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The baron’s answer seemed to consist of the Lord’s Prayer. Lucy and Paul heard him gabbling it under his breath.
“Amen!” said his visitor, with a sigh. “So that’s your last word?”
“You are the Devil incarnate!” said the baron. “Get out of my coach, and never let me set eyes on you again!”
“Just as you wish. There’s only one more little thing I should mention. I didn’t tell you before, so as not to agitate you unnecessarily, but on your tombstone, which I have seen with my own eyes, the date of your death is given as 14 May 1602.”
“But that,” said the baron, “that’s…”
“Today. Exactly. And it’s nearly midnight already.”
All that could be heard from the baron was a gasp.
“What’s he doing?” whispered Lucy.
“Breaking his own rules.” Paul’s goose bumps had spread right up to the back of his neck. “He’s talking about—” He interrupted himself, because a familiar queasy sensation was spreading through him.
“My coachman will be back at any moment,” said the baron, and now his voice was distinctly alarmed.
“Yes, I’m sure he will,” replied his visitor, sounding almost bored. “That’s why I’m going to cut this short.”
Lucy had moved her hand down to the region of her stomach. “Paul!”
“I know, I can feel it myself. Bloody hell.… We must run if we don’t want to fall into the middle of the river.” He seized her arm and pulled her on, taking care not to turn his face toward the coach window.
“You’re really supposed to have died in your native land from the effects of a severe attack of influenza,” they heard the other man saying as they slunk past the coach. “But since my earlier visits to you ultimately led to your presence here in London today, and it so happens that you are enjoying the best of health, the equilibrium of a rather sensitive state of affairs is now unbalanced. Correct as I am, I therefore feel it my duty to lend Death a helping hand.”
Paul was concentrating on the queasy feeling inside him and working out how far it still was to the bank, but all the same, the significance of those words seeped into his mind, and he stopped again.
Lucy nudged him in the ribs. “Quick!” she whispered, breaking into a run herself. “We have only a few seconds left!”
Feeling weak at the knees, Paul started off again, and as he ran and the nearby bank began to blur before his eyes, he heard a terrible if muffled scream from inside the coach, followed by a gasp of “you devil!” And then all was deathly quiet.
Today, at 1500 hours, Lucy and Paul were sent to elapse to the year 1948. When they returned at 1900 hours, they landed in the rose bed outside the window of the Dragon Hall, wearing early seventeenth-century costume and drenched to the skin.
They seemed to be very upset; they were talking wildly, and therefore, much against their will, I informed Lord Montrose and Falk de Villiers. However, there turned out to be a simple explanation for the whole affair. Lord Montrose said he still had a vivid recollection of the fancy-dress party held in the garden here in 1948, during which several guests, evidently including Lucy and Paul, had unfortunately landed in the goldfish pool after the excessive consumption of alcohol.
Lord Montrose had taken responsibility for this incident and promised to replace the two rosebushes they had ruined, “Ferdinand Pichard” and “Mrs. John Laing.” Lucy and Paul were strictly instructed to abstain from alcoholic beverages in future, no matter what the period.
FROM THE ANNALS OF THE GUARDIANS
18 DECEMBER 1992
REPORT: J. MOUNTJOY, ADEPT 2ND DEGREE
ONE
“YOUNG PEOPLE, this is a church! No kissing allowed here!”
Startled, I opened my eyes and hastily sat up straight, expecting to see some old-fashioned priest hurrying indignantly toward me with his cassock billowing, all set to deliver a stern lecture. But it wasn’t the priest of this parish church who had disturbed our kiss. It wasn’t a human being at all. The speaker was a small gargoyle crouching in the pew right next to the confessional, as surprised to see me as I was to see him.
Although that was hardly possible. Because basically my state of mind couldn’t be called mere surprise. To be honest, my powers of thought had switched off entirely.
It had all begun with that kiss.
Gideon de Villiers had kissed me—me, Gwyneth Shepherd.
Of course I should have wondered why the idea came into his head so suddenly—in a confessional in a church somewhere in Belgravia in the year 1912—just after we’d been running full tilt in headlong flight, and my close-fitting, ankle-length dress with its silly sailor collar kept getting in the way.
