Touchstone Season One- Complete Box Set

by Andy Conway

  Rachel thought about herself and how this ability had manifested itself as she started University.

  “But this is stronger than that,” said Mitch. “There’s a lot of bad energy around this house. It goes on for years. I can feel it. But something really unspeakable happens here on the night of 27th January, 1934.”

  Mrs Hudson let out an exasperated sigh. “Which just happens to be the exact same night of a certain crooner’s concert just around the corner. The very night my parents met and fell in love.”

  Rachel felt that feeling again: something crawling all the way up her back and her neck, with its scaly hand settling on her skull. It was the feeling she got when she sensed something very bad was about to happen. More and more it was a feeling that was becoming exclusively connected to Danny.

  “A crooner?”

  “Yes,” said Mrs Hudson. “A very special crooner who made a very special visit here and no doubt caused the births of a great many children nine months later. One of them being me.”

  “I think my friend Charlie is arranging that event,” said Rachel. “Is his name... Benny Orphan?”

  They all looked at her with shock now.

  “What do you know about it?” said Mrs Hudson.

  “What I said. Charlie’s my friend in the past. He’s helped me every time. I’ve just met him again in 1934 and he’s organising that concert. He’s very keen that it’s going to happen,” she added.

  “You’d better be right,” snapped Mrs Hudson. “That concert has to happen.”

  “Why would I try to stop it?”

  “Someone wants to.”

  “It’s obviously Fenwick,” said Kath. “You said so yourself.”

  The slimy hand that had tickled its way up her back and neck now dug its nails into Rachel’s skull. “Oh, God,” she said.

  They all looked at her.

  “What is it, girl?” snapped Mrs Hudson.

  “Just before I came back. I saw Danny arrive. He’s gone to 1934.”

  Mrs Hudson buried her face in her hands and slumped down onto the garden wall.

  “I’m sure he has no intention of preventing your parents meeting,” said Kath.

  “Are you?” said Mrs Hudson. “And what gives you such faith in his inherent goodness, Katherine?”

  Kath reddened and looked at the pavement. “I just don’t think he’s evil.”

  “I do,” said Rachel.

  “No one’s evil,” sighed Mrs Hudson. “But some people do evil things because they’re selfish. They only see their own needs. Fenwick was the same: he got drunk on his own sense of power and pursued it regardless of the damage it’s done to anyone around him. Danny is no doubt the same.”

  “It’s Amy Parker,” said Rachel. “He saved her life in 1912 and that’s what wiped out my life. He’s been preventing me from correcting that ever since.”

  “Who is she?” asked Kath.

  “He’s obsessed with her,” said Rachel. “If he’s gone back to 1934 you can bet your last farthing it’s to see her.”

  “Well, that’s something,” said Mrs Hudson. “But I still don’t like it. I don’t want him anywhere near the moment my parents first get together. I’m sure Fenwick is leading him there.”

  “I’ll go there and stop him,” said Rachel.

  “I don’t want you going there and changing anything,” said Mrs Hudson.

  Rachel unconsciously gripped her canvas bag a little closer to her side. Kath looked the other way.

  “You’ve got to let me go there,” said Rachel. “My friend is arranging that concert and I can help him. It makes sense.”

  Mrs Hudson rubbed her eyes and sighed and pushed herself back to her feet. She stared at Rachel for a while, as if she were trying to burrow her way into her soul. Was she reading her mind? Would she find out about the almanac?

  “I thought you were only interested in getting your life back?” said Mrs Hudson.

  She was right, Rachel realized. It was stupid to want to go to Charlie. There was no way Charlie could help her get her back to her old life with her dad. He’d already done everything he could.

  “1980,” she mumbled. “That’s where it happens. I think. This Amy Parker who should have died: she has a granddaughter who meets my dad in 1980, instead of my real mum. But I don’t know how to get there. If I could do it, I would. But I just go to 1934 instead.”

  Something in Mrs Hudson’s face thawed. She saw the lost girl in Rachel. She nodded and hugged her. “Oh, you poor girl. Don’t worry. We’ll help you. Of course we will. Please forgive me for being so wrapped up in my own troubles.”

