The Sarum Paradox
I. Unrelated Ironies
“Wooster,” said Gilgamesh Wulfenbach.
Mr Wooster returned his gaze with a practised impassivity beneath which, nonetheless, lurked an undercurrent of empathy. For some reason, Gil was annoyed by it. He was just about to open his mouth and express that annoyance when Mr Wooster forestalled him by saying, “Yes, Master Gilgamesh?”
“Oh, leave it out,” snapped Gil. “You know very well you don't have to pretend to be a butler any more. We all know exactly who you are.”
“Force of habit,” replied Mr Wooster. He thought, but did not add: and, besides, you clearly haven't had anything like enough sleep in my absence, and you are in an even worse mood than usual. I don't blame you. You're too young for the load on your shoulders at this moment.
I know that feeling.
“Besides,” Gil continued, “I'm amazed you can go back to Butler Mode after the fine brass neck you showed my father while you were away. That telegram! Oh yes, I saw it. I have to concede, somewhat reluctantly, that I was impressed.”
Mr Wooster raised a very well-bred eyebrow. “I asked the Baron an honest question. He returned an honest answer. The exchange benefited both sides, or I would hardly have begun it. His information enabled my team to catch and neutralise the Other's agent, meaning that his own agent was now no longer at risk. I imagine he will want to take her out of the circus and post her elsewhere now. But at least he still has the option of a live agent to do that with.”
Gil half smiled. “I've got to hand it to you. You do have a certain style. What did your superiors think? Are you in even deeper trouble now?”
“On the contrary. I'm in considerably less trouble. I... appear to have made a good impression over there. There are even noises about recalling me for longer next time.”
“Huh,” said Gil. “In that case, I had better see about getting you into some more trouble.”
Mr Wooster looked pained. “I trust you were joking. You are, after all, speaking to one who is exiled from his homeland.”
Gil sighed. “I was, Wooster, but you can't blame me for wanting to keep you. You're a good deal more sensible than some people round here.”
“I'm very flattered. Now, I suppose you did ask to see me for a reason?”
“Just checking that Her Britannic Majesty hasn't sent you back here with an extra pair of mechanical arms and a death ray.”
“That would be a little too much like your father's way of thinking. Her Majesty is... original.”
Gil slumped into the nearest chair. “Sometimes you're too damn right too damn often. And for your information, that remark was actually intended to be another joke. Clearly my famous repartee is losing its cutting edge.”
“With the greatest of respect,” said Mr Wooster, “I believe you are too tired to joke effectively.”
Gil sighed. “Damn right I'm tired. There's too much going on here right now.”
“And would that, actually, be why you wanted to see me?”
“Yes, it would.” Gil stood up again and paced across the room, his hands behind his back, his elegant long coat hanging open. “Fate is a strange goddess, Wooster. She laughs at me. Me, Gilgamesh Wulfenbach. Of all the vast numbers of people here who have sworn loyalty solely to my father, and of course by extension to me, sometimes the only one I can trust is a known foreign agent. Ironic, yes?”
“Ironic, but I am honoured,” replied Mr Wooster.
“You do right to be honoured, but it's a two-edged sword. I am now going to rant, swear and moan at you about the current state of affairs for...” Gil stopped to glance at his watch. “Probably about the next half hour. And then I shall have to rush back to my laboratory. I have things to do there.”
“Rant, swear and moan away,” said Mr Wooster. “I'm listening.”
“Good. Because you have been away for over a month, and I intend to get that full month's worth into the half-hour.” He gestured absently. “You'd better sit.”
“Thank you.”
Gil launched into his tirade, and Mr Wooster listened, politely but with increasing concern.
This was really not good. There were some swear words in there that Mr Wooster didn't even know.
* * * * *
“Now,” said Mrs Chadwick briskly. “This afternoon, we shall not be doing any training. We have an invitation to tea instead.”
The taller, and distinctly greener, of her two students grinned, showing all his fangs. Ottokar was a Jäger, currently the only one in Her Britannic Majesty's special forces. The other student, Alice Davenport, merely raised her eyebrows.
“An invitation to tea?” she asked. “Presumably quite a special one, to be allowed to interrupt training.”
“Oh, indeed. Quite a special one. Mrs Adelaide Buckingham, the lady you recently rescued from her husband's kidnap attempt, has found out who you are and now wishes to meet you. I have accepted on behalf of all of us.”
You might at least have asked us, thought Alice sullenly. Not that I don't want to go, but that's high-handed. As usual.
“Vill be goot,” said Ottokar cheerfully. “It vill be nize to see her again ven ve are not being distracted by pirates und rogue Jägers und schtuff like dat.”
“Distracted is, I suppose, one way of putting it,” said Mrs Chadwick, who had been present herself during the rescue. “And there was really only one pirate.”
“Ho ja. But she vos really goot at pirating,” replied Ottokar, unfazed.
“Well,” said Mrs Chadwick. “You had both better go home and dress for the occasion. Miss Davenport, you recall where Mrs Buckingham's house is? I'm aware you went there during the investigation.”
“I remember,” replied Alice.
“Then I'll meet you there. Half past three.”
It was the beginning of September. The recent heatwave had, thankfully, passed, and there was now the first hint of autumn on the London breeze. As they stepped into the street, the sky was cloudier than it had been half an hour ago while they were eating lunch, and there was a faint scent of rain.
“Hyu schtill don't like her, do hyu,” said Ottokar flatly.
“I don't suppose that matters, as long as she doesn't know,” replied Alice. “And you've got to admit, I'm good at not showing it.”
“Hy can see it.”
“Yes, but you know it's there.” She paused, and sighed. “And you know why it's there. Nobody else does. Even so, she's not making it any better. She just went and accepted the invitation on our behalf without asking us? Really?”
“Hy not offended,” said Ottokar. “Hy vant to go. Und so do hyu, don't hyu? Und she knows dat. Dat's vy she didn't ask.”
“Well, maybe. But when you consider the way she treated Mr Wooster...”
“Listen,” said Ottokar. “Hy been tinking about dat qvite a lot. But right now, do ve vant a cab or an airship?”
Alice considered. “The airship will be quick enough at this time of day. Let's get that.”
“Hokay.” They walked down to the airship platform at the street corner, by the old pump, and stepped into the lift. It rattled and clanked its way to the platform.
“So what have you been thinking about Mr Wooster?” asked Alice.
“Hy been tinking she vos actually qvite goot to him,” said Ottokar, reasonably. “Look. Ve don't know exactly vot happened. All ve know is he made some kind of mischtake, vhich, like hyu say, vos underschtandable vit all der schtuff he got to do, und he vos in trouble for it. But she calls him back here because she knows he der best person for der task, und den she lets him go to Kendal to sort out dat business vit der circus, und den she lets him schtay longer to train us. She doesn't send him back to vhere he vos originally until tings schtart going really wrong dere, und even den, she lets him schtay long enough to say gootbye to both of us. Dat doesn't seem so unfair to me.”
“But if she's so good to him, why was he in so much trouble in the first place when it can't have been his fault?” Alice demanded.
“Gott knows. Maybe it vosn't even her at all. Maybe it vos her boss. Or her boss' boss. Ve yust don't know. All ve got to go on is der vay ve seen her treat him, und dat's novhere near so bad as hyu reckon.”
Alice turned to face her Jäger friend. “Why are you so bothered, anyway?”
He shrugged. “Hy don't like pipple being unfair any more dan hyu do. Hyu should know dat by now.”
Alice frowned, but said nothing. The rebuke, gentle as it was, had stung a little coming from him.
“Is our bus,” said Ottokar.
The airship pulled up to the platform, and the two of them boarded it and bought tickets from the conductor.
“I wonder what he's doing right now?” said Alice, a little wistfully.
“Serving der Qveen,” replied Ottokar.
“Well, obviously.” Alice could not help smiling a little. “You know, Ottokar, in spite of that accent, sometimes you come over as more British than the British.”
He beamed. “Is a compliment, dat. Hy like it here.”
“I don't think he likes it all that much over there.” She sighed. “Oh, come on. Pull yourself together, Alice, and stop sounding like a third-rate impression of a Jane Austen heroine.”
“Hy should tink is difficult sometimes,” said Ottokar sympathetically.
Alice looked at him curiously as the airship slid away into the London air. “Don't you ever fall in love? I mean, first there was Sally at the circus who seemed to be pretty keen on you. And now there's Drauka. Oh, my, Drauka. I like her, but she's... really not subtle, is she?”
Ottokar coughed, embarrassed. “Ja. Drauka. Hy had to sit her down und have der liddle tok vit her about how hy like her yust fine as a friend, but if she can't keep her hands off, hy von't be going in her bar no more.”
“Well,” said Alice, “my point is that you're clearly not unattractive to women. I mean, Sally wasn't even a Jäger, for goodness' sake.”
Ottokar, who was considerably better informed than Alice on that last point, summoned a magnificent poker face as he replied, “Vell, hy don't know. Maybe hy yust not met der right girl yet. Ve live a long time, so vot's der hurry?”
“Aren't you lonely?” asked Alice.
“Vot a veird qvestion!” said Ottokar. “Vy vould hy be lonely? Hy got lots of goot friends now. Und most nights hy go to Drauka's und ve have a goot brawl.”
Alice shook her head. “Each to their own. I don't mind fighting when I have to, but I don't think I'll ever enjoy it for its own sake.”
“Dat's because hyu don't see fighting der vay Jägers do,” he replied. “Is like a schport. De bar brawls, is no malice in dem. Ven ve finish fighting, ve all buy vun anodder drinks und schtart singing. After ve put de furniture back, obviously.”
