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“He was old,” I said. “Maybe he was well preserved and looked after himself, but he was definitely old.”
“Well, you’ve proved that bit wrong, then,” said Lesley. “He must have had a fascinating personality, because he comes into a great many novels, and in some esoteric circles he was seen as a kind of guru, an Ascended Master, whatever that means. He was a member of many secret societies—the Freemasons and the Rosicrucians and several more—he was an outstanding musician, he played the violin and composed music, he spoke a dozen languages fluently, and he could apparently—listen to this!—he could apparently travel in time. Anyway, he claimed to have been present at various events when he couldn’t possibly have been there.”
“Except he could.”
“Yes. Crazy. He was also keen on alchemy. He had an alchemist’s tower of his own in Germany for doing his experiments—not sure what sort they were.”
“Alchemy, that’s something to do with the philosopher’s stone, right?”
“Exactly. And with magic. Though the philosopher’s stone means something different to everyone. Some just tried to make gold with it, so there were all sorts of odd developments. All the old kings and princes were after people who said they were alchemists, because of course they all wanted gold. It’s true that attempts to make gold led, among other things, to making porcelain, but most of the time, nothing at all happened, so the alchemists were put in prison as heretics and frauds or had their heads chopped off.”
“Their own fault,” I said. “They ought to have paid more attention in chemistry classes.”
“But the alchemists weren’t really interested in gold at all. That was just camouflage for their real experiments. The philosopher’s stone is more like a synonym for immortality. The alchemists thought if they could only get the right ingredients—toad’s eyes, the blood of a virgin, hairs from a black cat’s tail, no, ha, ha, only joking—well, if they could get the right ingredients and mix them in the right chemical process, they’d end up with a substance that made you immortal if you drank it. The followers of Count Saint-Germain claim he had the recipe, so he was immortal. There are sources saying he died in Germany in 1784—but there are other records of people meeting him alive and well many years after that.”
“Hm,” I said. “I don’t think he’s immortal. But maybe he’d like to be? Maybe that’s the secret behind the secret. It’s what will happen when the Circle closes.…”
“Well, could be. But that’s only one side of the coin, put forward by enthusiastic supporters of cryptic conspiracy theories manipulating the sources for their own purposes. Critics of such theories assume that the legends accumulating around the count are most of them pure fantasy on the part of his fans, all because of his own clever presentation of himself.” As Lesley came out with all this stuff from the Internet, she reeled it off so fluently and with such enthusiasm of her own that I couldn’t help laughing.
“Why not ask Mr. Whitman if you can write an essay on the subject for homework?” I suggested. “You’ve done so much research, I should think you could write a whole book about it.”
“I don’t think the squirrel would really appreciate my efforts,” said Lesley. “After all, he’s one of Saint-Germain’s fans himself—I mean, if he’s a Guardian, he has to be. As I see it he’s the villain of the piece—Count Saint-Germain, I mean, not Mr. Squirrel. He threatened you and nearly strangled you, didn’t he? And your mother said you were to beware of him. So she knows more than she’s admitting. And I tell you what, she can only know it from this Lucy.”
“I think they all know more than they’re admitting,” I sighed. “Or anyway, they all know more than me. Even you do!”
Lesley laughed. “Just consider me an external part of your own brain. The count always made a great secret of his origins. That name and title were invented, anyhow. He may have been the illegitimate son of Maria Anna von Habsburg, widow of King Charles II of Spain. Several people could have been his father. Or according to another theory, he was the son of a Transylvanian prince and was brought up in Italy at the court of the last Medici duke. One way or another, none of it can really be proved, so everyone’s just groping around in the dark. But now the two of us have a new theory.”
“Do we?”
Lesley rolled her eyes. “Of course we do! We now know that one of his parents must have come from the de Villiers family, anyway.”
“How do we know that?”
“Oh, Gwen! You said yourself that the first time traveler was a de Villiers, so the count must have been a member of that family, whether or not he was born in wedlock. You understand that, don’t you? Otherwise his descendants wouldn’t have the same surname.”
“Mm, yes,” I said uncertainly. I couldn’t quite sort out this theory of his descent. “But I think there’s something in the Transylvanian theory too. It can’t be coincidence that that man Rakoczy comes from Transylvania.”
“I’ll do some more research into him,” Lesley promised. “Oh, watch out!” The door outside the cubicles swung, and someone came into the girls’ toilets. She—at least, we assumed it was a she—went into the cubicle next to ours to use the loo. We kept perfectly still until she had gone again.
“Without washing her hands,” said Lesley. “Yuck. I’m glad I don’t know who that was.”
“No paper towels left,” I said. My legs were getting pins and needles. “Do you think we’ll be in trouble? Mrs. Counter is sure to notice we’re missing. And if she doesn’t, then someone will tell on us.”
“All the students look the same to Mrs. Counter—she doesn’t notice anything. She’s called me Lilly since Year Seven, and she gets you mixed up with Cynthia, of all people. No, listen, this is more important than geography. You must be as well prepared as possible. The more you know about your enemies, the better.”
“I only wish I knew who my enemies are.”
“You can’t trust anyone,” said Lesley, just like my mother. “If we were in a film, the villain would turn out to be the least-expected person. But as we aren’t in a film, I’d go for the character who tried to strangle you.”
“But who set those men in black on us in Hyde Park? It can’t have been the count! He needs Gideon to visit the other time travelers and get a drop of their blood so as to close the Circle.”
“Yes, so he does.” Lesley chewed her lower lip thoughtfully. “But maybe there are several villains in this film. I mean, Lucy and Paul could also be the baddies. Well, they stole the chronograph. And what about the man in black who stands outside number eighteen?”
I shrugged. “He was there this morning, same as usual. Why? Do you think he’ll suddenly whip out a sword?”
“No, I think he’s more likely to be one of the Guardians, standing there in that silly way just on principle.” Lesley turned back to her folder. “I couldn’t find out anything about the Guardians themselves, by the way. They seem to be a very secret lodge indeed. But some of the names you mentioned—Churchill, Wellington, Newton—were Freemasons too. So we can assume that both secret societies had at least some connection. Oh, and I didn’t find out anything on the Internet about a boy called Robert White who drowned, but you can look up all the editions of the Times and the Observer for the last forty years in the library. I’m sure I’ll find something there. What else? Oh yes, mountain ash tree, sapphire, raven.… Well, of course you can interpret that in all sorts of different ways, but with this mysterious stuff, everything can always mean anything, which means nothing is certain. We must try to go by the facts and not all these fantastic ideas. You’ll have to find out more, particularly about Lucy and Paul and why they stole the chronograph. They obviously know something that the others don’t know. Or don’t want to. Or that they have very different ideas about.”
The door opened again. This time the footsteps were firm and energetic. And they were coming straight toward the door of our cubicle.