  Rachel felt tears spring to her eyes and blinked them back.

  “But as you can only get to 1934, and as it seems you could be very useful there, why don’t you help us? And then we’ll help you in 1980?”

  Rachel nodded and smiled. “Thank you.”

  Kath and Mitch were grinning. They both patted her on the back.

  “Welcome to the team,” said Mitch.

  She felt a wave of pride swell inside her. It looked like all she had to do was make sure this concert happened, for Mrs Hudson’s sake, and then they would help her with her own problem. In some other time. Some other time that didn’t involve Charlie.

  Perhaps this had been Charlie’s sole purpose all along: the man who was arranging the concert where Mrs Hudson’s parents would fall in love. If that happened, Mrs Hudson could then help Rachel get her own life back.

  It seemed such a small part to play for a man who’d become so important to her.

  “You go to this friend of yours, Charlie,” said Mrs Hudson. “Make sure nothing changes. Use whatever influence you have with him to make sure this concert happens. We’ll take care of this anomaly here. And we’ll join you on the night in question.”

  Mrs Hudson turned and gazed up at the dirty windows and the flaking blue paint. The meeting was over.

  — 10 —

  “I THINK SHE’S A LITTLE bit tense,” said Kath as they walked back to her Mini. “She’s usually much nicer.”

  Mitch trotted over to them and murmured, “Go to my shop. You’ll need some money.”

  They both nodded and looked at Mrs Hudson, still gazing at the derelict house.

  Kath drove back to Moseley and stopped at Mitch’s junk shop, Buygones. She said nothing about Rachel’s almanac and her intention to hand it to Charlie, which was most definitely an attempt to change the past. It was an unspoken secret between them.

  Mitch came by a little later, after driving Mrs Hudson home, rattling his keys and opening up for them.

  He opened a drawer below the counter and Rachel caught a glimpse of a series of envelopes with random years written on them. He pulled out one marked 1933, heavy with coins, and emptied it out on the counter.

  Various dirty copper and silver coins poured out, all bearing the King’s head. There were some large white banknotes too.

  “Okay,” said Mitch. “This is a farthing. You get four of these to a penny. Here’s your shilling — that’s twelve pence. People also called these a bob. There’s also these thrupenny bits. They call that a joey. Worthless even during a Depression. You get four joeys to the shilling, or two of these sixpences. They’re also called tanners. Now, it’s not like decimalisation. You don’t get a hundred pennies to the pound, it’s 240. That’s twenty shillings. This is a pound note. Or a twenty bob note in the vernacular. This is a ten bob note — that’s 120 pence, or ten shillings, so half a pound. That’s the simple stuff. These two here make it a bit more complicated. This is the florin, which is a two shilling piece, worth 24 pennies, and this is the half crown, which is worth 30 pence, or two and six. Have you got that?”

  Rachel looked him in the eye. “Oh yes, totally.”

  Mitch smiled and dug around in a box full of purses, pulling out a fetching lime green one with a metal clasp. He poured most of the coins into it and a few notes.

  “You probably won’t need the notes as almost everything
costs a few bob. If you get rumbled, just pretend to be American. Always works for me.”

  Rachel took the purse and slipped it into her handbag.

  “Thank you, Mitch. That’s really kind of you.”

  “Good luck,” he said. “I have to say, I’m really excited to have you on board.”

  He shook her hand and she felt suddenly nervous, as if she’d been mistaken for a famous person.

  “Do you want me to walk you to...’ Kath let it trail off, feeling stupid.

  “I’m fine,” said Rachel. “I’ve got some clothes at my flat I can take with me. I’ll collect those on the way.”

  She went to the door and turned to see them watching her.

  “I’ll see you in 1934 then?”

  “We’ll be there,” said Mitch. “Good luck.”

  She waved and walked out, rushing to her flat. Being in Mitch’s shop had reminded her of the suitcase. She had a case full of old clothes, given to her by Maddy Parker after her mother died in ‘66. There was a particularly lovely ball gown. Maddy had wanted it all thrown out before the funeral. Rachel had offered to take it off her hands.