“Yes, but... well, not all of your people are so nice about it,” said Alice. “I mean, I think maybe the nicer ones end up over here, where there's no real warfare for them to be involved in. But I have heard about the wild ones.”
“Ja,” said Ottokar sombrely. “But is like hy alvays say. Any kind of pipple, der going to be goot vuns und bad vuns. Is how it goes.”
When they reached their lodgings, a Service house discreetly disguised under the name of the “Park Hotel”, Alice turned to Ottokar as she was unlocking the door. “What shall I wear?” she asked.
“Hy don't know,” replied Ottokar. “At least hyu know hyu not going to clash vit Mrs Chadvick, votever hyu vear.”
“That's what makes it rather difficult. Mrs Chadwick's mourning, that is. I don't want to be too gaudy, even if I do dislike the woman. I suppose she hasn't mentioned to you who she's mourning yet, has she? She seems to like you.”
Ottokar shrugged. “Is probably not a polite qvestion to ask.”
Alice considered. “I'll wear the grey, I think. A bit monochrome, but at least she can't accuse me of making her look drab. And my pearls. Pearls are good for a smart afternoon tea.”
“Ve going for schmot?” asked Ottokar.
“Yes, but not evening smart,” replied Alice. “If you want my advice, I suggest that waistcoat with the matching cravat.”
“Goot!” exclaimed Ottokar. “Hy like vearing dat, but hyu alvays say is too schmot for der office.”
“Not exactly too smart,” said Alice. “More like too fancy. But it'll be perfect for this afternoon.”
She vanished into her room, and Ottokar into his. He was the first to emerge, but only by a narrow margin; once Alice had decided what to wear, she could change surprisingly fast, especially considering all the awkward fastenings. She looked at him with an approving smile.
“Quite the Jäger about town,” she said. “All you need now is a cane.”
“But hy can valk yust fine!” Ottokar protested.
Alice rolled her eyes. “Not for walking. For fashion. Haven't you seen all those foppish young men who lounge around Piccadilly with nothing to do? Every last one of them's got a cane, and they all suck the ends, too, for some strange reason. I'm not suggesting you do that, but a cane, in itself, is an elegant accessory. It would be the finishing touch to that splendid outfit you're wearing.”
“Ja, but hyu got to carry it, und it takes up vun hand,” Ottokar objected. “Hy like both hands free. Anyvay, hy not an idle rich fop. Hy a vorking Jäger.”
Alice grinned. “Have it your own way. Come on. We'd better get a cab from here.”
They were, in the end, comfortably on time, and Mrs Chadwick joined them a few minutes later from another cab. She was still, of course, in mourning, but it was now silk rather than her usual sombre crape, and she had on a more elaborate hat than usual, though it was still black.
The door was opened by a mechanical footman, who took their cards upstairs and returned in a few moments to show them up to the parlour. The inventor of Buckingham's Buckram, clad in a dark green silk gown, rose to greet them. Her sister Constance remained on the chaise longue by the window, working on some embroidery.
“I'm so pleased to meet you,” said Adelaide Buckingham, stepping forward to shake their hands. “I'm sorry Constance is unable to stand. She is a little unwell at the moment, but she wanted to see you.”
Constance, who did look extremely pale, smiled and greeted them. On the mend, thought Alice, with a quick glance at her eyes; I expect she's had that stomach problem that's been going round.
Adelaide ushered them into chairs. As they sat down, Alice said, “I'm very honoured to meet you, too. Your buckram is a wonderful invention. I made this hat with it.”
Adelaide beamed. “Oh, you did a beautiful job! I would never have known it wasn't professionally made. The little flowers – did you make those too?”
“Yes. I cut out all the petals, hung them from a wire hoop and dip-dyed them using madder to get the gradient, then I made little clay forms, curved the petals over those and used the wand.”
“What a pity you're not a spark,” said Adelaide, admiringly. “With that artistic eye and attention to detail, you could build some really beautiful machines.”
Alice smiled. “Two of my best friends are sparks, and I'm content with that.”
“Oh! Anyone I know?”
“Charles and Hilde Greenwood.”
“Doesn't ring a bell,” replied Adelaide, “but then, sparks don't all know one another. Now, er... Ottokar, isn't it? That's a little informal. Do you have another name?”
“Ja, but hy a Jäger,” replied Ottokar. “Hy yust go by Ottokar.”
“Well, I certainly owe you special gratitude, considering you were the one who personally got me off that terrible woman's ship,” she said. “And I must apologise for flinching when I first saw you. Those other three...”
“Don't hyu vorry,” said Ottokar. “Dose odder tree vere bad Jägers, und if hyu hadn't met any goot vuns, how vere hyu to know?”
“You may like to know,” said Mrs Chadwick, “that the terrible woman will now be standing trial in March. It would have been January, but a few more charges have been added to the sheet in the meantime. Her ship was searched very thoroughly, and I won't upset Miss Temple here by going into detail about what they found, since she is feeling delicate.”
“I think I can guess,” said Constance, with a shudder.
“Will she hang?” asked Adelaide. It was said curiously rather than vindictively.
“She should by rights,” replied Mrs Chadwick, “but she's hired herself an excellent lawyer, so I'm afraid if there is any loophole at all she may escape through it.”
Adelaide rang the bell. “Perhaps it might be a good thing to turn our minds to more pleasant subjects, such as tea. While we're waiting for the maid to bring it in, I have some little tokens of appreciation for you.” She went to the mantelpiece and returned with something in her hands. When she opened them, the three agents saw that she was holding three pendants on gold chains, each with a large cabochon stone in a green like new beech leaves.
“You worked out, among yourselves, what my two chalcedony pendants did,” she explained, “and that helped you to rescue both me and Mr Holmes. These, therefore, seem to be particularly appropriate for you, especially given the nature of your work. They are made from peridot, a mineral with some very interesting properties; I could use almost any mineral for the basic matrix, but the peridot has allowed me to create an enhanced version. Incidentally, I have also given pendants to Mr Holmes and Dr Watson, but those are independent of yours. They do not communicate with them.”
She handed them each a pendant as the maid came in with the tea, and all murmured their thanks. Mrs Chadwick assumed her most professional smile as Ottokar and Alice immediately fastened theirs around their necks, Ottokar slipping his under the cravat.
“I am most appreciative of your kindness, Mrs Buckingham,” she said, “but I trust you understand I am not able to wear your beautiful gift just at the moment, since I am in mourning.”
“Of course I understand, Mrs Chadwick,” replied Adelaide, “and please accept my sincere condolences on your loss. Had I known, I would have considered using black onyx; it is not quite as powerful as the peridot for what I had in mind, but it would have been appropriate to your situation.”
Mrs Chadwick put the pendant into her reticule with great care to avoid tangling the chain. “You are most thoughtful,” she said, “and I can assure you that when it is possible for it to be used, it will be invaluable.”
They took tea, and also cake in most cases; the exception was Constance, which went some way to confirming Alice's suspicions about her illness. They chatted about a number of lighter things, in particular about Mr Sherlock Holmes, who, it appeared, had now become something approaching a friend of Adelaide's; which was to say, he called once a week when not too busy, talked a little about his work, and encouraged her to talk a lot about her inventions.
Ottokar grinned. “Dat sounds like Mister Holmes,” he observed. “He not a schpark, but hyu bet he vishes he vos.”
They all laughed. “He is very intelligent, even so,” said Adelaide. “I enjoy his company. Although I've had to ask him not to smoke in here. It makes me cough.”
“Oh!” said Constance. “That reminds me. Last time they were here, Dr Watson was wanting to know how he could contact Mr Wooster. He says he's disappeared again. You three know him; could you pass on a message?”
“Of course,” said Alice.
“Well, one of the Baker Street Irregulars, as they call them, provided an especially vital clue in finding where Mr Holmes had been taken,” Constance explained. “Her name was Maisie Arkwright. She couldn't read, but she could draw, so she copied down the number of the cab in which she saw Mr Holmes. Mr Wooster promised that if Mr Holmes was found, he would see to it that she got an education. Dr Watson would just like Mr Wooster to know that she has started school and says she is really enjoying it.”
Alice smiled. “I shall most certainly let him know next time I write. Thank you for telling us.”
“Did he, now?” asked Mrs Chadwick, with interest. “That was not something he put in his official handover report.”
Ottokar shrugged. “Hy don't suppose he needed to. Vos his own money, after all.”
“Ah,” said Mrs Chadwick, half smiling. “And you arranged it on his behalf, did you?”
“Vell, he could hardly do it himself. He vos elsevhere,” replied Ottokar simply.
Alice took refuge behind her fan, aware of the triumphant expression which was doing its best to take over her face.
It was only when they were finally back outside in the street, after a very pleasant and convivial afternoon, that Mrs Chadwick reached into her reticule again and took out the peridot pendant. She held it up, letting it glint in the inconstant afternoon sunlight.
“Well,” she said. “Obviously I couldn't possibly offend Mrs Buckingham when she has been so generous, but naturally I can't wear this.”
“So the mourning was merely an excuse, then?” asked Alice drily. She had to work hard to keep the hostility out of her voice.
“Of course it was. What sort of person do you take me for?”
I could answer that one if you really want, thought Alice.
“I can't wear it,” Mrs Chadwick went on, “because it is not mine to wear. I did not earn it. I was in command of that rescue vessel only by force of circumstances beyond the control of any of us. This pendant belongs to Mr Ardsley Wooster, and I should be much obliged if one of you could send it to him at the earliest opportunity.”
Alice's jaw dropped.
“Well, I don't see what you're so surprised about, Miss Davenport,” said Mrs Chadwick tartly. “I trust you haven't taken a dislike to him or anything.”
