The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction Sixth Series

by Edited by Anthony Boucher

  The other carle, Grim, hefted his spear. “Have vikings landed?” he asked.

  “When did vikings ever come to Iceland?” I snorted. “It’s the other way around.”

  The newcomer shook his head, as if it had been struck. He got shakily to his feet. “What happened?” he said. “What happened to the city?”

  “What city?” I asked reasonably.

  “Reykjavik!” he groaned. “Where is it?”

  “Five miles south, the way you came—unless you mean the bay itself,” I said.

  “No! There was only a beach, and a few wretched huts, and—”

  “Best not let Hjalmar Broadnose hear you call his thorp that,” I counseled.

  “But there was a city!” he cried. Wildness lay in his eyes. “I was crossing the street, it was a storm, and there was a crash and then I stood on the beach and the city was gone!”

  “He’s mad,” said Sigurd, backing away. “Be careful ... if he starts to foam at the mouth, it means he’s going berserk.”

  “Who are you?” babbled the stranger. “What are you doing in those clothes? Why the spears?”

  “Somehow,” said Helgi, “he does not sound crazed—only frightened and bewildered. Something evil has happened to him.”

  “I’m not staying near a man under a curse!” yelped Sigurd, and started to run away.

  “Come back!” I bawled. “Stand where you are or I’ll cleave your louse-bitten head!”

  That stopped him, for he had no kin who would avenge him; but he would not come closer. Meanwhile the stranger had calmed down to the point where he could at least talk evenly.

  “Was it the aitchbomb?” he asked. “Has the war started?”

  He used that word often, aitchbomb, so I know it now, though unsure of what it means. It seems to be a kind of Greek fire. As for the war, I knew not which war he meant, and told him so.

  “There was a great thunderstorm last night,” I added. “And you say you were out in one too. Perhaps Thor’s hammer knocked you from your place to here.”

  “But where is here?” he replied. His voice was more dulled than otherwise, now that the first terror had lifted.

  “I told you. This is Hillstead, which is on Iceland.”

  “But that’s where I was!” he mumbled. “Reykjavik . . . what happened? Did the aitchbomb destroy everything while I was unconscious?”

  “Nothing has been destroyed,” I said.

  “Perhaps he means the fire at Olafsvik last month,” said Helgi.

  “No, no, no!” He buried his face in his hands. After a while he looked up and said. “See here. I am Sergeant Gerald Roberts of the United States Army base on Iceland. I was in Reykjavik and got struck by lightning or something. Suddenly I was standing on the beach, and got frightened and ran. That’s all. Now, can you tell me how to get back to the base?”

  Those were more or less his words, priest. Of course, we did not grasp half of it, and made him repeat it several times and explain the words. Even then we did not understand, except that he was from some country called the United States of America, which he said lies beyond Greenland to the west, and that he and some others were on Iceland to help our folk against their enemies. Now this I did not consider a lie—more a mistake or imagining. Grim would have cut him down for thinking us stupid enough to swallow that tale, but I could see that he meant it.

  Trying to explain it to us cooled him off. “Look here,” he said, in too reasonable a tone for a feverish man, “perhaps we can get at the truth from your side. Has there been no war you know of? Nothing which-well, look here. My country’s men first came to Iceland to guard it against the Germans . . . now it is the Russians, but then it was the Germans. When was that?”

  Helgi shook his head. “That never happened that I know of,” he said. “Who are these Russians?” He found out later that Gardariki was meant. “Unless,” he said, “the old warlocks—”

  “He means the Irish monks,” I explained. “There were a few living here when the Norsemen came, but they were driven out. That was, hm, somewhat over a hundred years ago. Did your folk ever help the monks?”

  “I never heard of them!” he said. His breath sobbed in his throat. “You . . . didn’t you Icelanders come from Norway?”

  “Yes, about a hundred years ago,” I answered patiently. “After King Harald Fairhair took all the Norse lands and-”

  “A hundred, years ago!” he whispered. I saw whiteness creep up under his skin. “What year is this?”

  We gaped at him. “Well, it’s the second year after the great salmon catch,” I tried.

  “What year after Christ, I mean?” It was a hoarse prayer.

  “Oh, so you are a Christian? Hm, let me think ... I talked with a bishop in England once,’ we were holding him for ransom, and he said ... let me see ... I think he said this Christ man lived a thousand years ago, or maybe a little less.”

  “A thousand-” He shook his head; and then something went out of him, he stood with glassy eyes—yes, I have seen glass, I told you I am a traveled man—he stood thus, and when we led him toward the garth he went like a small child.

  ~ * ~

  You can see for yourself, priest, that my wife Ragnhild is still good to look upon even in eld, and Thorgunna took after her. She was—is tall and slim, with a dragon’s hoard of golden hair. She being a maiden then, it flowed loose over her shoulders. She had great blue eyes and a small heart-shaped face and very red lips. Withal she was a merry one, and kind-hearted, so that all men loved her. Sverri Snorrason went in voking when she refused and was slain, but no one had the wit to see that she was unlucky.

