The Accidental Time Traveller (11 page)

When Agatha saw me burst through the gap in the hedge she clapped her hands and cheered. “Sledging time,” she yelled. “I heard you coming. I was busy in my drawing. I have quite a pretty collection now. Come in and look, Saul. I have done a likeness of Agnes, yet it isna as lovely as she is.”

I didn’t know what to say. I’m not great at goodbyes and this was going to be one major goodbye. I smiled at her awkwardly. She must have sensed something. “Pray, what is the matter, Saul?”

I glanced down at my rucksack. Then I looked at the yew tree. I could feel this lump in my throat. We could have the picnic first, then do the experiment. “I brought bagels,” I said, not looking at her but fumbling about in the bag. “They’re nice. And I got you an orange. Remember, you saw one in Mrs Singh’s shop – I mean, in your house, when you just arrived. Oh yeah, and I got you chocolate biscuits, and figs.”

By this time Agatha was standing right in front of me. “Am I to return? Is that it, Saul? You have all in place? I am going home, is that it?”

I had the food in my hands. “We can have the picnic
first. You like chocolate. Well here, it’s a biscuit. With chocolate on the top.”

Agatha took the biscuit and ate it and all the time she didn’t take her eyes off me. “I will miss chocolate,” she said.

I knew if I was going to do this I had to get on with it. Macrimmon said you had to really want it. You had to focus your mind on the intended journey. “Your dad won’t believe it when you suddenly turn up in the parlour,” I said, trying to make it sound easy. “Then your monkey will screech the house down. He’ll jump on your shoulders. And if that horrible Dick calls you names just tell him to get lost.”

“I will,” Agatha said. But she didn’t look too happy.

“Remember, you’ve got your life to live. That’s what you’re always saying. But… you could stay here if you want.”

“No, you are in the right, dear Saul. Of course I wish to return home. Indeed I must return home. It’s only, I didna think it would be this moment. You surprise me. Have you everything ready?”

I nodded. “Finish your lunch,” I said. “I’ll get everything set out.” Wide-eyed like she couldn’t take in this was happening at last, Agatha nibbled at the bagel. I dashed into the den and brought out the plate of earth. I put it by the yew tree. I went back for the bowl of water, spilling some as I carried it. Next I hung up my glass crystal on a branch. A weak pale sun that was hardly higher than the hedge didn’t do much to make bright-coloured rainbows. I pushed the glass crystal and watched it swing. So did Agatha. “It’s a crystal,”
I told her, then I stuck the candle in the snow. “Hey,” I nattered, waving a box of matches in the air, “this is easier than rubbing stones together. Watch!” Except it took me loads of tries before I actually managed to light the thing.

“How magical,” Agatha said, but she didn’t sound that impressed.

I got out my jotter, turned it to the page with the gold star, then wedged it by the tree. Agatha, sucking juice noisily from the orange, stepped closer. I could picture her frowning behind me. “It’s a gold star,” I muttered and looked back over my shoulder to see her gazing at my drawing.

“Pray tell, Saul, what carat gold is the star?”

“That doesn’t matter, cause the main thing is,” I said, getting up and practically knocking her backwards, “that you have to totally believe it’s going to work.” I could tell she was ready to open her mouth and argue but I rubbed my hands together. “Right then,” I said, “you stand beside the tree and touch the bark.” She didn’t look too convinced but I patted her on the shoulder. I was sure we could trust Macrimmon’s law. You had to be pure of heart, he said. Agatha Black, I could tell, was that. And you had to trust. “Believe it, ok?” I said. Agatha nodded.

“Here, Agatha, press your palms against the tree.” She did. “Now close your eyes.” She looked round at me, mouthed the words, “Thank you,” then closed her eyes.

“The song?” she murmured. “What of the song?”

I hadn’t forgotten the song. At least some good might come of giving my pound away to the busker
last night. The tune he played was still going round and round in my head. “I’ve got one,” I said. I stepped closer. My heart was pounding hard. “Are you ready?”

