The Technicolor Time Machine

“Give it another try,” Barney said, squinting into the damp wall of blankness.

Dallas, protected from the weather by an immense black poncho and wide-brimmed Stetson, raised the carbon dioxide pressure flask with the foghorn attached and opened the valve. The moaning blare of sound throbbed out across the water, still echoing in their ears after the valve was closed.

“Did you hear that?” Barney asked.

Dallas cocked his head and listened. “Nothing, just the waves.”

“I swear I heard splashing, like someone rowing. Give it another blast, and keep it up, every minute, and listen closely in between.”

The foghorn sounded again as Barney trudged up the slope to the canvas-shrouded army truck and looked into the back. “Any change?” he asked.

Amory Blestead shook his head no without turning away from the radio receiver. He had earphones clamped to his head and was slowly turning the knob of the directional loop antenna on top of the set. It rotated in one direction, then in the other, and Amory looked up and tapped the pointer on the base of the loop.

“As far as I can tell the ship hasn’t moved,” he said. “The bearing is still the same. They’re probably waiting for the fog to lift.”

“How far away are they?”

“Barney, be reasonable. I’ve told you a hundred times I can tell direction but not range with this setup. I can’t read anything from the signal strength of the responder, could be a mile, could be fifty. The volume has picked up since we first heard it three days ago, so they’re nearer, but that’s all I know. And I can’t work out the distance from the bearings because there are too many variables. We’ve been cutting back and forth so I can’t use the truck’s speedometer to get a baseline, and the Viking ship must have moved—”

“You’ve convinced me. That’s what you can’t tell me—but what can you tell me?”

“The same as before. The ship sailed from Greenland eighteen days ago. I aligned the gyrocompass with the Strait of Belle Isle, put in new batteries and turned on the responder and tested it, and we watched them leave.”

“You and Lyn told me the crossing would take only four days,” Barney said, worrying a hangnail with his teeth.

“We said it might take only four days, but if the weather got bad, the winds changed or anything like that, it could take a lot longer. And it has. But we have picked up a signal from the responder, which means they’ve made the crossing safely.”

“That was two days ago—what have you done for me lately?”

“Speaking as an old friend, Barney, this time traveling is doing absolutely nothing for your nerves. We’re supposed to be making a film, remember? All this other stuff we do is above and beyond the call of duty—not that anyone is complaining. But off with the pressure and make it easier on all of us, as well as yourself.”

“You’re right, you’re right,” Barney said, which was about as close as he could ever come to an apology. “But two days—the waiting gets to you after a while.”

“There’s really nothing to worry about. With this fog and no wind to speak of, laying off an unknown coast— they’re not going to do any moving about. There’s no point in rowing around if you don’t know where you’re going. Right now, according to the direction finder, we are as close to them as we can get on dry land and when the fog lifts we can guide them in—”

“Hey!” Dallas shouted from the beach, “I hear something, out there in the water.”

Barney skittered and half slid down the slope to the beach. Dallas had his hand cupped to his ear, listening intently.

“Quiet,” he said, “and see if you can hear it. Out there in the fog. I swear I heard water splashing, like rowing, and voices talking.”

A wave broke and receded, and for a moment there was a hushed silence—and the slapping of oars could be plainly heard.

“You’re right!” Barney shouted, then raised his voice even louder. “Over here—this way!”

Dallas shouted too, the foghorn forgotten for the moment as a dark shape loomed out of the fog over the sea.

“It’s the boat,” Dallas said, “the one they had slung on deck.”

They called and waved as a sudden rift opened in the mist, giving them a clear view of the craft and its occupants.

The boat was made of some kind of dark skins and the three men in it were wearing fur parkas with the hoods thrown back, uncovering their long black hair.

“They’re not Vikings,” Tex said, waving his arm so that his black poncho flapped. “Who are they?”

When he did this the two men in the rear dug their round paddles into the water, but the man who was kneeling in the front whipped his arm forward and something flashed through the air towards Dallas.

“They got me!” Dallas shouted and fell over on his back with a spear sticking up out of his chest. The foghorn hit the beach next to him and the valve opened and the sound blared, roaring out across the water. When it did the men in the boat reversed their paddling with vigor and within a few strokes had vanished again into the fog.

Only a few seconds had passed from the time they appeared until the instant they vanished, and Barney stood, stunned by the impact, deafened by the wave of sound. It made thinking difficult and he had to stop it before he turned to Dallas, who still lay, unmoving, on his back, looking as dead as a kipper.

“Pull this thing out, will you?” Dallas said in a calm voice.

“I’ll hurt you—kill you—I can’t…”

“It’s not as bad as it looks. But make sure you pull up and don’t push down.”

Barney gingerly tugged on the wooden handle of the spear and it came up easily enough, but it caught in Dallas’s clothing so that he finally had to brace his feet and pull hard with both hands. It came free and tore a great strip of rubberized cloth from the poncho. Dallas sat up and lifted the poncho and ripped open his jacket and shirt.

“Look at that,” he said, pointing to a red scratch on his ribs. “Another couple of inches to the right and it would have ventilated me. That hook was digging into me when I moved and felt a lot worse than it looks now, let me tell you.” He touched the sharp barb that projected from the ivory head of the spear.

“What happened?” Amory called out, running down the slope from the truck. “What’s that? Wasn’t there a boat?”

Dallas stood and tucked his shirt back in. “We have been contacted by the locals,” he said. “Looks like the Indians or the Eskimos or somebody got here before the Vikings.”

“Are you hurt bad?”

“Not fatal. This spearhead didn’t have my name on it.” He chuckled and looked closely at the weapon. “Nice job of carving and good balance.”

“I don’t like this,” Barney said, groping out a damp cigarette. “Didn’t I have enough trouble as it was? I just hope they don’t find the Viking ship.”

“I hope they do,” Dallas said with relish. “I don’t think they would give Ottar much trouble.”

“What I wanted to tell you,” Amory said, “from up there in the truck you can see the fog breaking up, and the sun coming through in patches.”

“And about time,” Barney said, dragging deeply on the cigarette so that it fizzled and crackled.

Once the sun began burning away the mist it cleared quickly, helped by the west wind that blew steadily in their faces. Within a half hour it had lifted completely and there, clearly visible about a mile offshore, was Ottar’s knorr.

Barney almost smiled. “Give them a blast on that thing,” he said. “Once they look this way they’ll see the truck.”

Dallas kept triggering the CO₂ cylinder until it finally squawked and died, and it had the desired effect. They could see the big sail narrow, then widen again as it was pushed around, and the white bone of foam appeared at the bow as the ship gathered way. There was no sign of the skin boat, which seemed to have vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.

A few yards offshore the knorr turned and hove to, sail flapping, rocking in the gentle swell. There was a great deal of arm waving and incomprehensible shouting.