by Jodi Taylor
This is how it ends. One minute you have a job, somewhere to live, friends and no provision for a future you never expected to have. Take away the job and the friends and the home disappear all by themselves. Then the last money is gone, benefits that were inadequate anyway are never paid, the rent is due and suddenly a whole life just crashes to the ground, never to get back up again.
I wandered slowly down the High Street, stopping outside The Copper Kettle. Today’s special was roast beef and I had just enough money. I could stick two fingers up at the universe and go with a full stomach. It seemed like a plan.
It was warm and steamy inside. I ordered the beef, with a pot of tea to follow. I cleared my plate and by eating slowly, managed to make it last over an hour. The pot of tea lasted another half an hour and I read all their newspapers as well. I was in no hurry, but they would be closing soon. It was time to go.
As I began to get my things together, there was a bustle of movement; someone pulled out a chair and said ‘Hello, Madeleine, how are you?’
It was Mrs De Winter. I stared at her. Apart from a few glimpses at St Mary’s over the years, I hadn’t seen her since she handed me over to the Boss.
I managed to say, ‘I’m fine, thank you. How are you?’
She said, ‘Oh, fine,’ and touched the pot. ‘Let’s have a refill, shall we?’ She signalled to the waitress and ordered more tea. I started to get up and then wondered where I was going to go and sat back down again.
She chattered aimlessly while we were served, but as soon as the waitress left she leaned closer and said in a low voice, ‘Where have you been? I’ve been looking everywhere for you?’
‘Have you? Why?’
‘Dr Bairstow wanted you found as soon as possible. He’s been really worried about you. We all have been. And rightly so, I think. You look terrible. What’s been happening?’
‘I’ve been here in Rushford since I left St Mary’s,’ I said carefully. ‘But these last few days I’ve been in the clinic.’
‘Nothing serious, I hope?’
I lost my baby.
‘No, I had a bit of a chest infection, but I’m all clear now. And I must be going.’ I really don’t know what stupidity was pulling me out of the warm café and back to my spore-ridden ice-cube. Pride probably, but pride doesn’t keep you warm.
She put her hand on my arm. ‘Wait a minute. I need to speak to you. But not here.’ She looked at me carefully. ‘I have a proposition for you. I’d like you to come back to my house.’ I started to speak. ‘No, just for a few days. I have some of your things with me. My sister gave them to me for safe keeping.’
‘Your sister?’
‘Cleo Partridge – my sister.’
Cleo? Sister? Now I knew who Mrs Partridge reminded me of.
I considered this, trying hard to close my ears to the siren song of a warm house, maybe another meal. I opened my mouth to say no and it came out yes. I felt ashamed. I felt even more ashamed when she paid the bill. We argued. I lost, but told myself I could leave the money at her house later. She insisted we drive to my rooms, where, under her gently bullying, I packed my stuff. It still all fitted in one small sports bag. I looked around. I knew, for one reason or another, I’d never come back here. I slammed my door behind me and left the keys on the table by the front door and never looked back.
She had a very large house on the outskirts of town. ‘I sometimes do B & B,’ she said. ‘Life is boring since I retired. I get to meet some interesting people. But the house is empty at the moment.’
We went up to the big double room at the front. It was warm and nicely furnished. I loved it. ‘Make yourself comfortable. I’ll get your stuff and see you downstairs.’
I thought about unpacking, but it seemed presumptuous, so I left it. I met her downstairs in her big kitchen and we sat at the table. She pushed over a small box. Inside, I found the photo of the Chief and me, together with my Trojan Horse.
I looked at them both and then slowly reached out to the photo. The sense of loss cut through me like a knife. I stood it on the table in front of me. Him and me, laughing together about daffodils, of all things. I touched the frame with one finger. Then I fished out the little horse. Still as exquisite as the day he made it for me. Other memories rolled over me in waves.
I could have shown the photo to my son and said, ‘Look, this is your father.’
I could have shown the Trojan Horse to my son and said, ‘Look, your father made this.’
