The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century (20 page)

Afterward Helgi questioned him about the gun, and he said it could kill a man at bowshot distance but had no witchcraft in it, only use of some tricks we did not know.

Having heard of the Greek fire, I believed him. A gun could be useful in a fight, as indeed I was to learn, but it did not seem very practical—iron costing what it does, and months of forging needed for each one.

I fretted more about the man himself.

And the next morning I found him telling Thorgunna a great deal of foolishness about his home—buildings as tall as mountains, and wagons that flew, or went without horses.

He said there were eight or nine thousand thousands of folk in his town, a burgh called New Jorvik or the like. I enjoy a good brag as well as the next man, but this was too much, and I told him gruffly to come along and help me get in some strayed cattle.

After a day scrambling around the hills I saw that Gerald could hardly tell a cow’s bow from her stern. We almost had the strays once, but he ran stupidly across their path and turned them, so the whole work was to do again. I asked him with strained courtesy if he could milk, shear, wield scythe or flail, and he said no, he had never lived on a farm.

“That’s a shame,” I remarked, “for everyone on Iceland does, unless he be outlawed.”

He flushed at my tone. “I can do enough else,” he answered. “Give me some tools and I’ll show you good metalwork.”

That brightened me, for truth to tell, none of our household was a gifted smith.

“That’s an honorable trade,” I said, “and you can be of great help. I have a broken sword and several bent spearheads to be mended, and it were no bad idea to shoe the horses.”

His admission that he did not know how to put on a shoe was not very dampening to me then.

We had returned home as we talked, and Thorgunna came angrily forward. “That’s no way to treat a guest, Father,” she said. “Making him work like a carle, indeed!”

Gerald smiled. “I’ll be glad to work,” he said. “I need a... a stake... something to start me afresh. Also, I want to repay a little of your kindness.”

Those words made me mild toward him, and I said it was not his fault they had different ways in the United States. On the morrow he could begin in the smithy, and I would pay him, yet he would be treated as an equal since craftsmen are valued. This earned him black looks from the housefolk.

That evening he entertained us well with stories of his home; true or not, they made good listening. However, he had no real polish, being unable to compose a line of verse.

They must be a raw and backward lot in the United States. He said his task in the war host had been to keep order among the troops. Helgi said this was unheard of, and he must be bold who durst offend so many men, but Gerald said folk obeyed him out of fear of the king. When he added that the term of a levy in the United States was two years, and that men could be called to war even in harvest time, I said he was well out of a country with so ruthless and powerful a lord.

“No,” he answered wistfully, “we are a free folk, who say what we please.”

“But it seems you may not do as you please,” said Helgi.

“Well,” Gerald said, “we may not murder a man just because he aggrieves us.”

“Not even if he has slain your own kin?” asked Helgi. 

“No. It is for the... the king to take vengeance, on behalf of the whole folk whose peace has been broken.”

I chuckled. “Your yarns are cunningly wrought,” I said, “but there you’ve hit a snag.

How could the king so much as keep count of the slaughters, let alone avenge them?

Why, he’d not have time to beget an heir!”

Gerald could say no more for the laughter that followed.

The next day he went to the smithy, with a thrall to pump the bellows for him. I was gone that day and night, down to Reykjavik to dicker with Hjalmar Broadnose about some sheep. I invited him back for an overnight stay, and we rode into my steading with his son Ketill, a red-haired sulky youth of twenty winters who had been refused by Thorgunna.

I found Gerald sitting gloomily on a bench in the hall. He wore the clothes I had given him, his own having been spoilt by ash and sparks; what had he awaited, the fool? He talked in a low voice with my daughter.

“Well,” I said as I trod in, “how went the tasks?”

My man Grim snickered. “He ruined two spearheads, but we put out the fire he started ere the whole smithy burned.”

“How’s this?” I cried. “You said you were a smith.”

Gerald stood up, defiant. “I worked with different tools, and better ones, at home,” he replied. “You do it otherwise here.”

They told me he had built up the fire too hot; his hammer had struck everywhere but the place it should; he had wrecked the temper of the steel through not knowing when to quench it. Smithcraft takes years to learn, of course, but he might have owned to being not so much as an apprentice.

“Well,” I snapped, “what can you do, then, to earn your bread?” It irked me to be made a ninny of before Hjalmar and Ketill, whom I had told about the stranger.

