“They appeared out of nowhere.” Pam rested the crystal on the open book.
“What?”
“They just appeared—out of nowhere.”
“Yeah, you already said that.” Robin shrugged. “Okay, I don’t know what the joke is, but I’ve got to get back upstairs.” She turned away.
“No!” Pam shrieked. Something in her voice must have alarmed Robin, who spun around.
“What’s going on, Pam?” Robin’s eyes were now wary.
“I was sitting here reading my moon rhymes when these two just . . . appeared. Poof!” She snapped her fingers. “Just like that.” If not for the woman’s scream, she would have wondered if they were alive. They hadn’t said a word or moved a muscle since. They just stood and stared.
“You seriously expect me to believe that two people appeared out of thin air?” Robin drawled. “Are you telling me you don’t know them?”
“I’ve never seen them before in my life.”
Robin squared her shoulders and glared at the couple. “Okay, I don’t know who the two of you are or what you want, but if you’re not out of this house in five seconds, I’m calling the police. In fact, maybe I’ll do that anyway.”
“The police!” the man blurted. “There’s no reason to involve the constabulary. We mean you no harm. We’re as shocked as you are. We don’t know where we are.”
“We’re in my house,” the woman said quietly.
Pam pushed herself forward. “I beg your pardon! You are most assuredly not in your house.
You’re in my house.” Movement in the doorway caught her eye.
“Halfway house,” Robin mouthed, tipping her head to the left.
Oh god, yes! A halfway house for those with mental health problems was only a couple of streets away. But how had they gotten into this house? And why were they dressed in oldfashioned clothing? No, wait—they had appeared out of nowhere. Or had she somehow blacked out? Had they slipped into the room while she was in some sort of meditative state, and their movements had brought her out of it? But if they were creeping around the house, why would they enter an occupied room? Then again, if they’d wandered away from the halfway house . . .
The woman was murmuring to the man and pointing upward. Pam followed their gazes and squinted at the high, decorative ceiling. “And this,” she heard the woman say as the two strangers peered at the fireplace mantel.
Pam stiffened when she realized that Robin no longer stood in the doorway. Was this a weird dream? Who would appear or disappear next? Not wanting to alert the “guests” that she was alone, Pam tried to keep the rising panic from her face and silently willed Robin to return.
She released a relieved sigh when Robin stepped into the room and put her hands on her hips.
“Okay, both doors are locked and no windows are broken,” Robin announced.
“Did you call the cops?”
She shook her head. “I’m starting to think they are from the halfway house. I’d rather turn them over to the people there, not the cops.”
Pam understood why. Robin’s schizophrenic brother had spent a confusing night in the local lockup because officers had thought he was high. “But how did they get in?”
“We do have ears.” The woman’s voice was quiet but strong. “And this is my house.
Though the furnishings and decor have changed.”
“But when?” the man asked. “We were just standing in the drawing room.”
“I don’t know. But this,” she pointed to a chip in the wooden panel beside the mantel,
“happened when Uncle was demonstrating his golf swing and the club flew out of his hand.
Father never repaired it because he didn’t want to replace the entire panel for such a minor blemish.”
Pam no longer feared them; she pitied them, especially the woman, who seemed to be living in a fantasy world. “Listen, lady—”
The woman raised her hand. “No, no. I’m not a lady. You may address me as Margaret.” After rolling her eyes at Robin, Pam said, “All right, Margaret. My family has owned this house for over fifty years, and I don’t recall ever seeing you, your father, your uncle, or your companion here.”
“That’s impossible! Your family couldn’t have owned this house for that length of time. My father had it built and still lives in it.”
“My parents moved into this house in 1985,” Pam said patiently.
The man paled at the same time Margaret gasped and grabbed his arm. “Did you say 1985?” he asked hoarsely.
“Yep, 1985. So you must be in the wrong house. Now, I don’t know how you got in, but since you’ve been polite, I won’t involve the police. But do you know the name of anyone who’s been taking care of you in the big house a couple of streets over?”