II. Mr Wooster Has Visitors
“Dis is going to be fun,” said Ottokar, back at the Park Hotel.
“What is?” asked Alice. She was still in something approaching a state of shock.
“Hyu know. Vorking out exactly vot dese tings do. Hy like dat Mrs Buckingham. She knew ve'd vant to vork it out ourselves.”
Alice considered this. “Well, she did say they were an improvement on the originals, but that's about par for the course with a spark.” A thought struck her. “Do they, er, actually do the same as the originals as well? Because if they do, I suppose I owe you an apology for making you see double when Mrs Chadwick dropped her bombshell.”
“Heh,” said Ottokar. “No. Vhich is probably a goot ting if Mr Vooster's getting vun.”
Alice blushed scarlet. “Ottokar!”
“Vell, hy can't help it if de original vuns vere activated by schtrong emotions,” he said.
“All right, I do take your point,” said Alice, hastily recovering her dignity. “It could indeed have been quite embarrassing. Especially if he doesn't know, as we think.”
“Hy suppose he got to find out sooner or later,” said Ottokar, “but probably dat not der best vay.” He considered. “Mind hyu, is a bit ambiguous. Vit der previous design, if his pendant suddenly schtarted vorking, he vouldn't know if hyu vos in deadly peril or yust having vun of hyu Yane Austen moments.”
“Oh, Lord,” said Alice. “And neither would you. I'm really glad she's improved the design, because it could all have got distinctly theatrical otherwise.”
Ottokar fished out his pendant from beneath his cravat. “Hokay. So ve see vot dey do now.”
The pendant seemed to glow a little more as he touched it than it should have done given the ambient lighting, but nothing else appeared to happen. Alice held her own pendant; it did likewise.
“Now what?” she said.
“Vell, it doesn't vork yust off emotions, so probably dat means dere's some vay of controlling it,” replied Ottokar logically.
“I know that, but how?”
Ottokar took out the third pendant from his top waistcoat pocket and laid it down on the kitchen table. “Hokay. Ve got tree of dem. Maybe ve don't alvays vant to talk to both de odders at vunce. So hy reckon, first ting ve got to do is tell de pendants who dey belong to.” He held his up in front of his face. “Hy Ottokar. Hyu got dat?”
“Ottokar,” said a genderless alto voice from somewhere within its depths. “Confirmed.”
“Ve getting somevhere,” grinned Ottokar.
Alice did the same. “I'm Alice.”
“Alice,” said her pendant, in an identical voice. “Confirmed.”
“Do you think we should set Mr Wooster's for him or leave him to do that himself?” asked Alice. “I mean, normally the answer would be obvious, but I'm thinking about security. If we set it for him, nobody else can take it and use it.”
“Ja,” said Ottokar, “but how vill it know it's de real him ven it meets him? Hy say ve leave it.”
“All right,” said Alice. “That makes sense.” She gazed into the green depths of her own pendant. “Alice speaking. I would like to talk to Ottokar, please.”
“Confirmed,” said the pendant. It seemed to have a very limited vocabulary of its own.
Ottokar's pendant immediately glowed so brightly that there was no mistake. “Alice, for Ottokar,” it said.
“Hallo, Ottokar,” said Alice, a little self-consciously. Her words echoed through the pendant, an instant behind the original speech.
“Hy say ve go into our rooms und try from dere,” said Ottokar. That echoed too, back through Alice's pendant.
“No need. It's clear it works,” replied Alice and her echo. “How do you shut it off?”
“Close der link,” Ottokar tried. It worked. “Vell,” he said, “dat vos simple enough. Hy expect dere are odder phrases ve can use.”
“I hope it works well over a long distance,” said Alice. “It won't be a lot of use Mr Wooster having one if we can't talk over it.”
“Only vun vay to find out,” replied Ottokar. “Hyu vant to send it, hy expect?”
“Well... I'm not sure. It might look a bit odd from me, even though of course it's from Mrs Buckingham really. Would you like to send it?”
“Hy don't mind, vhichever vay,” said Ottokar equably.
“Still,” said Alice thoughtfully, “I suppose it is a good excuse to write a letter out of turn. Yes. Perhaps I will send it, after all.”
“Hy not sure dis whole romance ting isn't more trouble dan it vorth,” said Ottokar.
“Well, really, we haven't actually got a romance at the moment,” replied Alice, a little hotly. “That is the main problem.”
“Vould be a big problem even if hyu had,” Ottokar pointed out, in his usual pragmatic way. “Vot vit him being vherever he is, und hyu being here.”
“Yes, well,” said Alice, “I'm not the only one, after all. There are plenty of people who are in love with sailors and people like that. If they can handle it, so can I.”
Ottokar shrugged. “Hokay. Hyu vant cottage pie for dinner?”
Alice narrowed her eyes. “Sometimes, you do take things a good deal too literally.”
“Vot hyu expect? Hy a Jäger. Is not like ve really do subtle.”
“I'm sure you genuinely believe that, but as a matter of fact you can be as subtle as anyone when you like,” said Alice. “Just because you have the physical strength of ten...”
“At least tventy. Please.”
“However many. It doesn't matter. Just because you have superhuman strength, then, doesn't mean you also have to barge through metaphor and allusion all the time like a bull in a china shop. You were quick enough to notice I was in love with him in the first place.”
“Vell, hokay,” said Ottokar. “But even if hyu vant to sit like Patience on a monument schmiling at grief, hy schtill vant to know vot hyu fancy for dinner.”
Alice gaped at him. “That's Shakespeare. You quoted Shakespeare!”
“Ja. Und...?”
“Well, bang goes your 'I'm just a great big blundering Jäger' argument right there.”
“Hyu got a point,” agreed Ottokar amiably. “Hokay. Hy yust a great big blundering Jäger vot can qvote bits of Shakespeare. Now, hyu vant cottage pie or hyu don't? Yust let me know und hyu can go right back on hyu monument.”
Alice laughed in spite of herself, which had evidently been Ottokar's intention all along. “You are quite impossible sometimes,” she said. “And cottage pie would be lovely. Thank you. What are you having?”
“Nearly de same ting, but vit green lentils. Is very tasty.”
* * * * *
“Damn,” muttered Ardsley Wooster. “Damn, damn, damn. And possibly again damn.”
He was well aware that this lacked something in sheer inventiveness by comparison to Gil's tirade the other night, but then he was not Gil, and he was unused to swearing at all. It was something he normally only ever did when he was, as now, safely in the privacy of his own room, and very rarely even then.
He could see the future looming up ahead of him like an enraged battle clank. It was even less attractive. Gil's tirade had been one thing; things invariably seemed a lot worse to Gil when he was in one of his moods, and Mr Wooster was quite used to that. The disquieting thing was that it wasn't just Gil. He had talked to a number of people since his return; that was his job, after all. Talking to people, and listening to the answers he got. They had not been comforting answers.
Just when he'd been thinking he might be able to dig himself out of the trouble he'd got into by being unmasked by the Baron. Just when he'd been starting to congratulate himself on the fact that he'd even managed to turn that to general advantage. Oh, Gil wouldn't need to get him into any extra trouble in order to keep him. That would happen all by itself. Unless some miracle happened, the whole of Europa was about to get... really messy.
And he'd get the blame for failing to stop it.
Oh, not from Mrs Chadwick. She'd trained him, just like he'd been training Ottokar and Alice. She believed in him. She was proud of him; he was the youngest agent at his level of seniority in the Service, and that was mostly her doing. But her superiors were a very different matter.
It wasn't that they were in any doubt that he was a good agent. It was just that, knowing that, they expected perfection.
Mr Wooster lay back on the bed and heaved a sigh. He remembered, only a few weeks ago, though it seemed like years, clattering down the steep hill from Oxenholme station into Kendal in Charles and Hilde Greenwood's dual-powered jalopy Bertha, talking to Ottokar. And one of the very first things Ottokar had said to him was, “Hyu a goot man. But hyu yust Mister Vooster. Hyu not Gott.”
“It's my bosses you need to say that to, Ottokar,” Mr Wooster murmured sadly. “I'm not the one who needs convincing.”
There was a tap on the door. “Who's that?” he called.
“It's meeeeee!” said a cheerful voice. Cheerful, that is, with a side order of hellish.
“I'm sorry, Dupree,” he said. “You can't come in. I'm in my night clothes.”
“Oooh!”
Mr Wooster groaned and put a hand to his brow. “Stop that. You've tried to kill me more than once. I am not interested in a seduction attempt, least of all from you. Go away, Dupree.”
“Well,” she said. “Don't ever call me unreasonable. I'll give you a choice. I can break the door down and ogle you, or you can tell me what happened to my dear sister, because I think you might just have some idea.”
“Oh, well, that's easier than most of your choices,” replied Mr Wooster. “Although I do reserve the right to call you unreasonable, following your various murder attempts. Your dear sister was arrested in London on charges of... let me see if I can remember them all... attempted murder, kidnapping, piracy, smuggling, theft, causing an affray... oh, and I do believe there were a few more added later after they finished searching her ship. It was all in the papers.”
“And might you perchance have had anything to do with her arrest?” asked Dupree, with perilous sweetness.
Mr Wooster was well aware that the door provided very little real protection. However, he was no coward. He reached under the pillow for his Service pistol, just in case it should be required.
“Yes,” he said, simply.
“Oooh!” squealed Dupree. “Then I might just not kill you after all.” There was a beat. “You suuuuuure you don't want to let me in? I mean, you've been looking a bit careworn since you got back. You wouldn't care for a little light entertainment?”
Mr Wooster shuddered. “No. Thank you.”
