messenger was gone. There wasn't anything todo but use the tickets of course."
"Of all the luck! Maybe you and Ed've got a fairy Godmother orsomething. What'd you do for a sitter?"
"Oh, we were nearly insane finding one. Jane and Tina were busy and weknew you were away for the weekend. Fortunately we phoned this Mrs.Mimms and she was available. Kenneth _loved_ her."
"Isn't she _nice_? That woman's a wonder with children. Dicky and Sueare as good as gold when she's around and she always seems to be freewhen you want her. She's so cheap, too, I don't see how the womanlives."
"Glory we had a good time!" sighed Betty. "We had drinks and filetmignon at a nice little place near the theater and forgot all aboutkids for a while. It was like going on a date again. I had on myred-and-gold dress I haven't worn for months and Ed kept telling mehow cute I looked...."
* * * * *
"Zoom, zoom," the captain kept saying. The spaceship swooped in for alanding on the crimson Martian sands. Captain Bobby Taylor took up aposition before the air-lock and briefed his second-in-command, RonnieSmith. "We're surrounded by enemy aliens, Smith," announced CaptainTaylor. "Better break out the death-ray pistols. Our mission is todestroy every metal monster on this planet. Look at 'em come! They goteight legs and sixteen wire arms...."
"Ah, cut it out, Bobby. I ain't playing science-fiction with you anymore. It ain't like you say at all."
"What's it like then, wise guy? I suppose _you_ been to Mars."
"Maybe I ain't," said Lt. Smith. "Anyways I know somebody that _has_."
"Yeah? Who?"
"Mrs. Mimms. She babysits with me when Mom and Dad go out. She's beenall over in space. Venus and all them other planets. She says thereain't any monsters on any of 'em. There ain't _nuthin_ on Mars excepta little bitty grass and a lot of scientists from Earth."
"Mad scientists?" asked Captain Taylor hopefully.
"Nah, just scientists. She says we oughta forget about monsters andplay the right way. You know, like with atomic reactors and radarcommunication and growing new kinds of food for Earth colonies."
"Ah I don't believe it. She'd hafta be from someplace in the future.She'd hafta come here by time machine or something, wouldn't she?"
"That's what she did," Lt. Smith informed the captain. "She showed mepictures to prove it. Pictures of her last vacation on the moon. Yououghta see what they done to the place. She's from the future, allright."
"Then she ain't supposed to tell anybody about it, is she?"
Lt. Smith waved his hand airily. "She says it's OK to tell kidsbecause grownups wouldn't believe it anyway. Get your mother to lether sit for you next time. She'll show you the pictures if you askher. Heck, it's no fun playing monsters now."
"Well, look," said Captain Taylor magnanimously, "supposing I let yoube Captain today. You can pretend any kind of stuff you want."
"OK," said the new Captain, and immediately postulated a giganticatomic reactor on the planet Pluto.
* * * * *
The doctor had said Julie should not, but she had another cup ofcoffee anyway. She drank it and then lit a cigarette. Immediately shefelt a twinge of the morning sickness and wisely snubbed it out in theashtray. She was so happy it almost didn't hurt at all. I'm pregnantagain, she thought, that's the important thing. Julie hugged herselfand thought again of Mrs. Mimms and her tea leaves. It was thesilliest thing, she told herself, you didn't base important decisionson tea leaves. Not _tea_ leaves. It was right after the week Bill hadbeen having those queer dreams that they'd decided, well, to go ahead.Julie remembered Bill's face as he sat on the edge of her beddescribing one of the dreams to her as she laid there.
"It was vivid as hell, honey," Bill had said. "Maybe I ought to giveup eating cheese sandwiches at night or something. It's like dreamingon the installment plan. Every time I'm someplace different and someguy in a weird suit is showing me around. Last night I could swear itwas somewhere in New York, only the buildings were a lot taller andthere were kind of triple-decker ramp things with nutty-looking carson them and the people all wore tight-fitting clothes. Then all of asudden we were down on what looked like the Battery and the guy showedme a big cookie-shaped thing out in the harbor with planes that lookedlike flying saucers landing and taking off from it. Hell, maybe it'sgoing to be George Humphry's kind of world after all a couple ofhundred years from now."