“What are your names?” Robin asked. “Margaret what? And who are you?” she said to the man.
Margaret swallowed and placed her hand on her chest. “Something horrible has happened.
Jasper and I—we were just standing in this room, but in 1910. What year is it now?” Robin looked at Pam. “Great, they don’t even know what year it is. I’ll phone the halfway house, see if they’re missing a couple of people.”
“Wait!” Pam’s mind raced. “Robin, I know you’ll think I’m crazy, but they really did just appear out of thin air, right at the moment I was reading one of my time rhymes!” Oh my god, had she summoned people from the past? She grabbed her head. “I might have brought them here! Listen to this.” She lifted the book, allowing the rose quartz to slide onto her lap.
Jasper’s eyes widened and he pointed. “You practice the dark arts!” Pam chuckled and waved the silly notion away. “No, no, this isn’t magic.” Or maybe it was.
After all, she’d somehow sucked these poor people into the present—the future—no, the present.
“These are inspirational rhymes, meant to help attune you with the essence of the universe.” Robin and Margaret tutted, then looked at each other, startled. Robin cleared her throat. “So you expect me to believe that saying a rhyme brought these people here?”
“What other explanation is there?”
“I don’t know,” Robin said sarcastically, “maybe that one of the doors was unlocked and they waltzed in off the street?”
Pam shook her head. “I saw you lock the front door, remember? And we haven’t been out the back door all day. Or at least I haven’t.”
“Neither have I,” Robin mumbled. “And the windows have been closed all day, too.”
“And you keep denying what I saw with my own eyes!”
“And talking as if we’re not here,” Margaret said. “You also haven’t told us what year it is.”
“Two thousand and ten,” Pam said.
Jasper and Margaret gaped at her. Margaret recovered first. “I may be able to prove that I live here.” She frowned. “That I used to live here.”
Robin folded her arms. “Oh, this’ll be good.”
“Robin!” Pam wanted to throttle her. “Will you please give them a chance? How can you prove it?” she said to Margaret.
Margaret hesitated. “Well, I keep a diary . . . in the attic.”
“That’s a strange place for a diary,” Jasper said.
“It’s the only way to ensure privacy.”
“The housemaids?”
“No, Mother.”
“I’ve never been up in the attic.” Pam turned to Robin. “Have you?”
“I didn’t even know there was an attic. Where’s the access point?” Pam shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“I do.” Margaret stepped toward the doorway.
“Whoa!” Robin thrust out both her hands.
“Oh, for god’s sake, Robin, if they were going to hurt us or steal anything, they would have done it by now. I believe them.”
“You would.”
Pam glared at her.
“Tell me where the attic is,” Robin said to Margaret.
Margaret pointed upward. “It’s at the top of
the house.” Robin snickered. “I meant the access to the attic.”
“I know.” Margaret’s voice held a hint of contempt.
“I haven’t introduced myself,” Pam said, hoping to defuse the hostility rising between the other two women. “I’m Pam, and that’s Robin.”
“I am Jasper Bainbridge,” the man announced, “son of Mr. and Mrs. Sherwood Bainbridge, of the Bainbridge Estate. And this is Miss Margaret Wilton. Do you not have surnames now?”
“Oh yes, of course we do. My full name is Pamela Elizabeth Holden, and she’s—”
“Robin Tillman.” Robin’s smile looked forced. “Pleased to meet you.”
“Tillman?” Margaret glanced at Jasper. “The Tillman family used to live up the street from us—until Victor Tillman gambled away all his money.”
“They might not be any relation,” Pam said quickly. “Tons of people are named Tillman.” Including Robin Elenora Tillman. Pam couldn’t wait to tease her about leaving out the middle name she’d inherited from her great-grandmother—and hated. “Now, about that attic . . .”
“I’m delighted to meet you.” Jasper stepped forward and held out his hand.