  We led this Gerald Samsson—when I asked, he said his father was named Sam—we led him home, leaving Sigurd and Grim to finish gathering the driftwood. There are some who would not have a Christian in their house, for fear of witchcraft, but I am a broad-minded man and Helgi, of course, was wild for anything new. Our guest stumbled like a blind man over the fields, but seemed to wake up as we entered the yard. His eyes went around the buildings that enclosed it, from the stables and sheds to the smokehouse, the brewery, the kitchen, the bathhouse, the god-shrine, and thence to the hall. And Thorgunna was standing in the doorway.

  Their gazes locked for a moment, and I saw her color but thought little of it then. Our shoes rang on the flagging as we crossed the yard and kicked the dogs aside. My two thralls paused in cleaning out the stables to gawp, until I got them back to work with the remark that a man good for naught else was always a pleasing sacrifice. That’s one useful practice you Christians lack; I’ve never made a human offering myself, but you know not how helpful is the fact that I could do so.

  We entered the hall and I told the folk Gerald’s name and how we had found him. Ragnhild set her maids hopping, to stoke up the fire in the middle trench and fetch beer, while I led Gerald to the high seat and sat down by him. Thorgunna brought us the filled horns.

  Gerald tasted the brew and made a face. I felt somewhat offended, for my beer is reckoned good, and asked him if there was aught wrong. He laughed with a harsh note and said no, but he was used to beer that foamed and was not sour.

  “And where might they make such?” I wondered testily.

  “Everywhere. Iceland, too—no . . .” He stared emptily before him. “Let’s say ... in Vinland.”

  “Where is Vinland?” I asked.

  “The country to the west whence I came. I thought you knew . . . wait a bit.” He shook his head. “Maybe I can find out—have you heard of a man named Leif Eiriksson?”

  “No,” I said. Since then it has struck me that this was one proof of his tale, for Leif Eiriksson is now a well-known chief; and I also take more seriously those tales of land seen by Bjarni Herjulfsson.

  “His father, maybe—Eirik the Red?” asked Gerald.

  “Oh yes,” I said. “If you mean the Norseman who came hither because of a manslaughter, and left Iceland in turn for the same reason, and has now settled with other folk in Greenland.”

>   “Then this is ... a little before Leif’s voyage,” he muttered. “The late tenth century.”

  “See here,” demanded Helgi, “we’ve been patient with you, but this is no time for riddles. We save those for feasts and drinking bouts. Can you not say plainly whence you come and how you got here?”

  Gerald covered his face, shaking.

  “Let the man alone, Helgi,” said Thorgunna. “Can you not see he’s troubled?”

  He raised his head and gave her the look of a hurt dog that someone has patted. It was dim in the hall, enough light coming in by the loft windows so no candles were lit, but not enough to see well by. Nevertheless, I marked a reddening in both their faces.

  Gerald drew a long breath and fumbled about; his clothes were made with pockets. He brought out a small parchment box and from it took a little white stick that he put in his mouth. Then he took out another box, and a wooden stick from it which burst into flame when scratched. With the fire he kindled the stick in his mouth, and sucked in the smoke.

  We all stared. “Is that a Christian rite?” asked Helgi.

  “No . . . not just so.” A wry, disappointed smile twisted his lips. “I’d have thought you’d be more surprised, even terrified.”

  “It’s something new,” I admitted, “but were a sober folk on Iceland. Those fire sticks could be useful. Did you come to trade in them?”

  “Hardly.” He sighed. The smoke he breathed in seemed to steady him, which was odd, because the smoke in the hall had made him cough and water at the eyes. “The truth is . . . something you will not believe. I can scarce believe it myself.”

  We waited. Thorgunna stood leaning forward, her lips parted.

  “That lightning bolt-” Gerald nodded wearily. “I was out in the storm, and somehow the lightning must have struck me in just the right way, a way that happens only once in many thousands of times. It threw me back into the past.”

  Those were his words, priest. I did not understand, and told him so.

  “It’s hard to see,” he agreed. “God give that I’m only dreaming. But if this is a dream, I must endure till I wake up . . . well, look. I was born one thousand, nine hundred and thirty-two years after Christ, in a land to the west which you have not yet found. In the twenty-third year of my life, I was in Iceland as part of my country’s army. The lightning struck me, and now . . . now it is less than one thousand years after Christ, and yet I am here—almost a thousand years before I was born, I am here!”

  We sat very still. I signed myself with the Hammer and took a long pull from my horn. One of the maids whimpered, and Ragnhild whispered so fiercely I could hear. “Be still. The poor fellow’s out of his head. There’s no harm in him.”

  I agreed with her, though less sure of the last part of it. The gods can speak through a madman, and the gods are not always to be trusted. Or he could turn berserker, or he could be under a heavy curse that would also touch us.

  He sat staring before him, and I caught a few fleas and cracked them while I thought about it. Gerald noticed and asked with some horror if we had many fleas here.