“Oh, have it your own way.” Mr Wooster could picture the toss of the head now. “But, hey, you got my sister. I reckon that deserves a little respect.” She paused again. “For now. Goodnight!”
“Goodnight, Dupree,” said Mr Wooster, with the politeness that was second nature to him. As her footsteps vanished away down the corridor, he added in an undertone, “Good Lord.”
He carefully replaced the pistol and flicked out the reading lamp. It had probably been showing under the door, and he did not want any more visitors tonight. It was a little early to attempt to sleep, but perhaps...
Tap. Tap.
“Goodnight, Dupree,” he said, through his teeth.
“Do I look like Dupree?” snapped an irritable voice on the other side of the door.
Mr Wooster sighed, flicked the lamp on again, got out of bed and opened the door. “No,” he replied. “But you have to admit I was in no position to tell.”
“I don't have to admit anything,” retorted Krosp. “You'd better be nice to me. You've got bare legs.”
Mr Wooster shut the door behind the cat. “I am not in a good mood myself, Krosp, and as you might be able to deduce, I have just been further rattled by a visit from our friend the pirate queen. If you scratch my legs, I will bowl you down that corridor as though there were a set of ninepins at the other end.”
Krosp blinked. He was not used to this from Mr Wooster. “All right, all right. No need to be like that.” He looked at him sidelong. “What did Dupree want? Your guts for garters?”
“Not quite as much as usual. She wanted to know if I'd helped to get her sister arrested. I had.”
“And you told her?”
“Yes. She seemed quite happy about it. Apparently they don't get on.” Mr Wooster sat down on the edge of the bed. “So what do you want, Krosp? I was just about to turn in.”
“...that's actually quite a nice nightshirt,” said the cat. “I mean, if you just had a pair of trousers to go with it, it'd almost look like, well, sleep uniform.”
“Get on with it, Krosp,” sighed Mr Wooster. “I know you're a cat, but do you think you could manage to avoid running after distractions just this one time?”
“Well, you don't often see a nightshirt like that,” said Krosp.
“And you're a connoisseur of them, are you? - no, don't answer that. Don't even think about answering that. Just tell me what you're doing here. That's all I need.”
“It's the collar,” said Krosp. “Gives it a real air of distinction. I mean, you could sew on a pair of epaulettes...”
“KROSP!”
“Oh, all right.” The cat reached inside his military-looking jacket. “Here. For you. This one's got something in it, so I thought I'd better make double sure it didn't get intercepted.”
Mr Wooster deflated a little. “Oh. Thank you.” He took the letter; the handwriting was Alice's.
“Well?” said Krosp. “Aren't you going to open it?”
Mr Wooster hesitated momentarily, and then thought, “Well, what does it matter? The whole of Europa appears to be going to the devil in any case. I don't suppose this will make things go any more wrong.” He slit the envelope open with a blunt thumbnail. Out fell the green peridot pendant.
“Well, that's extraordinary,” he said, turning to the letter. “Oh, I see! It's from the lady I helped to, er, unkidnap, if you like.”
“She's got nice writing,” said Krosp.
“Not hers. She sent it through someone else.”
“You're not going to wear it, are you?” asked Krosp. “It's a bit girly.”
“If you honestly think my masculinity is going to be threatened by a piece of jewellery, you must have some very strange ideas about humans,” replied Mr Wooster, rather loftily.
“Not just my ideas, kiddo. Can you picture someone like Martellus von Blitzengaard wearing a thing like that?”
“It would clash with his hair,” said Mr Wooster, deadpan. He fastened the pendant around his neck. “If it makes you feel any better, there's a Jäger wearing one of these things back in London. He also helped rescue the lady.”
“Yeah, well, I suppose if a Jäger decides something's masculine, it's masculine,” said Krosp.
“I trust Your Feline Majesty is going to allow me the same privilege?” said Mr Wooster. He immediately felt a little bad about it. He disliked sarcasm in general, and preferred to avoid using it even on Krosp, who, heaven knew, asked for it enough.
“I might,” replied Krosp. Mr Wooster relaxed. The cat was impervious.
“Good,” he said. “Now, thank you again, and this has been a most delightful conversation, but if you don't mind I am cranky and tired, and I want to sleep.”
“Oh, all right. I'll just push off and catch a few rats, then.”
“You do that,” said Mr Wooster, getting up again to open the door. “Before they all leave the sinking ship.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Bad mood. Goodnight, Krosp.”
He settled back into bed and read the letter more thoroughly, with increasing interest. The information about the pendant was obviously both important and comforting, but it was even more immediately warming to see that there was no trace in this letter of the rather poorly concealed dislike of Mrs Chadwick which had struck a sour note in most of her previous letters. That, at least, was a relief, whatever else might be going wrong. It was also much more like the Alice he knew, who was generally a pretty shrewd judge of character.
He re-read the instructions one more time. Then he raised the pendant, which glowed slightly, and opened his mouth to speak.
He closed it again. He had been going to say “I am Wooster,” but in the circumstances it suddenly seemed ridiculously formal. If he managed to survive the impending cataclysm, the odds were good that he would never see his home or his friends again. If all he could ever do was talk to two of them from afar, was he really going to want them to call him Wooster for whatever remained of his life?
The pendant seemed to be looking at him, waiting. Just his imagination, perhaps.
“I am Ardsley,” he said, firmly.
“Ardsley,” it repeated back to him. “Confirmed.”
“This is Ardsley. I would like to talk to Ottokar.”
He waited. The pendant glowed more brightly, but nothing happened. He rolled onto his side and peered at his alarm clock in the dim light. Which way did the time difference go, again? He could never remember. But either way, there was a good chance that the Jäger would by now be happily throwing punches in Drauka's bar without an atom of malicious intent.
If only all fights were like those.
“Close the link, please,” he said. “This is Ardsley. I would like to talk to Alice.”
She would be in. She would answer. When she was settled in one place and had nothing particular to do, she enjoyed going to evening lectures, but she did not do that in London; the training was quite enough, especially since in her case it leaned towards the military. All she wanted to do in the evenings at the moment was curl up with a good book, or sometimes do a little needlework. It was, unsurprisingly, hats at the moment. Alice had a talent for making hats. She was so good at the tiny details.
The pendant was still glowing.
Still nothing. No friendly voice. Nothing but that little glow of light like an otherworldly spring.
“Alice?”
“Unable to connect,” said the pendant, without emotion. “Ceasing attempt. Ceased. Confirmed.”
Mr Wooster let the pendant fall onto his chest, bowed his head, and realised he was doing something he had not done since the death of his mother, back when he was nine years old. He was crying.
Well, he was on his own, and maybe at least the tears would be some release. He let them flow, slowly, as though they were being squeezed out of him; racking sobs, though less dignified, might have done the job more effectively, but they would not come and he had no intention of forcing them. He pulled a handkerchief from the other side of the pillow and wiped the tears from his face. He realised that he had never felt so utterly wretched, powerless and alone in his entire life.
He recalled the pistol. The tears ceased.
Well. It might be better than any of the other possibilities.
To be, or not to be? That was, suddenly, the question.
A voice almost made him jump out of the bed. “Ardsley, old man,” it said. “Don't.”
The voice was his own.
He blinked. This had to be some kind of hallucination, brought on by his unusually overwrought condition. Standing at the foot of the bed was... Ardsley Wooster. This version of him was dressed in a high-collared shirt, like the ones he usually wore, and his dark red jacket with the gold buttons.
“What?” he managed. It wasn't very polite, but, after all, he was talking to himself. Apparently.
“I said, don't. I know what you're thinking. Don't do it. If you do, more lives are going to be lost than just yours. Trust me on this. I'm you, after all.”
“You're me? Well, you're certainly a very good imitation. But how on earth did you get in here?”
“That's kind of complicated,” said Wooster Mark II. “But I assure you, you will find out. Later.”
“That is not entirely reassuring,” replied Wooster Mark I.
“Would it help if I told you I'd just confused the life out of Dupree?”
“That rather depends on how she reacted,” said Wooster Mark I nervously. “She's just... er...”
Wooster Mark II winced sympathetically. “Yes, I know what she's just done. But it's all right. She thinks I'm a hallucination too. I didn't give her time to find out otherwise.”
“Good,” said Wooster Mark I. “I think.”
“It is. She'll avoid you for a bit, and that will be good for your mental health. Do you have the faintest idea how badly stressed you are at the moment?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry. Rhetorical question. If you weren't badly stressed, you wouldn't be thinking about that pistol. Oh, you'll want to know about the pendant. It's just distance coupled with some poor reception at the moment. There are thunderstorms. It does work, sometimes. You're not totally cut off from your friends. And there is a way you'll be able to see them again, as long as you can at least manage to stay alive. Even get home from time to time.”
Wooster Mark I eyed his doppelganger thoughtfully. “How do I know you're not just a figment of my overheated imagination?” he asked. “Telling me what I want to hear?”
The other Wooster sighed. “I'm so suspicious, I can't even trust myself, apparently,” he said. “Here. Shake hands. See if I'm a figment.” He thrust out a hand.
Wooster Mark I took it gingerly. It was solid enough. A thought struck him. “Have you got one of those pendants?” he asked.
Wooster Mark II pulled it out from under his collar. “Naturally. I have the same pendant that you have. I am you.”
“All right. Call Ottokar.”
“I can't. Not from here. Thunderstorms, remember?”
“Oh, yes. Thunderstorms.”
“All right. Got to go before you start asking too many questions. You'll certainly ask them, but you need to get the answers on your own.” The doppelganger smiled. “Just remember. You've got to live. It's crucial. That's why I took all the trouble to tell you. Oh, and... see Higgs.”