Pam stared at it, then giggled and extended hers. “Oh, charmed, I’m sure,” she said breathily as he pressed his lips against it.
He turned to Robin. Pam stifled a grin as Robin grudgingly extended her hand. The moment Jasper’s head lifted, Robin pulled her hand away. “Now that we all know each other, where’s the access to the attic?”
“It’s in my room.” Margaret muttered something and shook her head. “The second room on the right.”
“That’s my bedroom!” Robin blurted. “You can’t get to the attic from there.”
“Yes, you can. If you’ll allow me to pass, I’ll show you.”
“Hold on.” Pam rested the book on the arm of the chair and the rose quartz on the book, then pushed herself up. “Let’s go.”
Jasper swept his arm out. “After you, ladies.”
“Oh, thank you.” The jerk at dinner could learn something about manners from Jasper! Pam felt as if she were in one of the old movies she loved to watch. She sighed when Robin stepped into the hallway and motioned for everyone to go ahead of her. “For all we know, he could knock us out the moment we turn our backs on him,” she whispered as Pam passed her. “And let her lead us to the bedroom, to see if she knows where she’s going.” Pam bit her tongue. Convinced that their two guests were indeed from the past, she wished Robin wouldn’t be so mistrustful. They were representing the twenty-first century, here!
“This is certainly . . . different,” Margaret said as they walked down the hallway. They climbed the stairs. Margaret didn’t hesitate on the landing; she walked to Robin’s bedroom and peered into it. “May I?”
“Be my guest,” Robin said.
“Be careful, Margaret.” Jasper waved his finger into the room. “We don’t know what those contraptions do.”
Did he mean the computer and the printer? Robin’s dirty laundry was more likely to harm them. “They won’t hurt you.” Pam walked into the bedroom and twirled once. “See?” Margaret took a couple of tentative steps, then walked over when Pam beckoned to her. “Now you, Jasper,” Pam said.
He shook his head. “It wouldn’t be proper for me to enter a lady’s bedroom.”
“Well, that’s all right, then. Robin’s not a lady,” Pam said with a giggle.
“And there’s no way you’re staying out here while we’re in there,” she heard Robin say.
“Very well.” He stepped into the room and clasped his hands behind his back.
Robin remained in the doorway. “Go on, then. Show us the access.” Margaret started to open the closet door.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Robin stepped into the bedroom, then stopped.
“The access to the attic is through here. Where did you think it was?” Margaret opened the door and surveyed the closet’s contents.
Pam peered over her shoulder. “What a mess! We’ll have to clear out all that stuff on the floor.”
“I’ll do it,” Robin quickly said. “You stand here. Both of you.” Neither Pam nor Margaret needed to be told twice. They silently watched as Robin threw shoes into a corner, rumpled shirts and pants onto the bed, and slid out a couple of boxes. She poked her head into the closet and looked up. “I can’t see anything. They should have added a light when they wired the rest of the house. We need a flashlight.”
“There’s one in the basement,” Pam said. “I’ll get it.”
“No! What about—”
“I’ll be quick. If I hear any screaming, I’ll call 911.” Shaking her head, Pam headed for the basement. If she had the slightest suspicion that Jasper and Margaret would hurt Robin, she wouldn’t leave her alone with them or go down into the basement by herself. Why would anyone dress up in early twentieth century clothing, break into a house, and pretend to be from the past?
Maybe they were from the halfway house, but Pam was inclined to believe her own eyes, and desperately hoped that Margaret’s diary was still there and would make Robin believe, too.
Otherwise two visitors from the past would be forced to wander the streets, confused, hungry, and homeless—and it would be Pam’s fault for being so careless with the power she hadn’t realized she possessed!
