Authors: Kerstin Gier
“Why not?” I asked. “Wasn’t that the whole idea?”
“Well, yes,” he said, squinting at the thick folio volume he had brought. “I suppose
you’re right. At least that way we can make sure it works, even if we don’t have much time left.” Suddenly he was all eager again. Leaning forward, he opened the volume of the
Annals.
“We have to take care not to pick a date when you’d burst into the middle of a Lodge meeting here. Or run into one of the de Villiers brothers. They spent hours and hours of their lives elapsing in the Dragon Hall.”
“Could I maybe meet Lady Tilney? Alone?” I’d had another good idea. “Preferably sometime after 1912.”
“I wonder if that would be wise.” Lucas was leafing through the volume. “We don’t want to make things more complicated than they already are.”
“But we can’t afford to waste our few chances,” I cried, thinking of what Lesley kept on telling me. I was to exploit every opportunity, she said, and
above all, ask as many questions as I could think of. “Who knows when the next chance may come?” I asked. “There could be something else in the chest, and it might not get me any farther. When did you and I first meet?”
“On 12 August 1948, at twelve noon,” said Lucas, deep in the Annals. “I’ll never forget it.”
“Exactly, and to make sure you never forget it, I’m going to write it down for you,”
I said. Yes, I really was a bit of a genius, I thought. I scribbled on a page in my notebook:
For Lord Lucas Montrose—important!!!
12 August 1948, 12 noon, the alchemical laboratory. Please come alone.
Gwyneth Shepherd
I tore the page out with a flourish and folded it.
My grandfather glanced up from the folio for a moment. “I could send you to the year 1852, 16 February, at midnight. That’s
where Lady Tilney elapses after leaving her own time on 25 December 1929, at nine
A.M.
,” he murmured. “Poor thing, she couldn’t even spend Christmas Day in comfort at home. At least they gave her a kerosene lamp. Listen, this is what it says here:
12:30
P.M.
: Lady Tilney comes back from the year 1852 seeming very cheerful. By the light of the kerosene lamp she took, she finished making two crochet-work
piglets for the charity bazaar on Twelfth Night, to be held this year on the theme of Country Life.
” He turned to look at me. “Crochet-work pigs! Can you imagine it? Of course, she may get the shock of her life if you suddenly appear out of nowhere. Do we really want to risk it?”
“She’s armed only with a crochet hook, and they have blunt ends as far as I remember.” I bent over the chronograph.
“Right, first the year. 1852, that begins with M, right? MDCCCLII. And the month of February is number three in the Celtic calendar you were talking about—no, four—”
“What are you doing? We have to bandage that cut and do some thinking first.”
“No time,” I said. “The day … this lever sets it, right?”
Lucas was looking anxiously over my shoulder. “Not so fast! It has to be exactly right, or
else … or else…” He was looking likely to throw up again. “And you must never be holding the chronograph, or you’ll take it into the past with you. And then you couldn’t get back.”
“Like Lucy and Paul,” I whispered.
“Let’s choose a brief three-minute window of time, to be on the safe side. Make it twelve thirty to twelve thirty-three
A.M.
Then at least she’ll be sitting comfortably making crochet-work
piglets. If she happens to be asleep, don’t wake her, or she might have a heart attack—”
“But then wouldn’t it say so in the
Annals
?” I interrupted him. “When I met Lady Tilney I got the impression that she was a pretty tough character, not the sort to fall down in a faint.”
Lucas moved the chronograph over to the window and put it down behind the curtain. “We can be sure there won’t be any
furniture standing here. No need to roll your eyes. Timothy de Villiers once made a crash landing on a table and broke his leg.”
“So suppose Lady Tilney is standing right here looking dreamily out at the night? Oh, don’t look at me like that! Only joking, Grandpa.” I pushed him gently aside, knelt on the floor in front of the chronograph, and opened the little flap just under the ruby. It was
exactly the right size for my finger.
“Wait a moment! Your cut!”
“We can see to that in three minutes’ time. See you then,” I said, taking a deep breath and pressing my fingertip down firmly on the needle.
The familiar dizzy roller-coaster sensation came over me, and as the red light began to glow and Lucas was saying, “But I still have to…,” everything blurred before my eyes.
