Mastodonia

TWENTY

Rila and Ben were waiting for me, with Herb Livingston hovering in the background. In the front room of the new office building, which smelled of fresh sawdust, half a dozen people sat at desks, not doing much of anything.

Rila rushed forward and I caught her in my arms and held her tight. I’d never been so glad to see anyone.

What I had seen outside had been frightening — parked cars lining the road, others ranked in Ben’s parking lot, hot dog, hamburger and souvenir stands, men selling balloons. And people everywhere, mostly standing in groups and gawking, but with a strange sense of excitement. The whole thing was a cross between a county fair and a carnival.

“I worried about you,” said Rila. “And look at the get-up you have on. Where are your other clothes?”

“In Elrod’s car,” I said. “He supplied these.”, Ben shook hands gravely. “There’ve been changes since you left,” he said.

Herb came up to shake hands. “How’s the PR business?” I asked. “I read about you in the London papers.”

“Well, hell,” said Ben, “we needed someone real fast to handle those news jockeys out there when they came swarming in and Herb seemed to be the man.

He’s getting along all right.”

“They’re yelling for a press conference,” said Herb, “but I haven’t had the guts to go out and face them.

We didn’t want to do anything until you got back. I’ve been handing out little press releases. Not really telling them anything, but giving them some small things for new stories. What shall I tell them about you being back?”

“Tell them,” said Ben, “that he returned and immediately left for Mastodonia. That’s something we should always emphasize. He and Rila aren’t here; they live in Mastodonia.”

“Just wait until you see Mastodonia,” said Rila.

“It’s beautiful. So wild and beautiful. We drove in a mobile home the day before yesterday and are all settled in there. We have a couple of four-wheel drives, as well.”

“Hiram?” I asked.

“Hiram and Bowser are there.”

“And Catface?”

“Catface moved along with them. There’s a cluster of wild crab-apple trees just down the ridge and he’s taken up residence in them. Hiram says he likes the place. Says he wonders why he stuck around here so long and never went time-traveling on his own.”

“Let’s get back into my office,” said Ben. “I got some comfortable chairs there and a bottle to break open. We ought to have a drink on this.”

We settled down in the chairs, which were comfortable, and Ben poured the drinks.

“You have a good trip?” Herb asked me.

“I guess it was,” I said. “My French turned out to be a little rusty, but I managed. I had no trouble in Zurich. I’m not used to such things, but everything went all right.”

“Those Swiss,” said Ben, “will always take your money.”

“What I’ve been wanting to ask,” I said, “is who tipped off the press. The news break came a whole lot sooner than I had thought it would.”

“Courtney did,” said Rila. “Really not Courtney himself, but someone he knows who is an expert at leaking news. Really, it was Safari. They put pressure on Courtney. They are anxious to find what the prospects are in the dinosaur-hunting business. They want to know before they talk with us. It makes sense that sportsmen would jump at a chance to bag a dinosaur, but Safari wants to be dead certain sure. They want to get some prospective clients lined up before they start negotiating for our license.”

“It’s too early yet to know, I suppose.”

“We haven’t heard from Courtney in a day or two.

They’ll be in touch with him.”

“There has been a feeler or two here already,” said Ben. “A man was in this morning to see if we could put him into Inca territory before the conquistadors arrived. He wanted to study the ancient Incan culture, he said, but it quickly became apparent that what he was interested in was Incan treasure. I told him to get lost. A mining engineer came in with the idea that maybe we’d be willing to send him back to the Black Hills of South Dakota prior to the gold strike there.

He was quite above board about his intentions. He wanted to skim the cream of the gold locations. Said he had no money, but he’d go shares with us. I liked the man and put him on hold. Said all I could do was pass on the word to you.

I shook my head. “I don’t know about that. That is the kind of sticky business I had hoped we could avoid. When anyone travels into any sort of historical situation, a lot of care must be taken or you’ll wind up with a mess on your hands.”

“But you must have known,” said Herb, “that the problem would come up.

“But that’s the point,” said Rila. “Almost no one could afford to at the rates we’ll ask. Tourism should be discouraged even if people are willing to pay.

Tourists would be trouble.”

“I think,” said Ben, “we should take business as it comes. Weed out the phonies, like our Inca character, but take a hard look at all legitimate proposals.”

We talked then, idly, easily about other matters, paying attention to our drinks. Ben’s motel was up and a few of the units were ready for occupancy. The building was larger than he originally had intended and he was considering constructing a second one. The parking lot was making money. A lot of people in the village were offering rooms for rent. We were having trouble getting enough guards to patrol the fence and guard the gate; for the moment, the sheriff had assigned deputies to the gate until we could find men to replace them. Herb had turned the operation of his paper over to his former assistant and was planning to print daily free advertising sheets of four to six pages, to start with, to be handed out to the flood of visitors who were anticipated, the first surge of them already in evidence. Some village people were upset by the public influx, which they thought would change the easy life the town had known before, but various organizations, particularly the women’s groups, were planning chicken suppers, strawberry ice cream festivals and other fund-raising schemes.

We finished the drinks and Rila said to me, “And, now, Mastodonia. I’m dying to show it to you.”