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I quickly drank four mouthfuls of my hot lemon straight off. As usual, I was torn both ways: should I tell Mum everything or not? It wasn’t a good feeling to be telling her lies, or at least concealing such important things from her. But then again, I didn’t want her worrying about me or picking a fight with the Guardians. And she probably wouldn’t be very happy to know I was hiding the stolen chronograph here and traveling back in time with it unsupervised.
“Falk assured me that all you do in the past is sit in a cellar getting your homework done,” she said. “He said I had nothing to worry about except making sure that you saw enough daylight.”
I hesitated for a second again, and then I smiled wryly. “He’s right. It’s dark and dead boring down there.”
“Good. I’d hate it if anything like what happened to Lucy back in the past also happened to you.”
“Mum, what exactly did happen back then?” It wasn’t the first time I had asked that question in the last two weeks, and she still hadn’t given me a satisfactory answer.
“You know what happened.” Mum stroked my forehead again. “Oh, my poor little mousie! You’re burning with fever.”
I gently pushed her hand away. I was burning all right, but not with fever.
“Mum, I really do want to know just what happened to Lucy,” I said.
She hesitated for a moment, and then she told me all over again what I already knew: Lucy and Paul thought the Circle of Blood ought not to be closed, so they had stolen the chronograph and gone into hiding with it, because the Guardians didn’t see things the same way.
“And since it was totally impossible to escape the Guardians and their network—you can bet they had eyes and ears everywhere, people planted in Scotland Yard and the Secret Service—in the end, all Lucy and Paul could do was travel into the past with the chronograph,” I said, unobtrusively loosening the bedclothes over my feet to get a bit of cool air. “You just don’t know what year they went to.”
“That’s right. Believe me, it wasn’t easy for them to go away, leaving everything here behind them.” Mum looked as if she were fighting back tears.
“Yes, but why did they think the Circle of Blood ought not to be closed?” Heavens above, I was boiling hot! Why had I ever claimed to be having shivering fits?
Mum stared past me into space. “All I know is that they didn’t trust Count Saint-Germain’s motives, and they were convinced that the secret of the Guardians was built on a foundation of lies. I’m sorry now that I didn’t ask more questions at the time … but I think Lucy was glad of that. She didn’t want to put me in danger too.”
“The Guardians think the secret of the Circle of Blood is some kind of miracle-working medicine. A cure for all the diseases of mankind,” I said, and I could tell from Mum’s expression that this information wasn’t news to her. “Why would Lucy and Paul want to keep this miraculous cure from being found? Why would they be against it?”
“Because … because they thought the price to be paid was too high.” Mum whispered those words. A tear ran out of the corner of her eye and down her cheek. She quickly wiped it away with the back of her hand and stood up. “Try to get some sleep, darling,” she said in her normal voice. “I’m sure you’ll soon feel warmer. Sleep is always the best medicine.”
“Good night, Mum.” In other circumstances, I’d certainly have bombarded her with more questions, but I could hardly wait for her to close my bedroom door. I flung the blankets off with great relief and opened the window so suddenly that I scared two pigeons (or were they the ghosts of pigeons?) off the sill where they had settled down for the night. By the time Xemerius came back from his flight around the house, checking up on everything, I had changed my sweat-drenched pajamas for a clean, dry pair.
“Everyone in bed, including Charlotte,” reported Xemerius. “Although she’s staring at the ceiling with her eyes wide open and doing stretching exercises for her calves. You look like a lobster.”
“I feel like a lobster.” Sighing, I bolted the door. I didn’t want anyone, least of all Charlotte, coming into this room while I was gone. Whatever she planned to do with her well-stretched calves, she wasn’t getting in to do it here.
I opened the wardrobe and took a deep breath. It was difficult clambering through the hole and crawling over to the crocodile with the chronograph hidden inside it. My clean pajamas were soon dirty gray all down the front, and any number of cobwebs were clinging to me. Disgusting.
“You have a … a little something there,” said Xemerius as I crawled out again with the chronograph under my arm. The little something turned out to be a spider the size of Caroline’s hand. (Well, almost, anyway.) It cost me enormous self-control to hold back a scream that would have woken up not only everyone in the house but the whole of this part of town. Once I’d shaken it off, the spider scuttled under my bed. (It’s amazing how fast something with eight legs can run.)
I stood there gasping for about a minute. Then I shook myself again with disgust as I set the chronograph.
“Don’t carry on like that,” said Xemerius. “Some spiders are easily twenty times that big.”
“Where? On Planet Zog? There, that should be okay.” I lifted the chronograph up on its little chest in the wardrobe and put my finger into the compartment under the ruby. “I’ll be back in an hour and a half. And keep an eye on Tarantula there, will you?” Holding Nick’s flashlight, I waved to Xemerius and took a deep breath.
With a dramatic flourish, he put a hand to his breast. “Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day.…”
“Oh, shut up, Juliet,” I said, pressing my finger firmly down on the needle.
When I took my next breath, my mouth was full of flannel. I hastily spat it out and switched on the flashlight. It was a bathrobe, right in front of my face. The wardrobe was crammed full of clothes hanging in two rows, and it took me some time to scramble to my feet in there among them.
“Did you hear that?” asked a woman’s voice outside the wardrobe.
Oh, no. Please not!
“What is it, darling?” That was a man’s voice. It sounded very, very hesitant.
I was transfixed with fright.
