Hominids

Everything came off flawlessly. Ponter and Mary left Reuben’s at just after 8:00 A.M., making it through the trees at the back of his property and over the fence without being seen; Ponter’s sense of smell helped them avoid the RCMP officer patrolling the back area on foot.

Louise’s friend was indeed waiting for them. Garth turned out to be a handsome, well-muscled Native Canadian about twenty-five years old. He was extremely polite, calling Mary—to her chagrin—“ma’am,” and Ponter “sir.” He drove them the short distance to the Creighton Mine. The security guards recognized Mary—and Ponter, too, of course—and let them in. There, Mary and Ponter switched into her rented red Neon, which had acquired a patina of dust and bird droppings while sitting in the parking lot.

Mary knew where to head. The night before, she had said to Ponter, “Is there anywhere in particular you’d like to go tomorrow?”

Ponter had nodded. “Home,” he’d said. “Take me home.”

Mary had felt so very sad for him. “Ponter, I would if I could, but there’s no way. You know that; we don’t have the technology.”

“No, no,” Ponter had said. “I don’t mean my home in my world. I mean my home in this world: the place on this version of Earth that corresponds to where my house is.”

Mary had blinked. She’d never even thought of doing that. “Um, yeah. Sure. If you’d like to see it. But how will we find it? I mean, what landmarks will you recognize?”

“If you can show me a detailed map of this area, I can find the spot, and then we can go there.”

Reuben’s password had gotten them into a private Inco website containing geological maps of the entire Sudbury basin. Ponter had no trouble recognizing the contours of the land and finding the spot he wanted, about twenty kilometers from Reuben’s house.

Then Mary drove Ponter as close as she could get to the place he’d indicated. Most of the land surrounding the city of Sudbury was covered with Canadian shield outcrops, forest, and low brush. It took them hours to hike through it all, and, although Mary wasn’t much of an athlete—she played an occasional mediocre game of te

Finally, they came over a ridge, and Ponter let out a delighted yelp. “There!” he said. “Right there! That is where my house was—I mean, where my house is.”

Mary looked around, taking in the location: on one side, there were large aspens mixed in with thin birch trees, covered with papery white bark; on the other, a lake. Mallard ducks were floating on the lake, and a black squirrel scampered across the ground. Ru

“It’s beautiful,” said Mary.

“Yes,” said Ponter, excitedly. “Of course, the vegetation is completely different on my Earth. I mean, the plants are mostly of the same types, but the specific places where they are growing are not the same. But the rock outcrops are very similar—and that boulder in the brook! How I know that boulder! I have often sat atop it reading.”

Ponter had run a short distance away from Mary. “Here—right here!—is where our back door is. And over here—this is our eating room.” He ran some more. “And the bedroom is right here, right beneath my feet.” He made a sweeping motion with his arm. “That is the view we have from the bedroom.”

Mary followed his gaze. “And you can see mammoths out there in your world?”

“Oh, yes. And deer. And elk.”

Mary was wearing a loose-fitting top and lightweight slacks. “Didn’t the mammoths overheat in the summer, what with all that fur?”

“They shed most of their fur in summer,” Ponter said, coming over to stand nearer to her. He closed his eyes. “The sounds,” he said wistfully. “The rustle of the leaves, the buzz of insects, the brook, and—there!—you hear it? The call of a loon.” He shook his head slightly in wonder. “It sounds the same.” He opened his eyes, and Mary could see that his golden irises were surrounded now by pink. “So close,” he said, his voice trembling a bit. “So very close. If only I could—” He shut his eyes again, hard, and his whole body jerked slightly, as if he were trying by an effort of will to cross the timelines.

Mary felt her heart breaking. It must be awful, she thought, to be torn from your own world and dumped somewhere else—somewhere, so similar, yet so alien. She lifted her hand, not quite sure what she intended to do. He turned to her, and she couldn’t say, she didn’t know, she wasn’t sure which of them had moved first toward the other, but suddenly she had her arms wrapped around his broad torso, and his head was resting against her shoulder, and his body was shuddering up and down, and he cried and cried and cried, while Mary stroked his long, blond hair.

Mary tried to remember the last time she’d seen a man cry. It had been Colm, she supposed—not over any of the problems with their marriage; no, those had been borne in stony silence. But when Colm’s mother had died. Even then, he’d tried to put on a brave face, letting only a few tears trickle out. But Ponter was crying now without shame, crying for the world he’d lost, the lover he’d lost, the children he’d lost, and Mary let him cry until he was good and ready to stop.

When he did, he looked up at her, and opened his mouth. She’d expected Hak to translate his words as, “I am sorry”—isn’t that what a man is supposed to say after crying, after letting his guard down, after wallowing in emotion? But no, that’s not what came forth. Ponter simply said, “Thank you.” Mary smiled warmly at him, and he smiled back.

Jasmel Ket started her day by heading off to find Lurt, Adikor’s woman.

Not surprisingly, Lurt was in her chemistry lab, hard at work. “Healthy day,” said Jasmel, coming through the square door.

“Jasmel? What are you doing here?”

“Adikor asked me to come by.”

“Is he all right?”

“Oh, yes. He’s fine. But he needs a favor.”

“For him, anything,” said Lurt.

Jasmel smiled. “I was hoping you would say that.”

It had taken longer to hike from Mary’s car to the location of Ponter’s home than Mary had expected, and, of course, just as long to hike back. By the time they did reach her car, it was after 7:00 P.M.

They were both quite hungry after all that walking, and, as they drove along, Mary suggested they get something to eat. When they came to a little country i

“I am no adjudicator of such things,” said Ponter. “What kind of food do they provide?”

“Venison.”

Bleep. “What is that?”

“Deer.”

“Deer!” exclaimed Ponter. “Yes, deer would be wonderful!”

“I’ve never had venison myself,” Mary said.

“You will enjoy it,” said Ponter.

The i

Mary had also ordered a glass of the house red, which turned out to be eminently potable. “May I try that?” Ponter asked when it arrived.

Mary was surprised. He’d declined when offered some of Louise’s wine at di