The Technicolor Time Machine

6

Barney threw the magazine back onto the table, but the cover stuck to his hand and half tore off. He impatiently peeled away the paper and regretted not having taken the time to wash off the Viking beer before coming here. But canceled!

“Miss Zucker,” he said. “L,M. wants to see me. He said so. He left a message. I’m sure that he is waiting impatiently to hear from me…”

“I’m very sorry, Mr. Hendrickson, but he left strictest instructions that he is in conference and cannot be disturbed.” Her fingers poised for a second over the typewriter, her gum-chewing suspended momentarily. “I will notify him that you are waiting as soon as I am able.” The typewriter thrummed again, the jaws moving in slow rhythm with it.

“You could at least ring through and tell him that I’m here.”

“Mr. Hendrickson!” she said, her tones those a Mother Superior might use if accused of running a bawdy house.

Barney went over and took a drink of water from the cooler, then rinsed off his sticky hand. He was drying it on some typing paper when the intercom buzzed and Miss Zucker nodded to him. “You may go in now,” she said coldly.

“What do you mean, L.M.?” he asked the instant the door closed behind him. “What do you mean by sending me that message?” Sam sat propped in his chair as mobile as a log of wood and Charley Chang slumped across from him, sweating heavily and looking miserable.

“What do I mean? What could I possibly mean I mean? I mean you led me up the garden path, Barney Hendrickson, and pulled my leg. You got my agreement to go ahead on a picture when you didn’t even have a script!”

“Of course I don’t have a script, how could I when we just decided to do the picture. This is an emergency, remember?”

“How could I forget. But an emergency is one thing doing a picture without a script is another. In France maybe, they make the arty-schmarty things you couldn’t tell if they had a script or not. But in Climactic we don’t work that way.”

“It’s not good business,” Sam agreed.

Barney tried not to wring his hands. “L.M., look. Be reasonable. This is a salvage operation, have you forgotten that? There are very special circumstances involved—”

“Say bank. The word don’t hurt no more.”

“I won’t say it, because we can beat them yet. We can make this picture. So you called in my scriptwriter—”

“He got no script.”

“Of course he’s got no script. It was just yesterday when you and I finalized the idea. Now you’ve talked to him and explained your ideas—”

“He got no script.”

“Hear me out, L.M. Charley’s a good man, you picked him yourself and you briefed him yourself. If any man can deliver the goods, good old Charley can. If you had a Charley Chang script in your hand for this film you would let production go ahead, wouldn’t you?”

“He got no—”

“L.M., you’re not listening. If. That’s the big word. If I were to here and now hand you a Charley Chang script for this great motion picture titled… titled… Viking Columbus, would you okay production?”

L.M. was wearing his best poker face. He glanced over at Sam, who let his head drop the merest fraction of an inch. “Yes,” L.M. instantly said.

“We’re halfway home, L.M.,” Barney hurried on. “If I were to hand you that script just one hour from now, you would okay production. Same difference, right?”

L.M. shrugged. “All right, same difference. But what difference does it make?”

“Sit right there, L.M.,” Barney said, grabbing the startled Charley Chang by the arm and dragging him from the loom. “Talk to Sam about the budget, have a drink—and I’ll see you in exactly one hour. Viking Columbus is almost ready to roll.”

“My head shrinker keeps evening hours,” Charley said when the door closed behind him. “Let him talk to you, Barney. I have heard rash promises in this rash business many, many times, but this takes the gold plated bagel—”

“Save it, Charley. You got some work ahead of you.” Barney steered the reluctant script writer out into the corridor while he talked. “Just give me your estimate of how long it would take you to rough out a first draft of a script for this film, working hard and putting your best into it. How long?”

“It’s a big job. At least six months.”

“Right. Six weeks. Concentrated effort, a first-class job.”

“I said months. And even six weeks are more than an hour.”

“If you need six months you can have them. You have all the time you need, just take my word for it. And a nice quiet spot to work.” They were passing a photomural and Barney stopped and jabbed his thumb against it. “There. Santa Catalina Island. Plenty of sun, a refreshing dip in the briny when the thoughts grow stale.”

“I can’t work there. It’s lousy with people, parties all night.”