I said hoarsely, ‘These mean a great deal to me. Please convey my thanks to Mrs Partridge when you next see her.’
‘I will. May I?’ She picked up the horse. ‘Is this a model of the Wooden Horse of Troy?’
‘Yes. The Chief made it for me. He always used to say he would have given a lot to see Odysseus and his men dropping out from under the horse’s tail. He didn’t believe the trapdoor was in the belly because he said that would have weakened the structure, but he was just winding me up.’
She turned the horse over. ‘Well, he’s put the trapdoor in the belly, nonetheless.’
I took the horse from her. She was right. I shrugged. ‘He was just teasing me,’ and put it down.
She poured another cup of tea. ‘So tell me what’s been happening to you?’
I countered, ‘If you’ll tell me what’s been happening at St Mary’s.’
‘Nothing’s been happening. That’s the point.’ she said angrily. ‘That stupid woman has everything nailed down. No one’s going anywhere. Well, they can’t. She has no historians left.’
‘Wait,’ I said, alarmed. ‘Dr Bairstow? He’s not dead, is he?’
‘No, you can’t kill Edward, but he’s still on ‘sick leave’, and she’s doing her best to keep him out.’
‘And she has no historians?’
‘Well, no, how can she? You’re gone, Peterson’s dead and Kalinda …’
A cold hand touched me. ‘What about Kalinda?’
‘It’s rather funny, actually. Barclay started throwing her tiny weight around, introducing inspections and paperwork and bureaucracy and I got the impression that spurred on by the redoubtable Miss Black, they all rather enjoyed a spell of civil disobedience. It all got a bit out of hand though when she tried to put Dieter on a charge for the damage to Pod Eight. Apparently, words were exchanged and Miss Black and Mr Dieter left the building to cheers and applause.’
I had to laugh. Good old Kalinda. I couldn’t help wondering just how civil the disobedience had been. I knew, none better, how very creative St Mary’s could be in their disobedience while actually doing exactly as they’d been told.
‘But, of course, the key people are now all gone. There’s only Andrew Rapson left and he’s keeping his head down. And Doctor Foster, but they tell me the fight’s gone out of her. I don’t think she realised how deeply attached she was to Peterson. Barclay’s running a historical research organisation without any historical researchers. Nothing’s moving and people are leaving in their droves.
‘So, tell me about you.’ She was relentless. She had been a schoolteacher after all. In the end, I just gave her the bare facts. Sacked. No work history. Unable to get work. No money. Cold flat. Chest infection.
I managed to get it all out in about six brief sentences. She patted my hand gently but said nothing, which I appreciated. I never know what to do with sympathy. But she kept patting.
‘What? I said.
‘I’m so angry. And so is Edward. This should not have happened. We don’t just throw our people out into the streets, Max. Do you think this hasn’t happened before? There’s an exit procedure. You should have been offered alternative employment at Thirsk for a year, to give you some sort of employment history and ease you back into outside life. Remember Stevens? And Rutherford? Do you think we just cast them adrift? She knew this. She’s a spiteful, jealous cow!’
She brooded a while and then said with determination, ‘You must stay here. No, don’t say anything, Max. I watched you through the cafe
window and I don’t know what you were thinking, or maybe I do, but I’d like you to think of my house as a haven, at least for a few days while you recover your strength. I hope you’ll stay. This is a big house, you know and sometimes …’ She trailed away to give me time to appreciate her loneliness. The redoubtable Mrs De Winter had never had a lonely moment in her life, but was making me a face-saving offer I couldn’t refuse.
I smiled a little and said, ‘Well, if you’re sure I won’t be in the way …’ She laughed and after a while, so did I.
To relieve the embarrassment I picked up the horse again. It felt good in my hand and it comforted me a little. Strange about the trapdoor though. He’d always been so definite about them wriggling out from under the Horse’s tail like so many heroic tapeworms. I looked under the tail and saw a tiny hole, exactly where …
I said, ‘Do you have a paperclip?’ She looked surprised but rummaged in a drawer and produced a box. I took one, un-bent it and inserted it into the tiny hole. There was a click, the trapdoor in the Horse’s belly sprang open and a little box clattered onto the table. The remote control of his pod.
