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“Is there a loo down here?”
“Oh. Yes, of course, just around the corner. I’ll show you the way.”
“I can find it for myself.”
“Of course,” Mr. George replied, but he followed me to the door like a small, stout shadow anyway. There, like a soldier on guard in front of Buckingham Palace, stood the man who had taken the vow of silence.
“The next door along.” Mr. George pointed to the left. “I’ll wait here.”
In the ladies’ room—a small place smelling of disinfectant with a loo and a washbasin—I took my mobile out of my pocket. No reception, of course. I’d have loved to tell Lesley about all this. At least the time display was working, and I was surprised to see that it was only noon. I felt as if I’d been here for days. I did actually need the loo.
When I came out again, Mr. George smiled at me in relief. He’d obviously been afraid I might have disappeared while I was in there.
In the documents room, I sat down on the sofa again, and Mr. George sat opposite me in an armchair.
“Well, let’s go on with our question and answer game,” he said. “But taking turns this time. I ask a question, you ask the next.”
“Okay,” I said. “You first.”
“Are you thirsty?”
“Yes, I’d like some water, if there is any. Or tea.”
Sure enough, there was water down here, and fruit juice and wine, as well as a kettle for tea. Mr. George made us a pot of Earl Grey.
“Your turn now,” he said, sitting down again.
“If this time-travel business depends on a gene, how come a person’s date of birth is so important? Why didn’t they take some blood from Charlotte ages ago and test it for the gene? And why can’t the chronograph send her back to some safe time in the past before she travels of her own accord and maybe gets into danger?”
“Well, first, we only think it depends on a gene—we don’t know for certain. All we’re sure of is that it’s something in the blood making the carriers different from normal people. But we haven’t found Factor X—as we call the time travel gene—although we’ve been working on research for many years, and you’ll find many of the best scientists in the world in our ranks. Believe me, it would make things much easier if we could prove the existence of the gene or whatever it is in the blood. As it is, we have to rely on calculations and observations made by generations of people before us.”
“If the chronograph had been tanked up with Charlotte’s blood, what would have happened?”
“In the worst case it wouldn’t have worked anymore,” said Mr. George. “But, Gwyneth, we’re talking about a tiny drop of blood—it’s not like filling up a car! My turn now. If you could choose a time, when would you most like to travel back to?”
I thought about it. “Not very far back. Only ten years. Then I could see my father again and talk to him.”
Mr. George looked at me sympathetically. “A very understandable wish, but I’m afraid it won’t do. You can’t travel back within your own lifetime. The closest you can come to that is the time just before your birth.”
“Oh.” That was a pity. I’d imagined traveling back to when I was at nursery school and a boy named Gregory Forbes called me an ugly toad in the school yard and kicked my shin four times. I’d have walked in like Superwoman, and Gregory Forbes would never have kicked little girls again, that was for sure.
“Your turn again,” said Mr. George.
“I was supposed to draw a chalk circle at the place where Charlotte disappeared. What would the point of that have been?”
Mr. George waved the question away. “Forget all that nonsense. Your aunt Glenda insisted on it so that we could have the place guarded. Then we’d have sent Gideon back to the past to describe the position, so that the Guardians would be waiting for Charlotte and could protect her until she traveled back.”
“Yes, but you couldn’t have known what time she’d gone back to. So the Guardians might have been watching that place all around the clock for years on end.”
“Right,” sighed Mr. George. “Exactly! Now my turn again. Can you remember your grandfather?”
“Of course. I was ten when he died. He wasn’t at all like Lady Arista—he was funny and far from strict. He always used to tell my brother and me horror stories. Did you know him yourself?”
“Oh, yes. He was my mentor and my best friend.” Mr. George looked thoughtfully at the fire for a while.
“Who was the little boy?” I asked.
“What little boy?”
