Charlie arose. "Well, I guess we better go. So long and thanks, Colonel."
"What? Oh, so long, boys."
Douglas and John and Charlie went on tiptoe out the door.
Colonel Freeleigh, though they crossed his line of vision, did not see them go.
In the street, the boys were startled when someone shouted from a first-floor window above, "Hey!"
They looked up.
"Yes, sir, Colonel?"
The colonel leaned out, waving one arm.
"I thought about what you said, boys!"
"Yes, sir?"
"And--you're right! Why didn't I think of it before! A Time Machine, by God, a Time Machine!"
"Yes, sir."
"So long, boys. Come aboard any time!"
At the end of the street they turned again and the colonel was still waving. They waved back, feeling warm and good, then went on.
"Chug-a-chug," said John. "I can travel twelve years into the past. Wham-chug-ding!"
"Yeah," said Charlie, looking back at that quiet house, "but you can't go a hundred years."
"No," mused John, "I can't go a hundred years. That's really traveling. That's really some machine."
They walked for a full minute in silence, looking at their feet. They came to a fence.
"Last one over this fence," said Douglas, "is a girl."
All the way home they called Douglas "Dora."
Long after midnight Tom woke to find Douglas scribbling rapidly in the nickel tablet, by flashlight.
"Doug, what's up?"
"Up? Everything's up! I'm counting my blessings, Tom! Look here; the Happiness Machine didn't work out, did it? But, who cares! I got the whole year lined up, anyway. Need to run anywhere on the main streets, I got the Green Town Trolley to look around and spy on the world from. Need to run anywhere off the main streets, I knock on Miss Fern and Miss Roberta's door and they charge up the batteries on their electric runabout and we go sailing down the sidewalks. Need to run down alleys and over fences, to see that part of Green Town you only see around back and behind and creep up on, and I got my brand-new sneakers. Sneakers, runabout, trolley! I'm set! But even better, Tom, even better, listen! If I want to go where no one else can go because they're not smart enough to even think of it, if I w
ant to charge back to 1890 and then transfer to 1875 and transfer again crosstown to 1860 I just hop on the old Colonel Freeleigh Express! I'm writing it down here this way: 'Maybe old people were never children, like we claim with Mrs. Bentley, but, big or little, some of them were standing around at Appomattox the summer of 1865.' They got Indian vision and can sight back further than you and me will ever sight ahead."
"That sounds swell, Doug; what does it mean?"
Douglas went on writing. "It means you and me ain't got half the chance to be far-travelers they have. If we're lucky we'll hit forty, forty-five, fifty. That's just a jog around the block to them. It's when you hit ninety, ninety-five, a hundred, that you're far-traveling like heck."
The flashlight went out.
They lay there in the moonlight.
"Tom," whispered Douglas. "I got to travel all those ways. See what I can see. But most of all I got to visit Colonel Freeleigh once, twice, three times a week. He's better than all the other machines. He talks, you listen. And the more he talks the more he gets you to peering around and noticing things. He tells you you're riding on a very special train, by gosh, and sure enough, it's true. He's been down the track, and knows. And now here we come, you and me, along the same track, but further on, and so much looking and snuffing and handling things to do, you need old Colonel Freeleigh to shove and say look alive so you remember every second! Every darn thing there is to remember! So when kids come around when you're real old, you can do for them what the colonel once did for you. That's the way it is, Tom, I got to spend a lot of time visiting him and listening so I can go far-traveling with him as often as he can."
Tom was silent a moment. Then he looked over at Douglas there in the dark.