“Odin alone knows,” said Grim. “I took him with me to ride after your goats, and never have I seen a worse horseman. I asked him if maybe he could spin or weave, and he said no.” 

“That was no question to ask a man!” flared Thorgunna. “He should have slain you for it.”

“He should indeed,” laughed Grim. “But let me carry on the tale. I thought we would also repair your bridge over the foss. Well, he
can
barely handle a saw, but he nigh took his own foot off with the adze.”

“We don’t use those tools, I tell you!” Gerald doubled his fists and looked close to tears.

I motioned my guests to sit down. “I don’t suppose you can butcher or smoke a hog, either,” I said, “or salt a fish or turf a roof.”

“No.” I could hardly hear him.

“Well, then, man, whatever can you do?”

“I—” He could get no words out.

“You were a warrior,” said Thorgunna.

“Yes, that I was!” he said, his face kindling.

“Small use on Iceland when you have no other skills,” I grumbled, “but maybe, if you can get passage to the eastlands, some king will take you in his guard.” Myself I doubted it, for a guardsman needs manners that will do credit to his lord; but I had not the heart to say so.

Ketill Hjalmarsson had plainly not liked the way Thorgunna stood close to Gerald and spoke for him. Now he leered and said: “I might also doubt your skill in fighting.”

“That I have been trained for,” said Gerald grimly.

“Will you wrestle with me?” asked Ketill.

“Gladly!” spat Gerald.

Priest, what is a man to think? As I grow older, I find life to be less and less the good-and-evil, black-and-white thing you call it; we are each of us some hue of gray. This useless fellow, this spiritless lout who could be asked if he did women’s work and not lift ax, went out into the yard with Ketill Hjalmarsson and threw him three times running. He had a trick of grabbing the clothes as Ketill rushed him... I cried a stop when the youth was nearing murderous rage, praised them both, and filled the beer horns. But Ketill brooded sullen on the bench the whole evening.

Gerald said something about making a gun like his own, but bigger, a
cannon
he called it, which would sink ships and scatter hosts. He would need the help of smiths, and also various stuffs. Charcoal was easy, and sulfur could be found by the volcanoes, I suppose, but what is this saltpeter?

Too, being wary by now, I questioned him closely as to how he would make such a thing. Did he know just how to mix the powder? No, he admitted. What size must the gun be? When he told me—at least as long as a man—I laughed and asked him how a piece that size could be cast or bored, supposing we could scrape together so much iron.

This he did not know either.

“You haven’t the tools to make the tools to make the tools,” he said. I don’t understand what he meant by that. “God help me, I can’t run through a thousand years of history by myself.”

He took out the last of his little smoke sticks and lit it. Helgi had tried a puff earlier and gotten sick, though he remained a friend of Gerald’s. Now my son proposed to take a boat in the morning and go with him and me to Ice Fjord, where I had some money outstanding I wanted to collect. Hjalmar and Ketill said they would come along for the trip, and Thorgunna pleaded so hard that I let her come too.

“An ill thing,” mumbled Sigurd. “The land trolls like not a woman aboard a vessel.

It’s unlucky.”

“How did your fathers bring women to this island?” I grinned.

Now I wish I had listened to him. He was not a clever man, but he often knew whereof he spoke.

At this time I owned a half-share in a ship that went to Norway, bartering wadmal for timber. It was a profitable business until she ran afoul of vikings during the uproar while Olaf Tryggvason was overthrowing Jarl Haakon there. Some men will do anything to make a living—thieves, cutthroats, they ought to be hanged, the worthless robbers pouncing on honest merchantmen. Had they any courage or honor they would go to Ireland, which is full of plunder.

Well, anyhow, the ship was abroad, but we had three boats and took one of these.

Grim went with us others: myself, Helgi, Hjalmar, Ketill, Gerald, and Thorgunna. I saw how the castaway winced at the cold water as we launched her, yet afterward took off his shoes and stockings to let his feet dry. He had been surprised to learn we had a bathhouse—did he think us savages?—but still, he was dainty as a girl and soon moved upwind of our feet.

We had a favoring breeze, so raised mast and sail. Gerald tried to help, but of course did not know one line from another and got them fouled. Grim snarled at him and Ketill laughed nastily. But erelong we were under weigh, and he came and sat by me where I had the steering oar.

