Harry Harrison - The Technicolor Time Machine

“We will have to reset the compass,” Amory said. “Ottar will wait for us and we’ll put in new batteries and point the compass at the Straight of Belle Isle, right here. He should have enough faith in the instrument by then to follow it—even though his course won’t run along a parallel. However, the East Greenland Current does flow in the same direction and he is familiar with that. He’ll have no trouble reaching either the coast of Labrador or Newfoundland.”

“He’ll find Vinland all right,” Barney said. “But how do we find him?”

“There is a radio responder sealed in with the batteries. It will automatically send back a signal when it detects our radio signal. Then it is a simple matter of our using the radio direction finder.”

“Sounds foolproof. Let’s hope it is.” Barney looked along the low-bulwarked deck and up at the thin mast. “I wouldn’t even want to sail this thing across the bay, but then I’m no Viking. Tomorrow’s the day. We’ve done all the shooting we need to here. Launch the ship in the morning and we’ll run it in and out of the harbor a few times, shoot from the shore and from aboard ship. Then turn on your homing pigeon and let them go. And your gadget better work, Amory, or we’re all going to stay in Vinland and set up housekeeping with the Indians. If I can’t bring back this picture with me there’s just no point in going back.”

Gino popped his head up out of the bailing well like a jack-in-the-box and waved. “They can run it up now, I’m ready.”

Barney turned to Ottar, who leaned negligently on the tiller of the steer-board, and said, “Pass the word, will you.”

The tired seamen grumbled darkly as they heaved once more on the windlass. They had been running the big square sail up and down and tacking about the bay since dawn, while the shiphandling sequences were being shot. As the drum of the windlass turned, the oiled walrus-hide rope creaked through the hole in the top of the mast, hauling up the dead weight of the bulky woolen sail, made even heavier by the seal-hide strips that had been sewed on to give it shape. Gino trained the camera up the mast to film it as it rose.

“The time is late,” Ottar said. “If we sail today we better sail soon.”

“We’re just about finished,” Barney told him. “I want to get a good shot of you leaving the bay, and that can be the last one.”

“You shot that shot this morning, sailing into dawn you said.”

“That was from the shore. Now I want to get you and Slithey at the tiller as you sail from your home into the unknown…”

“No woman at no tiller on my ship.”

“She doesn’t have to steer the thing. She’ll just stand by you, maybe hold your arm, that’s not much to ask.”

Ottar shouted a flood of orders as the sail reached the top of the mast. The halyard that had pulled it up was secured to act as a backstay and unfastened from the drum of the windlass, then the anchor rope was attached in its place. With more heaving—caught on film by Gino—the anchor was hauled up and pulled aboard, a seaweed-hung kilik made from a large stone held in a framework of wooden rods. The ship was beginning to gather way as the wind filled the sail and Barney hurried the camera into position.

“Slithey,” he called out. “Onstage, and make it fast.”

It wasn’t easy to get from the fore to the rear deck of the knorr when she was fully loaded. Since there were no holds, and only two tiny sleeping cabins, not only was the cargo packed on deck, but in and around it were over forty people, six stunted cows and a lashed-down bull, a small flock of sheep, and two goats that stood high on the peak of the cargo. The bellowing, baaing and shouting made it hard to think. Slithey staggered her way through all of this and Barney helped her up onto the tiny deck. She was wearing a white gown with a low-cut kirtle, and looked very attractive with her long blond braids and her cheeks made rosy by the wind.

“Stand up there next to Ottar,” Barney told her, then moved himself out of camera range. “Camera.”

“Good shot of the back of their heads” Gino said.

“Ottar,” Barney shouted, “for Thor’s sake will you turn around, you’re facing the wrong way.”

“Facing the right way to steer,” Ottar said stubbornly, holding onto the handle of the steer-board that came across the deck from the side, and facing full astern toward the vanishing land. “When leaving land always look at it, making sure of direction. That is the way it is done.”

With a certain amount of pleading, cajoling—and bribery—Barney managed to get Ottar and Slithey to the far side of the handle where Ottar had to steer by looking over his shoulder. Slithey stood next to him, her hand resting on the wood next to his, and they got their shots of the receding shore.

“Cut,” Barney finally ordered, and Ottar relievedly went back to the correct position.

“I put you ashore around the point,” he said.

“Suits,” Barney said. “I’ll get on the radio and have one of the trucks waiting for us.”

Slinging the camera overboard was the only tricky part, and Barney stayed aboard after the others had disembarked, waiting until it was safely ashore. “See you in Vinland,” he said, putting out his hand. “Have a good trip.”

“Sure,” Ottar said, crushing Barney’s hand in his. “You find a good spot for me. Water, grass for animals, plenty hardwood trees.”

“I’ll do my best,” Barney said, shaking the blood back into his whitened fingers.

The Viking did not waste any time. As soon as Barney had jumped ashore he ordered, with relieved shouts and loud curses, that the beitass be rigged in position. This long pole fitted into a socket in the deck and the other end caught the edge of the sail so that it bellied into the wind. The ship pulled free of the land for the last time and headed for the open sea, the shouts and animal sounds fading into the distance.

“They better make it,” Barney said, half aloud. “They just had better make it.” He turned away abruptly and climbed into the truck. “Get me to the platform—and step on it” he told the driver. He could eliminate at least half of his fears at once by finding out if the ship would make a safe arrival in Iceland. The time machine did not simplify his problems, but it at least made the waiting and nail-chewing period a good deal shorter.

The camp was in a turmoil as they drove up, the tents being struck and everything loaded for the move to the new location, but Barney had no eyes for it; he tapped impatiently on the window frame. The entire operation was waste motion if anything happened to the ship. He was out of the car while it was still braking to a stop at the time platform. The jeep was already aboard and Tex and Jens Lyn were watching the professor charge the vremeatron batteries.

“Where’s Dallas?” Barney asked.

Tex pointed with his thumb. “In the can.”

“At a time like this!”

“We can go without him,” Tex said. “It doesn’t need the two of us for this job. All we have to do is deliver Ottar’s winter ration of whiskey once we know he arrived okay,”

“You’ll do what I say. I want two men along for protection, just in case. I don’t want any slip-ups. Here he comes now—get going.”

Barney stepped away from the time platform as the professor activated the field. As always—from the observer’s point of view—the voyage seemed to take no more than a fraction of a second. The platform vanished and reappeared again a few feet farther away.

It had changed though. Professor Hewett was sealed into his instrumentation shack, while the rest were in the jeep, which had its top up and side curtains attached. Almost a foot of snow blanketed everything, and a flurry of airborne snow blew out of the vremeatron’s field and coated the grass around it.