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“Okay.” I peeled the banana as Lucas went on making notes. “What do you say instead?”
“Instead of what?”
“Instead of sex.”
“We don’t talk about it,” said Lucas, concentrating on his notepad. “Or anyway, not to girls of sixteen. So let’s go on. The chronograph was stolen by Lucy and Paul before the blood of the last two time travelers could be read into it. Then the second chronograph came into use, but of course the blood of all the other time travelers is missing from that one.”
“Not anymore. Gideon has found nearly all of them, and they gave him some of their blood. There’s only Lady Tilney to go, and the Opal, Elise something-or-other.”
“Elaine Burghley,” said Lucas. “A lady-in-waiting at the court of Queen Elizabeth. She died in childbirth aged eighteen.”
“Right. And Lucy and Paul’s blood too, of course. So we’re after their blood, and they’re after ours. Or that’s how I understand it, anyway.”
“And now there are two chronographs which might complete the Circle? This is really incredible!”
“What will happen when the Circle is complete?”
“Then the secret will be revealed,” said Lucas solemnly.
“Oh, no, not you too!” I shook my head angrily. “Isn’t there any more concrete information available, just for once?”
“Well, the prophesies speak of the rise of the eagle, the victory of mankind over disease and death, and the dawn of a new age.”
“Oh,” I said, no wiser than before. “So it’s a good thing, is it?”
“A very good thing. Something of benefit to the entire human race. That’s why Count Saint-Germain founded the Society of the Guardians. That’s why the most brilliant and powerful men in the world joined our ranks. We all want to keep the secret so that it can be revealed at the right time and save the world.”
Okay. A clear statement for once. Or at least the clearest anyone had yet given me since I got mixed up in all this mysterious secret stuff. “But why don’t Lucy and Paul want the Circle to be closed?”
Lucas sighed. “I’ve no idea. When did you say you met them?”
“In the year 1912,” I said. “June. June the twenty-second, I think. Or the twenty-fourth. I didn’t notice exactly.” The more I tried to remember, the less certain I was. “Or maybe the twelfth? It was an even number, I do remember that. The eighteenth? Anyway, sometime in the afternoon. Lady Tilney had the table laid for tea.” Then it dawned on me what I’d just said, and I clapped my hand over my mouth. “Oh, no!”
“What’s the matter?”
“Now I’ve gone and told you, and you’ll tell Lucy and Paul, and that’s why they can lie in wait for us there. So really you are the one who gives us away, not me. Mind you, I suppose it all comes to the same thing in the end.”
“What? No, no!” Lucas shook his head energetically. “I won’t do that. I won’t tell them anything at all about you—that would be crazy! If I tell them tomorrow that they’re going to steal the chronograph someday and disappear into the past with it, they’ll fall down dead of shock on the spot. You have to think very, very carefully what you’re going to tell anyone about the future, understand?”
“Well, no, maybe you won’t tell them tomorrow, but there are years and years ahead when you could do it.” I thoughtfully munched my banana. “On the other hand, what time did they travel back to with the chronograph? Why not this period? They’d always have a friend here in you. Maybe you’re lying to me and they’ve been waiting right outside that door for ages to get a few drops of my blood.”
“I haven’t the slightest idea where they could have gone.” Lucas sighed. “I can’t even imagine them ever doing anything so crazy. Or why they’d do it!” He added, sounding discouraged, “I’ve no idea of anything at all!”
“So neither of us has any idea at this moment,” I said, just as discouraged.
Lucas wrote down Green Rider, second chronograph, and Lady Tilney on his notepad, and added large question marks to all of them. “What we need is to meet again later. By then I could find out a good deal.…”
I had a bright idea. “Originally I was supposed to be sent to the year 1956 to elapse. Maybe we could meet again tomorrow evening.”
“Ha, ha!” said Lucas. “1956 may be tomorrow to you—for me it’s— But yes, let’s think. If you get sent to elapse to a time after this, will it be to this room?”
o;Ruby red, with G major, the magic of the raven, brings the Circle of Twelve home into safe haven,” murmured Lucas.
“Yes, well, there you are—magic of the raven, blah blah blah. But I’m the wrong person. Count Saint-Germain throttled me even though he was standing several yards away, and I could hear his voice in my head, and then there were those men with pistols and swords in Hyde Park, and I had to run a sword into one of them because otherwise he’d have killed Gideon, who is … who’s such a…” I took a deep breath, only to go headlong on the next minute. “Gideon is a pain in the neck, he acts as if I were a millstone around his neck, and this morning he kissed Charlotte, well, only on the cheek, but maybe it meant something, I never ought to have kissed him without asking about that first, after all, I’ve only known him a day or so, but suddenly he was so nice and then … oh, it all happened so fast … and everyone thinks I told Lucy and Paul when we were visiting Lady Tilney because we need her blood, and we need some of Lucy and Paul’s blood too, but they need Gideon’s blood and mine because that’s still missing from their chronograph. And no one tells me what’s going to happen when everyone’s blood has been read into the chronograph, and sometimes I think they don’t know for certain themselves. And Lucy said I ought to ask you about the Green Rider.”
Lucas had half closed his eyes behind his glasses and was obviously trying desperately to make sense of my torrent of words. “I have no idea what this Green Rider could mean,” he said. “I’m sorry, but it’s the first time I ever heard of him. Maybe it’s the title of a film? Why don’t you ask … I know, you could simply ask me in the year 2011.”
I looked at him, horrified.