He vanished.
Mr Wooster stared for several minutes into the void his doppelganger had just been occupying, then muttered, “I give up,” flicked off the light again, and buried his head under the covers. He was, he decided, probably losing his mind. Perhaps a good sleep would encourage it to come back. He needed it.
III. The Greenwoods Also Have Visitors
Hilde Greenwood was knitting. This was not, in itself, an unusual occupation for a respectable middle-aged lady such as Hilde, but it has to be remembered that she was a spark. That explained, insofar as anything ever possibly could, why the knitting was floating gently in the air in front of her, rather than hanging down in the usual way into her lap.
“Doesn't it make it awkward to knit?” asked her husband Charles. “I mean, doesn't it lift the needles in your hands?”
“It may if I knit a large enough sample,” replied Hilde. “But this is just a test run.”
“What are you planning to use it for?” His blue eyes gleamed with excitement. “Could you make an actual flying carpet?”
“Possibly, dear,” said Hilde placidly. “But I thought flying sweaters might be quite fun.”
“It's got so much potential!” Charles exclaimed. “Does it have to be textiles, or could it...? You know, this could revolutionise our entire fleet of airships!”
She looked over her glasses. “I think you're running a little ahead of yourself, darling.”
“But can you lend me a little of it? I've got to do some experiments with it, now!”
“Only if you promise to do them outside, away from any buildings. You know what very nearly happened last night.”
Charles glanced out of the window. “It's raining.”
“Then you can borrow some tomorrow afternoon, when we're out and about anyway. I really don't think it's safe for you to invent things in hotels. Not when you're short of sleep, at any rate.”
“Short of sleep is relative,” Charles pleaded. “I really don't do so badly on two hours.”
“You ought to see yourself in the morning. Honestly. Now, are there any possible clues in the local paper?”
He sighed. “None at all. I think this is the most intractable case we've ever dealt with, don't you? There's not a shred of evidence anywhere. Just three sparks, all dead, in various parts of Salisbury.”
“What sort of person goes round killing sparks in this country?” asked Hilde, not for the first time. “On the Continent, I admit I can sort of understand it, but here?”
“Any maniac can take it into their head to kill sparks,” replied Charles. “What's really puzzling me is how they manage, in one of our three cases, to get into a locked room to do it.”
“Yes, and it's still puzzling the police,” said Hilde. “Oh, I haven't told you yet, have I? I didn't really want to talk shop over dinner. I finally managed to talk to the inspector in charge of the case. She has a rather odd theory. She thinks it's another spark.”
Charles blinked. “Why?”
“Well, because a spark weapon was used,” replied Hilde, “but of course we knew that. And there are plenty of those around that don't need a spark to use them. But she thinks it could be some kind of rogue spark who's jealous of other sparks. I suppose we can't totally discount the idea, but there's now only one spark left in the area and he seems to be genuinely afraid for his life.”
A maid tapped at the door. “Mr and Mrs Greenwood?”
“Yes?” said Hilde.
“Gentleman to see you. Professor Quagmire.”
They exchanged puzzled glances. “All right,” said Charles. “Please show him in.”
The maid hurried off, returning shortly with a large, bluff, bearded man wearing a decidedly battered-looking hat. “Well, well, well!” he exclaimed happily. “I saw your names in the visitors' book, so of course I couldn't possibly fail to come and see you. What a delightful surprise! And how are you both keeping? How are Miss Davenport and Mr Wooster and, er... the Jäger, I'm so sorry, I've forgotten his name, most remiss of me?”
They both stared blankly at him. “Um... the maid said your name was Professor Quagmire,” said Charles. “Is that correct? I'm terribly sorry, but I'm afraid I have no recollection of you at all.”
Quagmire stared back. “You don't remember me? Horace Rutherford Quagmire, DPhil? The one whose life you saved a few years ago, not far from this very city? Don't you recall the dig at Stonehenge?”
“You're an archaeologist?” Hilde hazarded.
He looked absolutely crushed. “You don't remember me in the slightest, do you? I'm so sorry for disturbing you.” He turned to leave.
“No, no, wait,” said Charles quickly. “There is something going on here that we don't understand, and perhaps if you stay we might get to the bottom of it. Please, Professor, take a seat.”
Quagmire sat down, very self-consciously. “You don't even recognise me,” he said.
“No, we don't,” replied Charles, “but I think there may be a good reason for that. Please rest assured that if circumstances were normal, you would be absolutely unforgettable. You have a very distinctive name and appearance. Therefore, we can safely conclude that circumstances are not normal.”
Quagmire relaxed a little. “Well, I can assure you, I remember both of you very well, and the other three. The Jäger... was he Otto? It was something like that.”
“Close,” replied Hilde. “His name is Ottokar.”
“Thank you. And a remarkable character he was, too.”
“He is,” agreed Charles. “But I suspect that neither he nor the others will remember you any better than we do. You see, I was born here in Salisbury, and that is why I happen to recall Alice – that is, Miss Davenport – mentioning that she had never been here.”
Quagmire frowned. “But that's extraordinary! I met all of you here. Well, Stonehenge, at least, which is hardly a million miles away. Are you certain she hasn't been to Stonehenge?”
“I'm afraid so, Professor,” replied Hilde. “I remember that conversation. Charles said that if she did visit Salisbury, Stonehenge was one of the places she should see, and she said she would very much like to go. And this was... well, about June, I believe.”
“What, June this year?” asked Quagmire. “But it must be over ten years since you saved my life!”
“Ah!” exclaimed Hilde. “Over ten years? How old, at a rough guess, was Miss Davenport at the time?”
“Well, er, I don't like to guess a lady's age, but... early twenties?”
“Good grief,” said Charles. “And Ottokar has been a Jäger for only a few months. I see what's been happening.”
“Absolutely,” said Hilde. “Professor Quagmire, Miss Davenport is twenty-two years old at the moment. Therefore, at the time you were rescued, our version of her would have been no more than a child.”
Quagmire blinked. “Your version? There are two?”
“It's time travel,” Charles explained. “I don't understand how it comes about, but that is what has to have happened. The events you are talking about, which are over ten years in your past, have not happened to us yet. They are in our future.”
Quagmire gaped. “But that's remarkable! I suppose it does make sense, looking at you. You both ought to be at least sixty now, but you haven't changed in the slightest respect since I saw you last.” He looked at Hilde more closely. “Why, that's even the same dress.”
“Oh dear,” said Hilde. “That does rather suggest it's about to happen quite soon.”
“Indeed,” said Charles. “We hadn't actually planned any time travelling. Although, of course, if it means we save your life, we'll be quite happy to do so. We'd just... um... quite like to know when it starts.”
“At least we've now got a warning, dear,” said Hilde. “That's something.”
“Well!” said Quagmire. “This is extraordinary.”
“It is, rather,” Charles admitted. “I mean, we've not actually done it before.”
“We did try once,” added Hilde, “but something crucial exploded.”
“I probably hadn't had enough coffee,” said Charles, lugubriously.
“Do you suppose we need to start building another device?” asked Hilde.
“Well, possibly,” said Charles, “but what's puzzling me is the other three. Ottokar and Alice are in London at the moment, at least as far as we know, and Mr Wooster is very definitely out of the country.”
“Yes,” said Hilde. “Poor Alice does seem rather upset about that. I do wonder, you know.”
“I can't imagine Mr Wooster is feeling much better about it himself,” replied Charles. To be fair to him, the suggestion would not normally have whooshed straight over his head, but he was thinking extremely hard about time travel, which is enough to distract any spark.
“Well. Er,” said Quagmire. “Should I, perhaps, take my leave? I'm sorry to have been the author of any confusion.”
“You really needn't apologise, Professor,” said Hilde warmly. “You were a great deal more confused than we were, and you've done us a service, albeit unwittingly.”
“Well. Happy to,” replied Quagmire. “After all, you did save my life. That is, will save my life. Er... will have saved my life. Will save my life in the past? I'm afraid this business makes tenses a little awkward.”
“Have saved it from your point of view, will save it from ours,” said Hilde practically. “And we're very happy to. To have. To be going to.”
Quagmire considered this. “What happens if you don't, though?”
“Why wouldn't we?” asked Charles, much more surprised than offended.
“Well. Something might go wrong. You might miss the right time. You mightn't see what was going on. All sorts of things might happen. We don't know, because from your point of view it's all in the future, after all.”
“Yes, but for you it's already happened and you're here to prove it,” Hilde pointed out. “If we didn't save your life in our future, you couldn't be coming here to see us now.”
“Oh dear,” said Quagmire. “This is giving me a headache. I think, if you don't mind, I'll go to bed.”
“We don't, but it's been absolutely lovely to meet you, Professor,” said Hilde. “And thank you so much again for letting us know. Even if that wasn't remotely what you thought you were doing.”
“Well, goodnight, both of you. I do hope you get it sorted out,” he said, a little nervously.
When he had left, the Greenwoods exchanged puzzled looks. “Ottokar, Alice and Mr Wooster,” said Charles.
“I know,” said Hilde. “That's the strangest part of the whole thing.”
Charles was just opening his mouth to say something when there was a green flash in the air, and there appeared within it a tall figure with a mop of pale grey hair and a beard to match. He wore a chunky blue sweater and some kind of sun visor; he was beaming from ear to ear and displaying a mouthful of perfect white teeth; and he was carrying what looked suspiciously like some kind of death ray.
“Good evening, unfortunate sparks!” he exclaimed. “Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Othar Tryggvassen, GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER!”
“So why 'unfortunate'?” asked Charles.
“And why the capital letters?” added Hilde.
