“Good piloting,” the Captain had said, unaware of the echo from the past. Anjin was a very unusual Japanese name that happened to mean “pilot.” It had come down only through one small family whose members showed no outward signs of European ancestry but who, according to family legend, were descended from a British pilot who rose to nobility after his ship had rim aground nearly five hundred years ago. Anjin had never believed the story, until genetic maps became available to verify it. Now, as the columns of fire receded aft, he realized that he was carrying on an ancient family tradition. Even when viewed from the rear, shrinking rapidly second by second, the sunquake lost none of its drama and spectacle. What would the first Anjin have thought, he wondered, if he could have looked heavenward and known that one of his descendants would sail through a sunspot and master it? The eruption could easily have en-gulfed a thousand Earths; and Anjin imagined that if his ancestors could have peered ahead in time to see what their namesake had done, they might have felt confirmed in their Sun worship.

11

The Secret Savior

After pointing Edith toward lifeboat number 11, Jonathan continued to wander through the dying ship. Forward of the Grand Stairway, at the entrance to third class, he found the brass gates drawn shut and locked. At the official inquiries into the loss of R.M.S. Titanic, surviving officers had denied barring the way from third class to the lifeboats, but robot probes had proved them liars, finding the way still blocked nearly a century later.

Jonathan found endless fascination in what was, to him, becoming the strangest night of leadership in the history of the North Atlantic: twenty men and a dog lowered away in a lifeboat built to hold sixty-five people.

He called through the gateway to third class and heard no reply. Perhaps the passengers had found some other way up; he was thinking of breaking the gate down when a wave of waist-high water came crashing through and drove home the message that it was getting late and there was no time left for sightseeing. Somewhere nearby a bulkhead had burst, sending the ship’s bow down like an express elevator.

An insistent tide pursued Jonathan up three decks, paused for a moment, then came again higher. He beat the rising water to the ship’s kennel, where he came upon the officers who had left the gates to third class locked, but who nevertheless had the presence of mind to be running around frantically opening cages, so first class dogs might have a chance at survival.

“You arrogant bastards!” Jonathan shouted. “We really have overromanticized this time period, haven’t we?”

“Pardon?”

“Now I understand Hitler,” Jonathan said. “His seed is in all of you.” As he hurried off to find Edith, one of the officers shot him an expression that said Who the hell is Hitler?

“What a strange man,” said one of the others.