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Gideon held me back just as we reached the door and hissed into my ear, “I said you were terribly scared, so look a bit upset if you want to get home early this evening.”
“I thought I was looking upset already,” I murmured.
“They’re waiting for you in the Dragon Hall,” panted Mr. George at the top of the steps. “You’d better go straight in, and I’ll find Mrs. Jenkins and get her to bring you something to eat. You must be hungry by now. Anything special you’d like?”
Before I could tell him, Gideon had taken my arm and was leading me on. “Lots of everything, please!” I called back to Mr. George over my shoulder, before Gideon hauled me through a doorway and into a wide corridor. I was having difficulty not stumbling over the hem of my ankle-length skirt.
The gargoyle skipped nimbly along beside us. “I don’t think your boyfriend has very good manners,” he remarked. “This is more the way you’d drag a goat to market.”
“Slow down a bit, can’t you?” I asked Gideon.
“Look, the sooner we get this over with, the sooner you can go home.” Was there a touch of concern in his voice, or did he simply want to get rid of me?
“Yes, but … maybe I’d like to be in on this whole meeting too—did you ever think of that? I have a lot of questions, and I’m sick and tired of no one ever giving me any answers.”
Gideon slackened his pace slightly. “No one would give you answers today anyway. All they’ll want to know is how Lucy and Paul came to be lying in wait for us there. And I’m afraid you’re still our prime suspect.”
That our cut me to the heart. I resented it.
“But I’m the only one who doesn’t know anything about all this!”
Gideon sighed. “I’ve already tried to explain. Now you may be totally ignorant and … and innocent, but no one knows what you may do in the future. Don’t forget, you can travel to the past yourself, and that way you could tell them about our visit.” He stopped short. “Well—you would be able to tell them.”
I rolled my eyes. “So would you! Anyway, why does it have to be one of us? Couldn’t Margaret Tilney herself have left a message behind in the past? Or the Guardians? They could give one of the time travelers a letter to take from any time to any other time—”
“Eh?” asked the gargoyle. “Can you explain what you’re talking about? I can’t make head or tail of it.”
“Of course there are various possible explanations,” said Gideon, definitely slowing his pace now. “But I had a feeling today that Lucy and Paul somehow or other … let’s say impressed you.” He stopped, let go of my arm, and looked at me seriously. “You could have talked to them, you could have listened to their lies, maybe you’d even have given them your blood for the stolen chronograph voluntarily if I hadn’t been there.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” I said. “But I really would have liked to hear what they wanted to say to us. They didn’t seem all that evil to me.”
Gideon nodded. “You see, that’s exactly what I mean. Gwyneth, those two are out to destroy a secret that’s been safely guarded for hundreds of years. They want something that isn’t theirs. And for that they need our blood. I don’t think they’d shrink from anything to lay hands on it.” He pushed a curly strand of brown hair back from his forehead, and I instinctively held my breath.
Oh, God, he looked terrific! Those green eyes, the curve of his lips, the pale skin—everything about him was just perfect. And he smelled so good that for a split second I toyed with the idea of simply leaning my head against his chest. Of course I didn’t.
“Maybe you’ve forgotten that we wanted their blood as well. And it was you who put a pistol to Lucy’s head, not the other way around,” I said. “She didn’t have a gun.”
An angry line showed between Gideon’s eyebrows. “Gwyneth, please don’t be so naive. We’d been lured into a trap—as usual. Lucy and Paul had armed reinforcements. It was at least four to one!”
“Two!” I snapped. “I was there too!”
“Five if we count Lady Tilney. But for my pistol, we could be dead by now. Or at least they could have taken blood from us by force, because that’s exactly what they were there for. And you wanted to talk to them?”
I bit my lip.
“Hello?” said the gargoyle. “Anyone got a thought to spare for me? Because I don’t understand this one little bit!”
“I can see why you’re confused,” said Gideon, much more gently now, but you couldn’t miss the patronizing note in his voice. “You’ve had too many new experiences over these last few days. And you were totally unprepared. How could you understand what it’s all about? You ought to be at home in bed. So let’s get this over and done with, fast.” He reached for my arm again and made me go on. “I’ll do the talking, and you confirm my story, right?”
“Yes, so you’ve said at least twenty times already!” I replied, annoyed, stopping when I saw a brass plate outside the door saying LADIES and bracing my legs. “You can all start without me. I’ve been needing to go to the loo since June 1912.”
Gideon let go of me. “Can you find the way up by yourself?”
“Of course,” I said, although I wasn’t absolutely sure whether I could rely on my sense of direction. This house had too many passages, flights of stairs, doors, and nooks and crannies.
“Great! We’re rid of that pest at last,” said the gargoyle. “Now you can tell me what’s going on.”
I waited until Gideon had disappeared around the next corner, then I opened the door of the ladies’ room and snapped at the gargoyle, “Okay, come on in here!”