  “Why, of course,” said Thorgunna. “Have you none?”

  “No.” He smiled crookedly. “Not yet.”

  “Ah,” she sighed, “you must be sick.”

  She was a level-headed girl. I saw her thought, and so did Ragnhild and Helgi. Clearly, a man so sick that he had no fleas could be expected to rave. There was still some worry about whether we might catch the illness, but I deemed it unlikely; his trouble was all in the head, perhaps from a blow he had taken. In any case, the matter was come down to earth now, something we could deal with.

  As a godi, a chief who holds sacrifices, it behooved me not to turn a stranger out. Moreover, if he could fetch in many of those little fire-kindling sticks, a profitable trade might be built up. So I said Gerald should go to bed. He protested, but we manhandled him into the shut-bed and there he lay tired and was soon asleep. Thorgunna said she would take care of him.

  ~ * ~

  The next day I decided to sacrifice a horse, both because of the timber we had found and to take away any curse there might be on Gerald. Furthermore, the beast I had picked was old and useless, and we were short of fresh meat. Gerald had spent the day lounging moodily around the garth, but when I came in to supper I found him and my daughter laughing.

  “You seem to be on the road to health,” I said.

  “Oh yes. It . . . could be worse for me.” He sat down at my side as the carles set up the trestle table and the maids brought in the food. “I was ever much taken with the age of the vikings, and I have some skills.”

  “Well,” I said, “if you’ve no home, we can keep you here for a while.”

  “I can work,” he said eagerly. “I’ll be worth my pay.”

  Now I knew he was from a far land, because what chief would work on any land but his own, and for hire at that? Yet he had the easy manner of the highborn, and had clearly eaten well all his life. I overlooked that he had made no gifts; after all, he was shipwrecked.

  “Maybe you can get passage back to your United States,” said Helgi. “We could hire a ship. I’m fain to see that realm.”

  “No,” said Gerald bleakly. “There is no such place. Not yet.”

  “So you still hold to that idea you came from tomorrow?” grunted Sigurd. “Crazy notion. Pass the pork.”

  “I do,” said Gerald. There was a calm on him now. “And I can prove it.”

  “I don’t see how you speak our tongue, if you come from so far away,” I said. I would not call a man a liar to his face, unless we were swapping brags in a friendly way, but . . .

  “They speak otherwise in my land and time,” he replied, “but it happens that in Iceland the tongue changed little since the old days, and I learned it when I came there.”

  “If you are a Christian,” I said, “you must bear with us while we sacrifice tonight.”

  “I’ve naught against that,” he said. “I fear I never was a very good Christian. I’d like to watch. How is it done?”

  I told him how I would smite the horse with a hammer before the god, and cut his throat, and sprinkle the blood about with willow twigs; thereafter we would butcher the carcass and feast. He said hastily:

  “There’s my chance to prove what I am. I have a weapon that will kill the horse with . . . with a flash of lightning.”

  “What is it?” I wondered. We all crowded around while he took the metal club out of his sheath and showed it to us. I had my doubts; it looked well enough for hitting a man, perhaps, but had no edge, though a wondrously skillful smith had forged it. “Well, we can try,” I said.

  He showed us what else he had in his pockets. There were some coins of remarkable roundness and sharpness, a small key, a stick with lead in it for writing, a flat purse holding many bits of marked paper; when he told us solemnly that some of this paper was money, even Thorgunna had to laugh. Best of all was a knife whose blade folded into the handle. When he saw me admiring that, he gave it to me, which was well done for a shipwrecked man. I said I would give him clothes and a good ax, as well as lodging for as long as needful.

  No, I don’t have the knife now. You shall hear why. It’s a pity, for it was a good knife, though rather small.

  “What were you ere the war arrow went out in your land?” asked Helgi. “A merchant?”

  “No,” said Gerald. “I was an . . . engineer . . . that is, I was learning how to be one. That’s a man who builds things, bridges and roads and tools . . . more than just an artisan. So I think my knowledge could be of great value here.” I saw a fever in his eyes. “Yes, give me time and I’ll be a king!”

  “We have no king in Iceland,” I grunted. “Our forefathers came hither to get away-from kings. Now we meet at the Things to try suits and pass new laws, but each man must get his own redress as best he can.”

  “But suppose the man in the wrong won’t yield?” he asked.

  “Then there can be a fine feud,” said Helgi, an
d went on to relate with sparkling eyes some of the killings there had lately been. Gerald looked unhappy and fingered his gun. That is what he called his fire-spitting club.

  “Your clothing is rich,” said Thorgunna softly. “Your folk must own broad acres at home.”

  “No,” he said, “our . . . our king gives every man in the army clothes like these. As for my family, we owned no land, we rented our home in a building where many other families also dwelt.”

  I am not purse-proud, but it seemed to me he had not been honest, a landless man sharing my high seat like a chief. Thorgunna covered my huffiness by saying. “You will gain a farm later.”