It seemed impossible. They’d been in the time machine for such a long time, listening to the steady roar of the engines, the throbbing of the instruments. All that time they thought they were winging back toward home, whisking through time and space, back to America and the twentieth century.
But suppose something
… instruments hadn’t been calibrated correctly? Suppose, suppose, suppose they were really and truly back in Yucatan again, far from…
“Neil, are you listening to me?”
Neil snapped out of his gloomy thoughts. “I… I’m sorry, Dave. What did you say?”
“Look at that! A light, Neil. An electric light! A good, old, one-hundred-percent American electric light bulb!”
“What?”
“Yes! There, right ahead. It’s a house and a light.”
Neil stared, hardly willing to believe his eyes. “It is! It’s a light.” He looked closer. “Well, for crying out loud!”
“What’s the matter?” Dave asked.
Neil began laughing, his raucous bellow splitting the night air.
“What is it?” Dave demanded.
“That house,” Neil said between gales of laughter. “It’s Student Hall. We’re right on the campus, Dave. We’ve been right here since we landed.”
Dave stared around him in bewilderment. Then he slapped one hand against the other and started laughing. “You’re right! We’ve been floundering around in the woods behind the stadium. We’re home, boy! Home!”
They broke into a run, dashing out of the woods and onto the paved streets of the campus.
The campus looked exactly as they’d left it. Student Hall, proud and austere, covered with ivy. The street lamps glowing. The twisted walks covered with autumn leaves.
Autumn! It had been the beginning of summer when they left. Autumn!
They ran past the Exchange, past Crane Hall, past Examination Walk and into Faculty Row.
The little red brick house stood at the end of Faculty Row, a light glowing in the front room. They ran down the street, clattered up the front steps and hastily rang the bell.
“Just a minute,” came a voice from inside.
“My father,” Neil said breathlessly.
They heard the shuffle of slippers against a rug, and then the door opened. Doctor Falsen stood there, his head high, the neat, black beard covering the point of his chin.
He was standing! No cast, no cane.
He peered out into the darkness, his eyes squinting.
“Who is it?” he asked.
Neil bit his lip and grinned broadly. Doctor Falsen snapped on the porch lights. He was turning, his hand still on the switch, when he saw his visitors for the first time.
“Neil!” He shouted. And then as if uncertain this was really his son standing there, he asked, “Neil?”
Neil rushed into his father’s arms. “Dad, Dad.”
The two men stood on the steps, father and son. Doctor Falsen mumbled, “Neil, my boy, Neil. We thought you’d been…” His eyes saw Dave, and he extended a welcome hand to him. “Dave! My, I don’t know what to…” Tears rushed into his eyes.
He broke away from Neil and shouted. “Mother! Get down here, Mother. Neil is home!”
And then, in an outburst that seat of learning would remember for a long time, Doctor Falsen shouted to Faculty Row, “My son is home! My son is home! Come in, Neil. Come in. Don’t stand out there. Come in, come in!”
The Falsen household was a festive place that night. The faculty came and went, and Mrs. Falsen rushed here and there, serving her guests, hardly able to keep her eyes off her son. How he had grown! Students dropped in, and Neil talked for hours, explaining the trip, relating all the experiences he and Dave had known, telling all about Erik and Talu and the city of Chichen-Itza.
At last everyone was gone, and Neil sat in the quiet of his living room, talking to his father.
“You see, Dad,” he said, “we never did find Kukulcan. The trip was a failure.”
“Was it?” Doctor Falsen asked.
“Why, yes,” Neil said. “I just told you. There was no Kukulcan. The Mayas never heard of him.”
Doctor Falsen stroked his beard thoughtfully. “You didn’t know very much about Kukulcan, Neil,” he said. “Unfortunately, I didn’t tell you more before you left. But then, I didn’t know that Doctor Manning and Arthur Blake would…” His voice trailed off.
“I don’t understand, Dad.”
“Unless I’m greatly mistaken,” Doctor Falsen said, “the trip wasn’t such a failure, after all.”
“How do you mean?”
“We know very little about Kukulcan, but I’m sure you’ll be able to tell us a lot more about him now.”
Neil shook his head. “Dad, you don’t understand. We didn’t find Kukulcan. There was no such…”
“Kukulcan,” Doctor Falsen interrupted, “is described as a tall, white man with blond hair and a blond beard”
“Well, what’s that got to…”
“It is believed that he greatly influenced the agricultural habits of the Mayas.”
“Agricultural habits?” Neil asked, a faint glimmer of understanding beginning to seep into his mind.