“That’s what you think. How would you like to work on Catalina without another soul around, the whole island to yourself? Just think of the work you could get done.”

“Barney, honestly, I don’t know what the hell you are talking about.”

“You will, Charley. In a very few minutes you will.”

“Fifty reams of typing paper, a box of carbon paper, typing chair—one, typing table—one, typewriter…”

“This is a steam model, Barney,” Charley said. “The antique kind you push with the fingers. I can only work with an IBM electric.”

“I’m afraid the electric current isn’t so reliable on the part of the island where you’ll be. You watch how fast the fingers will get the old touch back.” Barney made a tick mark on the sheet as a big crate was pushed into the back of the truck. “One safari outfit, complete,”

“One what?”

“A do-it-yourself safari from the prop department. Tent, cots, mosquito nets, chairs, folding kitchen—and everything works. You’ll feel just like Dr. Livingstone only twice as comfortable. Fifty-gallon drum of water —three, spring-powered time clock with cards—one.”

Charley Chang watched in numb incomprehension as the varied assortments of items was loaded into the army truck. None of it made any sense, including the old geezer behind all the junk who was working away on a Frankenstein radio set. The ancient, mahogany time clock with roman numerals on its face was pushed over the tailgate, and Charley grabbed Barney’s arm and pointed to it.

“None of this do I understand; and that least of all. Why a time clock?”

“Professor Hewett will explain everything in greatest detail in a few minutes, meanwhile take it all on faith. The clock is an important part, you’ll see. Punch in every morning, don’t forget.”

“Mr. Hendrickson,” his secretary called out, “you’re very much in luck.” She came into the warehouse leading by the arm a frowning Negro who wore white work clothes and a tall chef’s hat. “You said you wanted a cook, but instantly, and I went right to our commissary and found Clyde Rawlston here. Not only can he cook, but he can take shorthand and type.”

“You’re an angel, Betty. Order another typewriter…”

“It’s on the way. Did the first-aid box come?”

“Already aboard. That’s the lot then. Clyde this is Charley, Charley, Clyde. You’ll get better acquainted later. If you will kindly board the truck now.”

“I’ll go as soon as someone explains what is going on around here,” Clyde Rawlston said with cold-eyed belligerence.

“A company emergency, Climactic needs you, and as loyal employees I know you’ll both cooperate. Professor Hewett will explain it all to you. It won’t take long. I’ll see you both right here in just ten minutes by my watch, that’s a promise. Now—if you will just climb over those crates go I can get this tailgate up.”

Chivvied on by the voice of authority, they clambered aboard and Professor Hewett leaned out over their shoulders.

“I thought the Cambrian period would be best,” he said to Barney. “You know, early Paleozoic. A nice, moderate climate, warm and comfortable, with no vertebrates around to cause trouble. Seas churning with the simple trilobite. Though it might be a little warm for continued comfort. Perhaps a little later in the Devonian. There would still be nothing big enough to harm—”

“You’re the doctor, Prof, whatever you think best. We have to work fast now, at least on this end. Take them to Catalina, drop them off, then move six weeks ahead and bring them back here. Leave the junk on the island, we may need it later. Only about fifteen minutes left.”

“Consider it done. With each trip made I feel it easier to calibrate the instruments, so that now the settings are most precise. No tune shall be wasted, no time at all.”

Professor Hewett returned to his instruments and the generator howled. Charley Chang was trying to say something, but his words were cut off as the truck vanished. There was no flicker or fading, it just disappeared as instantly and as quickly as the image on a back-projection screen when the film breaks. Barney started to turn to talk to his secretary, but just as his motion began the truck appeared.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, then saw that all the suppplies were gone from the back. Clyde Rawlston was standing near the professor at the controls and Charley Chang was sitting on an empty crate clutching a thick folder of typed sheets.

“Nothing is wrong,” the professor said. “I have just timed our return with the utmost of exact precision.”

Charley was no longer wearing his jacket and his shirt was creased and faded, so bleached by the sun across the shoulders that all the color was gone. His hair was long and a black bristle of beard covered his cheeks.

“How did it go?” Barney asked.

“Not bad—considering. I’m not quite finished though, you see it’s those things in the water. Those teeth! Eyes… !”

“How much more time do you need?”

