The Technicolor Time Machine

“Right as always, L.M. And it so happens we have a story, a true-to-life story, and, what is more, a patriotic story. If I was to ask you who discovered America, what would you say?”

“Christopher Columbus, 1492.”

“That’s what most people think, but it was the Vikings who did the job first.”

“Was Columbus a Viking—I thought he was Jewish?”

“Let us please drop Columbus. Five hundred years before Columbus was born Viking ships had sailed from Greenland and discovered what they called Vinland which has since been proven to be part of North America, The first expedition was led by Eric the Red—”

“Kill that idea! You want to get us blacklisted with a commie picture?”

“Just hold on for a bit please, L.M. After Eric found the place it was colonized, Vikings came and lived there and built houses and fanned, and this was all organized by the legendary hero, Thorfinn Karlsefni…”

“These names! He’s got to go too. I can already hear the big romance scene… kiss me my dearest Thorfinn Karlsefni she whispers. Out. You’re not so hot, Barney.”

“You can’t rewrite history, L.M.”

“What else have we ever done? This is no time to go soft on me, Barney Hendrickson, you who were at one time my best producer and director before the lousy moron-box ruined us all. Get a grip on yourself. The motion pictures are not primarily an educational medium. We are selling entertainment, and if it doesn’t entertain it doesn’t sell. I see it this way. We got this Viking, you call him Benny or Carlo or some other good Viking name, and you do a saga of his adventures…”

“That’s just the word for it, L.M.”

“…like one day fighting, and winning of course, restless, he’s that land. He goes off and finds America then comes back and says I have found America! so they make him the king. Then there is this girl, with long, blond wig hair, who keeps waving to him every time he sails away and promises to return. Only now he is older with a little gray above the ears and some scars, he has suffered, and this time instead of going away he takes the girl with him and together they sail into the sunset to a new life as the first pioneers at Plymouth Rock. Well?”

“Great, as always, L.M. You haven’t lost the touch.” Barney sighed tiredly. Dr. Jens Lyn—whose eyes had been getting wider—made a strangling noise.

“B-but—it is not that way, it is in the records. Even Mr. Hendrickson is not completely correct. It was Leif Ericsson, the son of Eric the Red, who is generally credited with the discovery of Vinland. There are two versions of the chronicle, one in the Hauksbók and the other in the Flateyjarbók—”

“Enough!” L.M. grumbled. “You see what I mean, Barney? Even the history books can’t agree, so with a little bringing together here and there and some touching up we got a story. Who were you thinking of for the leads?”

“If we can get him, Ruf Hawk would be perfect for the Viking. And someone who is really stacked for a girl.”

“Slithey Tove. She’s available and between pictures and for two weeks her crumb of an agent has been in and out of here with deals, so I know she is broke and we can get her cheap. Next you will need a writer, and for that use Charley Chang, we have him on contract. He’s a specialist.”

“On Bible stories, maybe, not historicals,” Barney said doubtfully, “and frankly I didn’t think much of Down from the Cross or the other thing, Walking the Red Sea Waters.”

“Ruined by censorship, that’s all. I okayed the scripts myself and they were great—” He broke off suddenly as a bellowing cry sounded through the wall. “Did you hear that?”

“It’s the Viking,” Tex said. “He was still aching for a fight so we slugged him and chained him to the shower in the executives’ head.”

“What’s this?” L.M. scowled.

“An informant,” Barney told him. “One of the locals. He attacked the truck so we brought him along so that Dr. Lyn could talk to him.”

“Get him in here. He’s just the man we need, someone with local knowledge to answer some questions on production problems. You got to have a local who knows his way around when you are shooting on location.”

Tex and Dallas went out and, after a few minutes of chain rattling and two loud thuds, returned with the slightly glassy-eyed Viking. He stopped in the door when he saw the men waiting in the room, and they had their first clear look at him.