The Accidental Time Traveller

by Sharon Griffiths

  The 1950s House … It couldn’t be, could it? When she’d talked about people living in a 1950s house for a television programme, she hadn’t meant me, had she? She’d mentioned research. That’s why I’d spent the morning in the bound file room. But she hadn’t said anything about being here.

  But she could have. I hadn’t been listening. Hadn’t heard. Wouldn’t remember if she had. I had been away with the fairies all through conference.

  But she had said in that meaningful way that I would find my visit to Mrs Turnbull ‘interesting’. This is what it was all about. Was I taking part in one of those reality TV shows? I looked around for the cameras. I remembered that glint of light in the factory. I thought it had been sunlight on a window, but it could have been a camera.

  A camera! I looked around. Was I being filmed now? Without thinking about it, I realised I had put my hand up to smooth my hair.

  But how had they got me there? And how was outside completely different? It must have been something to do with that taxi driver I supposed. He had seemed odd and my head had been so rough I hadn’t really taken much notice of where I was. And he’d followed me up the path.

  Maybe somehow he’d made me go somewhere else.

  Maybe the path had been a stage set and that’s why it had sent my eyesight funny. A trick, just projected on a wall or something. Maybe it had just been a façade, a front in front of this old house. It seemed a bit over the top, but there – for I’m a Celebrity they parachuted people into the jungle, didn’t they? Walking up the wrong garden path was nothing compared to that.

  And that factory. It could be the old rope works on the other side of town. There were a couple of indie TV production companies in there. The Big Brother house was in the middle of an industrial estate. This could just be in a car park. Maybe.

  ‘All right, dear?’ said Mrs Brown. ‘You’ve got a bit of colour back. You just sit there for a bit while I get supper ready.’

  Feeling a bit calmer now I thought I’d worked this out, I sat on the rocking chair stroking Sambo, who purred quietly while I listened to Mrs Brown clattering away in the next room. So this must be the 1950s house and the Vixen must have volunteered me for it. And I was clearly staying for a while. I wondered what the rules were, who else would be there. I was just wishing I knew more, a lot more, when Mrs Brown called out, ‘There we are, here’s Frank and Peggy. Right on time.’

  Frank was clearly Mr Brown, middle-aged in a thick suit, specs and moustache. He smiled at me and said, ‘Well, you must be Rosie.’ He shook my hand. A nice handshake.

  ‘And this is Peggy,’ said Mrs Brown.

  Peggy was about my age, maybe a year or so younger. She had curly blonde hair and a pleasant open face that darkened when she saw me.

  ‘Hello,’ she said. That’s all, and went to hang up her coat.

  ‘So,’ I said brightly, ‘are we all in this together then? All play-acting in the 1950s? Did you enter a competition to get here? Or were you just volunteered by your boss, like I was?’

  There was a silence. Peggy came and stood and looked at me as if I’d totally lost it. Mrs Brown came wandering out of the kitchen with her hands in oven mitts and a baffled expression. And Mr Brown took off his jacket and his tie, rolling it up carefully and putting it on the dresser, took a cardigan off the peg, put that on and swapped his shoes for slippers.

  I realised I must have said something wrong.

  ‘Oh sorry,’ I said. ‘Aren’t we allowed to mention it’s a programme? Do we have to pretend all the time that we’re in the 1950s? I mean, I don’t even know if it’s like the Big Brother house and we’re all competing against each other, or if it’s just to see how we get on. Do you know? I mean, how did you get here?’

  The silence continued. They were all still staring at me.

  Finally Mr Brown said, ‘We’ve rented this house since before the war. That’s why we’re here. You’re here because our Peggy asked us to have you to stay, on account of you were working on The News. No more than that can I tell you.’

  Right, I thought, that explains it. We clearly have to pretend at all times that we are in the 1950s. These three were obviously taking it desperately seriously. Like those people who dress up and guide you around museums and keep calling you ‘thee’ and ‘thou’ and pretend not to understand when you ask if there’s a cash machine. These three were clearly In Character in a big way. No sneaking back to the twenty-first century, not even for a bit of light relief.

  ‘I see,’ I said and tried to enter into the spirit of the thing. ‘Since before the war?’

