Dennys looked at Sandy, at his tan, healthy skin, muscled arms and legs, clear eyes. "We have big hospitals-places to take care of sick people. But I"m not sure I"d have had any better care for my sunstroke there than I got from Yalith and Oholibamah."

Sandy said, "We have showers and washing machines. And radios and rockets and television. And jet planes."

Dennys smiled. "But I came to your tent on a white camel. Almost all the way."

Lamech whispered, and both boys bent down to hear.

"People"s hearts-are they kinder?"

Sandy thought of the first vender who had tried to give him half the amount of lentils Grandfather Lamech had requested, and who had snarled and cursed when Sandy protested.

Dennys wondered how much real difference there was between terrorists who hijacked a plane and Tiglah"s father and brother, who had thrown him into the garbage pit.

"People are people-" Sandy started.

Simultaneously, Dennys said. "I guess human nature is human nature."

Lamech reached out a trembling hand to each boy. "But you have been to me as my own."

Dennys gently squeezed the cold hand.

Sandy mumbled, "We love you, Grandfather Lamech."

"And I you, my sons."

"El"s words are strange words. I don"t understand," Lamech said. "I don"t understand the thoughts of El."

Neither did the twins.

Lightning and thunder came simultaneously. Light splashed through the roof hole and the open tent flap. The walls of the tent shook from the violence of the thunder and a long earth tremor.

But no rain fell.

The twins sat on the root bench to watch the stars come out. Higgaion stayed in the tent with Grandfather Lamech. The sky still had a yellow tinge, though there was no further lightning or thunder. Tongues of flame licked up from the volcano. High in the trees, the baboons chittered nervously.

Sandy curled his toes on the soft moss under the tree root. "We"ve never been to a deathbed."

"No."

"I thought that was going to be one, this afternoon with Grandfather Lamech."

Dennys shook his head. "I think he wanted to ask us those questions."

"Does he know there"s going to be a great flood?"

"I think his El that he talks to has told him."

Sandy picked up a fallen frond of palm and looked at it in the last light. "But the flood was a natural phenomenon."

Dennys shook his head slightly. "Primitive peoples have always tended to believe that what we call natural disasters are sent by an angry G.o.d. Or G.o.ds."

"What do you think?" Sandy asked.

Again Dennys shook his head. "I don"t know. I know a lot less than I did before we came to the oasis."

"Anyhow"-Sandy"s voice was flat-"it didn"t work."

"What didn"t work?"

"The flood. Wiping out all those people, and then starting alt over again. People are taller, and we do even worse things to one another because we know more."

Dennys took the palm frond out of Sandy"s hand. "I wouldn"t choose Ham and Anah to repopulate the world, if I were doing the choosing."

"Oh, they"re not that bad," Sandy said. "And Shem and Elisheba are all right. Not terribly exciting. But solid. And j.a.pheth and Oholibamah are terrific."

"Well. What you said. It didn"t work."

"Maybe n.o.body should"ve been saved." Sandy"s voice was hoa.r.s.e.

Yet again, Dennis shook his head. "Human beings-people have done terrible things, but we"re not all that bad, not all of us."

"Like who?"

"There"ve been people like-oh, Euclid and Pasteur and Tycho Brahe."

Sandy nodded. His voice came out more normally. "I like the way Tycho Brahe was so in awe of the maker of the heavens that he put on his court robes before going to his telescope."

"Who told you that?"

"Meg."

"I like that, I really do. Hey, and I think Meg would like us to mention Maria Mitch.e.l.l. Wasn"t she the first famous woman astronomer?"

"I miss Meg. And Charles Wallace. And our parents."

But Dennys was still involved in his list. "And the wise men who followed the star. They were astronomers. Hey!"

"What?"

"If the flood had drowned everybody, if the earth hadn"t been repopulated, then Jesus would never have been born."

Sandy, his nostrils a.s.sailed by a now familiar but still disturbing odor, hardly heard. "Shh."

"What?"

"Look."

A small, shadowy form left the public path and came toward them. "Tiglah."

"She doesn"t give up," Dennys mumbled.

Tiglah had learned that Dennys was not to be touched, not by her fingers, at any rate. She approached the twins demurely, eyes cast down, giving her eyelashes the full benefit of their l.u.s.trous length. She reached out and put her hand lightly against Sandy, as though to steady herself. "It"s a fine evening, after all," she said.

Dennys pulled back from the mingled odor of sweat and perfume.

"It"s okay." Sandy looked dubiously at the yellow light pulsing on the horizon.

