Towards new goals

Chapter 24. Singeing the Beard. The quartet trudged down the time tunnel in silence. Each was lost in his own thoughts. ÖffliBöffli was thinking about how close they had come to leaving their heads in a basket under the guillotine. Forward, or rather downward, they went at a leisurely pace. Out of nowhere, a massive iron ball came clattering through a shattered door. The door had been splintered into smithereens. Not a single piece was large enough to carry a date. Kalle Kanon studied the iron ball, and with his highly trained artillery eye, identified it as 36-pound cannonball. "Someone nearby is firing a very powerful Kanon for whatever purpose. Let's go through the door and find out what's going on,'' Kalle Kanon said, excited at the prospect of seeing the enormous Kanon and perhaps meeting some healthy action. That grade of Kanon was not something one encountered every day. After some consideration and discussion, they decided to venture through the time warp. They emerged onto a flowery meadow which sloped gently down toward the sea. A mighty full-rigged warship lay out off shore. All her Kanon ports were open. From them issued puffs of black smoke. "Throw yourselves to the ground! NOW!'' yelled Kalle Kanon. ''That ship is firing at us!" All four of them dropped to the ground and tried to make themselves as small as possible. A second later, cannonballs whizzed over their heads and landed further up the meadow. Large pillars of earth exploded high into the air where the cannonballs had struck the ground with heavy thuds. Then they noticed that large canvasses had been erected. On them had been painted an array of fighting sailing ships. "False alarm! Relax! They're just having target practice'', Pelle Pistol assured them and as he stood up. "Yes, they sure need the practice," growled Kalle Kanon. ''They're miserable artillery men. Poor shots." "Let's move along and try to find out where we've landed,'' said ÖffliBöffli, taking the lead. They came upon a country road winding between green knolls and fields of swaying crops. After a while, they met a farmer leisurely driving a hay wagon pulled by a team of oxen. The old man stopped and stared suspiciously at the four in front of him. "Who are you?'' the farmer asked sourly, displaying the remnants of a set of very bad teeth. ÖffliBöffli introduced himself and his friends, and asked, "What country is this?" "That's the dumbest question I've heard in years. You are in the realm of Her Majesty Elizabeth the First, our glorious Gloriana, Queen of England, the world's only real country. Which country, indeed! There is no other,'' the farmer snapped sourly. ''His bad teeth presumably cause him severe digestive problems, which would explain why he's so sour,'' muttered ÖffliBöffli. "One last silly question, if you please. What year is this?'' he added. "You really are a numskull! It's the year of our Lord 1588. And before you ask any more scatterbrained questions, this is the road