“Hell,” I said, “that’s no great virtue. You were like everybody else. We were just a bunch of small-town boys and everybody was like everybody else.”
“You see,” Ben said to Rila. “You see why I trust this guy.”
“I’m glad you do,” said Rila, “and we’ll be thankful for any help you give us. This is going to be a big job just for the two or us.”
“Why don’t you let me nose around a little on this fence deal? I can ask some questions and sort of line up some people and no one will think a great deal about it. I can sort of let it out that I’m doing it for someone who is going into the mink farming business.
Nothing definite, of course, acting as if I were being cagey about it. They’d expect that sort of foxiness in me. I can get it all lined up so the fence can start moving the moment you give the word. I think I could manage to line up quite a crew of men to go to work.
The thing is that the fence has to go in fast, before there’s too much speculation about it. With the crops in by now, there are bound to be a bunch of farm boys who’d be glad of a chance to earn some money. I suppose you ought to have the land surveyed before you slap up the fence. No sense in taking the chance of it slopping over on someone else’s land. Security guards will be a little tougher, but I think they can be gotten. The Minneapolis police department has been hit by a new city budget cutback and has let twenty or thirty of their boys go. Maybe some of them would be available. I’ll talk to the sheriff over at Lancaster and see if he has any other ideas. Not telling him any more than I have to. You’ll need to get some good-sized No Trespassing signs painted. I think there are some regulations about that. They have to be a certain size, and the law has something to say about the wording on them. I’ll look into that.”
“You think of everything,” said Rila. “You’re way ahead of us.”
“When you’re going to do a thing,” said Ben, “you should do it right. A little advance planning can save a lot of trouble.”
He looked at his watch. “Got to go,” he said. “I’ll be late for supper and Myra will have my hide. There’s some sort of doings she is dragging me to tonight’ and she wanted to eat early.”
He rose and said, “We’ll be in touch. You let me know when you plan on leaving. I’ll have to figure out. some phoney excuse for taking a few days off. A trip or something.”
“Two days might be enough to do what we want to do,” said Rila.
“I shouldn’t have too much trouble arranging that,” he said.
After he had left, Rila said, “The man’s a steam-roller.”
“You heard what he said early on,” I told her.
“He’s planning to horn in.”
“We’ll sell him five percent,” said Rila. “Has he any money?”
“The first nickel he ever made,” I said, “plus the family fortune — which may not be all that great, but it is enough.”
SIXTEEN
Hiram was in charge and being important about it.
“You see those stakes,” he said, pointing to three red-painted stakes standing in a row, one behind the other. “Those stakes mark the time hole. You just follow them and you’ll walk into it.”
He handed me a bundle of similarly painted stakes.
“When you get there,” he said, “don’t go running off without looking. Plant these stakes in front of the other end of the hole the way I lined up these three here.
That way you will know where the hole is when it’s time to come back.”
“But you have only three stakes here,” I said.
“I gave you more,” said Hiram, “because you may want to mark it better. Back there where you are going, things might be running over the stakes, but there’s no chance of that happening here. I made the stakes longer, too, and heavier, so you can pound them in real good.”
“Hiram,” Rila asked, “did you think this up all by yourself?”
“Sure I did. There was nothing to it. And don’t you worry none. If you’re not back in a few days, I’ll send Bowser in to find you. He can lead you home. You remember, Mr. Steele, the time he led you home.”
“Indeed I do,” 1 said. “And, Hiram, thank you very much.”
”You be sure you stay right here,” Ben said to him.
“Don’t go wandering off. Keep an eye on this place.
Asa left enough food in the refrigerator so you won’t have to leave to eat.”
“Could I maybe leave long enough to go to the bathroom?”
“Yes, of course,” said Ben, “but be quick about it.
And don’t tell anyone what is going on. Not even if they come asking. Herb might come. He smells that something’s going on and he could get itchy. If anyone comes by and asks what those stakes are, say that you don’t know.”
“Once we’re gone,” said Rila, “he could even pull up the stakes.”
“No I can’t,” said Hiram. “What if I have to go through the hole to rescue you?”
“We won’t need any rescuing,” said Ben. “Even if we’re a little late, don’t worry. Don’t send Bowser in.
Don’t come in yourself.”
“If I have to come,” said Hiram importantly, “I’ll get together a posse.”
“Damn it, no!” yelled Ben. “Don’t do anything at all. You just stay here.”
“All right, Mr. Page,” said Hiram.
I looked at the other two and there seemed no reason that we shouldn’t start. Rila was loaded down with her camera equipment, and both Ben and I were carrying backpacks as well as the big rifles. In addition, Ben had a.30–06 slung over his shoulder. He was taking it because he said we would need a meat gun.
“I never go on a hunting trip,” he’d said, “that Idon’t shoot some meat. Living outdoors, we’ll need fresh meat.”
“But there are only lizards,” I’d said. “Dinosaurs and lizards and other things like that.”
“Who says lizards can’t be eaten?” he’d demanded, “Or even dinosaur. There are a lot of people who eat lizards. I read about it somewhere. Said they taste like chicken.”
So there we were, standing in a row, with me in the lead and Rila in the middle, Ben bringing up the rear.
“So let’s go,” I said. “One thing to remember. We may come out of the other end at night. Through millions of years, the length of the day would vary. And anyhow, Catface can’t be all that accurate. At the distance back in time we’re traveling, there’ll be some error. He’s aiming at seventy million years, but there might be an error of several years plus or minus, so you can understand …”
“Asa,” said Ben, “cut out the lecture. Let’s go.”
I stepped out, and although I didn’t look behind me, I knew the other two were following. 1 went down the line of bright red stakes, and when I passed the last one it seemed that something tripped me, but in one stride I caught my balance and was in a different place.
“Stay right where you are,” I told the other two.
“Keep facing in the same direction. We have to set these stakes out and there can’t be any slip-up.”
It wasn’t until I’d said all this that I gave myself the time to see where we were. That was something I should have reminded them about before we’d left, and I was in something of a panic that somehow we’d fouled up our direction and our placement. I was remembering the terror I had felt when I had had no idea how to get out of the Pleistocene.
It wasn’t night, as I had told them it might be.