  ‘Yes. Our Stephen wasn’t born and Peggy was just a toddler and now look at her.’

  I did. She glared at me.

  ‘Now then, young Rosie,’ said Mr Brown. ‘Tell me all about America.’

  ‘America?’ I said, not knowing what he was talking about. ‘Well I’ve only been there twice, once to New York and once to Flor—’

  ‘Now girl, don’t be silly, I know you must be American, wearing trousers like that.’

  I was dressed perfectly normally for work. Black trousers and a stretchy silky top. Though my jacket was a nifty little Jilly G. number that I had bought on eBay. Maybe Mr Brown recognised a style snip when he saw one. OK, maybe not.

  ‘Never mind about that now,’ said Mrs Brown. ‘She’s got plenty of other clothes in her trunk I expect.’

  ‘Well she can’t wear those to work,’ said Peggy with sarcastic satisfaction. ‘It might be all right in America but it won’t do here. No. Mr Henfield won’t stand for that. No women in trousers in the office.’

  ‘Mr Henfield?’

  ‘Richard Henfield, the editor of The News,’ said Mrs Brown. ‘Peggy’s his secretary,’ she added proudly.

  Henfield … Henfield …

  I remembered the Vixen’s office, the wall with the photographs of all the editors of The News that I’d gazed at in conference. Somewhere in the middle of them all I’m sure there was a Richard Henfield.

  ‘Does he have a moustache and smoke a pipe?’ I asked. ‘I think I’ve seen his picture somewhere.’

  ‘Well you would,’ said Peggy, ‘he’s very well known.’

  ‘Never mind that now,’ said Mrs Brown. ‘Peggy, come and mash the potatoes for me.’ Mrs Brown was bustling around dishing up supper. She took a big casserole dish out of the stove and put it on the table.

  ‘Well this looks special for a Monday,’ said Mr Brown, rubbing his hands.

  ‘Well, seeing as we have a visitor,’ said Mrs Brown, through a cloud of steam.

  So I didn’t dare say that I don’t really eat red meat. I’m not vegetarian, but I’m not really a red meat sort of person. And I didn’t want to seem like one of those whingeing, whining contestants making a fuss about nothing, so I ate it up, and it was really quite good. Chunks of meat and thick gravy. Afterwards, from another compartment in the stove, Mrs Brown produced a rice pudding. I couldn’t remember when I’d last had rice pudding, certainly not one that hadn’t come out of a tin. Mrs Brown was definitely in character. Unless they had another kitchen out the back where they had a cook lined up to make everything, so Mrs Brown could just do the ‘Here’s one I made earlier’ routine.

  ‘So does your mother like cooking?’ asked Mrs Brown.

  ‘Well yes, I think so. She’s worked her way through Delia and Nigella. I’m not sure she bothers much when it’s just her and Dad, but when my brother or I go home …’

  ‘Oh, don’t you live at home? In digs, are you?’

  ‘Digs?’ I groped for a moment, trying to work out what she meant and thinking of Time Team and hairy archaeologists.

  ‘Digs,’ she said again, ‘lodgings.’

  ‘Oh, no. I have my own flat.’

  ‘Oh you are a career woman, aren’t you?’ said Mrs Brown, looking a bit surprised. Peggy simply looked murderous.

  ‘It’s quite small, but it’s in nice grounds and there’s secure car parking.’

  ‘You’ve got a car?
’

  ‘Well yes, just a little one. Nothing flash.’

  ‘Your own flat and a car? Very nice I’m sure,’ said Peggy, accepting another helping of rice pudding. ‘All I can say is it must be very nice to be American. I hope you can manage to slum it with us.’

  She really didn’t like me …

  ‘Look really, I’m not American.’

  ‘Well you talk like one.’

  ‘Do I?’

  The Browns all had quite strong local accents. I didn’t think I had much of any sort of accent really. I wished they didn’t keep thinking I was American.

  I offered to help with the washing up, but Mrs Brown was adamant.

  ‘No, Frank will help me tonight, for a change. You two girls go and watch the television.’ That sounded like a good idea. A bit of goofing out in front of the box was just what I needed. Some chance. The TV was a huge box affair with a tiny little screen showing a programme about ballroom dancing. It was nothing like Strictly Come Dancing. Somewhere there were a lot of tiny grey figures in grey dresses and grey suits waltzing across a grey ballroom.