Something inside me woke up.
I tried to think clearly. I could use this. I could return, now, to the Cretaceous, as near as I could get to that awful night and bring them back. If they were still alive. And if they weren’t … well, that wasn’t important. The point was that I could go. Now. I started to get up.
‘No, wait,’ she said. Being a teacher she obviously did mind reading as well. ‘No, I don’t mean you can’t go. Obviously you must go, but you’ll only get one chance and you have to do it properly. Now, the first thing is to bring the pod here so we can check supplies, equipment and suchlike. Once we’ve ascertained our resources, we can make a proper plan.’
One surprise after another. She knew not only what the device was, but what it related to. I was beginning to have a great deal of curiosity about these sisters.
‘Do you have a back garden?’
She flung the curtain aside to display a back garden the size of half Rushfordshire. I’d never used this gizmo before, or seen it used, but it seemed relatively simple, even for me. There was only one button. Presumably you pressed it. Walking out into the garden, I selected a spot and, hoping it had a built in safety margin and wouldn’t materialise on top of me, I pressed it. Ten feet away from me, one of those rotary washing-line thingies crumpled flat under the weight of an invisible pod.
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘Learner driver.’ Thank God, she seemed more relaxed about this sort of thing than her sister Mrs Peacock did. I stood at where I thought the front would be and said, hopefully, ‘Door.’ It opened and I stepped inside.
Nothing had changed since I was last here. I inhaled the familiar smell. This was my world. This was where I belonged. I wondered when he had programmed me into the controls. Why had he given me a remote but not told me? He always maintained he knew nothing of the future after the day he arrived in my timeline, but I sometimes wondered. And if he didn’t know, I bet the Boss did. I couldn’t imagine the Boss not knowing anything.
I became aware of Mrs De Winter standing on the threshold. ‘Come in. Please.’ She began opening lockers and I activated the console.
‘Can you do it?’ she asked. I was flicking through past co-ordinates.
‘Theoretically, yes. His last jump but two was to the Cretaceous. I should recognise the coordinates.’
I heard my own voice saying to him, ‘But why did he send you? You couldn’t interfere – what was the point?’ Was the point to get the co-ordinates into the memory so I could use them later? Forget it. Deal with the now.
‘Yes, here they are. I need to sit down and work out how many days elapsed between these and our mission to the Cretaceous. Then I should maybe add a day for safety’s sake – I don’t want two of me there – and if they’re alive then I should be able to get them out. I hope.’
I wasn’t anywhere near as confident as I sounded. This was not my pod. I had no idea how it handled. It might not even accept commands from me.
‘Do you have a calculator?’ She nodded and slipped out, returning a few minutes later with that, two pens and a pile of paper. I thanked her absently and began to fire things up.
I sat and worked it all out very slowly and carefully, showing my calculations in a way I hadn’t done since basic training. I checked everything. It seemed OK. I worked it backwards and the co-ordinates matched.
Mrs De Winter came back. I realised I’d been working for two hours. She asked me how I was getting on. I showed her and asked her to check. She said, ‘But I can’t do that!’
‘No,’ I said. ‘But you can check the maths, which is my weak spot.’
She did so and twenty minutes later said, ‘Your calculations are correct,’ which was encouraging. I just hoped they were the right calculations. She stocked the chiller with beer. I hadn’t thought of that.
And then, just as everything was going so well, I started to lay in the figures and the bastard computer wouldn’t accept them. Initially, I didn’t know if it was me or my figures it disliked, but it accepted commands for the door and lights happily enough, so it had to be the figures. I added one day, increasing the interval between our night attack and my proposed new jump and it spat that back at me as well. I added another day and another and with increasing dismay, another. All the time, Mrs De Winter stood quietly beside me, whispering, ‘Keep trying, Max. Keep trying.’
