No Time Like the Past (6 page)

Further along were even more musical instruments. At the invitation of a smiling exhibitor, I sat at a beautiful harpsichord, inlaid with mother of pearl. I dredged through my childhood memories and played ‘In an English Country Garden’, very badly. He tried so hard to induce Mr Sands to buy one for his talented and lovely – I saw him falter on the word ‘wife’, mentally substitute ‘sister’, lose his nerve, baulk at ‘mother,’ and settle for ‘charming companion’. Mr Sands declined, but politely.

‘I’ve been well brought up,’ he said, as we moved away.

‘But not by me,’ I said, feeling that the mother issue should be made absolutely clear.

I couldn’t help staring back wistfully at the little harpsichord. I wondered what had happened to it. Had it survived the two hundred years between then and now? Was it perhaps in a museum, somewhere? Was it someone’s cherished possession? Who played it now? I’d never know.

We strolled back downstairs again, intending to spend some time under the trees admiring the Crystal Fountain and favouring the refreshment area there with our patronage. The crowds, however, were particularly thick. This was obviously a popular watering hole and so we settled for the Western Refreshment Court instead.

I have nightmares in which we didn’t. Nightmares in which we did push through the crowds to the North Transept and sit down there for a cup of tea. How long would we have had? How long before time unravelled? Would we ever have known anything about it? I would have lifted a perfect cup of tea to my lips – and then what? Would everything have gone white? Where would I be when I opened my eyes? Would I even have eyes to open?

But we didn’t. I remembered Mr Sands, and although he would drop down dead rather than admit it, he must be tired by now. I know I was, so we entered the Western Refreshment Court instead, which wasn’t that busy. I went off to visit the Ladies and to experience using the very first public convenience ever – and the origin of the phrase,
spending a penny
, leaving Mr Sands to select a table and instruct the waiter to bring us afternoon tea.

Everyone should spend ten minutes in a Victorian lavatory. The word ‘bog’ does not apply. The fixtures and fittings were of brass, mahogany, and marble. There were mirrors. And red plush seats. To sit on, I mean, not the lavatory kind. And discreet attendants – presumably in case the more frail ladies were overwhelmed by their own clothing.

I joined him a few minutes later, picking my way carefully through the tables because these skirts could get away from you if you weren’t careful.

The restaurant was lovely. Round tables were covered with crisp, white damask tablecloths. The china was exquisite. We’re St Mary’s – the concept of unchipped, matching china is completely alien to us. Ladies poured tea from silver pots. Cake stands were piled with sumptuous looking cakes and pastries. Gruesomely ugly potted palms and aspidistras were scattered around the place, but this was Victorian England after all – a bit of a taste-free zone. Besides, we weren’t here for the landscaping. We were here for Afternoon Tea.

Mr Sands rose as I joined him and held my chair for me. Exactly as a contemporary would do.

I sat back in my chair, sighed with contentment, laid aside my muff, looked around, and found myself staring straight at Dr Bairstow.

It took a second or two to register, but once it did, there could be no doubt. I was looking at a very young Dr Bairstow. Good grief, he was younger than me. I stared. I couldn’t help it. There could be no doubt. This was Edward Bairstow. He even had hair – dark hair – brushed back from his forehead. Actually, he was rather handsome in a young eagle sort of way. He was accompanied by a young woman who, like me, looked slightly out of place in her Victorian costume. She wore a sea-green dress with wide sleeves and a fabulously embroidered Paisley shawl. Such hair as I could see under her matching bonnet was honey-blonde, gathered around her head in smooth bands and secured in a knot at the base of her neck. I knew who this must be. This was Annie Bessant.

I’ll tell the story as Leon told it to me.

Once upon a time, there were three young historians. Three young, gifted historians. Edward Bairstow, Annie Bessant, and Clive Ronan. They were a team. The dream team. Only they weren’t. They were a triangle, which is never a good situation and all the more serious because no one ever realised they were a triangle until it was far, far too late.

Matters came to a head during an assignment to the 16
^th
century. James VI of Scotland. It was the time of the witch-hunts and for some reason, Annie was arrested. Edward Bairstow and Ronan got her back, but she’d picked up some sort of sickness while in gaol and developed a fever.