“Well, you're unfortunate because I'm about to kill you,” explained Othar heartily, “but it's only polite to introduce myself first. As for the capital letters, well, trademark, you know?”
“Killing people doesn't seem terribly gentlemanly to me,” said Charles, rather severely. “Which school did you go to?”
“My dear,” said Hilde, “he's... Norwegian, or something. They may have totally different ideas about what constitutes a gentleman in Norway.”
“Congratulations, madam!” exclaimed Othar, beaming even more broadly. “Yes, I am indeed from Norway.”
“So why,” asked Hilde, “are you planning to kill us?”
“Because I must kill all sparks!” he replied. “It is the great mission of my life to eradicate this terrible evil from the world. And then, of course, when I have killed all the others, it will be my solemn duty to kill myself, for, I confess, I too am a spark.”
Charles stared at him. “You're insane,” he said. “We're not evil. Ask anyone.”
“Of course I'm insane!” exploded Othar. “Doesn't it go with the territory?”
“Well, we're not,” said Hilde. “And I suppose you killed those other sparks.”
“Of course,” said Othar, proudly.
“But you...” Charles began.
“Enough talk! We do not want your quaintly named Professor to decide to come wandering back in again. Besides, I happen to want an early night. Now, just stand over there, please, both together, and we'll get it over with. You see, nobody can say I'm not considerate. Neither of you will have to watch the other die.”
“But...” said Hilde.
“Move!” roared Othar.
They moved. There seemed no other alternative.
“Um,” said Charles.
Hilde slipped an arm round his waist. “Well,” she said. “We've had a lovely thirty years together, haven't we, darling?”
“Yes. Oh, yes, we have indeed. But I was actually just going to ask if I could, er, have a last request.”
“Nothing sparky,” warned Othar.
“Oh, no, absolutely nothing like that,” Charles assured him. “I would just very much like another cup of coffee.”
“Oh, for goodness' sake! No,” said Othar. “I can see you've been drinking it all evening. Do you want to go into whatever afterlife you believe in completely strung out on caffeine?”
“Actually, yes,” replied Charles. “I'm not sure I can think of a better way of doing it.”
“Well, no,” said Othar. “It's a waste of time.” So saying, he levelled the death ray at them, staring along the sights through his visor.
“Sorry, darling,” whispered Charles. “I was hoping...”
“I know.” She squeezed his hand.
There was a loud fzzzzzzzzt noise.
There was a green flash. When it cleared, there was no sign of either Charles or Hilde.
Othar threw down the weapon theatrically. “Oh, damn and blast!” he exclaimed. “How in the world could I have been so careless?”
* * * * *
The thunder rolled ominously. Mr Wooster woke up and pulled his head straight with an effort. Yes, that was only thunder; he was in bed, and that was rain lashing against the window. It was not, as his subconscious had just been trying to insist, the rumble of a battle clank so mighty that it dwarfed even Castle Wulfenbach.
Lightning flashed, and he took advantage of it to consult his alarm clock. Ten past five. An ungodly hour, but he was wide awake now and certain that would not be changing until much later. He switched off the alarm and dragged himself out of bed. He felt dehydrated, and he had a headache.
At least he'd slept. It hadn't felt like it, but he must have done at some point or the thunder couldn't have woken him up.
Thunderstorms. Oh yes. There were thunderstorms, and that was why his pendant hadn't worked last night.
Had he dreamt that?
He had a good wash, which was usually quite an effective tactic for separating dream and reality. It seemed not to be working quite so well this time. He'd been visited by Dupree (he shuddered at the recollection), and then Krosp... well, Krosp had brought the pendant, and he was still wearing it, so that was real enough. But then he'd seen... himself? And himself had talked him out of committing suicide? Really?
Well, he was alive. He did have to concede that. He was pretty sure that if he had shot himself, he wouldn't have woken up in the same bedroom, however exactly the afterlife worked.
And there was Higgs. His doppelganger had told him to see Higgs.
Coffee, he decided. Coffee would be a good idea. And then find Higgs and see what light the enigmatic airman could shed on the case. Higgs was such a weird unknown quantity that, at the very least, he probably wouldn't be fazed by being told that Mr Wooster had been visited by another Mr Wooster and told to go and see him. That was the kind of thing he'd just take in his stride.
He dressed, located his umbrella, then slipped out into the storm and the dark. There were coffee houses round here that opened at all hours. One of them might even have croissants or something of that nature. He primarily needed liquid, but food would be good too.
He stepped into the first one that showed a light. Somehow, he wasn't surprised to notice a blond figure sitting in the corner, his hair tied into a neat nautical pigtail with a red ribbon.
He went to the counter and ordered coffee and toast, then walked over to the other man's table. “Morning, Higgs,” he said.
“Morning, sir,” said Higgs. “You're abroad early.”
“I could say the same for you,” replied Mr Wooster. “And less of the 'sir'. This isn't going to be a formal conversation.” He half smiled.
“So what can I do for you, Mr Wooster?” asked Higgs, motioning him into the chair opposite.
“Well,” said Mr Wooster. “Something very puzzling happened to me last night, but I think a walk in the rain has helped me make at least a tiny amount of sense out of it. I had a visitor.”
“Krosp?” asked Higgs.
“Well, yes, Krosp,” replied Mr Wooster, filing away for future reference the question of how on earth Higgs knew that. “But much stranger than that. Me.” He paused. “What do you know about time travel, Mr Higgs?”
“Ah!” said Higgs. “I was wondering when you'd ask.”
Mr Wooster stared at him, but the man's face was, as ever, impassive almost to the point of ennui. “Higgs,” he said. “Are you going to tell me you're behind all this?”
“Me? If you visited yourself last night, I didn't make you do it.”
Mr Wooster sighed. “I hope the coffee shows up quickly. This is getting confusing. But you do know something, don't you?”
“Yes, I know something, but if you don't mind we'll wait for your order. I don't want to be interrupted while I'm explaining.”
“All right. I can live with that.”
The coffee and toast arrived. Mr Wooster thanked the waitress, and then, once she was out of earshot, observed, “Coffee and toast. It's all right, but I'm already missing hot buttered muffins.”
Higgs reached into a leather bag that hung over the back of his chair. “You might want this,” he observed, handing Mr Wooster a curious brass item resembling nothing so much as an astrolabe.
Mr Wooster wiped his fingers carefully on a napkin and took the device. Whatever exactly it was, it was a work of art as well as craft; the curiously meshing gears were a wonder to behold. “I'll take your word for it that I might want it,” he said, “but do you think it might be helpful to explain what I might want it for?”
“Well,” said Higgs, “obviously you need some means of travelling in time now, otherwise you can't go back and talk yourself... tell yourself whatever it was you had to tell yourself. That would cause a paradox, wouldn't it? We can't have that. Causes all sorts of problems, that, sir.”
“Quite so,” replied Mr Wooster. He had a horrible feeling that he knew exactly what Higgs had been going to say when he corrected himself. The airman would be really disturbing sometimes, if he weren't so invariably helpful. “And this is it? This is the time travel mechanism?”
“That's right, sir. You use these dials here to set the time you want to travel to. Once that's set up, you can use these to set the location, but that's relative to the time, so the time always has to be set first. Otherwise, you'd probably end up off the earth altogether due to the fact that it's orbiting about the sun. Oh, and you can store relative locations using this dial here. Push it in to store a location, and turn it to retrieve them. You'll have noticed the minus sign, by the way. Once you go back in time, it'll disappear and you can go forward again, but only as far as the moment you left. Press this button to take you back to the location you originally left when you went back in time, and use the dial as normal if you need to go to another location.” He gave a hint of a smile. “And that's about it, sir. Use it wisely. As if you wouldn't.”
Mr Wooster took a gulp of his coffee. “Well... thank you, Mr Higgs. But I do have a lot more questions.”
Higgs raised a blond eyebrow. It was difficult to tell whether that was supposed to be inviting the questions or forestalling them. Mr Wooster decided to go with the former. “First of all, might I ask where you got this and why you're giving it to me?”
“Not at liberty to answer the first one, sir, but the second one is easy enough. You've got it because you need it.”
And that, thought Mr Wooster, looking at Higgs, is all I'm going to get. The one thing I can read in him is when he's closing up. He's doing that now. He's still perfectly friendly, but he's closing up. Like a steel safe full of secrets. “Why do I need it?” is not going to get any answer right now, so I'm not even going to ask it.
“Well. Thank you again.” Another thought struck him. “You were waiting for me here, weren't you? You knew I would come in here. That's more than I did until a few minutes before I went in. Are you by any chance a future version? There's another Axel Higgs from the present timeline, currently asleep in his bed?”
“Maybe, sir,” replied Higgs politely.
Click. That steel safe was locked now. It was beyond any skill of Mr Wooster's to open it.
He could, he supposed, go and check. Find out where Higgs slept, and see if he was still there. But somehow it seemed rather impolite, after this kindness. At least, he assumed it was probably a kindness. Higgs had always been on his side before, inasmuch as he was on anyone's side. He carefully put the disc down and bit into a slice of toast. As a final attempt, he asked, “Is there anything else I need to know?”
“Nothing you won't work out for yourself, sir.” There was that half smile again. “I've got confidence in you.”
Well, that was reassuring. Maybe. “Thank you for the compliment,” replied Mr Wooster.
“And if you'll excuse me, sir, I've got to go now,” said Higgs. “You know how it is with airships. Always something to do.”
“At this hour?”
Higgs gave the faintest of shrugs. “Probably at all hours from now on, sir. Reckon things are going to get a bit warm for a while, don't you?”
“Yes,” replied Mr Wooster sombrely, “and I know for a fact you're not talking about the weather.”
