Chapter XVI

Turber took Nanette back to his time ship. A dozen canoes had arrived now, the treasure was nearly all loaded aboard. The Indian legends here had told of it—these chests buried on the shore of the water, up the river a day’s journey. How it got there no one can say. Left by some Mongol outlaw, perhaps—of that Eastern civilization which was here centuries before and which merged gradually into these savages the white man called Indians.

Turber had laid his plans. The renegade Dutchman—one Melyn from the Staten Island region—had been supplied with money by Turber. He had purchased trinkets—had bribed the Indians—organized and fitted out the expedition.

“And now we have it, little Nanette,” said Turber. “You will love me for all this wealth and luxury and power that I will lavish upon you.”

The ship was everywhere littered with treasure. Piles of broken, moldy chests; scattered with jewels strewn in heaps in the various cabins. Jewels fashionedin strange devices of beaten gold and silver, ankletsofgold, garlanded with insetsofrubies and emeralds,aheap of sapphires glowing like the tropic sea at night, gemmed bangles of a myriad designs, great metal vases, ornate with hydra-headed images—religious trappings of a heathen age, and fabulous Eastern riches. The ship started almost as soon as Turber and Nanette came aboard. It flashed forward in Time, and flew slowly in Space. Not far in Space—south down the Hudson River, across the harbor until it poised over Staten Island.

Turber sat with Nanette in the control room. She heard Josefa’s voice, but Turber ordered the woman away. Bluntnose was at the controls. How Josefa explained our escape Nanette never knew. Perhaps by blaming it upon the Indian—her word was as good as his. Turber with his treasure, and having recovered Nanette, was in too good a humor to bother with probing it.

Nanette knew that they were upon the last of the voyage now. Headed for the Great City of New York in the Time-world of 2445. Their permanent home.

“No more traveling, Nanette. We will conquer the world, you and I, and rule it together.”

Nanette was frightened, but she would not let him see it. Alone now. Alan and I, she thought, were gone from her forever.

It was a brief trip. They stopped, just for a moment, in the year 1779. It was a fairly large settlement here now on Staten Island, and the ship selected a safe landing place, came down in a field near it. A Colonial settlement, they called it, but it was in the hands of the enemy. Sir William Howe had landed in the Narrows two years before and now held all the island.

It was night again when the ship stopped.

Nanette sat in the control room and attentively listened to the new voices. All English now.

“Wolf Turber, we failed—”

“Yes?” His quiet voice was unruffled. “Did the sloop get in?”

“Last week. I have been here every night since—you come late, tonight of all nights! They’re fighting over in the marshes—this traitorous Mercer and his men.”

Turber interrupted: “About the sloop, Atwood! Who cares about Mercer?”

“Gad! You can brush me aside, but I’ve had a hellish time.”

“All right, Tony, I believe you.”

“It’s well you should.Ihad thoughtif you did not come tonight, by tomorrow Mercer’s troops must be here. And where would I be? Not here—that I promise you. As it is, Sir William does not think any too much of me. He called me somewhat of an ugly name last week. I think I am insulted.”

“Well, you didn’t get the gold?”

“No. The sloop got in—ninety days from the Bermudas in weather of the vilest sort. And then the blockade—but it got through. I have Somerset’s letter. Your money was spent—”

Turber laughed. “I fancy it was!”

“—spent in what I warrant must have been no less than a digging up of all the beach on Copper’s Island. Treasure there was none.” He added. “I did what I could. I hope this is your last passing, egad, it had better be, and take me with you. They’ll be sending me on a still longer journey if I stay around here.”

They took him aboard. The ship hung over Staten Island and sped forward again in Time. Through the 1800’s. The 1900’s. And then, while the huge city grew under it, sped on five hundred years farther. It took only half an hour.

Turber said: “We are here.” The ship had settled—a phantom setting down ina shadowy city. It rested on that same rise of ground on Staten Island which in 1962 held the Turber Hospital. It flashed to a halt in 2445. Through the windows Nanette heard the tumultuous road of the monstrous city. Turber led her from the ship.