Protocol states you shoot the patient with every antibiotic known to man and wait and see. When you consider some of the diseases flying around at that time, you definitely don’t want to bring any of them back to modern times. To be fair, most of these things aren’t a huge threat to modern historians who are vaccinated against everything under the sun and beyond, and it’s just a case of waiting for the antibiotics to kick in, seeing what you’re dealing with, and then returning to strict quarantine. Contrary to protocol, Ronan wanted to return immediately to St Mary’s. Edward Bairstow refused and Ronan shot him. Just like that. He took out a gun and shot him in the leg, pitched him out of the pod to die, alone and abandoned, and returned to St Mary’s telling everyone he’d been killed during Annie’s rescue. Annie, at this point unconscious, was unable to refute his story.

I don’t know how he thought he’d get away with it, because when Annie woke up, which she did because a course of antibiotics sorted things out, she told the truth and Ronan was arrested. They charged him with contravening St Mary’s protocols and attempted murder. In that order.

He escaped custody, killing someone in the attempt, grabbed Annie from Sick Bay, tried to get to Hawking with her and escape in a pod, and Annie was shot in the crossfire. She died. Ronan got away. A rescue team went back for Edward Bairstow who was found in a bad way, hiding under someone’s cart. They saved his life but he’s limped ever since.

And here were two of that dream team, sitting a few tables away and on assignment, presumably, just like us. Like us, they were enjoying Victorian afternoon tea. They’d tucked into cakes and pastries. The table was littered with crumbs and empty plates. Any minute now, they’d be calling for the bill. This was obviously before their disastrous James VI assignment, when they were still a team, so where was the third one? Where was Clive Ronan?

I looked around and found him immediately, because he was sitting directly behind them at a separate table and they had no idea he was there.

It was very obvious that he wasn’t with them. He was older. He was so badly dressed that I was surprised the waiter had served him. An untouched pot of tea stood on the table in front of him. He never took his eyes off them, and most worryingly of all, I couldn’t see his hands. Both were below the table.

I had an awful, awful feeling about this. I had met our Mr Ronan on several occasions, and on none of them had he impressed me with his concern for others. Or even his sanity. On the other hand, his ruthless determination to get his own way at whatever the cost was more than impressive. There was going to be trouble.

I asked myself why he was here and I really don’t know why I bothered, because the answer was painfully obvious, even to me. He was here to kill Edward Bairstow. I could follow his reasoning perfectly.

If Edward Bairstow died, right here, right now, then he wouldn’t be around to prevent a sick Annie Bessant being returned to St Mary’s. Maybe that assignment wouldn’t even happen. So Ronan wouldn’t have to shoot him. So he wouldn’t be arrested. So he wouldn’t have to flee. So Annie wouldn’t die in the crossfire as he tried to force her into a pod. Edward Bairstow dies – here and now – and Annie lives. For him it was simple.

Except it wasn’t and what was I going to do about it? Should I tell Mr Sands? Would that help? How much time did I have? People kept walking between Ronan and his targets, who were oblivious to his presence. Even if they turned around, he was partially obscured by potted palm trees.

He’d tried this sort of thing before. The man’s a bloody nuisance and we can’t kill him because his future is our past. If we change his future then we’d be changing our past. So killing him was out of the question. Somehow, he had to be neutralised before he could do any damage here today.

I put down my tea because my hands weren’t quite steady, drew a deep breath, and smiled at Sands.

‘Mr Sands. Please show no reaction of any kind. We are in very serious trouble. Sitting at a table over there is a very young historian named Edward Bairstow, together with his colleague, Miss Bessant. More importantly, behind them, near the exit, is a man named Mr Ronan, of whom you will have heard.’

He knew better than to turn and look. ‘Is this a test?’

‘No. Listen carefully. I strongly suspect he is here to kill Edward Bairstow. We cannot allow that to happen. You may be about to see and hear things that you will never, ever, under any circumstances, divulge to a living soul. Is that perfectly clear?’

He smiled pleasantly, nodded as if we were discussing the weather, and stirred his tea. He was a good lad.