*****
Margaret listened to Pam’s receding footsteps and hoped she wouldn’t take long to retrieve the flashlight. The curious creature staring at them from the closet opening made her nervous. At first she’d thought Robin was a young man. Then Robin had stopped shouting and had spoken with a low but feminine voice, and Margaret had noticed her hips and smooth face. Not a man but a woman, and a rather suspicious and gruff one at that. Margaret and Jasper were the ones who had cause to worry, not these two women from the future. If Margaret’s diary wasn’t there because it had already been discovered and removed sometime during the past one hundred years
. . . Her heart thumped. There was no telling what Robin would do to them.
Of course, Margaret reasoned, perhaps she was dreaming, or had experienced a bout of nerves and was in a trance. It was hard to believe that she really had been transported to the future when she’d doubled over in the drawing room. Had her mind created this world to escape marriage to Jasper? No, she never would have imagined a world like this. Did all the women dress like men? Margaret hadn’t seen a single dress come out of Robin’s closet.
Robin’s bedroom didn’t look like a lady’s room. Where were the vanity and the full-length mirror? The blue walls were drab and masculine; a multicoloured rectangular cloth hanging on one wall stood out in contrast. Was it supposed to represent a rainbow? It was the wrong shape.
She glanced over her shoulder when she heard Pam climbing the stairs. Were Pam and Robin related? Where were their husbands and families?
“Here,” Pam said breathlessly, handing the flashlight to Robin.
She turned it on and swept it across the closet ceiling. “I do see what could be a trapdoor.” Margaret felt Jasper’s eyes on her and turned to him. His brows drew together. “You climb into the attic?”
Blood rushed to her cheeks. “There’s a stepladder in my closet. It’s been there since I was a child. I think everyone but me has forgotten about it.”
“We need a stepladder here, too,” Robin said.
Pam sighed. “How about a chair? And not yours. You could break your neck if it rolls away.” She snapped her fingers. “No, the stepladder we use to water the plants. I think it’s in the guest bedroom.”
“But what about your clothes?” Jasper asked Margaret, clearly struggling with the idea of Margaret scrambling into the attic to scribble in her diary.
Pam answered for her. “The closet’s practically a small room.” She jutted her chin toward Robin. “Remember how amazed you were when you first saw it?”
“I still don’t understand why you didn’t want this bedroom.” Robin stepped out of the closet.
“This thing’s wasted on me.”
“Because this was never my bedroom. I wanted my bedroom.” Pam had said the house belonged to her family. Margaret didn’t think Pam and Robin were sisters. Cousins? “Are the two of you related?”
Pam drew breath to respond. “We’re friends,” Robin said tersely. “That’s all you need to know. Are you going to get the stepladder, or what?”
“Yes!” With a sigh, Pam whirled.
Margaret didn’t expect her to be away for long, and she wasn’t. Robin took the stepladder from Pam and opened it inside the closet.
“I wonder what’s up there.” Pam sounded both fearful and curious. “If this were a crime show, a body would tumble out when we push that trapdoor open.”
“A body!” Margaret edged closer to Jasper.
Robin looked at Pam. “You’re scaring the guests. Do you want to go up? If I go, I expect you to keep an eye on them and not let them come up after me.”
“Oh, for god’s sake!” Pam climbed up the stepladder.
“Perhaps I should do it,” Jasper said.
Pam chuckled. “Jasper, you’ll find twenty-first century women are quite capable of doing things for ourselves.”
From her vantage point, Margaret could only see Pam from the waist down. When she heard a thud, she could tell that the trapdoor had opened slightly, then thudded shut again. It had done so many times for her, until she’d learned how much momentum to put behind her shove so that it would swing fully open.
“Harder,” Robin said.
A muffled crash told Margaret that Pam’s second attempt had succeeded. “Light!” Pam barked. Robin handed her the flashlight. “Mmmm. Nothing much interesting here.” Pam stood on tiptoe. “I don’t see a diary. I don’t see—aaaaah!” She leaped off the stepladder and dropped the flashlight. “Get it off me! Get it off me!” she cried, slapping at her head and making spitting noises. “Oh my god,” she wailed, blindly moving around the bedroom.
Threaded Through Time, Book One Page 2