Greta Dykeman and Peter Van Saant—so the chronicle stated—had been attacked by Indians that night. They had taken refuge in a cave, where a great shining presence in the guise of a strange man had come and frightened away the Indians. He had led Peter and Greta to safety—and then had vanished.
Silently Alan left the Historical Society. Why had it seemingly been his destiny to rescue that Dutch boy and girl? That strange urge which both he and his grandfather before him had felt so strongly—why was that? Van Saant—why, that suggested the name Vincent! The one, Dutch—and the other just its English, modernized equivalent?
Alan hurried to the Genealogical Room at the Public Library; and there he found it. Ruth's family—the Vincents—and before that, the Van Saants.
Then he came to 1656. The marriage of Peter Van Saant, to Mistress Greta Dykeman....
Alan sat numbly, staring in awe.
If they had died in that smoke-filled cave, this son of theirs, recorded here as Hans Van Saant, born 1657, would never have been born, nor any of his descendants. No Ruth Vincent, now in 1942; no little son of hers and Alan's....
Alan was smiling to himself, a whimsical, awed smile. He certainly had had no cause to be apprehensive that his mission back into time would fail. It was ordained—predestined—a million events down from Peter and Greta to Ruth were recorded, with his own action fitting into them. Nothing else was possible!
Miracle ... there is so much that none of us will ever understand!