While rumor has it that the Jacobite army has reached Derby and is now advancing on London, we have moved into our new headquarters. We sincerely hope that reports of 10,000 French soldiers joining the forces of Prince Charles Edward Stuart, the Young Pretender to the throne (known to the populace as Bonnie Prince Charlie), will prove mistaken, so that we can celebrate a peaceful Christmas
in the city. It is impossible to imagine more suitable accommodation for the Guardians than the venerable buildings here in the Temple. The Knights Templar themselves were, after all, guardians of great mysteries. Not only is Temple Church within sight of our premises, its catacombs are connected to ours. Officially we will be going about our everyday professions from the Temple, but there will also
be accommodation for adepts, novices, and guests, and of course for our servants, as well as several laboratories designed for alchemical purposes. We are glad to say that the slanders spread by Lord Alastair (see report of 2 December) have not succeeded in disrupting the good relations of Count Saint-Germain with the Prince of Wales and that, thanks to the patronage of His Highness, we have been
able to acquire this complex of buildings. The solemn ceremony in which the secret documents of the Lodge are transferred from the hands of Count Saint-Germain to the members of the Inner Circle is to take place in the Dragon Hall today.
F
ROM
T
HE
A
NNALS OF THE
G
UARDIANS
18
D
ECEMBER 1745
R
EPORT:
S
IR
O
LIVER
N
EWTON
, I
NNER
C
IRCLE
FOUR
IT TOOK ME
a few seconds to get used to the different lighting conditions. The hall was lit only by an oil lamp on the table. The picture I saw by its warm but meager light was a comfortable still life: a basket, several balls of pink wool, a teapot with a felt tea cozy, and a cup decorated with roses. Also Lady Tilney, who was sitting on a chair doing crochet, and at the sight of me
let her hands sink to her lap. She was obviously older than when we last met, with silver strands in her red hair, which had been neatly permed. All the same, she still had the same majestic, unapproachable look as my grandmother. And she didn’t look in the least likely to scream or go for me brandishing her crochet hook.
“Happy Christmas,” she said.
“Happy Christmas,” I replied, slightly bewildered.
For a moment I didn’t know what to say next, but then I pulled myself together. “Don’t worry, I’m not after some of your blood or anything like that.” I stepped out of the shadow of the curtain.
“Oh, we settled all that business about the blood long ago, Gwyneth,” said Lady Tilney, with a touch of reproof in her voice, as if I ought to know exactly what she was talking about. “I’ve been wondering
when you’d turn up again. Tea?”
“No, thank you. Look, I’m afraid I only have a few minutes.” I went a step closer and handed her the note. “My grandfather has to get this so that … well, so that everything will happen the way it did happen. It’s very important.”
“I understand.” Lady Tilney took the note and unfolded it at her leisure. She didn’t seem in the least annoyed.
“Why were you expecting
me?” I asked.
“Because you told me not to be scared when you visited me. Unfortunately you didn’t say when that would be, so I’ve been waiting years and years for you to try scaring me.” She laughed quietly. “But making crochet pigs has a very soothing effect. To be honest, it easily sends you to sleep out of sheer boredom.”
I had a polite “It’s for a good cause, though,” on the tip of my tongue,
but when I glanced at the basket, I exclaimed instead, “Oh, aren’t they cute!” And they really were. Much larger than I’d have expected, like real soft toys, and true to life.
“Take one,” said Lady Tilney.
“Do you mean it?” I thought of Caroline and put my hand into the basket. The pigs felt all soft and fluffy.
“Angora and cashmere wool,” said Lady Tilney with a touch of pride in her voice.
“I never use any other. Most people crochet with sheep’s wool, but it’s so scratchy.”
“Er, yes. Thank you.” Clutching the little pink pig to my breast, I spent a moment pulling my thoughts together. Where had we been? I cleared my throat. “When do we meet next time? In the past, I mean?”
“That was 1912. Although it’s not next time from my point of view.” She sighed. “What exciting days those
were—”
“Oh, hell!” My stomach was doing its roller-coaster ride again. Why on earth hadn’t we chosen a larger window of time? “Then anyway, you know more than I do,” I said hastily. “There’s no time to go into detail, but … maybe you can give me some good advice to help me?” I had taken a couple of steps back in the direction of the window, out of the circle of lamplight.
