L. Camp: Lest Darkness Fall

Padway slowly asked the bead-seller: "What did he say?"

"He said he didn't know," replied the bead-seller. "I don't know either."

Padway started to walk off. The bead-seller called after him: "Mister."

"Yes?"

"Did you mean an agent of the municipal prefect?"

"Yes."

"Marco, where can the gentleman find an agent of the municipal prefect?"

"I don't know," said Marco.

The bead-seller shrugged. "Sorry, I don't know either." If this were twentieth-century Rome, there would be no difficulty about finding a cop. And not even Benny the Moose could make a whole city change its language. So he must be in (a) a movie set, (b) ancient Rome (the Tancredi hypothesis), or (c) a figment of his imagination.

He started walking. Talking was too much of a strain. It was not long before any lingering hopes about a movie set were dashed by the discovery that this alleged ancient city stretched for miles in all directions, and that its street plan was quite different from that of modern Rome. Padway found his little pocket map nearly useless.

The signs on the shops were in intelligible Classical Latin. The spelling had remained as in Caesar's time, if the pronunciation had not.

The streets were narrow, and for the most part not very crowded. The town had a drowsy, shabby-genteel, run-down personality, like that of Philadelphia.

At one relatively busy intersection Padway watched a man on a horse direct traffic. He would hold up a hand to stop an oxcart, and beckon a sedan chair across. The man wore a gaudily striped shirt and leather trousers. He looked like a central or northern European rather than an Italian.

Padway leaned against a wall, listening. A man would say a sentence just too fast for him to catch. It was like having your hook nibbled but never taken. By terrific concentration, Padway forced himself to think in Latin. He mixed his cases and numbers, but as long as he confined himself to simple sentences he did not have too much trouble with vocabulary.

A couple of small boys were watching him. When he looked at them they giggled and raced off.

It reminded Padway of those United States Government projects for the restoration of Colonial towns, like Williamsburg. But this looked like the real thing. No restoration included all the dirt and disease, the insults and altercations, that Padway had seen and heard in an hour's walk.

Only two hypotheses remained: delirium and time-slip. Delirium now seemed the less probable. He would act on the assumption that things were in fact what they seemed.

He couldn't stand there indefinitely. He'd have to ask questions and get himself oriented. The idea gave him gooseflesh. He had a phobia about accosting strangers. Twice he opened his mouth, but his glottis closed up tight with stage fright.

Come on, Padway, get a grip on yourself. "I beg your pardon, but could you tell me the date?

The man addressed, a mild-looking person with a loaf of bread under his arm, stopped and looked blank. "Qui' e'? What is it?"

"I said, could you tell me the date?"

The man frowned. Was he going to be nasty? But all he said was, "Non compr' endo." Padway tried again, speaking very slowly. The man repeated that he did not understand.

Padway fumbled for his date-book and pencil. He wrote his request on a page of the date-book, and held the thing up.

The man peered at it, moving his lips. His face cleared. "Oh, you want to know the date?" said he.

"Sic, the date."

The man rattled a long sentence at him. It might as well have been in Trabresh. Padway waved his hands despairingly, crying, "Lento!"

The man backed up and started over. "I said I understood you, and I thought it was October 9th, but I wasn't sure because I couldn't remember whether my mother's wedding anniversary came three days ago or four."

"What year?"

"What year?"

"Sic, what year?"

"Twelve eighty-eight Anno Urbis Conditae."

It was Padway's turn to be puzzled. "Please, what is that in the Christian era?"

"You mean, how many years since the birth of Christ?"

"Hoc ille— that's right."

"Well, now—I don't know; five hundred and something. Better ask a priest, stranger."

"I will," said Padway. "Thank you."

"It's nothing," said the man, and went about his business. Padway's knees were weak, though the man hadn't bitten him, and had answered his question in a civil enough manner.

But it sounded as though Padway, who was a peaceable man, had not picked a very peaceable period.

What was he to do? Well, what would any sensible man do under the circumstances? He'd have to find a place to sleep and a method of making a living. He was a little startled when he realized how quickly he had accepted the Tancredi theory as a working hypothesis.

He strolled up an alley to be out of sight and began going through his pockets. The roll of Italian bank notes would be about as useful as a broken five-cent mousetrap. No, even less; you might be able to fix a mousetrap. A book of American Express traveler's checks, a Roman street-car transfer, an Illinois driver's license, a leather case full of keys—all ditto. His pen, pencil, and lighter would be useful as long as ink, leads, and lighter fuel held out. His pocket knife and his watch would undoubtedly fetch good prices, but he wanted to hang onto them as long as he could.

He counted the fistful of small change. There were just twenty coins, beginning with four ten-lire silver cartwheels. They added up to forty-nine lire, eight centesimi, or about five dollars. The silver and bronze should be exchangeable. As for the nickel fifty-centesimo and twenty-centesimo pieces, he'd have to see. He started walking again.

He stopped before an establishment that advertised itself as that of S. Dentatus, goldsmith and money changer. He took a deep breath and went in.

S. Dentatus had a face rather like that of a frog. Padway laid out his change and said: "I . . . I should like to change this into local money, please." As usual he had to repeat the sentence to make himself understood.

S. Dentatus blinked at the coins. He picked them up, one by one, and scratched at them a little with a pointed instrument. "Where do these-you-come from?" he finally croaked.

"America."

"Never heard of it."

"It is a long way off."

"Hm-m-m. What are these made of? Tin?" The money changer indicated the four nickel coins.

"Nickel."

"What's that? Some funny metal they have in your country?"

"Hoc ille."

"What's it worth?"

Padway thought for a second of trying to put a fantastically high value on the coins. While he was working up his courage, S. Dentatus interrupted his thoughts:

"It doesn't matter, because I wouldn't touch the stuff. There wouldn't be any market for it. But these other pieces—let's see—" He got out a balance and weighed the bronze coins, and then the silver coins. He pushed counters up and down the grooves of a little bronze abacus, and said: "They're worth just under one solidus. Give you a solidus even for them." Padway didn't answer immediately. Eventually he'd have to take what was offered, as he hated the idea of bargaining and didn't know the values of the current money. But to save his face he had to appear to consider the offer carefully.

A man stepped up to the counter beside him. He was a heavy, ruddy man with a flaring brown mustache and his hair in a long or Ginger Rogers bob. He wore a linen blouse and long leather pants. He grinned at Padway, and reeled off: "Ho, frijond, habais faurthei! Alai skalljans sind waidedjans." Oh, Lord, another language! Padway answered: "I . . . I am sorry, but I do not understand."

The man's face fell a little; he dropped into Latin: "Sorry, thought you were from the Chersonese, from your clothes. I couldn't stand around and watch a fellow Goth swindled without saying anything, ha, ha!"