Johnny and the Bomb (5 page)

Mrs Tachyon stared intently in front of her, and jigged happily among the pillows.

‘She looks happy enough,' said Kasandra. ‘What's she listening to?'

‘I couldn't say for sure,' said the nurse. ‘All I know is the headphones aren't plugged in. Are you relatives?'

‘No. We're—' Kasandra began.

‘It's a sort of project,' said Johnny. ‘You know … like weeding old people's gardens and that sort of thing.'

The nurse gave him an odd look, but the magic ‘project' word did its usual helpful stuff.

She sniffed. ‘Can I smell vinegar?' she said.

Kasandra glared at Johnny. He tried to look innocent.

‘We've just brought some grapes,' he said, showing her the bag.

Mrs Tachyon didn't look up as they dragged chairs over to her bed.

Johnny had never spoken to her in his life, except to say ‘sorry' when she rammed him with her trolley. He wasn't sure how to start now.

Kasandra leaned over and pulled one earphone aside.

‘Hello, Mrs Tachyon!' she said.

Mrs Tachyon stopped jigging. She turned a beady eye on Kasandra, and then on Johnny. She had a black eye, and her stained white hair looked frizzled at the front, but there was something horribly
unstoppable
about Mrs Tachyon.

‘Indeed? That's what
you
think!' she said. ‘Call again tomorrow, baker, and we'll take a crusty one! Poor old biddy, is it? That's what
you
think! Millennium hand and shrimp? Free teeth and corsets? Maybe, for them as likes it, but not me, thank you so much. Wot, no bananas? I had a house, oh yes, but it's all black men now. Hats.'

‘Are they treating you all right?' said Kasandra.

‘Don't you worry! Right as rain and twice as ninepence. Hah! Tick tick bang! I'd like to see them try. There's puddings. Of course, I remember when it was all fields, but would they listen?'

Kasandra looked at Johnny.

‘I think she's a bit … confused,' she said. ‘She doesn't understand anything I'm saying.'

‘But we don't understand anything she's saying, either,' said Johnny, who felt confused all the time in any case.

Mrs Tachyon adjusted her headphones and started to boogie again.

‘I don't believe this,' said Kasandra. ‘Excuse
me
.'

She pulled the headphones off the woolly hat and listened to them.

‘The nurse was right,' she said. ‘There's nothing at all.'

Mrs Tachyon bounced up and down happily.

‘One born every minute!' she chortled.

Then she winked at Johnny. It was a bright, knowing wink, from Planet Tachyon to Planet Johnny.

‘We've brought you some grapes, Mrs Tachyon,' he said.

‘That's what
you
think.'

‘Grapes,' said Johnny firmly. He opened the bag, exposing the steaming greaseproof fish and chip paper inside. Her eyes widened. A scrawny hand shot out from under the covers, grabbed the packet, and disappeared under the blanket again.

‘Him and his coat,' she said.

‘Don't mention it. Er. I'm keeping your trolley safe. And Guilty is all right, although I don't think he's eaten anything apart from some chips and my hand.'

‘I blame Mr Chamberlain,' said Mrs Tachyon.

A bell tinkled.

‘Oh dear that's the end of visiting time my word don't the hours just fly past what a shame,' said Kasandra, standing up quickly. ‘Nice to have met
you Mrs Tachyon sorry we have to be going come on Johnny.'

‘Lady Muck,' said Mrs Tachyon. She nodded at Johnny.

‘What's the word on the street, mister man?'

Johnny tried to think like Mrs Tachyon.

‘Er … “No Parking”?' he suggested.

‘That's what
you
think. Them's bags of time, mister man. Mind me bike! Where your mind goes, the rest of you's bound to follow. Here today and gone yesterday! Doing it's the trick! Eh?'

Johnny stared. It was as though he had been listening to a lot of static on the radio and then, just for a second, there was this one clear signal.

The other Mrs Tachyon came back.

‘He's mixing sugar with the sand, Mr McPhee!' she said. ‘That's what
you
think.'