I settled my dead animal firmly around my shoulders. ‘If anything goes wrong, approach Dr Bairstow, identify yourself, and escort them both immediately from the building. Your priority – both our priorities – is to ensure the safety of Edward Bairstow and his colleague. Is that clearly understood?’

He smiled again, as if he didn’t have a care in the world, but his voice was tense. ‘What about the others?’

‘Leave them for the time being. We can’t go at this mob-handed. If everything goes horribly wrong, try and get everyone back to St Mary’s.’

Fat lot of good that would do them.

Sands had worked it out. ‘If anything happens to Edward Bairstow here … If he doesn’t live long enough to found St Mary’s … Then none of us will be here for it to happen in the first place … Bloody hell, Max. Paradox.’

I nodded. Trying to sound confident, I said, ‘It won’t come to that. Ready?’

‘You’re doing this alone?’

‘If possible. You’re first reserve. If I touch my bonnet, take whatever action seems appropriate.’

I rose from the table. He stood politely and passed me my muff.

I carried out a quick weapons check. I had two hatpins in my bonnet. A small can of pepper spray, which was almost useless here. I could spray him – but it would attract attention and make a scene. I suspected a stun gun would be my best bet but, of course, I hadn’t brought mine with me today because this was supposed to be the most boring assignment ever. I really should be slapped round the side of the head on a regular basis.

I remembered to thread my way slowly between the tables. Firstly, because that’s what women did in this time; secondly, because I still wasn’t completely in control of my wide skirts, but mostly because the last thing I wanted to do was push Ronan into precipitate action. He had his back to the wall and a potted palm tree sheltered his right side, so I could only approach from an angle. He paid me no attention at all, never taking his eyes from the two people sitting at the nearby table, who were still talking quietly with their heads together. As I passed them, Edward Bairstow gently placed his hand over hers. They were completely unaware of his presence. In a world of their own.

I was very conscious of the murmur of conversation around me, the genteel clink of china, the tinkle of teaspoons, the sounds of the string quartet playing quietly in the corner.

Making no attempt at concealment, I pulled out a chair opposite him, thereby blocking his view to some extent and making it difficult for him to get past me.

I sat carefully and laid my muff on the table in front of me, keeping both hands inside it so he wouldn’t be nervous and I could get to my pepper spray easily.

‘Good afternoon, Mr Ronan. Or is it Dr Ronan? I’ve never been quite sure.’

The last time I’d seen him, he’d been an old man; desperate and diseased; a jumping, jerking, nervous wreck. If he showed the slightest sign of instability, I’d have no choice but to spray him immediately and just deal with the consequences. At the moment, however, he seemed relatively calm. Well, as calm as a man contemplating murdering his former colleague and good friend can be, but then, he was never one for the dramatic reaction.

He went very still and then said, ‘You!’

I nodded.

‘From Edinburgh.’

I nodded again. We’d encountered each other in the mean streets of 16
^th
-century Edinburgh. There had been a certain amount of rolling around in the rain. Being unarmed, I’d had to resort to biting him and it wouldn’t have ended well for me but Leon turned up and slugged him with a Maglite. And even then, the bastard had still managed to get away.

We regarded each other over the silver tea service.

‘Are you armed?’

I nodded for a third time. Unless he had X-ray vision, he wouldn’t know it was only pepper spray.

‘What now? Have you come to take me in?’

‘No.’

He seemed surprised.

I smiled slightly. ‘I’m so sorry to damage your ego, Mr Ronan, but I’m not part of a major task force come to arrest you. I’m here on another assignment and just happened to recognise you. This is a friendly warning to move on. I don’t want to have to take any action today and you don’t want to be arrested. Or shot. Or killed. So, I’m giving you a chance. Stand up slowly, leave this place, return to your pod, and jump away. This is a once-in-a-lifetime offer.’

‘And if I don’t?’

‘Then make no mistake, I’ll neutralise you.’

‘No,’ he said, urgently. ‘Wait. Please wait.’

I waited.

‘Let me explain.’

‘Explain what? Your plan to murder your colleague?’

He seemed thunderstruck. ‘Murder? I’m not going to murder anyone. Why would you think I want to murder someone? Who would I want to murder?’

‘Well, Edward Bairstow, for one.’