She nodded. She still had my clothes on, but I reckoned it wouldn’t matter. I bent down and swirled the water. Next to the water the candle was flickering bravely. I stood up, closed my eyes then started to hum the tune.

I don’t know how long I stood there, under the yew tree, humming that strange tune. It was like I was dreaming. I saw Mrs Singh and her red sari. I saw Agatha with her arms flung out wide. I saw the car swerve round her. And the sliding door of the cinema. And snow. And Agatha jumping hopscotch. I even saw things I’d never actually laid eyes on, like Dick pressing his nose against the window pane, and Albert Black gazing into the fire, and Pug all dressed up on market day, smoking a pipe, and Agatha scrubbing potatoes, and making paper fish flap in the air…

After what felt like ages I opened my eyes.

“It hasna worked,” Agatha said. She dropped her hands from the tree, brushed passed me and walked through the snow to the den.

I ran after her. “You didn’t want it enough,” I shouted.

She was sitting slumped on the floor of the den, tracing a circle on the floor with her finger. She didn’t look at me. “Yea havna proper gold.” She sniffed and a small tear rolled down her cheek and fell onto the floor.

I left her there. I didn’t know what to say. I felt like a failure. I trudged over the wasteland. I stepped in my own footsteps, going the other way. These footsteps had been confident, the ones pointing to the den. Now I felt like Albert Black, a loser. I was supposed to be an apprentice time traveller and I hadn’t managed to shift her an inch.

“You look sad.”

I glanced up in fright. Agnes was sitting on the wall at the edge of the wasteland. She had a hole in her shoe. She didn’t seem bothered that she was sitting on the snow. I was stumped for words. She was right. I was sad. Agatha Black said I was the only one who could get her back. I had tried. I had failed. I was sad.

“I hope you win the competition.” She jumped off the wall and came over to me. I was just standing there, like I had been struck dumb and frozen, all at once. “Imagine if you win, Saul. Mrs Veitch will have a hairy fit.” Agnes started to giggle. “And you would get £200. Imagine that!”

The cuffs of her sweatshirt were all frayed. She could probably do with £200. She shook back her hair and smiled at me. “I’m going to see Agatha.” In a funny way it felt like a relief, somebody else knowing her real name. “I won’t tell anyone about the den,” she said. “It’s the best secret den ever. It’s like a real house.”

“She’s done a picture of you,” I said, not believing I was actually talking to this girl. She’d been in my class for years and I had never said a word to her.

“Bet she’s made me look much nicer that I do.” I
shrugged. What was I supposed to say to that? “She’s pretty special, isn’t she?” Agnes went on. She stared at me with her pale blue eyes. Suddenly I really wanted to tell her the truth. And the way she looked at me made it easy.

“I dunno what she told you,” I mumbled. I waited for Agnes to say something but she just kept on gazing at me. “She got herself lost here. She’s from Peebles, but, like, two hundred years ago. She was trying to help her dad. She’s too good. She should never have agreed. Anyway, he got her lost. She nearly got knocked over by a car and that’s when she found me. I was going to the shops when, wham – this girl, dressed all funny, started screaming. She grabbed me. So, she said it’s up to me. I have to help her get back.”

Through all this garbled speech Agnes didn’t look a bit amazed or gob-smacked. She didn’t look at me like I was lying, or crazy.

“So that’s it,” I said. “Weird, I know, but…”

“I know,” Agnes said.

In the distance I heard the church bells. I had to get a move on. Was Agnes skipping school? “Um, better get back then,” I muttered. Agnes just smiled again. She was the kind of girl that could be invisible. Half the time she didn’t even come to school and I swear the teachers didn’t notice. Will said she was so clever they couldn’t teach her anything anyway.

“It’s great you’ve been helping her.” Agnes said. “Agatha told me she’s having a brilliant time here. And you’ve fed her and showed her things.”