He must have lain long awake thinking, for now he ventured shyly: “In my land they have... will have... a rig and rudder which are better than these. With them, you can sail so close to the wind that you can crisscross against it.”

“Ah, our wise sailor offers us redes,” sneered Ketill.

“Be still,” said Thorgunna sharply. “Let Gerald speak.”

Gerald gave her a look of humble thanks, and I was not unwilling to listen. “This is something which could easily be made,” he said. “While not a seaman, I’ve been on such boats myself and know them well. First, then, the sail should not be square and hung from a yardarm, but three-cornered, with the two bottom corners lashed to a yard swiveling fore and aft from the mast; and there should be one or two smaller headsails of the same shape. Next, your steering oar is in the wrong place. You should have a rudder in the stern, guided by a bar.” He grew eager and traced the plan with his fingernail on Thorgunna’s cloak. “With these two things, and a deep keel, going down about three feet for a boat this size, a ship can move across the wind... thus.”

Well, priest, I must say the idea has merits, and were it not for the fear of bad luck—

for everything of his was unlucky—I might yet play with it. But the drawbacks were clear, and I pointed them out in a reasonable way.

“First and worst,” I said, “this rudder and deep keel would make it impossible to beach the ship or go up a shallow river. Maybe they have many harbors where you hail from, but here a craft must take what landings she can find, and must be speedily launched if there should be an attack.”

“The keel can be built to draw up into the hull,” he said, “with a box around so that water can’t follow.”

“How would you keep dry rot out of the box?” I answered. “No, your keel must be fixed, and must be heavy if the ship is not to capsize under so much sail as you have drawn. This means iron or lead, ruinously costly. 

“Besides,” I said, “this mast of yours would be hard to unstep when the wind dropped and oars came out. Furthermore, the sails are the wrong shape to stretch as an awning when one must sleep at sea.”

“The ship could lie out, and you go to land in a small boat,” he said. “Also, you could build cabins aboard for shelter.”

“The cabins would get in the way of the oars,” I said, “unless the ship were hopelessly broad-beamed or else the oarsmen sat below a deck; and while I hear that galley slaves do this in the southlands, free men would never row in such foulness.”

“Must you have oars?” he asked like a very child.

Laughter barked along the hull. The gulls themselves, hovering to starboard where the shore rose dark, cried their scorn.

“Do they have tame winds in the place whence you came?” snorted Hjalmar. “What happens if you’re becalmed—for days, maybe, with provisions running out—”

“You could build a ship big enough to carry many weeks’ provisions,” said Gerald.

“If you had the wealth of a king, you might,” said Helgi. “And such a king’s ship, lying helpless on a flat sea, would be swarmed by every viking from here to Jomsborg.

As for leaving her out on the water while you make camp, what would you have for shelter, or for defense if you should be trapped ashore?”

Gerald slumped. Thorgunna said to him gently: “Some folk have no heart to try anything new. I think it’s a grand idea.”

He smiled at her, a weary smile, and plucked up the will to say something about a means for finding north in cloudy weather; he said a kind of stone always pointed north when hung from a string. I told him mildly that I would be most interested if he could find me some of this stone; or if he knew where it was to be had, I could ask a trader to fetch me a piece. But this he did not know, and fell silent. Ketill opened his mouth, but got such an edged look from Thorgunna that he shut it again. His face declared what a liar he thought Gerald to be.

The wind turned crank after a while, so we lowered the mast and took to the oars.

Gerald was strong and willing, though awkward; however, his hands were so soft that erelong they bled. I offered to let him rest, but he kept doggedly at the work.

Watching him sway back and forth, under the dreary creak of the holes, the shaft red and wet where he gripped it, I thought much about him. He had done everything wrong which a man could do—thus I imagined then, not knowing the future—and I did not like the way Thorgunna’s eyes strayed to him and rested. He was no man for my daughter, landless and penniless and helpless. Yet I could not keep from liking him. Whether his tale was true or only madness, I felt he was honest about it; and surely whatever way by which he came hither was a strange one. I noticed the cuts on his chin from my razor; he had said he was not used to our kind of shaving and would grow a beard. He had tried hard. I wondered how well I would have done, landing alone in this witch country of his dreams, with a gap of forever between me and my home.