  When she’d woken up back in her apartment, the case had been there, and she’d never known if it had somehow materialized with her or if Charlie had just kept it there for her all those years.

  It was at the bottom of the wardrobe. She pulled out a few things that were obviously too old for her, threw the almanac in there and snapped it shut.

  No one noticed the girl in the late-fifties suit with the old suitcase as she walked into St Mary’s churchyard. She simply looked like one of any number of girls wearing vintage fashions in 2013.

  An hour ago, she thought, she’d only intended to go back and throw the book at Charlie and then have nothing more to do with him. Now she smiled as she walked towards the touchstone. She smiled because she had a mission, and the mission involved getting to know Charlie all over again.

  — 11 —

  AMY PARKER SMOOTHED out her dress and checked her face in the kitchen mirror. The light was useless here, by the back door where the tin bath hung next to the privy. She ought to check her face in the dressing table mirror in her bedroom.

  She dug lipstick from her handbag and put it to her lips, then changed her mind.

  It was the Ogbornes’ tea party next door, not a ball. And besides, today wasn’t about her; it was about Little Amy.

  She half laughed bitterly to herself.

  Little Amy, the teenage girl who was about to call with her mother, Mrs Dowd. How everyone chuckled at the confusion over their names. Then the devastation as they’d called the girl ‘Young Amy’ then realized with embarrassment that that meant she’d have to be ‘Old Amy’.

  Old. At the grand old decrepit age of thirty-four.

  She didn’t feel old. A lot of women married at about her age. But she sensed her options were thinning out rapidly. There weren’t many men in Moseley who showed any interest in her, due to the whiff of scandal regarding her father.

  She heard their whispers. The women more than the men. The women were cruel, malicious, full of spite. The men tried to ignore it, but privately made a mental note to avoid her.

  Constable Davies was about the only man around who smiled at her, even touched the peak of his hat when he passed her desk at work.

  She wondered if he would be at the dance this weekend. She let herself imagine him asking her to dance, taking her in his arms, swirling to the music, his body against hers, her hand resting on his broad shoulder.

  No.

  He wouldn’t ask her to dance. No one ever did. She was damaged goods. She was the girl whose father had died in the loony bin.

  She was Old Amy, Big Amy, On the Shelf Amy.

  But there had been the boy, Danny Pearce, who’d appeared suddenly, mysteriously, and rescued her from her insane father, and just as suddenly disappeared again, never to return. There had been many times when she thought she’d seen him. But it was always mistaken identity. And even a man who looked like him suddenly seemed less handsome when she discovered it wasn’t him.

  The doorbell chimed.

  She focussed on her own face and realized she’d been staring at her reflection in the misty mirror for ages. She scowled and dashed to the front door.

  Mrs Dowd stood there in a floral summer dress that looked like it had been made from a pair of curtains ripped down from a ballroom window. Her mole eyes squinted through pint glass spectacles.

  Now here’s someone who really deserved to be called Big and Old, thought Amy. And then felt guilty for her bitterness.

  Little Amy stepped from behind her mother’s giant frame and Amy took in a startled breath.

  Little Amy Dowd looked beautiful in a white flapper’s dress and matching cloche hat. Her pretty eyes sparkled with genuine warmth as she rushed to hug her.

  Was this the only person in Moseley who actually liked her?

  “Hello, Auntie Amy!”

  Amy gave her a peck on the cheek and held her out, looking her up and down.

  “My! You look absolutely lovely.”

  She was not Little Amy’s aunt. There was no family connection at all with the Dowds. But this was how it was. A youngster could not call her parents’ friends by their first names, so you became their aunts and uncles.

  Mrs Dowd blinked up at the sky. “Nice day, considering.”

  “Surprisingly warm for January.”

  She ushered them through to the parlour where a pot of tea was waiting under a cosy. Mrs Dowd slumped into the sofa as if she’d walked a hundred miles to be here, instead of a hundred yards. Little Amy slid into a spot beside her.