Finally, it accepted the co-ordinates for no less than eleven days after that disastrous night. Eleven days! How could they survive that long? No one knew better than me how long eleven days could be in the Cretaceous period. And these were four men, possibly badly hurt, bleeding and low on ammunition, no shelter, no food and no clean water; not prepped in any way.
‘Stop that!’ said Mrs De Winter, accurately guessing what was going on in my head. ‘They’ll be fine. They’ll be tucked away, keeping themselves safe, ready for rescue, you’ll see. There might even be other survivors there. They may not be alone.’
I shook my head. ‘I doubt it. Eleven days. It will be a miracle if anyone’s left alive.’
‘It’s Guthrie, Farrell, Peterson and the indestructible Markham. Do you want to put money on it? Now, in addition to essential beer supplies, there is bottled water and some sandwiches for you. There are two torches with working batteries. Eight flares in that locker over there – fizzers I think you call them. As for weapons, there’s a wide-angle blaster, charged. There’s a Taser showing a small charge and a jumbo-sized pepper spray, half-full. There are matches, fire-lighters and toilet paper. What else could you need?’
What else indeed?
I took a deep breath and looked at Mrs De Winter. She said, ‘I could come too,’ but I shook my head.
‘If I don’t come back, someone will need to tell the Boss where I’ve gone and why. Don’t let him waste anyone coming after me.’
‘You’ll be back. I know it.’
I had a sudden thought, just as she stepped out of the door. ‘What day is it today?’
‘Friday.’
Oh. Bugger.
She stepped outside and I closed the door behind her. Alone now, the familiar pod smell wrapped itself around me. Hot electrics, wet carpet, the head, the incinerator, a faint whiff of cabbage; awakening memories as painful as lemon juice in a paper cut. Eau de pod; the most evocative smell in the world.
I eased myself into the seat and checked the console. Everything seemed OK.
‘Initiate jump.’ And the world went white.
And stayed white. What? It was foggy. It was bloody foggy! God Almighty, does nothing ever go right? This meant the eight fizzers were useless. Ditto a fire – the smoke would be invisible in all this murk. Could the universe never cut me a break? I had a think and then started rummaging through the lockers. There was bound to be something somewhere. There was. I found four or five discs including Sergeant Pepper – an omen if ever I saw one. Now all I had to do wa
s switch from internal to external speakers and even I could do that.
Five minutes later I was ready to rock and roll. Literally. I’d checked the proximity readings and nothing was moving anywhere. But I reckoned it was only just past dawn which gave me all day. At night, if the fog had cleared then I could use the fizzers. Or light a fire. Of course, all this sound and light would attract the attention of everything within a five mile radius, but that was OK. So long as my guys knew I was here, we could work out how to dodge the wildlife later. The important thing was them knowing I was here. If they were still alive. Eleven days was a lifetime. I threw that thought out of my head and cautiously opened the door. I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. Everything was strangely silent. Well, I’d soon put a stop to that.
I de-activated the camouflage device because I wanted to be highly visible and muttering, ‘Balls to the wall, guys,’ flipped a switch and a second later The Beatles were asking a startled prehistoric world to picture themselves in a boat on a river. With tangerine trees and marmalade skies. I shut the door and fortified myself with some fruit drink.
There’s a protocol for this sort of thing. Certain information should be broadcast calmly and clearly, giving location, routes, warnings, number and disposition of rescuers – all that sort of thing. I’d done it scores of times in simulations and now, now that it really mattered, now that lives depended on it, I couldn’t remember a bloody word.
Worried that my voice would let me down as badly as my memory, I switched off the music and opened my mouth.
‘Gooooooood morning, St Mary’s! This is your early morning wake-up call.
‘Will all passengers returning to St Mary’s today please immediately make their way to approximately one hundred yards south of Ground Zero, just under the tree line.
‘Please have your boarding cards ready for inspection and your passports open at the photograph page.
‘Please be aware that anyone pissing off the pilot will not be allowed to board and since the pilot’s already both pissed and pissed off, there’s a very good chance some of you won’t make the cut.