"And ... and will ye take Easy Money to this land whereof ye speak, Sir Thomas?"
"Sir Thomas" grinned. "Wit ye well," he said, "and his buddy, too. Come on."
In the Yore, he tossed his helmet and gauntlets into a corner of the rec-hall and proceeded straight to the control room. There, with Rowena standing at his elbow, he set the time-dial for June 21, 2178 and the space-dial for the Kansas City Time-Tourist Port. Lord, it would be good to get home again and get a haircut! "Here goes," he told Rowena, and threw the switch.
There was a faint tremor. "Brace yourself, Rowena," he said, and took her over to the control-room telewindow.
Together, they gazed upon the screen. Mallory gasped. The vista of spiral suburban dwellings which he had been expecting was not in the offing. In its stead was a green, tree-stippled countryside. In the distance, a castle was clearly discernible.
He stared at it. It wasn't a sixth-century job like Carbonek—it was much more modern. But it was still a castle. Obviously, the jump-board had malfunctioned and thrown the Yore only a little ways into the future, the while leaving it in pretty much the same locale.
He returned to the jump-board to find out. Just as he reached it, its lights flickered and went out. The time and space-dials, however, remained illumined long enough for him to see when and where the TSB had re-materialized. The year was 1428 A.D.; the locale, Warwickshire.
Mallory made tracks for the generator room. The generator was smoking, and the room reeked with the stench of shorted wires.