  “I thought we were going next door for tea,” said Mrs Dowd.

  “Well, I suppose we are,” said Amy. “This is sort of the pre-tea.”

  Little Amy giggled.

  Mrs Dowd grunted and took a teacup and saucer, slurping at it. “Are they in?”

  Amy nodded. “I saw Mrs Ogborne in the garden this morning.”

  An embarrassed silence fell between them. Little Amy looked from one to the other and for the first time, Amy could see she was only a girl, not a young woman. The whole thing felt ridiculous.

  “Auntie Amy?”

  “Yes?”

  “Can I turn on your radio?”

  “May I!” barked Mrs Dowd. “How many times?”

  “May I?” said Little Amy.

  “Of course,” said Amy. “It’s in the next room. You know where it is.”

  Little Amy dashed out and the sound of a dance band cooing their way through Why Should I Beg for Love? wafted through to the parlour.

  “That girl,” complained Mrs Dowd. “Always with the songs. Can’t go anywhere without the radio on. She’s more excited about this bloomin’ Orphan fellah pitching up than she is about today.”

  “I suppose she knows Benny Orphan better than she knows Harold next door,” said Amy.

  “How could she? That’s bloody daft.”

  “I mean. Well, Benny Orphan makes you feel like he’s singing just for you. Every night he’s on the radio, whispering sweet nothings in your ear. Young girls like that.”

  Amy gave up explaining. It wasn’t only young girls who liked that.

  Mrs Dowd looked at her like she was crazy. “She’s never seen Benny Orphan. She’s seen Harold Ogborne.”

  “Yes. I suppose so.”

  Amy pictured young Harold next door, a spotty teenager with a scrawny neck, fidgeting, waiting for Little Amy to arrive. It was going to be awful.

  They were going to marry her off to the boy and kill her dreams, and Amy was going to be one of the co-conspirators. And all because she lived next door to them and it seemed more appropriate that she should be the go-between.

  “Harold’s a good lad too,” said Mrs Dowd. “Not like most young men his age. Left school early. Walked straight to Braddock’s factory round the corner and asked for a job. On the machines in no time. Four years he’s been there now. Eighteen th
is year and already the man of the house. A wage earner. Good thing to have.”

  “Yes,” said Amy. “Quite right.”

  How could Benny Orphan, handsome, rich, debonair crooner, possibly compete with all that?

  “Between you and me,” said Mrs Dowd, lowering her voice to a whisper. “I think young Harold’s going to pop the question on Saturday. At the dance.”

  “That’s romantic,” said Amy.

  She felt happy for the girl. Then realized that Little Amy would be married before her. She really would be On The Shelf Amy then.

  “I suppose we’d better get round there,” said Mrs Dowd.

  “I’ll go and get her,” said Amy, putting her teacup aside and smoothing her dress down.

  Little Amy was sitting with her head right next to the radio, humming along. “Can I just hear the end of this song?”

  Amy sat beside her and nodded, wondering if the girl wanted to delay the meeting with Harold.

  They listened together for a while as some unknown crooner whispered their dreams.

  “This is like the man in my dreams,” said Little Amy.

  “The what?”

  “There’s a man that I’ve dreamed about. I can see his face and everything. I’ve seen him a few times in my dreams. It’s almost as if no real man can match up to him. I think I’ll see him for real one day.”

  Amy reached out and stroked the girl’s forearm.

  She knew exactly what she meant.

  — 12 —

  RACHEL CLIMBED THE iron steps to Charlie’s door and slipped the note through the letterbox. She rang the bell and had scooted down the steps and out of the yard before Charlie had read the note and opened the door.

  The note said:

  Mohan Singh, Indian aviator, flying from Croydon to Cape Town trying to set the world record, will crash his plane near Paris this afternoon. He will escape with nothing but a broken leg. If you want to know more, I am sitting in Drucker’s across the road. Please come. — Rachel.

  Drucker’s looked almost exactly the same as it had — or would do — when she’d sat there in 1966. She could have sworn some of the same old ladies were sitting in there, wearing the same outfits.