Harry Harrison - The Technicolor Time Machine

“Taking a day off,” Barney told him, “back on Old Catalina. A day off with pay, big party, barbecue, the works.”

“Why party?”

“Because I’m generous and like to see people happy and we couldn’t do anything until you arrived, and because it saves money. I’ve been waiting here for you with a skeleton staff for three weeks. Everyone else at the party will be gone only one day.”

“Want to see Gudrid.”

“Slithey you mean. And I imagine she wants to see you too.”

“Been a long time.”

“You’re a man of simple pleasures, Ottar. At least finish your ham first and remember that this is a historical moment. You have just arrived in the New World.”

“You nuts, Barney. Same old world, just a place name of Vinland. Looks like good trees here.”

“I’ll remember those historical words,” Barney said.

“I don’t feel so good this morning,” Slithey said, loosening the large gilt buckle on her belt. “It must be the air here or the climate or something.”

“Something like that,” Barney said with complete lack of sympathy. “The air. Of course it couldn’t be that Viking barbecue on the beach last night with roasted clams and blue mussels over a driftwood fire and six cases of beer gone through.”

She didn’t answer him, but there was a deepening of the green tinge to her peaches and cream skin. He shook another two pills into the rattling handful he already had and held them out to her.

“Here, take these, and I’ll get you a glass of water.”

“So many,” she said weakly. “I don’t think I can get them down.”

“You better, we have a day’s shooting ahead of us. This is Dr. Hendrickson’s guaranteed morning-after and hangover cure. Aspirin for the headache, Dramamine for the nausea, bicarbonate for the heartburn, Benzedrine for the depression and two glasses of water for the dehydration. It never fails.”

While Slithey was choking over the pills Barney’s secretary knocked on the trailer door and he shouted for her to come in.

“You look very bright-eyed and bushy-tailed this mom-ing,” he said.

“I’m allergic to mussels so I went to bed early.” She held up the day’s call sheet. “I’ve got a query for you.” She ran her finger down the list. “Artists, okay… stand-ins, okay… camera department, okay… props. They want to know if you want blood with the collapsible dagger?”

“Of course I do—we’re not shooting this film for the kiddy matinee.” He stood and pulled his jacket on. “Let’s go, Slithey.”

“I’ll be with you in a moment,” she said in a faint voice.

“Ten minutes, no more, you’re in the first scene.”

It was a clear day and the sun had already cleared the ridge behind them and was casting long shadows from the sod huts and birch-bark-roofed lean-tos in the meadow below. The Norse settlers were already busy and a thread of blue smoke rose straight up from the hole in the ridge of the largest building.

“I hope Ottar is in better shape than his leading lady,” Barney said, squinting across the water of the bay. “Are those rocks there, just to the left of the island, Betty—or is it a boat?”

“I don’t have my glasses with me.”

“It could be the motorboat—see it’s closer. And it’s about time they decided to come back.”

Betty had to run to keep up with his long strides down the slope toward the shore, skirting a huddle of cud-chewing cows. The boat was clearly visible now and they could hear the faint pop-pop of its motor across the water. Most of the company was waiting on the shore near the knorr and Gino was setting up the camera.

“Looks like the explorers are coming home,” he called out to Barney, and pointed at the boat.

“I can see them and I can take care of it myself, so everyone else can stay on camera. We’re going to shoot this scene as soon as I’ve talked to them.”

Barney waited, almost at the water’s edge as the boat came in. Tex was in the stem steering the outboard and Jens Lyn sat in front of him. Both men had good growths of beard and a decidedly scruffy look.

“Well?” Barney asked, even before the boat touched shore. “What news?”

Lyn shook his head with unconcealed Scandinavian gloom. “Nothing,” he said, “anywhere along the coast. We went as far as we could with the gasoline we had, but found no one.”

“Impossible. I saw those Indians with my own eyes—and Ottar killed a couple more. They have to be around somewhere.”

Jens climbed ashore and stretched. “I would like to find them as much as you would. This is a unique opportunity for research. The construction of their boats and the carving of the spear leads me to suspect that they are members of the almost unknown Cape Dorset culture. We know comparatively little about these people, just some facts gleaned from digging on archeological sites, and a few hints from the sagas. As far as we can ascertain the last of them seem to have vanished about the end of this century, the eleventh century…”

“I’m not interested in your unique opportunity for research but in my unique opportunity to finish this picture. We need Indians in it—where are they? You must have seen some signs of them?”

“We did discover some camps on the shore, but they were deserted. The Cape Dorset are a migratory people, following the seal herds for the most part, and the schools of cod. I feel that, at this time of year, they may have moved farther north.”

Tex heaved the motorboat’s bow up on the beach, then sat down on it. “I don’t want to tell the Doc here his business, but well…”

“Superstition!” Lyn snorted. Tex cleared his throat and spat into the water. This was obviously a difference of opinion they had had before.

“What is it? Out with it,” Barney ordered.

Tex scratched the dark stubble on his jaw and spoke, not without reluctance.

“Look, the Doc is right. We didn’t see anything or anybody except some old campsites and piles of seal bones. But, well, I think they’re out there somewhere, close by, and they been watching us all the time. It wouldn’t be hard to do. You can hear this lawnmower engine five miles away. If they’re seal hunters, like the Doc says, they could lay low when they heard us coming and we’d never see a thing. I think they’re out there.”

“Do you have any evidence to support this theory?” Barney asked.

Tex writhed unhappily and scowled. “I don’t want to hear no laughing or anything,” he said pugnaciously.

Barney remembered his record as an instructor in unarmed combat. “One thing I’m never going to do, Tex, is laugh at you,” he said sincerely.

“Well… it’s like this. We used to feel it in the jungle, like someone was looking at you. Half the time someone was. Bang, a sniper. I know the feeling. And I been getting it all the time we been out. They’re out there, somewhere close, so help me they are.”

Barney considered the information, and cracked his knuckles. “Yes, I suppose you’re right, but I don’t see how it’s going to help us. We’ll talk about it during lunch, see if we can figure something out. We need those Indians.”

Nothing went right with the scene, which was probably Barney’s fault. His mind wasn’t on it. It should have been simple enough to shoot, since it was mostly action. Orlyg, played by Val de Carlo, is Thor’s best friend and right-hand man, but he has secretly fallen in love with Gudrid, who is afraid to tell Thor because of the trouble it will cause. His passion becomes too great however, and, since Gudrid has told him she can love no other man while Thor is alive, he resolves in a moment of love-inflamed madness to slay Thor. He hides behind the ship and attacks Thor when he passes. Thor at first cannot believe it, however he does believe it when Orlyg stabs him in the arm. Then, with only one arm and barehanded, Thor goes on to win the battle and kill Orlyg.