“Two weeks should wrap it up, with time to spare. But, Barney, the eyes…”

“There’s nothing there big enough to hurt you, that’s what the Prof said.”

“Maybe not big, but in the ocean, so many of them, and the teeth…”

“See you. Take it away, Prof. Two weeks.”

This time the truck barely flickered, and if he had blinked at the wrong moment Baney would have missed the trip altogether. Yet, Charley and Clyde were sitting together on the other side of the truck and the wad of typescript was thicker.

“Viking Columbus,” Charley said, waving it over his head. “A wide-screen masterpiece.” He handed it down and Barney saw that there were some cards clipped to the folder. “Those are our time cards, and if you examine them you’ll see that they have been punched in every day, and Clyde and I are asking double time for Saturdays and treble for Sundays.”

“Who’s arguing?” Barney said, weighing the script happily. “Come on along, Charley, we’ll have the story conference right away.”

Charley sniffed the twilight air as they came out of the warehouse. “What a lot of stinks,” he said. “I never realized it before. What great air we had there on the island.” He looked down at his feet while he walked. “Feels funny to be wearing shoes again.”

“The native’s return,” Barney said. “I’ll bring the script in and you can get some clothes from wardrobe to replace your beachcomber’s rags and grab a shave. Get over to L.M.’s office as soon as you can. Is it a good script?”

“Maybe it’s too early to say—but in a way I think it’s the best thing I have ever done. Working the way I did, no outside distractions you know—if you don’t count the eyes! And Clyde was a big help, a good clean typist. He’s a poet, did you know that?”

“I thought he was a cook?”

“He’s a lousy cook, I ended up doing all the cooking. He only took the job in the commissary to pay his rent. He’s a damn good poet, and great on dialogue. He helped me a lot there. Do you think we can get him a credit on this film?”

“I don’t see why not. And don’t forget that shave.”

Barney went into L.M.’s office and dropped the script onto the desk. “Finished,” he said.

L.M. weighed it carefully in both hands, then held it at arm’s length so he could read the cover sheet.

“Viking Columbus. A good title. We’ll have to change it You delivered like you said, Barney, so maybe now you can tell me the secret of in one hour producing a script. Tell Sam, he wants to hear too.” Sam was almost invisible, immobile against the dark wallpaper, until he nodded his head.

“No secret, L.M., it’s the vremeatron. You saw it in action. Charley Chang went back in time to a nice quiet spot where he worked very hard to produce this script. He stayed as long as he needed, then we brought him back to almost the same moment when he left. Hardly any time at all elapsed here while he was away, so from your point of view it looks like it took just an hour to produce a complete script.”

“A script in an hour!” L.M. said, beaming happily. “This is going to revolutionize the business. Don’t be cheap, Barney. Give me the highest hourly rate you can imagine, then double it—twice! I don’t care about money. I want to do the right thing and see that Charley Chang gets the greatest rate per hour ever paid to man, paid for one hour of his time.”

“You missed the point, L.M. Maybe only an hour of your time went by, but Charley Chang worked more than two months on that script, Saturdays and Sundays included, and he has to get paid for that time.”

“He can’t prove it!” L.M. said, scowling fiercely.

“He can prove it. He punched a time clock every day and I have the time cards right here.”

“He can sue! One hour it took, one hour I pay for.”

“Sam,” Barney pleaded, “talk to him. Tell him you don’t get nothing for nothing in this world. Eight weeks’ pay is still beans for a great script like this.”

“I liked the one-hour script better,” Sam said.

“We all liked the one-hour script better, except there never was a one-hour script. This is just a new way of working, but we still have to pay the same amount for the work whatever happens.”

The buzz of the phone interrupted and L.M. picked it up, first listening, then answering with a monosyllabic series of grunts, finally slamming the handpiece back into the cradle.

“Ruf Hawk is on his way up,” L.M. said. “I think maybe we can use him for the lead, but also I think he is under contract to an independent for another picture. Feel him out, Barney, before his agent gets here. Now—about this one hour…”

“Later we discuss the one hour, please, L.M. It’ll work out.”