I shrugged and went red. “We haven’t done much,” I mumbled. I thought about the sledging plan. We could
still do it. There was a floodlight on the sledging hill. Even in the dark we could go sledging. “Um, tell her, if she wants, we could go sledging after school.” Agnes looked at me, like she was waiting for an invitation but not daring to ask. “And, um, you can come too, if you like,” I added, hurriedly.

“I’d love that,” she said. “I haven’t got a sledge, but I could watch.”

Well, I didn’t have a sledge either, but Will had a good one, and Robbie had two. “That’s ok,” I said, then I grinned and she did too. I waved to her. She waved back, then I turned and clambered over the wall. I ran all the way back to school. And even though I had tried the experiment and even though it hadn’t worked, I didn’t feel such a rotten failure anymore.

That afternoon I sent notes to Will and Robbie about sledging.

So can’t wait

Robbie wrote on his note.

Beast

Will wrote on his.

“What’s your cousin up to this afternoon, Saul?” Mrs Veitch asked.

I crumpled the notes and dropped them under my desk. I shook my head, thinking, how come she’s bothered about Randolph and not Agnes? I said, “He’s getting ready to go back.”

“Ah, of course,” she said, smiling at me. It was like I was the teacher’s pet all of a sudden because I had done the essay. I squirmed in my seat and looked down. “Everyone,” she said, “likes to be home for Christmas.”

The sledging turned out to be really good fun, at least to start with. Agnes sat on the snow watching us. She didn’t even have a proper coat. Then Agatha waved for her to join in and soon you’d think the five of us were the best of pals. It was really busy at the sledging hill and some of the kids from school shouted, “Hiya Randolph,” to Agatha and she waved at them and shouted “Hiya” back. The same people threw us some pretty weird looks because Nessa Nobody was playing with us, but I didn’t care. She wasn’t nobody. She was poor, that was for sure. When we were on the sledge together I saw she had newspaper stuffed into her boots. “This is fantastic, isn’t it, Saul?” she shouted as we zoomed down the hill on Robbie’s sledge. It was pretty good fun. The hill was worn smooth; each time we went down it got faster and faster.

Agatha went down with Will on his big blue sledge. When we were all trudging up the hill I could hear him getting in a right state. “That was great Randolph. It was fast. Bet you don’t have sledging hills in London, Agatha. I mean, Randolph. I mean, long ago.”

“Much has changed, Will,” she said, throwing back her head and laughing. “The river isna frozen over, but
this hill is the same. The snow is the same. And we slide down it on whatever we can find. Tin trays at times.”

“Cool!” Will said.

“Aye,” said Agatha with a twinkle in her eye. “Cool indeed.”

Robbie had all three sledges lined up for a race. Will ran down the hill. He was going to mark the finishing line and check the winner. Robbie got on one sledge. Agnes got on another and Agatha got on the third. Robbie gritted his teeth and held the rope. The girls were going to go down head first. I got the oh-so-exciting job of standing at the starting line and shouting “Ready – steady – GO!”

They zoomed down the hill, screaming and
laughing
. I was left at the top of the hill, cheering them on. Robbie got a good start, but then Agatha caught up fast. I watched them till I could hardly see them
anymore
. I pulled my Rasta hat down over my ears when suddenly I felt a snow ball land on the back of my leg. “Watcha, nerd!” I felt my blood run cold. I didn’t turn round. I didn’t have to. I knew who it was. The voice came closer. “Look at that. Your pals gone off and left you out in the cold, eh?”

I wished the others would come back, but I knew they’d be ages. I could still hear them laughing, way down at the bottom of the hill. I heard Crow’s footsteps crunch down on the snow. He was getting closer. He was probably after more money. My heart was pounding. I wasn’t going to hang about and find out what he wanted. I bolted away and ran down the hill. I fell on the glassy snow. I rolled over, and over.
Then I staggered to my feet. And I kept running.

“Agnes won,” Will said and he held his hands together – inches apart, “by that much.”