* * * * *
Then a night or two later they'd gone out to a movie. She'd been luckyto get Mrs. Mimms to sit with Georgie. After they got back Mrs. Mimmshad made some tea--_real_ tea she'd brought from her own apartment.When she offered to tell their fortunes in the leaves, Julie began togiggle ... until she saw Bill was taking it perfectly seriously. Maybeit was the quiet way Mrs. Mimms had discussed their futures over thebrown leaves, as if she'd been there herself. Funny old duck.Wonderful with Georgie, though; and the other girls swore by her. Billhadn't batted an eye when she predicted it would be a girl this time,and perfectly healthy and all right.
Julie peeked into the bedroom where Georgie was sleeping and pulledthe blanket up under his chin. "According to Mrs. Mimms, my lad,you'll be getting a baby sister soon," she whispered. Bill _had_changed lately. Not so gloomy somehow, nicer. But _tea_ leaves, forHeaven's sake, they couldn't have anything to do with....
She stopped trying to figure it out because the nausea returned. Thistime it was bad and she had to run for the bathroom.
* * * * *
The crisp directive--Zonally disguised as a contemporary telegram--wasforwarded to Mrs. Mimms on a Monday night. Although it bore theResident Destinyworker's address, it had come of course directly fromthe Chief's office for the code word DESTWORK headed the message.Decoded, it read:
URGENT YOU CLOSE OUT PRESENT ASSIGNMENT IN DAY OR TWO. CONDITION 16 IN 22ND CENTURY APPROACHING CRISIS. IMPORTANT ALL AVAILABLE PERSONNEL BE CONCENTRATED. PICK-UP AT POINT OF ENTRY ACCORDING TO PROCEDURE. BRIEFING TO COME FROM KEY RESIDENTS. ALL VACATIONS AND LEAVES-OF-ABSENCE HEREWITH CANCELLED.
Mrs. Mimms sighed. It was always this way she reflected. Central wasperpetually short of experienced help. The younger Destinyworkers,fresh from the colleges, always wanted to traipse off into the futurewhere nothing practical ever got done. Oh, they argued, you couldalways read about the past if you wanted to and, anyway, since DirectInfluence on Historic Continuum was strictly forbidden, what was thegood of wandering around in musty yesterdays? Mrs. Mimms however knewbetter and so did every other member of the small cadre of qualifiedCPO's. A good CPO, a dedicated one, could always find loopholes in theDestiny Code. The past _could_ be shaped in little ways even if theorganization _was_ powerless to stop major catastrophes.
At any rate orders were orders and Mrs. Mimms began to consider thepractical side of leaving Greenlawn. Packing was no problem. All CPO'swere required to be Translation Alert in half an hour if necessary,inclusive of destroying all telltale evidence such as notes, papers,etc. Her apparatus was in perfect working order and the rent for thatmonth was paid. Mrs. Mimms passed over these details quickly. She wasthinking: it was invariably the _priorees_ who suffered in emergencyconversions.
The case book labeled ACTIVE was open on the table. There were twofull pages alone of babysitting appointments she would have to cancelnot to speak of the more serious cases, some of which were Second andThird Intensity. A heavy discouragement settled over Mrs. Mimms as shesat down at the apparatus to check certain images as they came andwent on the screen. The Nortons, who hadn't been out for weeks, werefighting again; that date would have to be canceled. The delinquentattitude developing in the Bradley youngster was going to rob theworld of a great scientist unless Mr. Bradley's business got back onits feet and he could spend more time with his son; Mrs. Mimms had asimple campaign mapped out for this, but it would take time--more timethan she had left. Then there was the cocktail party the Haskells hadbeen planning for weeks and F
rank Haskell's boss was going to bethere; Mrs. Mimms had left that date open especially because Frank'smother who had promised to take the kids overnight was going to besick and they'd have to get someone to help her. And that teenagepicnic--there would be trouble unless she, and not someone else, werechaperoning it.
She dared not think of the growing list of Third Intensities. AnotherCondition Twelve in the far building and one developing on the floordirectly above. Crippled old Mrs. Schaefer on the ground floor who hadtried to commit suicide before with an overdose of sleepingtablets--and might certainly try