‘What did you have to go and give her them for?' Kasandra hissed, as she strode out of the ward. ‘She needs a proper healthy balanced diet! Not hot chips! What did you give her them for?'

‘Well, I thought hot chips would be exactly what someone'd like who'd got used to cold chips. Anyway, she didn't get any supper last night. Hey, there was something very odd about—'

‘She
is
very odd.'

‘You don't like her much, do you?'

‘Well, she didn't even say thank you.'

‘But
I
thought she was an unfortunate victim of a repressive political system,' said Johnny. ‘That's what you said when we were coming here.'

‘Yes, all right, but courtesy doesn't cost anything,
actually
. Come on, let's get out of here.'

‘Hello?' said someone behind them.

‘They've found out about the chips,' muttered Kirsty, as she and Johnny turned around.

But it wasn't a nurse bearing down on them, unless the hospital had a plain clothes division.

It was a young woman in glasses and a worried hairstyle. She also had boots that would have impressed Bigmac, and a clipboard.

‘Um … do you two
know
Mrs … er … Tachyon?' she said. ‘Is that her name?'

‘I suppose so,' said Johnny. ‘I mean, that's what everyone calls her.'

‘It's a very odd name,' said the woman. ‘I suppose it's foreign.'

‘We don't actually
know
her,' said Kasandra. ‘We were just visiting her out of social concern.'

The woman looked at her. ‘Good grief,' she said. She glanced at her clipboard.

‘Do you know anything about her?' she said. ‘Anything at all?'

‘Like what?' said Johnny.

‘Anything. Where she lives. Where she comes from. How old she is. Anything.'

‘Not really,' said Johnny. ‘She's just around. You know.'

‘She must
sleep
somewhere.'

‘Don't know.'

‘There's no records of her
anywhere
. There's no records of
anyone
called Tachyon anywhere,' said the woman, her voice suggesting that this was a major criminal offence.

‘Are you a social worker?' said Kasandra.

‘Yes. I'm Ms Partridge.'

‘I think I've seen you talking to Bigmac,' said Johnny.

‘Bigmac? Who's Bigmac?'

‘Er … Simon … Wrigley, I think.'

‘Oh, yes,' said Ms Partridge darkly. ‘Simon. The one who wanted to know how many cars he had to steal to get a free holiday in Africa.'

‘And
he
said
you
said you'd only send him if cannibalism was still—'

‘Yes, yes,' said Ms Partridge, hurriedly. When she'd started the job, less than a year ago, she'd firmly believed that everything that was wrong with the world was the fault of Big Business and the Government. She believed even more firmly now that it was all the fault of Bigmac.

‘He was dead impressed, he said—'

‘But you don't actually
know
anything about Mrs Tachyon, do you?' said the social worker. ‘She had
a trolley full of junk, but no one seems to know where it is.'

‘Actually—' Kasandra began.

‘I don't know where it is either,' said Johnny firmly.

‘It'd be very helpful if we could find it. It's amazing what they hoard,' said Ms Partridge. ‘When I was in Bolton there was an old lady who'd saved every—'

‘We'll miss the bus,' said Kasandra. ‘Sorry we can't help, Ms Partridge. Come on, Johnny.'

She pulled him out of the building and down the steps.

‘You
have
got the trolley, haven't you,' she said. ‘You
told
me.'

‘Yes, but I don't see why people should take it away from her or poke around in it. You wouldn't want people poking around in your stuff.'

‘My mother said she was married to an airman in the Second World War and he never came back and she went a bit strange.'

‘My grandad said he and his friends used to tip up her trolley when
he
was a boy. He said they did it just to hear her swear.'

Kasandra hesitated.

‘What? How old is your grandad?'

‘Dunno. About sixty-five.'

‘And how old is Mrs Tachyon, would you say?'

‘It's hard to tell under all those wrinkles. Sixty?'

‘Doesn't that strike you as odd?'

‘What?'

‘Are you dense or something? She's
younger
than your grandfather!'