“What’s up with you?” Robbie said, dragging his sledge over to where I was slumped down in the snow, panting like mad. I didn’t know whether to tell them. “I know! You came to help pull the sledges back up? Good man! Do you want a go?” The last thing I wanted to do was go back up that hill. I got to my feet, feeling my knees throb. I shook my head. I was shivering. My gloves were damp with snow and my cheeks were numb with cold.

“Nah, it’s getting late,” I mumbled, “and I’m cold.”

Robbie flipped open his phone and the next thing he was chatting to his mum, asking her to come and pick him up.

We all trudged along the side of the river to the car park, pulling the sledges behind us. “Here in the spring are a million primroses. Oh, it’s the bonniest place then.” Agatha pointed to the river bank. She had, I noticed, completely dropped the Randolph disguise.

“What’s a primrose?” Will asked her.

“Oh, a dainty little pale-yellow flower. I do love the primroses.” Then she started chatting away about Pug and how he would love to go sledging. Then she said she was going to tell her dad all about the modern sledges so he could make one. “That would be a safe occupation, I think,” she said, laughing. “And it might bring him fame and fortune!”

The others laughed about Agatha’s monkey, but not me. I kept looking back over my shoulder. I couldn’t
see Crow. Mind you, I couldn’t see anyone. Out of the floodlight it was pitch dark. When we got to the car park, Robbie’s mum was waiting with her Land Rover. It was big enough to get Robbie and his two sledges in, plus Will and his one sledge, but not big enough for all of us.

“Sorry guys,” Robbie said.

“That was the best fun,” Will said. Then the doors slammed and they were off. Vroooom! I suddenly felt embarrassed standing in the empty car park with two girls.

“It is dark,” Agatha said, looking around her.

“And it’s freezing,” Agnes said, blowing into her bare hands.

After the buzz of the sledging it seemed eerily quiet. “Thanks for inviting me,” Agnes said. She was looking around the car park like she was nervous about something. “I better go now.”

She started to head off when suddenly this voice called out, “Agnes? Agnes? Is that you?” Next thing heavy footsteps ran towards us. Then out of the shadows the dark figure of a man appeared. “Agnes,” the man said, anxiously, “I’ve been looking for you.” I couldn’t believe it. It was the grungy man who played the fiddle in the street. This was Agnes’s dad.

She seemed flustered. She was looking from us to him. “I’m sorry,” she said to him, “I should have told you where I was. But it’s alright,” and then they were gone, hurrying away and swallowed up into the dark.

“He was once a great musician,” Agatha said.

“Is that what Agnes told you?”

Agatha nodded.

“It was his tune, you know?” I said.

Agatha lifted an eyebrow. “Tune?”

“That old song I was humming. You know, in the failed time-travel experiment?”

“It was a perfect song. It was not on account of the song that I failed to make the journey. I did tell you Saul. It is the gold.” She marched off and I followed her. If she was heading back to the den, she was heading the wrong way.

“Where are you going?”

“Pisa.”

I jerked my thumb in the opposite direction. Agatha laughed, though more of a hopeless laugh than a happy one. “So much has changed,” she said, “even the very streets. Here you know, was the prison.”

She was pointing to a café at the edge of the car park. I shuddered, picturing convicts grasping at bars. “Want me to walk back with you?” I said, not really wanting to. The bad thing about midwinter was that by six o’clock it was like the middle of the night.

“I would be most grateful,” she said, “for alone I may wander forever.”

Once we got up onto the brightly lit High Street, it didn’t feel so gloomy anymore. I slowed down and tried to shake off the mood Crow had put me in. A bunch of carol singers were standing next to the Christmas tree, singing ‘Good King Wenceslas’, or whatever he’s
called. And beside the carol singers someone had a stall with hot mince pies.

I saw Agatha’s nose twitch. “It reminds me of
dumpling
,” she said, tugging at my sleeve for me to stop. “When we kept a cook she made a braw clootie dumpling. Now cook is gone I do my best. But pray Saul, why all this singing on the street? Is it market day?”

