There were ghosts and chimeras and phantasies everywhere about. Two slim elegant centaurs, a male and a female, grazed on the hillside. A burly thick-thighed swordsman appeared on the porch of the temple of Poseidon holding a Gorgon’s severed head and waved it in a wide arc, grinning broadly. In the street below the hotel gate three small pink sphinxes, no bigger than housecats, stretched and yawned and began to prowl the curbside. A larger one, lion-sized, watched warily from an alleyway: their mother, surely. Even at this distance he could hear her loud purring.
Shading his eyes, he peered far out past the Lighthouse and across the water. He hoped to see the dim shores of Crete or Cyprus to the north, or perhaps the great dark curve of Anatolia. Carry me toward that great Byzantium, he thought. Where all is ancient, singing at the oars. But he beheld only the endless empty sea, sun-bright and blinding though the morning was just beginning. Nothing was ever where he expected it to be. The continents did not seem to be in their proper places any longer. Gioia, taking him aloft long ago in her little flitterflitter, had shown him that. The tip of South America was canted far out into the Pacific; Africa was weirdly foreshortened; a broad tongue of ocean separated Europe and Asia. Australia did not appear to exist at all. Perhaps they had dug it up and used it for other things. There was no trace of the world he once had known. This was the fiftieth century. “The fiftieth century after what? ” he had asked several times, but no one seemed to know, or else they did not care to say.
“Is Alexandria very beautiful?” Gioia called from within.
“Come out and see.”
Naked and sleepy-looking, she padded out onto the white-tiled patio and nestled up beside him. She fit neatly under his arm. “Oh, yes, yes!” she said softly. “So very beautiful, isn’t it? Look, there, the palaces, the Library, the Lighthouse! Where will we go first? The Lighthouse, I think. Yes? And then the marketplace—I want to see the Egyptian magicians—and the stadium, the races—will they be having races today, do you think? Oh, Charles, I want to see everything!”
“Everything? All on the first day?”
“All on the first day, yes,” she said. “Everything.”
“But we have plenty of time, Gioia.”
“Do we?”
He smiled and drew her tight against his side.
“Time enough,” he said gently.
鬼魂，喀迈拉 ，怪兽无处不在。两个瘦削优雅的半人马，一公一母，在山坡上吃草。一个身材魁梧腿部肌肉紧实的剑客出现在了海神宫殿的走廊里，提着蛇发女妖的被砍下的头颅，挥舞着在空中画出一道弧线，龇牙咧嘴的笑着。在旅馆门口下面的街道上，三头年幼的粉色的狮身体人面的司芬克斯，比家猫还小，伸腰打着哈气，开始沿着路边散步。一头体型稍大，无疑那是他们的母亲。她有狮子大小，从小巷一端小心的张望过来。他在远处也能听见她响亮的咕噜声。
他用手遮挡在眼睛上方，凝望远方。视线穿过灯塔，越过水面，希望能看到北部模糊的克里特或塞浦路斯岛屿，或是西亚小岛深色的轮廓。“把我带去伟大的拜占庭吧。”他暗暗的想，在那儿一切都是那么古老，划桨歌唱。清晨刚刚伊始，但他只能看到辽阔无际的大海和炫目刺眼的阳光 。一切都不是想象的那样，陆地似乎也不在正确的位置上。很久前Gioia带他做过一次短暂的飞行，给他看过这些。南美洲的端部太过于倾斜插进了太平洋，非洲也很奇怪被透视一般的缩小了，海洋中一片很宽的岬角切断了欧洲和亚洲，澳洲也不复存在。也许他们把它挖出来用做别的了。他所了解的世界已经毫无踪影。这是15世纪。“十五世纪之前呢？“他问了好几次，谁也不知道，或许他们不愿意说。
“亚历山大漂亮么？”Gioia在里面嚷道。
“过来看看吧。“
她赤裸着身体，刚刚睡醒，轻快的走到了白色瓷砖的露台上，偎依在他身边。她刚好融进他的胳膊里。“啊！是的，是的！“她轻轻的说道，”真的太美了，不是吗？瞧，这儿，宏伟的宫殿，巨大的图书馆，高耸的灯塔！我们先去哪里？我想先去灯塔吧，怎么样？然后再逛逛集市——我想看看埃及的魔术师，还有体育场，比赛——他们今天会有比赛，你觉得呢？噢！查尔斯，我什么都想看到！“
”都看到？全在第一天？”
“全在第一天，是的”，她说，”所有的一切“
”我们时间很多呢，Gioia“
”是么？“
他笑着，把她紧紧的拉到身边
“时间够呢”他温柔的说道。