  Of course, they didn’t have colour TV in the 1950s.

  ‘Anything on any of the other channels?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Peggy.

  Of course, they wouldn’t have Sky. But ITV, Channel 4?

  ‘This is television. There’s only this one.’

  ‘Haven’t you got ITV yet?’

  ‘The one with adverts?’

  ‘Yes, the one with adverts.’

  ‘They’ve got it in London, but we haven’t.’

  Right.

  I looked around the room, trying to spot where the cameras were. There were a couple of pictures on the wall, and they looked innocent enough, but the mirror above the fireplace – that could definitely be a two-way job with a camera on the other side. I looked straight at it and smiled – winningly, I hoped. Mrs Brown came in and picked up a big bag from behind the armchair and took out some knitting. This was clearly going to be a riveting evening.

  ‘If you don’t mind, I think I’d like to sort myself out,’ I said.

  ‘Of course, dear. What was I thinking of?’ said Mrs Brown. ‘Peggy, take Rosie up to her room, will you please, pet?’

  Peggy clearly didn’t want to be dragged away from the grey delights of television, but, sighing heavily, she led me up the narrow dark stairs, along a narrow dark landing, up a few more steps, to a small, icy cold room. It had been quite nice in front of the fire in the sitting room, toasting my toes, but once you went out of that room, the temperature plummeted.

  ‘Here you are,’ she said. ‘It’s really my brother Stephen’s room, but he’s in Cyprus at the moment.’

  ‘Oh, lucky him,’ I said, thinking of bars and beaches and all that clubbing.

  She stared at me as if I were mad. ‘Two soldiers were killed there last week.’

  ‘Is he a soldier then?’

  ‘Doing his national service, isn’t he?’ she said and left me to it.

  It was a bleak little room. Lino on the floor and a rug at the side of a narrow bed with a shiny green quilt, a chair, wardrobe, a bookcase with lots of Biggles books and football annuals, and a pile of football programmes. There was a trophy of a cricketer and some model planes, and that was about it. The only clothes in the wardrobe were a school blazer and a few old jumpers. Our Stephen was hardly a style icon, unless he’d taken all his possessions with him.

  I looked around for cameras. Nothing obvious. Would they give us privacy in our bedrooms? Surely they would. But they didn’t in the Big Brother house, did they? I looked around again. If there was a camera here, it had to be in the cricket trophy, I decided. Too obvious. Or maybe the model planes … I picked them up and put them in the wardrobe and shut the door. Then I picked up the Biggles books and put those in there too. That felt a bit safer. Now I could look in that trunk beneath the window.

  A proper old-fashioned trunk, and on it were my initials RJH – Rose Jane Harford. I lifted up the lid. Clothes! So this is what I was to wear. I rummaged through them excitedly. Oh I do love clothes.

  I tried to remember what sort of clothes they wore in the 1950s. I thought of Grace Kelly in High Society … Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face. Or even Olivia Newton John in Grease. Oh yes. In my mind’s eye I was already jiving with John Travolta, his hand on my nipped-in waist while my skirt swished and swayed beguilingly …

  To my deep disappointment, these clothes were not at all beguiling. In fact, they all reminded me of my old geography teacher. And I mean old geography teacher. There were a couple of heavy wool skirts, one of which had a matching jacket. Some cotton blouses, and cardigans, hand-knitted by the look of them. And a pair of trousers, Capri pants in heavy navy cotton.

  There was a dressing gown that looked like my grandad’s. Oh and the underwear! The bras were made of white cotton and looked as though they were designed for nuns. I bet Grace Kelly never wore anything like those. Knickers too -white cotton. I don’t think I’d worn pants like those since I was about three years old. In fact, even at that age my underwear had more style. These were dreadful.

  There was a serviceable, very serviceable, raincoat and a bright red jacket like a duffel coat. I quite liked that. It had a matching beret too. I tried them on and did a twirl in front of the rather blotchy wardrobe mirror. Then I hung the dressing gown in front of it. Just in case of cameras.

