Brett-James was shaking his head. "No. You see, by coincidence, a police squad car was coming down the street just at that moment to arrest Mr. Rossi. You would have been apprehended. As I understand Californian law of the period, your life would have been forfeit, Mr. Prantera."
Joe winced. It didn't occur to him to doubt their word.
Reston-Farrell said, "As to reward, Mr. Prantera, we have already told you there is ultra-abundance in this age. Once this task has been performed, we will sponsor your entry into present day society. Competent psychiatric therapy will soon remove your present—"
"Waita minute, now. You figure on gettin' me candled by some head shrinker, eh? No thanks, Buster. I'm going back to my own—"
Brett-James was shaking his head again. "I am afraid there is no return, Mr. Prantera. Time travel works but in one direction, with the flow of the time stream. There can be no return to your own era."
Joe Prantera had been rocking with the mental blows he had been assimilating, but this was the final haymaker. He was stuck in this squaresville of a world.
Joe Prantera on a job was thorough.
Careful, painstaking, competent.
He spent the first three days of his life in the year 2133 getting the feel of things. Brett-James and Reston-Farrell had been appointed to work with him. Joe didn't meet any of the others who belonged to the group which had taken the measures to bring him from the past. He didn't want to meet them. The fewer persons involved, the better.