Harry Harrison: The Technicolor Time Machine

“Then teach one—but no more crazy men.”

Barney Hendrickson suppressed a groan, and the hand that raised the carton of black coffee to his lips tremored ever so slightly. He had forgotten how many hours—or centuries—it had been since he had had any sleep. One difficulty had followed another through the night, until the dawn of a new day brought its own problems. Dallas Levy’s voice buzzed in the earpiece of the phone like an irritated wasp while Barney sipped his coffee.

“I agree, I agree, Dallas,” he rasped in answer, his vocal cords eroded by three chain-smoked packs of cigarettes. “Just stick by him and keep him quiet, no one ever goes near those old storerooms… Well you’ve been on double time the last three hours… All right then, treble time now, I’ll okay the vouchers. Just keep him locked up and quiet until we decide what to do with him. And tell Dr Lyn to get up here as soon as he has finished talking to B.O. Plenty.”

Barney hung up the phone and tried to concentrate on the budget sheet before him. So far most of the entries were followed by penciled question marks; this was going to be a hard picture to cost. And what would happen if the police got wind of the Viking locked up down below? Could he be charged with kidnapping someone who had been dead almost a thousand years? “The mind reels,” he mumbled, and reached for the coffee again. Professor Hewett, still apparently as fresh as ever, paced back and forth the length of the office, spinning a pocket calculator and scribbling the results in a small notebook.

“Any results yet, Prof?” Barney asked. “Can we send anything bigger than that truck back in time?”

“Patience, you must learn patience. Nature yields up her secrets only with the greatest reluctance, and a misplaced decimal point can make disclosure impossible. There are many factors that enter the equations other than the accepted four dimensions of physical measurement in time. We must consider three additional dimensions, those of displacement in space, mass, a cumulative error, which I am of the opinion is caused by entropy—”

“Spare me the details, just the answer, that’s all I want,” His intercom buzzed and he told his secretary to show Dr. Lyn in. Lyn refused a cigarette and folded his long form into a chair.

“Out with the bad news,” Barney said. “Unless that is your normal expression. No luck with the Viking?”

“As you say, no luck. There is a communication problem, you realize, since my command of Old Norse is far from perfect, which must be coupled with the fact that Ottar has little or no interest in what I am trying to discuss with him. However, I do feel that with the proper encouragement he could be convinced that he should learn English.”

“Encouragement… ?”

“Money, or the eleventh-century equivalent. Like most Vikings he is very mercenary and will do almost anything to gain status and wealth, though of course he prefers to get it by battle and killing.”

“Of course. We can pay him for taking his language lessons, bookkeeping has worked out a rate of exchange and it’s all in our favor, but what about the time factor? Can you have him speaking English in two weeks?”

“Impossible! With a cooperative student this might be done, but not with Ottar. He is reluctant at best, in addition to the not considerable factor that he refuses to do anything until he is released.”

“Not considerable!” Barney said, and had the sudden desire to tug at a fistful of his own hair. “I can just see the hairy nut with his meat ax on the comer of Hollywood and Vine. That’s out!”

“If I might offer a suggestion,” Professor Hewett said stopping his pacing in front of Barney’s desk. “If Dr. Lyn were to return with this aborigine to his own time there would be ample opportunity to teach him English in his own environment, which would both reassure and calm him.”

“It would not reassure or calm me, Professor,” Lyn said coldly. “Life in that particular era tends to be both brutish and short.”

“I’m sure precautionary measures can be taken, Doctor,” said Hewett, giving his calculator a quick spin. “I would think that the philological opportunities would far outweight the personal factor…”

“There is of course that,” Lyn agreed, his unfocused eyes staring at nouns, roots, cases and genders long buried by time.

“Plus the important point that in this manner the time factor can be altered to suit our needs. Gentlemen, we can collapse or stretch time as we will! Dr. Lyn can have ten days, or ten months, or ten years, to teach the language to Ottar, and between the moment when we leave him in the Viking era and the moment when we see him again but a few minutes need have passed from our point of view.”

“Two months will be adequate,” Lyn snapped, “if you wish to take into consideration my point of view.”

“It’s agreed then,” Barney said. “Lyn will go back with the Viking and teach him English, and we’ll arrive with the company two months later Viking-time to start the production rolling.”

“I have not agreed,” Lyn persisted. “There are dangers…”

“I wonder what it would feel like to be the world’s single greatest authority on Old Norse?” Barney asked, having had some experience with the academic mind, and the wide-eyed expression on Lyn’s face revealed that his shaft had sunk home. “Right. We’ll work out the details later. Why don’t you go see if you can explain this to Ottar. Mention money. We’ll get him to sign a completion and penalties contract, so you’ll be safe enough as long as he wants his pay.”

“It might be possible,” Lyn agreed, and Barney knew that he was hooked.

“Right then. You get down to Ottar and put the deal to him, and while you’re getting his okay I’ll have the contract department draw up one of their barely legal, lifetime-at-hard-labor contracts.” He flipped on the intercom. “Put me through to contracts, will you, Betty. Has the Benzedrine arrived yet?”

“I called the dispensary an hour ago,” the intercom squeaked.

“Well call them again if you expect me to live past noon.”

As Jens Lyn went out, a slight Oriental wearing pink slacks, a cerise shirt, a Harris Tweed sports jacket and a sour expression entered.

“Well, Charley Chang,” Barney boomed, sticking out his hand, “long time no see.”

“It’s been too long, Barney,” Charley said, grinning widely and shaking the outstretched hand, “Good to work with you again.”

They disliked each other intensely and as soon as their hands separated Barney lit a cigarette, and the smile vanished into the unhappy folds of Chang’s normal expression. “What’s cooking, Barney?” he asked.

“A wide-screen, three-hour, big-budget film—and you’re the only man who can write it.”

“We’re running out of books, Barney, but I’ve always thought that there was a good one in the Song of Solomon, sexy without being dirty—”

“The subject has already been chosen, a wholly new concept of the Viking discoveries of North America.”

Chang’s frown deepened. “Sounds good, Barney, but you know I’m a specialist. I don’t think this is up my alley.”

“You’re a good writer, Charley, which means everything is up your alley. Besides, ha-ha, let’s not forget your contract,” he added, slipping the dagger a few inches out of the scabbard so it could be seen.

“No, we can’t forget the contract, ha-ha,” Charley said coldly. “I’ve always been interested in doing a historical.”

“That’s great,” Barney said, pulling the budget sheet toward him again. The door opened and a messenger pushed in a trolley loaded with books. Barney pointed at them. “Here’s the scoop from the library, everything you need to know. Just take a quick flip through them and I’ll be with you in a minute.”