  A very functional wash bag contained a toothbrush, a round tin of bright pink toothpaste, a face cloth, a bottle of White Rain shampoo for ‘normal’ hair, and some cold cream. And at the bottom was a handbag, nice leather but brown and boring. I opened it to find a funny little purse containing money. But not money I knew. There were some notes, orange ones that said ten shillings and green ones that said one pound. One pound notes – I thought they only had those in Scotland – also lots of coins, not like Euros, but big and heavy.

  I kept the jacket on. It was so cold in there. Out of the window I could hear the sound of rushing water. There must be a river. I looked out, but the streetlights were so dim I could only see the faint outline of some trees and a bridge. The view could wait till morning. I presumed I would still be here in the morning. I wished I knew exactly what was going on. I felt very unsettled and a bit, quite a bit actually, lost.

  I missed Will. I tried my phone again. I have a video on it of Will just walking down the street towards me. It’s wonderful because you can see he’s thinking of something else and then suddenly he sees me and then he has a great big grin. I play it a lot, especially when I miss him. And never missed him as much as in this strange place where I didn’t know what’s happening. But the phone was absolutely dead. Nothing.

  There was a knock on the door. Mrs Brown. ‘Rosie, I’ve made a cup of tea. Or you can have cocoa if you like. Come downstairs and get warmed up.’

  Cocoa! Such excitement, I thought as I went down into the kitchen. In the dim light, Mr Brown was sitting in the rocking chair, reading a copy of The News – the old broadsheet version, of course, very authentic. But there was someone else in there.

  A small girl was sitting at the table. She was surrounded by exercise books. Judging by the dirty dishes near her, she’d also polished off the remains of the casserole and the rice pudding. She was wearing one of those old-fashioned pinafore dress things they had in the St Trinian’s films – a gymslip? – a very grubby school blouse and a stringy tie. Her mousy, greasy hair looked as though it had been hacked rather than cut. And she had specs, the ugliest specs I’ve ever seen and so cruel to give to a child.

  But as she looked up at me, I realised she was older than I had first thought – probably about eleven or twelve, and that behind those horrid specs she had a measuring, challenging expression that was a bit disconcerting.

  ‘Are you the American?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m not American,’ I said, already weary with that assumption.

  ‘This is Janice,’ said Mr Brown. ‘She’s very clever, do
ing well at the grammar school and she comes here to do her homework.’

  I must have looked a bit puzzled by this because Janice said simply, ‘I’ve got seven brothers. Two of them howl all the time.’

  ‘Her mum cleans the post office where Doreen works,’ said Mr Brown, ‘so she always comes here when she’s got homework to do. I used to be able to help her but I think she’s cleverer than me now, aren’t you, girl?’

  With that Peggy came into the kitchen and to my surprise, gave the grubby little girl a big smile. Peggy looked really pretty when she smiled.

  ‘Hiya kid!’ she said. ‘How’s the French? Mrs Stace still giving you hell?’

  ‘Of course. We’ve got a test tomorrow.’ Janice looked worried. ‘Will you test me, Peggy, please? Perfect tense?’

  ‘I have given.’

  ‘ J’ai donné.’

  ‘He has finished.’

  ‘Il a fini.’

  ‘They have gone.’

  ‘Aha, that takes être! Ils sont allés.’

  ‘Well done,’ said Peggy.

  ‘Do you speak French, Rosie?’ asked Janice.

  ‘A bit,’ I said. ‘I did it for GCSE, but not like that.’

  ‘Janice is smashing at it,’ said Peggy amiably, almost proudly. ‘One day she’s going to go to France and she’ll need to know how to talk to them all, order her snails and frogs’ legs and wine.’

  ‘It would be wonderful to go to France,’ said Janice wistfully, ‘wonderful to hear people talking differently.’

  ‘Tell you what,’ said Peggy – she really seemed quite nice when she wasn’t talking to me – ‘you don’t need to do any more French, you know enough for today. Shall I wash your hair for you? You can use some of my new shampoo.’

  ‘Oh yes please, Peggy!’ said the little scruff, bundling her books into her satchel.

  Soon she was on a stool, kneeling over the big white stone sink in the scullery, while Peggy shampooed her hair and rinsed it using a big enamel jug. She wrapped it in a rough kitchen towel and then combed it out for her quite gently and carefully, easing the comb through the tangles.