Higgs nodded. “Indeed, sir. Be seeing you.”
Mr Wooster watched him step out into the rain, a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in... well, apparently a body capable of knocking a Jäger out cold and recovering from the kind of damage that would instantly kill anyone else he could think of, up to and including an armoured clank. He'd seen Higgs in battle mode a few times, and heard plenty of stories from others. Heaven only knew why he was still only an Airman, Third Class.
He finished his breakfast, paid, and then started walking back to his room. It was in a hotel which had been temporarily commandeered by the Baron and his forces. For a moment he felt reluctant to go back into the building in case he met Dupree again, but he pulled himself together quickly. That was just stupid. It wasn't logical to be able to cope when she was trying to kill him, but absolutely terrified when she was trying to seduce him.
Well, maybe it was, actually, this being Dupree. He wondered idly whether she ate her lovers, like the black widow spider. He would not have put it past her.
By some strange chance, the first person of any importance he met in the corridors was, indeed, Dupree. By an even stranger chance, she lost her habitual smile, grew very wide-eyed, and then turned away hastily down a side route that Mr Wooster was quite sure she had not originally intended to take.
Now that was gratifying. He remembered what his doppelganger had said the previous night about having startled her, or something. Clearly he had done a fine job of it. With the first real smile of the day on his face, he walked up to his room, closed the door, and took out the pendant again. The thunder had died away over breakfast, though it was still raining quite hard outside.
“This is Ardsley,” he said. “I would like to speak to Ottokar.”
The green depths of the pendant glowed, and after a few moments the Jäger's voice came over the link, though very faintly.
“Is hyu!” he exclaimed, happily. “Is vorking. Ve tried last night und notting.”
“There were thunderstorms,” replied Mr Wooster, “and we're a long way apart. You're extremely faint. Can you hear me?”
“Ja. Hy got goot ears.”
“Good. How are you and Alice?”
“Vell,” replied Ottokar, “is goot news und is bad news. Vhich hyu vant first?”
“The way I've been feeling lately, I think I'll take the good news first to cushion me somewhat against the bad news,” said Mr Wooster.
“Ho. Hyu been feeling bad?” asked Ottokar, all concern.
“I'm afraid so. I'm afraid things are going to descend into absolute chaos over here, and there isn't a thing I can do about it. Well,” he amended, “probably not. I've had something rather extraordinary happen over the last twelve hours or so. I'm not at all sure I understand it myself, but the short story is that I've got a time travel device and I definitely know that I will use it in the future at some point. But even with that, I don't think I can go back in time to stop it all going wrong, because I don't know where things started to unravel.”
“Hyu got a...?! How?”
“I think I'd better put it all in a letter,” replied Mr Wooster. “I'll be able to get it all down more coherently. But I'm sorry; you were going to tell me your good news and then your bad news.”
“Ho, ja! Vell, der goot news is ve got our first big assignment. Hyu know, vitout supervision on de scene. Mrs Chadwick reckons ve goot enough to handle it even vitout having finished all our formal training yet.”
“I think Mrs Chadwick is absolutely right,” said Mr Wooster warmly. “Well done, both of you. You deserve it. So what's the assignment?”
“Vell,” said Ottokar mournfully, “dat vould be der bad news.”
“Oh dear,” said Mr Wooster. “What's wrong?”
“Is Charles und Hilde,” Ottokar explained. “Hyu know dey vere investigating who vos killing de schparks in Salisbury? Vell... dey disappeared.”
Mr Wooster's heart skipped a beat. “Oh, no!”
“Is vy ve vere sent,” said Ottokar. “Since ve know dem und ve get letters und schtuff, ve vere de obvious pipple. But, ve don't tink dey dead. No bodies. All de odder schparks, dey vos very clearly dead, because pipple found dem.”
“So... are you two in Salisbury at the moment?”
“Ja.” Ottokar gave the name of their hotel.
“Right. I think I need to come over for a chat. Would you be free for lunch tomorrow?”
“But hyu got to be over dere!” Ottokar protested. “Hyu leave now, dey put hyu in a cell.”
“The time device,” replied Mr Wooster. “Higgs... I'll tell you about him later... Higgs said I could set the location as well. It can move me in space as well as time, just so long as I move in time first. And it can bring me back to the moment I left. I will leave the day after tomorrow, come and see you and Alice tomorrow, and return to the day after tomorrow when we've had lunch. Nobody will notice I've left, even if they're looking at me at the time.”
“Dat,” said Ottokar, “is clever, Mister Vooster.”
“Ardsley. That's how I've set it on the pendant communicator. I did it in a morbid mood last night, thinking I might be blown to shreds within the week; but I would like to keep it that way. I wish to be Ardsley to both of you from now on.” He paused. “To be honest, I might easily still be blown to shreds, irrespective of any morbid mood. And if I am, I don't want to go out being Mister-Woostered by two of my best friends.”
“Hokay,” said Ottokar. “But if hyu get blown to shreds, hy going to have someting to say to de pipple vot did de blowing.”
Mr Wooster smiled. “Good to know, even though it won't bring me back. But, well, enough of this. I don't want to drag you down; you've got enough on your plates as it is. Give my best regards to Alice, and tell her I'll be with you at half past twelve tomorrow, if that's all right.”
“Hy vill! Vill be goot to see hyu again. Und hy really looking forvard to seeing de time travel gadget ting, too.”
“Oh, and... this had better not go into the official report. I would have no problem explaining my presence in two places at once to Mrs Chadwick, but I wouldn't want it to go any higher. I doubt it would go down well.”
“Hyu can count on us,” Ottokar assured him robustly.
“Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow, then.”
IV. This Is Still Salisbury?
There was a puzzled silence. Hilde was the first to break it.
“Well,” she said. “I'm fairly sure we're not dead, darling. I think if this were either heaven or hell, there would be a lot more going on.”
She had a point. They were standing on short, springy turf, surrounded by gently rolling chalk downs as far as the eye could see. At least, it was reasonable to assume they were chalk, given the fact that there were lumps of it lying around here and there. The sun was sinking softly in a watercolour cloudscape, and small, scruffy sheep and goats grazed here and there. The daisies at their feet had already folded their petals for the night.
“It looks English enough,” observed Charles. “But I can't think where we are. Somehow it looks extremely familiar, but I can't say why. It's chalk, but it's not a view I know.”
“Well, there's chalk in other areas too,” Hilde pointed out. “We needn't be anywhere near Salisbury. We could just as easily be in, say, Sussex.”
“Wherever it is, it does look very deserted,” said Charles. “And we can't sleep out here in the open; it feels as though it's going to get cold tonight. We'd better go and look for some kind of shelter.”
“There are people round here somewhere, at least,” said Hilde. “There's a fence. Maybe we could try following it and see if there's a farmhouse?”
“Better to follow the river, I think.” Charles pointed to a glint of water winding through a cluster of trees. “If we do that, we're bound to find a town eventually.”
“Good idea,” agreed Hilde. “You're right that it's getting chilly, dear. I wish I had my wrap.”
He took her hand in his, and smiled. “We'll get warm walking. And we're not dead yet, in spite of that Norse lunatic. I don't know what he got wrong, but clearly he's not unstoppable.”
They followed the river for a while, but when they reached one of the higher hills, Charles decided to climb it to see if he could get a better view of the surrounding territory before the light altogether failed. Hilde remained at the bottom, since her knee, once again, was starting to give her some trouble. She sat on a chalk outcrop in the lee of the hill, huddling with her knees against her chest for warmth.
It was some time before her husband returned, and, when he did, he looked almost as pale as the chalk around them. “Well, darling,” he said, in a rather strained voice, “I now know where we are.”
“You don't sound as though that's very reassuring,” said Hilde slowly.
“It isn't.” He came and sat down beside her, putting an arm round her. “I looked back to where we started walking from, and then it all clicked into place. I knew this scene looked familiar, but I couldn't understand why. I know now.” He pulled the long face he had, which was usually comic exaggeration; there was no comedy in it at this moment. “This hill. I must have been up it hundreds of times when I was a boy. I know all the outlines of the land. What threw me initially was the buildings. There aren't any buildings. Nothing. Not even the Cathedral.”
Hilde stared at him. “You mean... this is still Salisbury?”
“Well, we're a little outside it now. But yes. Where we started from, that was Salisbury. Except that it obviously isn't at the moment.” He considered. “We probably ended up in the exact corresponding location. Thank the Lord we were on the ground floor when whatever that was happened, or we could have dropped out of the air.”
“Time travel?” said Hilde, after a few moments.
“It's looking like it. But, if so, we must have gone a very long way back indeed for there to be nothing on the site of Salisbury at all. I mean, parts of the cathedral are... I'm not certain, but I have a feeling we're looking at the tenth century, and there would have had to be a thriving settlement here before that. People don't normally build major cathedrals in the middle of nowhere.”
“Darling,” said Hilde sympathetically, “this must be awful for you.”
“Well, it's awful for both of us,” he said, a little surprised.
“No, but you were born here. That makes a difference.”
“You're right,” he admitted. “It does, rather. It was the most frightful wrench when it hit me.”
Hilde hugged him for a little while before she spoke again. Then she asked gently, “What's the oldest building around here that you know? Apart from the cathedral, of course?”
“That's easy enough,” replied Charles. “Stonehenge. It's a fair walk from here, but we could do it before bedtime, I think.”
“All right,” said Hilde. “Then I think that's where we need to go. If we're so far back that there's no Salisbury, then any settlements here are likely to be around Stonehenge.”
“Good idea. But will your knee be all right?”
“I'm afraid it'll have to be. I would rather have a sore knee than hypothermia.”
