The Technicolor Time Machine

“Did you see how I hit the leg?” Ottar said; brandishing the retrieved ax over his head. “Hit him. Krasc! Leg next to off.”

“Very well played, I saw it all. My congratulations. But who was he—and what were they doing here?”

“He was called Torfi. Whiskey?” The last was added in an exultant shout as Tex dropped the freed cable into the sand and dug a pint bottle out from under the jeep’s seat.

“Whiskey,” Tex said. “Not your favorite brand, but it’ll do. That’s a great backhand you got with that thing.”

Ottar rolled his eyes with pleasure, then closed them tight as he raised the pint bottle to his lips and drained it.

“Wish I could do that,” Tex said enviously.

Barney waited until the bottle was empty and Ottar had hurled it into the sea with a happy cry before he asked, “This Torfi. What was the trouble with him?”

The aftereffects of the battle—and the whiskey—hit Ottar at the same time and he sat down suddenly on the pebbles, shaking his great head. “Torfi, the son of Valbrand,” he said as he got his breath back, “the son of Valthjof, the son of Orlyg came to Sviney… Torfi killed the men of Kropp twelve of them together. He also made the killing of the Holesmen, and he was at Hellisfitar, with Hlugi the Black and Sturii the Godi when eighteen cave-living people were killed there. They also burned, in his own house, Audun the son of Smidkel at Bergen.” He stopped and nodded his head sagely as though he felt he had communicated vital information.

“Well?” Barney asked, puzzled. “What does all that mean?”

Ottar looked at him and frowned. “Smidkel married Thorodda, my sister.”

“Of course,” Barney said. “How could I have forgotten that. So this Torfi has been in trouble with your brother-in-law and this means trouble with you, and it all ends up when he tries a bit of manslaughter here. What a way to live. Who were the men with him?”

Ottar shrugged and climbed to his feet, pulling himself up on the jeep’s front wheel. “Vikings, raiders. Go to raid England. They don’t like Torfi now because he comes here first instead of raiding England. Now they go with me to raid England. They go in my new longship.” He pointed the ax at the dragon ship and roared with laughter.

“And that one man who didn’t want to join you?”

“One Haki, brother of Torfi. I make him a slave. Sell him back to his family.”

“I gotta give these guys credit,” Tex said. “No beating about the bush.”

“You can say that again,” Barney said, looking in open wonder at the Viking, who at that moment seemed a giant of a man in every way. “Climb into the jeep, Ottar, we’ll drive you back to the house.”

“Ottar ride the cheap,” he said enthusiastically, throwing his ax and shield in, then climbing over the side.

“Not in the driver’s seat,” Tex told him. “That comes much later.”

The supplies looted from the longship had included a dozen kegs of ale, most of which had been broached in front of the house, where a victory celebration was already in progress. There seemed to be no ill will held toward the former invaders, who mixed with the victors and matched them drink for drink. Haki, who had been tied hand and foot and flung under a bench, seemed to be the only one who wasn’t enjoying himself. A hubbub of welcoming shouts heralded Ottar’s appearance, and he went at once to the nearest barrel that had a knocked-in head, plunging his cupped hands into the ale and drinking from them. As the shouting died away a rumbling exhaust could be heard and Barney turned to see one of the film company pickups come bouncing along the beach. It skidded to a stop in a rain of fine gravel and Dallas leaned out.

“We been trying to contact you on the radio for ten minutes, maybe more,” he said.

Barney looked down at the radio and saw that all the power had been turned off. “There’s nothing wrong here,” he said. “I just made a mistake and switched this thing off.”

“Well there’s plenty wrong at the camp, that’s why we’ve been trying to call you—”

“What! What do you mean?”

“It’s Ruf Hawk. He came back all excited, wasn’t looking where he was going. He tripped over a sheep, you know them dirty gray ones, they look just like rocks. Anyway he fell over it and broke his leg.”

“Are you trying to tell me that—on the third day of shooting this picture—that my leading man has broken his leg?”

Dallas looked him straight in the eyes, not without a certain sympathy, and slowly nodded his head.

9

There was a crowd around the door of R.uf Hawk’s trailer and Barney had to push his way through it. “Break it up,” he called out. “This is no side show. Let me through.”

Ruf lay on the bed, his skin grayish and beaded with sweat, still wearing the Viking costume. His right leg was wrapped below the knee with white bandages, now stained red with blood. The nurse stood by the head of the bed, uniformed and efficient.

“How is he?” Barney asked. “Is it serious?”