AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Gideon looked as if he’d burst into tears next moment. He took my hand and almost crushed it. “Then we can only hope that the count never, never, never finds that out.”
“And let’s hope we can still think up our brilliant plan,” I said. “So let’s not hang around here any longer. We’re in a hurry.”
* * *
“QUARTER OF AN HOUR, not a minute longer!” said Gideon. He was kneeling in front of the chronograph on the picnic rug that we had spread on the grass in Hyde Park, not far from the Serpentine Gallery and with a view of the lake and the bridge. Although it looked like being as fine a spring day as yesterday, it was still freezing cold, and the grass was wet with dew. Joggers and dog walkers passed by, some of them looking curiously at our little group.
“But a quarter of an hour isn’t long enough!” I said, as I strapped on the hooped framework with its padding at the hips. It would make sure that my dress billowed out around me like a ship in full sail and didn’t drag on the ground, and it had been my reason for bringing the outsize traveling bag along this morning instead of a backpack. “Suppose he arrives late?” Or not at all. That was what I secretly feared most. “I’m sure clocks didn’t keep particularly good time in the eighteenth century.”
“Then it’s just his bad luck,” growled Gideon. “This is a crazy idea anyway. And today of all days!”
“For once he’s right,” said Xemerius, sounding tired. He hopped into the traveling bag, laid his head on his paws, and yawned widely. “Wake me when you get back. I definitely got up too early this morning.” Soon after that, I heard a snore from the bag.
Lesley carefully put the dress over my head. It was the flowered blue dress that I’d worn for my first meeting with the count, and it had been hanging in my wardrobe ever since. “There’d be plenty of time to meet James later,” she said. “For him, it will always be the same time on the same day, whenever it is here that you set out to visit him.” She began doing up the little hooks behind my back.
“The same applied to keeping that letter from being delivered,” I contradicted her. “That didn’t have to be done today, either. Gideon could have hit himself over the head on Tuesday, for instance, or in August next year—it would have come to the same thing. Apart from which, Lady Tilney has taken charge at her end.”
“It always makes me feel dizzy when you lot bring up these ideas,” complained Raphael.
“I simply wanted to get it done and over with before we next meet Lucy and Paul,” said Gideon. “Surely that’s not so hard to understand.”
“And I want to get vaccinating James over and done with,” I said, adding in dramatic tones, “then if anything happens to us, at least we’ll have saved his life!”
“Are you two really going to disappear and reappear in front of all these people?” asked Raphael. “Don’t you think it’ll get into the newspapers and people will want to interview you on TV?”
Lesley shook her head. “Nonsense,” she said firmly. “We’re a good way from the path, and they won’t be gone long. Only the dogs will notice anything.” Xemerius’s snoring changed pitch.
“But remember to start back from exactly the same place where you landed,” Lesley went on. “Tell you what, mark the place with one of these nice shoes.” She handed me one of the shoes that Raphael had been wearing, and beamed at me. “This is fun! I want to do it every day from now on, please!”
“I don’t,” said Raphael, looking down for a moment at his socks, wiggling his toes gloomily, and then staring back at the path. “My nerves are stretched to breaking point. In the Tube just now, I was sure we were being followed. It would be only logical for the Guardians to have someone shadowing us. And if anyone comes along to take the chronograph away from Lesley and me, I can’t even kick him properly with no shoes on!”
“He’s a bit paranoid,” Lesley whispered to me.
“I heard that,” said Raphael. “And it’s not true. I’m only being cautious.”
“And I can’t understand how come I’m really doing this,” said Gideon, getting Lesley’s backpack on. He had put the vaccination kit into it. “We’re breaking all the Golden Rules at once. Come on, Gwenny, you first.”
I knelt beside him and smiled at him. He’d refused to put on his sea-green eighteenth-century clothes for this expedition, although I’d tried to explain that he’d scare James in his ordinary things. Or even worse, James wouldn’t take us seriously.
“Thank you for doing this for me,” I said all the same, putting my finger into the compartment under the ruby.
“That’s okay,” said Gideon, and then his face blurred before my eyes. When I could see properly again, I was kneeling on wet leaves among a lot of fallen chestnuts. I quickly stood up and put Raphael’s shoe down where I had landed.
It was pouring with rain, and there wasn’t a soul in sight. Only a squirrel scurried up to the top of the tree and looked curiously at us.
Gideon had landed beside me and was looking around. “Hm,” he said, mopping rain off his face. “Perfect weather for riding and vaccination, I’d say.”
“We’ll lie in wait behind that bush,” I suggested. For once, I was the one to take Gideon’s hand and lead him on.
He was reluctant. “Only for ten minutes,” he insisted. “If he doesn’t turn up by then, we’re going back to Raphael’s shoe.”
“Yes, yes,” I said.
There really was already a bridge over the narrow part of the lake at this time, although it didn’t look at all like the one I knew. A coach rattled by on the road around the park. And a single horseman was coming over the bridge from the opposite bank at a brisk trot. On a gray horse.
“There he is!” I cried, and began waving for all I was worth. “James! Here I am!”
“How about making yourself even more conspicuous?” asked Gideon.
