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The story is about a man who has a thriving business and a lovely wife. He receives a visitor to whom he decides to tell a supposedly made up tale of what is his actual life.

He was a criminal who got sent back to the 20th century, but he says that life here is easy and free of punishment for taking risks. The visitor turns out to be an agent of the future, who pulls a stun pistol. The agent says to the reader that he deposited the man just outside the walls in the middle east one year before it was sacked by Tamerlane.

DavidW
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user3429534
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  • Hi, welcome to SF&F. Where and when did you read this? Was it in a magazine, an anthology or online? – DavidW Aug 08 '23 at 19:47

1 Answers1

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This is "My Object All Sublime", a short story by Poul Anderson which was also the answer to the old question A man condemned to serve his sentence in other times. It was first published in Galaxy Magazine, June 1961, which is available at the Luminist Archive. You may have read it in one of these compilations.

The story is narrated by the visitor from the future. The last line:

I left him in Damascus, the year before Tamerlane sacked it.

user14111
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