Tiglah said, "I thought you might like to know that Mahlah is going to have her baby tonight."

"How do you know?" Dennys demanded.

"Rofocale told me."

"How does he know?" Sandy asked.

"He and Ugiel are friends. Yalith and Oholibamah are going to help."

The twins had seen kittens and puppies being born, and once a calf, and they had played with baby lambs and pig-lets on a neighboring farm. They looked at each other. "I"ll bet Oholibamah"s a good midwife," Dennys said.

Tiglah continued, "They tell me that Oholihamah"s mother had a hard time birthing her. Nephil babies tend to be large." She sounded anxious.

Dennys looked at her sharply. "Does that worry you?"

"It might, one day. I hope it won"t be too hard on Mahlah. She"s such a little thing. Like me."

"Well," Dennys said. "Thanks for telling us." His tone was dismissive.

"It"s going to be a beautiful night." Tiglah"s fingers strayed toward Sandy"s arm.

Dennys turned his face away and looked toward the tent. The flap was still pegged open. Higgaion was sitting in the opening, waving his trunk slightly, as though to catch the breeze.

Sandy looked at Tiglah, hesitated.

Swiftly, Tiglah coaxed. "It"s such a nice night for a walk. After Mahlah"s baby is born, Yalith and Ohoiibamah will be walking home and we might meet them . . ."

Sandy rose to the bait. "Well . . . but not far ... or for long . . ."

"Of course not," Tiglah rea.s.sured. "Just a little walk."

Sandy became aware of Dennys carefully not looking at him. "Are you coming?"

"No."

"Do you mind if I go?"

"Of course not."

"I won"t be long."

"Feel free."

They were not communicating. Sandy did not like the feeling. But he stood. Tiglah reached up and put her small hand in his much larger one. When they reached the public path, he looked back. Higgaion had left the tent and was standing by Dennys.

The night was heavier than usual. The stars looked blurred, and almost close enough to touch. The rainless storm had increased rather than decreased the heat. The mountain smoked.

"Let"s go by the desert," Tiglah suggested, "and watch the moonrise."

To step off the oasis onto the desert was like stepping off a ship onto the sea. The desert sand felt cool to Sandy"s feet, which were now accustomed to the hot sands by day, to walking on stones, on sharp, dry gra.s.ses.

Tiglah led the way to a ledge of rock. "Let"s sit."

Moonrise over this early desert was very different from moonrise at home. At home, as the moon lifted above the horizon, it was a deep yellow, sometimes almost red. Here, in a time when the sea of air above the planet was still clear and clean, the moon rose with a great blaze of diamonds.

Sandy"s eyes were focused on the brilliant light of the rising moon, and he was not prepared to have the light suddenly darkened by Tiglah"s face as she pressed her lips against his. She was up on her knees in order to reach him, and her lips smelled of berries. Then he was surrounded by her particular odor of scented oils and her own un-washed body.

He knew what she wanted, and he wanted it, too; he was ready, but not, despite her gorgeousness, with Tiglah. Tiglah was not worth losing his ability to touch a unicorn.

But Yalith- He knew that he and Dennys should do nothing to change the story, to alter history. Even with Yalith . . .

He was getting ahead of himself. Yalith was not Tiglah.

Yalith smiled on both of them with equal loveliness.

Tiglah"s red hair, turned silver-gold in the moonlight, tumbled about his face, drowning him in its scent. She ma.s.saged the back of his head, his neck. Her breathing mingled with his. He knew that if he did not break this off, he would not be able to. With a deep inward sigh, he pulled away. Stood.

Tiglah scrambled to her feet, stared up at him reproachfully. "Don"t you like it? Don"t you like what I was doing?"

"Yes, I like it." His voice was hoa.r.s.e. "I like it too much."

"Too much? How can anything be too much? What is there in life except pleasure, and the more the better! How can you talk of too much?"

"You"re too much." He tried to laugh. "I think I"d better go now. Grandfather Lamech isn"t well."

"He"s dying," Tiglah said bluntly "Rofocale told me."

"Rofocale doesn"t know everything."

"He knows more than we do, more than any mortal."

Sandy stood still. He thought he heard the shrill whine of a mosquito. Then silence. He turned and started walking back to the oasis. Tiglah slid down from the rock, ran to catch up with him, and reached for his hand.

"You, too," she said. "You must be of the same breed as Rofocale, so tall, so strong. You could pick me up, and throw me over your shoulder. Where do you come from?"

He was tired of answering the old questions. "Another part of the planet. Another time."

"Why have you come?"

"It was a mistake," he said shortly.