This stretch in turn appeared to be the top of a plateau, falling away to the right. Mossy boulders shouldered up through the grass, which here and there gave way to patches of purple-flowered heather, while daisies nodded in the steady breeze. Here and there was a single tree, but down in the valley beyond their plateau the low land was covered with what appeared at this distance to be birch and oak. In the distance, as they turned to contemplate the scene, rose the heads of farblue mountains.

The cloud-cover thinned rapidly and broke some more. The air had cleared enough so they could now see two other little storms sweeping across the middle distance, trailing their veils of rain. As the patches of sunlight whisked past, the landscape blazed with a singularly vivid green, quite unlike that of Ohio.

Brodsky was the first to speak. «If this is Ohio, I’m a peterman,» he said. «Listen, Shea, do I got to tell you again you ain’t got much time? If those yaps from the D.A.’s office get started on this, you might just as well hit yourself on the head and save them the trouble. He’s coming up for election this fall and needs a nice fat case. And there’s the F.B.I. Rover boys — they just love snatch cases, and you can’t put no fix in with them that will stick. So you better get me back before people start asking questions.»

Shea said, rather desperately, «Pete, I’m doing all I can. Honest. I haven’t the least idea where we are, or in what period. Until I do, I don’t dare try sending us anywhere else. We’ve already picked up a rather high charge of magical static coming here, and any spell I used without knowing what kind of magic they use around here is apt to make us simply disappear or end up in Hell — you know, real red hell with flames all around, like in a fundamentalist church.»

«Okay,» said Brodsky. «You got the office. Me, I don’t think you got more than a week to get us back at the outside.»