‘Oh … well … perhaps there was another Mrs Tachyon?'

‘That isn't very likely, is it?'

‘So you're saying she's a hundred years old?'

‘Of course not. There's bound to be a sensible explanation. What's your grandfather's memory like?'

‘He's good at television programmes. You'll be watching, and then he'll say something like, “Hey, him … the one in the suit … he was the policeman in that programme,
you
know, the one with the man with the curly hair, couple of years ago,
you
know.” And if you buy anything, he can always tell you that you could get it for sixpence and still have change when he was a lad.'

‘Everyone's grandad does that,' said Kasandra severely.

‘Sorry.'

‘Haven't you looked in the bags?'

‘No … but she's got some odd stuff.'

‘How do you mean?'

‘Well … there are these jars of pickles …'

‘Well? Old people like pickles.'

‘Yes, but these are … kind of new and old at the same time. And there was fish and chips wrapped up in a newspaper.'

‘Well?'

‘No one wraps up fish and chips in newspaper these days. But they all looked fresh. I had a look because I thought I might as well give the fish to the cat, and the newspaper …'

Johnny stopped.

What could he say? That he
knew
that front page? He knew every word of it. He'd found the same one on the microfiche in the library and the librarian had given him a copy to help him with his history project. He'd never seen it apart from the copy and the fuzzy image on the screen and suddenly there it was, unfolded in front of him, greasy and vinegary but undoubtedly …

…
new
.

‘Well, let's have a
look
at them, at least. That can't hurt.'

Kasandra was like that. When all else failed, she tried being reasonable.

The big black car sped up the motorway. There were two motorcyclists in front and two more behind, and another car trailing behind them containing some serious men in suits who listened to little radios a lot and wouldn't even trust their mothers.

Sir John sat by himself in the back of the black car, with his hands crossed on his silver-topped walking stick and his chin on his hands.

There were two screens in front of him, which showed him various facts and figures to do with his companies around the world, beamed down to him from a satellite, which he also owned. There were also two fax machines and three telephones.

Sir John sat and stared at them.

Then he reached over and pressed the button that operated the driver's intercom.

He'd never liked Hickson much. The man had a red neck. On the other hand, he was the only person there was to talk to right now.

‘Do you believe it's possible to travel in time, Hickson?'

‘Couldn't say, sir,' said the chauffeur, without turning his head.

‘It's been done, you know.'

‘If you say so, sir.'

‘Time's been changed.'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘Of course, you wouldn't know about it, because you were in the time that it changed into.'

‘Good thing for me then, sir.'

‘Did you know that when you change time you get two futures heading off side by side?'

‘Must have missed that in school, sir.'

‘Like a pair of trousers.'

‘Definitely something to think about, Sir John.'

SirJohn stared at the back of the man's neck. It really was very red, and had unpleasant little patches of hair on it. He hadn't hired the man, of course. He had people who had people who had people who did things like that. It had never occurred to them to employ a chauffeur with an interest in something else besides what the car in front was doing.

‘Take the next left turn,' he snapped.

‘We're still twenty miles from Blackbury, sir.'

‘Do what you're told! Right now!'

The car skidded, spun half around, and headed up the off-ramp with smoke coming from its tyres.

‘Turn left!'

‘But there's traffic coming, Sir John!'

‘If they haven't got good brakes they shouldn't be on the road! Good! You see? Turn right!'

‘That's just a lane! I'll lose my job, Sir John!'

Sir John sighed.

‘Hickson, I'd like to lose all our little helpers. If you can get me to Blackbury by myself I will personally give you a million pounds. I'm serious.'

The chauffeur glanced at his mirror.

‘Why didn't you say, sir? Hold on to something, sir!'

As the car plunged down between high hedges, all three of the telephones started to ring.

Sir John stared at them for a while. Then he pressed the button that wound down the nearest window and, one by one, threw them out.

The fax machine followed.

After some effort he managed to detach the two screens, and they went out too, exploding very satisfactorily when they hit the ground.