Time and the Woman

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  TIME and the WOMAN

  By Dewey, G. Gordon

  [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Orbit volume 1 number2, 1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.copyright on this publication was renewed.]

  [Sidenote: HER ONLY PASSION WAS BEAUTY--BEAUTY WHICH WOULD LAST FOREVER.AND FOR IT--SHE'D DO ANYTHING!]

  [Illustration ]

  Ninon stretched. And purred, almost. There was something lazily catlikein her flexing; languid, yet ferally alert. The silken softness of hercouch yielded to her body as she rubbed against it in sensual delight.There was almost the litheness of youth in her movements.

  It was true that some of her joints seemed to have a hint of stiffnessin them, but only _she_ knew it. And if some of the muscles beneath herpolished skin did not respond with quite the resilience of the youththey once had, only _she_ knew that, too. _But they would again_, shetold herself fiercely.

  She caught herself. She had let down her guard for an instant, and afrown had started. She banished it imperiously. Frowns--just onefrown--could start a wrinkle! And nothing was as stubborn as a wrinkle.One soft, round, white, long-nailed finger touched here, and here, andthere--the corners of her eyes, the corners of her mouth, smoothingthem.

  Wrinkles acknowledged only one master, the bio-knife of the facialsurgeons. But the bio-knife could not thrust deep enough to excise thestiffness in a joint; was not clever enough to remold the outlines of afigure where they were beginning to blur and--sag.

  No one else could see it--yet. But Ninon could!

  Again the frown almost came, and again she scourged it fiercely into theback of her mind. Time was her enemy. But she had had other enemies, anddestroyed them, one way or another, cleverly or ruthlessly ascircumstances demanded. Time, too, could be destroyed. Or enslaved.Ninon sorted through her meagre store of remembered reading. Some oldphilosopher had said, "If you can't whip 'em, join 'em!" Crude, but apt.

  Ninon wanted to smile. But smiles made wrinkles, too. She was content tofeel that sureness of power in her grasp--the certain knowledge thatshe, first of all people, would turn Time on itself and destroy it. Shewould be youthful again. She would thread through the ages to come, likea silver needle drawing a golden filament through the layer on layer ofthe cloth of years that would engarment her eternal youth. Ninon knewhow.

  Her shining, gray-green eyes strayed to the one door in her apartmentthrough which no man had ever gone. There the exercising machines; thelotions; the unguents; the diets; the radioactive drugs; the records ofendocrine transplantations, of blood transfusions. She dismissed themcontemptuously. Toys! The mirages of a pseudo-youth. She would leavethem here for someone else to use in masking the downhill years.

  There, on the floor beside her, was the answer she had sought so long. Abook. "Time in Relation to Time." The name of the author, his academicrecord in theoretical physics, the cautious, scientific wording of hispostulates, meant nothing to her. The one thing that had meaning for herwas that Time could be manipulated. And she would manipulate it. ForNinon!

  The door chimes tinkled intimately. Ninon glanced at her watch--Robertwas on time. She arose from the couch, made sure that the light wasbehind her at just the right angle so he could see the outlines of herfigure through the sheerness of her gown, then went to the door andopened it.

  A young man stood there. Young, handsome, strong, his eyes aglow withthe desire he felt, Ninon knew, when he saw her. He took one quick stepforward to clasp her in his strong young arms.

  "Ninon, my darling," he whispered huskily.

  Ninon did not have to make her voice throaty any more, and that annoyedher too. Once she had had to do it deliberately. But now, through theyears, it had deepened.

  "Not yet, Robert," she whispered. She let him feel the slight but firmresistance so nicely calculated to breach his own; watched the deepeningflush of his cheeks with the clinical sureness that a thousand suchexperiences with men had given her.

  Then, "Come in, Robert," she said, moving back a step. "I've beenwaiting for you."

  She noted, approvingly, that Robert was in his spaceman's uniform, readyfor the morrow's flight, as he went past her to the couch. She pushedthe button which closed and locked the door, then seated herself besidethe young spaceman on the silken couch.

  His hands rested on her shoulders and he turned her until they facedeach other.

  "Ninon," he said, "you are so beautiful. Let me look at you for a longtime--to carry your image with me through all of time and space."

  Again Ninon let him feel just a hint of resistance, and risked a tinypout. "If you could just take me with you, Robert...."

  Robert's face clouded. "If I only could!" he said wistfully. "If therewere only room. But this is an experimental flight--no more than two cango."

  Again his arms went around her and he leaned closer.

  "Wait!" Ninon said, pushing him back.

  "Wait? Wait for what?" Robert glanced at his watch. "Time is runningout. I have to be at the spaceport by dawn--three hours from now."

  Ninon said, "But that's three hours, Robert."

  "But I haven't slept yet tonight. There's been so much to do. I shouldrest a little."

  "I'll be more than rest for you."

  "Yes, Ninon.... Oh, yes."

  "Not yet, darling." Again her hands were between them. "First, tell meabout the flight tomorrow."

  The young spaceman's eyes were puzzled, hurt. "But Ninon, I've told youbefore ... there is so much of you that I want to remember ... so littletime left ... and you'll be gone when I get back...."

  Ninon let her gray-green eyes narrow ever so slightly as she leaned awayfrom him. But he blundered on.

  "... or very old, no longer the Ninon I know ... oh, all right. But youknow all this already. We've had space flight for years, but onlyrocket-powered, restricting us to our own system. Now we have a new kindof drive. Theoretically we can travel faster than light--how many timesfaster we don't know yet. I'll start finding out tomorrow, with thefirst test flight of the ship in which the new drive is installed. If itworks, the universe is ours--we can go anywhere."

  "Will it work?" Ninon could not keep the avid greediness out of hervoice.

  Robert said, hesitantly, "We think it will. I'll know better by thistime tomorrow."

  "What of you--of me--. What does this mean to us--to people?"

  Again the young spaceman hesitated. "We ... we don't know, yet. We thinkthat time won't have the same meaning to everyone...."

  "... When you travel faster than light. Is that it?"

  "Well ... yes. Something like that."

  "And I'll be--old--or dead, when you get back? If you get back?"

  Robert leaned forward and buried his face in the silvery-blonde hairwhich swept down over Ninon's shoulders.

  "Don't say it, darling," he murmured.

  This time Ninon permitted herself a wrinkling smile. If she was right,and she knew she was, it could make no difference now. There would be nowrinkles--there would be only the soft flexible skin, naturally soft andflexible, of real youth.

  She reached behind her, over the end of the couch, and pushed threebuttons. The light, already soft, dimmed slowly to the faintest ofglows; a suave, perfumed dusk as precisely calculated as was the exactrate at which she let all resistance ebb from her body.

  Robert's voice was muffled through her hair. "What were those clicks?"he asked.

  Ninon's arms stole around his neck. "The lights," she whispered, "and alittle automatic warning to tell you when it's time to go...."

  The boy did not seem to remember a
bout the third click. Ninon was notquite ready to tell him, yet. But she would....

  * * * * *

  Two hours later a golden-voiced bell chimed, softly, musically. Thelights slowly brightened to no more than the lambent glow which was allthat Ninon permitted. She ran her fingers through the young spaceman'stousled hair and shook him gently.

  "It's time to go, Robert," she said.

  Robert fought back from the stubborn grasp of sleep. "So soon?" hemumbled.

  "And I'm going with you," Ninon said.

  This brought him fully awake. "I'm sorry, Ninon. You can't!" He sat upand yawned, stretched, the healthy stretch of resilient youth. Then hereached for the jacket he had tossed over on a