“Advice?”
“Yes. Well,
something like: beware of…?” I looked at her expectantly.
“Beware of what?” Lady Tilney looked back at me just as expectantly.
“That’s just what I don’t know! What
ought
I to beware of?”
“Pastrami sandwiches, for one thing, and too much sunlight. It’s bad for the complexion,” said Lady Tilney firmly—and then she blurred in front of my eyes and I was back in the year 1956.
Pastrami sandwiches,
for heaven’s sake! I ought to have asked
who
I ought to beware of, not
what.
But it was too late now. I’d lost the opportunity.
“What on earth is that?” cried Lucas, when he saw the piglet.
Yes, and instead of making use of every precious second to get information out of Lady Tilney, I’d been idiot enough to spend time on a pink soft toy. “It’s a crochet pig, Grandfather, you can see it is,”
I said wearily. I was really disappointed in myself! “Angora and cashmere. Other people use scratchy sheep’s wool.”
“Our test seems to have worked, anyway,” said Lucas, shaking his head. “You can use the chronograph, and we can make a date to meet. In my house.”
“It was over much too quickly,” I wailed. “I didn’t find anything out.”
“At least you have a … er, a pig, and Lady Tilney didn’t have
a heart attack. Or did she?”
I shook my head helplessly. “Of course not.”
Lucas put the chronograph back in its velvet wrappings and took it over to the shrine. “Don’t worry. This way we have enough time to smuggle you back down to the cellar and go on making plans while we wait for you to travel back. Although if that useless Cantrell has slept off his hangover, I don’t know how we’ll talk
our way out of it this time.”
* * *
I FELT
positively euphoric when I finally landed back in the chronograph room in my own time. So maybe the trip to acquire the pink piglet (I’d stuffed it into my schoolbag) hadn’t brought much in the way of results, but Lucas and I had worked out a cunning plan. If the original chronograph really was in that chest, we wouldn’t have to depend on chance
anymore.
“Any special incidents?” Mr. Marley asked.
Well, let’s think: I’ve spent all afternoon conspiring with my grandfather, breaking all the rules. We read my blood into the chronograph, then we sent me back to the year 1852 to conspire with Lady Tilney.
Okay, I hadn’t actually been conspiring with her, but it was a forbidden meeting all the same.
“The lightbulb in the cellar flickered
now and then,” I said, “and I learned French vocabulary by heart.”
Mr. Marley bent over the journal, and in his neat, small handwriting, he actually did enter
1943 hours, the Ruby back from 1956, did her homework there, lightbulb flickered.
I suppressed a giggle. He had to keep such meticulous records of everything! I’d bet his star sign was Virgo. But it was later than I liked. I hoped Mum wouldn’t
send Lesley home before I was back.
However, Mr. Marley didn’t seem to be in any hurry. He screwed the top back on his fountain pen infuriatingly slowly.
“I can find my own way out,” I said.
“No, you mustn’t,” he said in alarm. “Of course I’ll escort you to the limousine.” Mr. Marley closed the journal and stood up. “And I have to blindfold you—you know I do.”
Sighing, I let him tie the black
scarf around my head. “I still don’t understand why I’m not supposed to know the way to this room.” Quite apart from the fact that I knew it perfectly well by now.
“Because that’s what it says in the
Annals
,” said Mr. Marley, sounding surprised.
“What?” I exclaimed. “My name’s in the
Annals
, and they say I mustn’t know the way here and back? Why not?”
Now Mr. Marley’s voice was distinctly uncomfortable.
“Naturally your name isn’t there, or all these years the other Ruby, I mean Miss Charlotte, of course, wouldn’t have—” He cleared his throat, then fell silent, and I heard him opening the door. “Allow me,” he said, taking my arm. He led me out into the corridor. I couldn’t see him, but I felt sure he was blushing furiously again. I felt as if I were walking along beside a radiant heater.
“What
exactly does it say about me there?” I asked.
“I’m sorry, but I really can’t … I’ve said too much already.” You could almost hear him wringing his hands, or at least the hand that wasn’t holding me. And this character claimed to be a descendant of the dangerous Rakoczy! What a joke!