The Time Pirate (56 page)

“No, sir! It belongs to you! General Washington awarded it to you! You have fought at his side for six long years.”

Lafayette smiled. “I'm still a young man, Nick, a military man to the bone. There will be plenty of battles and more medals perhaps. This one is most deservedly yours.”

“But—”

“But me no buts! Come closer so I can pin this where it rightfully belongs.”

Nick looked down at the medal gleaming on his chest. Emotion threatened to overtake him. He knew it was time to say good-bye to this great man who had befriended him.

“If you don't mind,” Lafayette said, “I'd be more than interested to watch your departure with the orb.”

“Not at all,” Nick said, dismounting and giving Chief a farewell hug. Pulling the gleaming machine from his pouch and twisting the two halves apart, he inserted the coordinates for the Greybeard Inn, Greybeard Island, on the afternoon of the day he'd left his home. He'd be home for supper, he thought, with Katie and his dear mother and, he hoped, perhaps his father.

“Sir,” Nick said, about to rejoin the two halves, “it occurred to me that there was a certain sadness in General Washington's eyes when he saw us at the surrender. Is everything all right?”

“Not really, Nicholas. His last child, the boy, Jacky, whom you met, died in his arms last night. He was taken by the fever.”

A lump formed in Nick's throat as he thought of General Washington telling his wife Martha the terrible news. She'd “had a bad feeling” about her son going to Yorktown. And she had begged Nick not to go.

“Will you do me a great favor, sir?” Nick asked. “It's most important to me.”

“Anything on this earth.”

“Would you kindly inform Mrs. Washington that Nicholas McIver sends her his deepest sympathies and condolences for her loss and that . . . and that someday he shall return to Mount Vernon under happier circumstances and spend long summer days with her, walking in her beautiful gardens.”

“I will do it as soon as I see her, Nicholas.”

“Good-bye, sir.”

“Good-bye, Nicholas. I hope we meet again.”

“All things are possible,” Nick said and, rejoining the two halves of the Tempus Machina, he disappeared in a tinkling of a thousand bells and the flickering countless golden fireflies.

· Greybeard Island, 1940 ·

N
ick reluctantly closed the wonderful book he was reading,
Treasure Island
, and laid his head back against his pillow. His mind was so flooded with vivid memories of his own latest adventure he could scarcely keep up with the doings of young Jim Hawkins and the evil pirate Long John Silver.

It had been, naturally enough, a happy homecoming. His parents, thanks to the Baroness de Villiers, were safely home. Neither his sister nor his parents had the slightest idea that he'd ever been away. However, during dinner, he'd felt enormous guilt over not telling his father about the loss of the Sopwith Camel and had told his father of ditching her in the sea. He'd left out the part about the aeroplane being on fire in order to save his poor mother undue concern.

They were all so grateful that he was safe and alive that the loss of the Camel was soon forgotten in the latest news about the Nazis and the plight of the islanders in the face of the ongoing occupation. As long as we stay together as a family, his father had said at dinner, and take good care of each other, we'll surely survive to see better days.

Nick sighed, wondering what new schemes he and Gunner could concoct to make the Germans sorry they'd picked these particular English islands, and reached up to turn off the light above his bed.

A soft tapping at his door was followed by his father's face appearing in the flickering light. “All tucked in?” he asked.

“Yes, father.”

“I've good news that should make you sleep better tonight.”

“What is it?”

“Your mum and I were just listening to the BBC from London. Prime Minister Churchill has just announced that the Yanks are coming to our aid after all. They are going to give us battleships, tankers, and destroyers in something called the Lend-Lease Program. It's the beginning of the end for Hitler and his Nazis, the Prime Minister says. Isn't it wonderful, Nick? Isn't that great news? The Yanks are coming after all!”

“Wonderful news, Father,” Nick said, smiling as Angus McIver softly closed the door.

Nick pulled Lafayette's medal from beneath his pillow and pinned it to his pajama-top pocket.

Then he reached up, switched off his light, rolled over, and, with a most contented smile on his face, fell fast asleep.

He had done his duty.