“It’s for Christmas of course.”

“Christmas?”

I couldn’t believe she didn’t know about Christmas. It wasn’t what you’d call a new invention, was it? Like, the baby Jesus was born two thousand years ago. Surely Agatha Black knew that? “You know,” I said, “presents and Santa, and Christmas dinner – turkey and Brussels sprouts. And decorations, and a stocking at the end of your bed. I’ve seen two new DVDs in Mum’s cupboard, so I know I’m getting them. You must know about Christmas?”

“Turkey I know. Mr Balfour by the river keeps turkeys. I feed them sometimes. I love turkeys. I love the handsome bublyjocks and I do know of Christmas. We do sing a song for Christmas. Nothing more.”

“Christmas is the best day ever,” I told her. By this time the singers had moved on to ‘Feed the World’. “Yeah, you can wish for whatever you want and you’ll get it at Christmas.” I tried to sound hopeful. Mum was dropping enough hints for me to guess I probably wasn’t getting a BMX. The DVDs were probably going to be the main event.

“I wish for home. I know I complained of Dick and I know the vagabonds do steal and are foul and I know
Uncle grows weary of hapless Father. But he loves him really. He gives us his shillings. And Father loves me dearly. I miss my home, and my monkey will miss me right sore. Oh, and dear Father will be distraught with me gone.” She wrung her hands together. “Oh, Saul, when all’s said and done, home is home.”

I pulled Agatha away from the carol singers. She was working herself up into a right state and some of them were beginning to give her funny looks. She sniffed and wiped her face with the back of her hand. Then she patted me on the arm. “I know I can trust you. All I need is gold.”

“Search me,” I said, patting my pockets. “I haven’t got any gold. And my parents are not well off. That’s what they always say. They haven’t got gold kicking around.”

“I need gold,” she insisted, “else I will be forever lost.” She turned and marched off along the High Street.

“Hey!” I ran and caught her up. “What do you want me to do? Rob a bank?”

She shook her head. “I am sorry indeed to put yea to this fuss, Saul. I amna asking you to steal gold. It would be a sin to be a robber. I will never ask yea to sin.”

“Let’s get a move on,” I said. We hurried along the snowy street and up past the launderette, not saying any more about gold and Christmas, or anything. By the time we had reached the wasteland, a freezing fog was starting to roll in. It felt gloomy, and really cold. All the fizz and excitement of this adventure had gone.

The fog was so thick now we wandered about, looking for the hedge. We stumbled over the snow with
our arms stuck out like we were playing blind man’s bluff. We kept bumping into each other. This was scary movie weather and my heart was thumping. Why did I keep thinking of hangings and body snatchers? I am the gang leader, I kept reminding myself. Gang leaders are brave. I never felt less brave in my life.

I let out a yell. Something scratched my face. I jumped back. Then realised it was the prickly leaves of the holly hedge. We were close to the den. At the same time I could hear something. I felt my blood run cold. It sounded like somebody coughing.

“We have arrived at the Holland hedge that takes us through,” Agatha said.

“Be quiet!” I hissed. With my heart banging I strained my ears. Had I imagined a coughing sound? I couldn’t hear it now. Everything was quiet except my kicking heart. “Ok,” I whispered, trying to keep my voice from trembling. I reached out my hands, fumbling to find the gap in the hedge. “Let’s go.”

With Agatha still clinging to my scarf we wriggled through the gap and came into the hidden wild garden. The freezing fog was so thick, by this time I could hardly see my feet. I took small steps in the direction of where I thought the den was. Agatha shuffled behind me. I took another few steps, bumped up against the den and Agatha bumped up against my back.

“Ouch! I am here,” she whispered. “What…” She stopped dead and gripped my arm. The coughing noise, just inches away, sounded again. I turned rigid with fright. Somebody was in the den.