless and less time to get ready for work.

  "Well, look! Look at that!"

  She thrust the paper into his hands, still folded, the big, blackheadline where he could see it.

  KHALID IB'N HUSSEIN ASSASSINATED

  He glanced over the leading paragraphs. Leader of Islamic Caliphateshot to death in Basra ... leaving Parliament Building for his palaceoutside the city ... fanatic, identified as an Egyptian named MohammedNoureed ... old American submachine-gun ... two guards killed and athird seriously wounded ... seized by infuriated mob and stoned todeath on the spot....

  For a moment, he felt guilt, until he realized that nothing he couldhave done could have altered the event. The death of Khalid ib'nHussein, and all the millions of other deaths that would follow it,were fixed in the matrix of the space-time continuum. Including,maybe, the death of an obscure professor of Modern History namedEdward Chalmers.

  "At least, this'll be the end of that silly flap about what happened amonth ago in Modern Four. This is modern history, now; I can talkabout it without a lot of fools yelling their heads off."

  She was staring at him wide-eyed. No doubt horrified at hiscold-blooded attitude toward what was really a shocking and senselesscrime.

  "Yes, of course; the man's dead. So's Julius Caesar, but we've gottenover being shocked at his murder."

  He would have to talk about it in Modern History IV, he supposed;explain why Khalid's death was necessary to the policies of theEastern Axis, and what the consequences would be. How it would hastenthe complete dissolution of the old U. N., already weakened by thecrisis over the Eastern demands for the demilitarization andinternationalization of the United States Lunar Base, and necessitatethe formation of the Terran Federation, and how it would lead,eventually, to the Thirty Days' War. No, he couldn't talk about that;that was on the wrong side of the knife-edge. Have to be ca
reful aboutthe knife-edge; too easy to cut himself on it.

  * * * * *

  Nobody in Modern History IV was seated when he entered the room; theywere all crowded between the door and his desk. He stood blinking,wondering why they were giving him an ovation, and why Kendrick andDacre were so abjectly apologetic. Great heavens, did it take themurder of the greatest Moslem since Saladin to convince people that hewasn't crazy?

  Before the period was over, Whitburn's secretary entered with a notein the college president's hand and over his signature; requestingChalmers to come to his office immediately and without delay. Justlike that; expected him to walk right out of his class. He wasprotesting as he entered the president's office. Whitburn cut him offshort.

  "Doctor Chalmers,"--Whitburn had risen behind his desk as the dooropened--"I