Ruf Hawk came in, stopping for a moment in the doorway and turning his head in profile so they could see how good he looked. He looked good. He looked good because that was really the only thing in life that he cared about. While all around the world, in countless movie houses, women’s hearts beat faster when they watched Ruf lock some lucky starlet in his firm embrace, little did these countless women know that their chances of getting locked in that embrace were exactly zero. Ruf did not like women. Not that he was a queer or something, he didn’t like men either. Or sheep or raincoats or whips, etc. Ruf just liked Ruf, and the light of love in his eyes was nothing more than a reflected gleam of narcissistic appreciation. He had been just one more slab of beefcake on muscle beach until it was discovered that he could act. He couldn’t act really, but it had been also discovered that he could act what he had been told to act. He would follow exactly whatever instructions were given to him, repeating the same words and actions over and over again with infinite bovine patience. Between takes he refreshed himself by looking into a mirror. His incompetence had never been revealed, because, in the kind of pictures he appeared in, before anyone could notice how bad he was the Indians would attack or the dinosaurs stampede or the walls of Troy would get torn down or something else mildly distracting would happen. Therefore Ruf was happy, and when the producers looked at box-office receipts they were happy, and everyone agreed that he had plenty of mileage left in him before his gut began to spread.

“Hi, Ruf,” Barney said, “just the man we want to see.”

Ruf raised his hand in greeting and smiled. He didn’t talk much when he hadn’t been told to talk.

“I’m not going to beat around the point, Ruf, all I’m going to say is that we’re going to make the world’s greatest picture and we were talking about a lead and your name was mentioned, and I said right out loud if we are going to do a Viking picture, then Ruf Hawk is the most vilkingest Viking I can think of.”

Ruf showed no signs of emotion or interest at this revelation. “You’ve heard of Vikings, haven’t you, Ruf?” Barney asked.

Ruf smiled slightly.

“You remember,” Barney said, “tall guys with big axes and horns on their helmets always sailing around in ships with a carved dragon in front…”

“Oh, yeah, sure,” Ruf said, his attention captured at last. “I’ve heard of Vikings. I’ve never played a Viking.”

“But in your heart of hearts you have always wanted to play a Viking, Ruf, it couldn’t be any other way. This is the kind of role that is made for you, the kind of role you can sink your teeth into, the kind of role that will make you look great in front of the camera.”

The thick eyebrows slowly crawled together to form a frown. “I always look great in front of the camera.”

“Of course you do, Ruf, that’s why we have you here. You haven’t got any big commitments, any other pictures, do you?”

Ruf frowned even deeper as he thought. “Got a picture coming up end of next week, something about Atlantis.”

L.M. Greenspan glanced up from the script and matched his frown to Rufs. “I thought so. My apologies to your agent, Ruf, but we gotta find someone else.”

“L.M.,” Barney said. “Read the script. Enjoy it. Let me talk to Ruf. You’ve forgotten that this film will be in the can by Monday, which will give Ruf three days to rest up before Atlands sinks.”

“I’m glad you mentioned the script because it has some grave faults, big ones.”

“How can you tell—you’ve only read ten pages? Read it a bit more, then we’ll talk about it, the writer is waiting outside right now. Any changes that are needed he can make them practically while you wait.” He turned back to Ruf. “You’re going to get your wish and play that Viking. We’ve got a new technical process whereby we go on location to shoot the picture, and, though we’ll be back in only a couple of days, you get paid for a feature-length picture. What do you think of that?”

“I think you better talk to my agent. Anything to do with money I don’t say a word.”

“That’s the way it should be, Ruf, that’s what agents are for and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“It just won’t do,” L.M. said in a voice of doom. “From Charley Chang I expected better. The opening won’t do.”

“I’ll get Charley in now, L.M., and we’ll thrash this out, find the trouble and lick it.”

Barney looked at the clock: 8:00 P.M. And get hold of this slab of muscle’s agent. And fight the script through a rewrite and shoot Charley back to Catalina—and his teeth and eyes—to do the job. And find actors for the supporting roles. And get every single item lined up that they might need for a couple of months of shooting, then get the entire company moved back in time. And shoot the picture in the eleventh century, which should raise some interesting problems of its own. And get the entire thing done, finished and in the can by Monday morning. And here it was eight o’clock of a Wednesday night. Plenty of time.

Sure, nothing to it, plenty of time.

Then why was he sweating?