Charles nodded soberly. “Very well. You can always lean on me if you need to. Now let's see if I can get us there the straightest way.”
They started walking. The journey was rather longer than Charles remembered, although his sense of direction did not fail him; even without the familiar roads and landmarks to guide him, he kept them moving steadily in the right direction. It was fully dark long before they were anywhere close, and they were able to continue only by the faint light of a gibbous moon. Once they crossed a river, possibly the same one they had briefly followed; it took them some time to find a place where they could safely ford it, but Charles was determined. Failure to cross could cost their lives.
Hilde was mostly silent on the journey, conserving her energy as much as possible and fighting the increasing pain in her knee. That joint had given her problems since a tussle involving an out-of-control clank six years earlier. Charles, well aware of this, did not try to encourage her into unnecessary conversation.
He drew to a halt. “Look,” he said. “Over there. Am I seeing things, or is that a fire somewhere over there?”
Hilde peered into the darkness. “There does seem to be a faint glow. I think there are trees in the way.”
“There do seem to be a lot of trees,” said Charles. “Far more than I recall. But never mind that; if that's really a fire, we need to be heading for it.”
She nodded. “Yes. I'm pretty sure it is.”
He took her arm again. “Come on, then. Last lap.”
She smiled. “It'll be good to see some human faces. It's much too lonely round here.”
“Yes; sheep do have their limitations as company,” said Charles.
It was a fire. That became ever more obvious as they drew nearer. Soon, to their utter relief and delight, they heard voices raised in song; it was difficult to tell exactly how many people there were, but there were enough of them to sound like a reasonable choir. The harmonies were strange in places, but they were, nonetheless, recognisably harmonies. A light, clear tenor voice soared above them in a short solo passage.
Hilde frowned. “What language is that?” she asked.
“Nothing I recognise,” said Charles, with a slight frown. “I suppose if we're as far back as we think, it's probably a Celtic language, and I'm not well up on those. Although that tenor is wonderful. He's got a Purcell voice, don't you think?”
“I was thinking Dowland, but I know what you mean.”
“Well, yes, also Dowland, of course, but somehow he makes me think of Purcell in particular. Which is quite ridiculous, of course, since Purcell won't exist for several hundred years.”
“How,” asked Hilde, “do you suppose we're going to talk to them?”
“Sign language, I suppose. And if they've got anything to draw with...”
“They will. If nothing else, we can always scratch pictures in the chalk.”
“I hope we don't look too strange to them,” said Charles.
“We will,” replied Hilde. “The question is more how much they'll mind us looking strange. I hope we can manage some very diplomatic sign language.”
“We've got to try,” said Charles.
As they drew towards the fire, the singing stopped raggedly. About a dozen pairs of eyes, glinting in the firelight, stared at them. Charles and Hilde both held out their hands in front of them, palms upwards, fingers spread, in token of peace.
A young man stepped forward and asked them a question. It was completely incomprehensible. Charles did a sort of stage Italian shrug.
“I can't make out a single word,” he said to Hilde. “It doesn't even sound Celtic to me, though I'm no expert, of course.”
Hilde pointed to her knee and pulled an agonised face. That hardly required any acting skill; she had been trying not to pull the same kind of face for at least the last three miles. Another man stood up and spoke to the first one.
There was a puzzled confabulation between several of the people around the fire, which seemed at times, judging by the tones of voice, to verge on actual argument. Finally, one woman spoke in a very authoritative way for some minutes.
That appeared to settle it. The conversation stopped, and the woman came up to Charles and Hilde with a smile. She was possibly the oldest member of the group, although it was not clear exactly how old she was; she was wrinkled, but there was something about her face which suggested she might still be younger than either Charles or Hilde. She wore a long plaid skirt, a large shawl in a different plaid fastened with a bone pin, and, from the look of it, a brown tunic under the shawl with long sleeves. Over her shoulder was slung a bag, which was made of something similar to coarse sacking, but neatly made and decorated with embroidered spirals. She rummaged in it for a moment, and then produced a piece of bark and handed it to Hilde.
Hilde stared at the bark, and then at the woman. “Thank you,” she said, uncertainly.
The woman looked puzzled. Then she turned to her companions and said something. There was laughter, and Hilde understood that she was the butt of it, though it sounded quite good-natured.
“I'm getting something wrong,” she said to Charles. “I ought to know what to do with this. Is it a ritual, do you think?”
“Let me see, darling.” He leaned closer. “Oh! I know. I think that's willow bark. Try chewing it.”
“Salicylates,” said Hilde. “Of course! They know I'm in pain.” She smiled at the woman. “Thank you,” she said again, and put the bark in her mouth.
The woman beamed back as Hilde started chewing. The stuff tasted foul, but that was hardly a surprise. The woman pointed to herself. “Belod,” she said, with the accent on the last syllable.
Hilde nodded acknowledgement. “Hilde,” she said, pointing to herself in turn. “Charles.” She indicated her husband.
“Hilde,” Belod repeated, pronouncing it perfectly; Hilde was Swiss, and, on the rare occasions when anyone in England other than Charles or Ottokar pronounced it, it tended to come out as “Hilda”, which made her cringe a little inside. Belod had slightly more trouble saying “Charles”, inserting a schwa between the two final consonants. She gestured to Hilde to sit down on a fallen tree trunk, which she did with some difficulty and a little assistance from Charles. She then proceeded to lift Hilde's skirts to examine the affected knee. Hilde was momentarily nonplussed, given that there were men present, but she had enough sense to understand that this was a completely different culture, and, besides, her knee was still throbbing despite the willow bark.
It was noticeably swollen. Belod tut-tutted under her breath, then pulled some strips of cloth from her bag and bound it expertly. The others, in the meantime, had been banking up the fire with turf and were starting to move away. Belod motioned to Charles and Hilde to come with her, and they followed the rest of the party.
“That was some luck,” said Charles. “We seem to have fallen in with the local doctor. I still can't work out the time period, though.”
“Maybe that'll be clearer in the morning, dear,” replied Hilde. “I can't even see Stonehenge at the moment.”
“I caught a glimpse of it through the trees earlier,” said Charles. “It's there all right.”
“That's something, anyway,” said Hilde.
There was a little cluster of tents not very far away, and Belod led her two charges into one of them. It smelt of leather and herbs. She helped them to a corner of the tent, where they found blankets and furs. She said something to them, and both replied, “Goodnight.” It seemed to be the appropriate response.
Both sparks were so tired that they fell asleep almost immediately, and, as usual, it was Hilde who woke first. The tent flap was open, and the morning light streamed in. Belod was already up and about, and when she saw Hilde moving she smiled, pointed to her knee, and asked some question.
Hilde got up as carefully as she could, to avoid disturbing Charles. She indicated the knee, nodded and smiled; it did feel noticeably better. Belod beamed back at her. Charles rolled over, groaned, and blinked.
“Coffee,” he muttered.
“Ahh,” said Hilde. “I'm afraid... that could be a bit of a problem, darling.”
Charles pulled himself blearily into a sitting position. “What... er?”
“If you remember, my love, we were thrown back in time,” Hilde reminded him. “I'm fairly sure coffee didn't arrive in this country until several hundred years after Salisbury Cathedral was built.”
Charles passed a hand over his forehead. “Great Scott.”
Belod looked at him enquiringly. “Char-les?”
Hilde attempted to explain, in gestures, that her husband was just going to have to be allowed to recover by himself. How much of this got across was questionable. She turned to Charles. “Maybe you need to go outside and have a stretch, darling,” she suggested. “A little fresh air will help you to wake up.”
“Can't do any harm, I suppose.” He nodded to Belod. “I'm sorry. I'm forgetting my manners. Good morning, Belod.”
Belod, naturally, understood no word of this except her own name, but she read his face well enough to understand that she was being greeted. She smiled back and replied in her own language.
Charles stepped outside the tent, blinking again in the early sunshine. Hilde, meanwhile, had some rather more esoteric needs that she too was attempting to ignore. As usual, she had woken up sparking, and she had a marvellous idea for a new type of automatic coal-scuttle which she knew she had no more chance of implementing than Charles had of getting a cup of coffee. So, instead, she decided to see if she could turn her spark to the much more immediate problem of communication rather than inventing.
There was nothing in the tent that appeared to lend itself to drawing, so Hilde set about working with Belod to establish some basics, starting by pointing to various objects around the tent and looking questioning. She had managed to learn the words for “tent”, “blanket”, “fur”, “bowl” and the major parts of the body by the time Charles returned, looking, if anything, even more dazed than he had previously done.
“I went to look at Stonehenge,” he announced.
“Well, what's the matter, darling?” asked Hilde.
“Well. You know we were trying to establish how far back we'd come?”
“Has it given you any clues, then?” asked Hilde.
“Rather,” said Charles hollowly. “They're still building it.”
V. Mr Wooster Investigates
“Do you think the dress is all right, Ottokar?” asked Alice.
The dress in question was striped, dark green and pale gold, and very high-necked. There are women who like to dress a hint less modestly than usual when in the presence of the object of their affections, and then there are women like Alice, who are inclined to do quite the opposite. Ottokar looked at it thoughtfully.
“Is nize,” he decided. “But hy hope hyu don't vear it in a fight. De schleeves are not goot for fighting.”
“I'm not actually proposing to get into any fights today, Ottokar,” she replied, with a smile. “Though you are quite right about the sleeves.”
Alice glanced in the mirror, for what must have been the fiftieth time that morning. “Und hyu hair looks fine too,” said Ottokar, not waiting for the question. “De liddle curls at de front, dey a goot look on hyu. But he going to be here very soon, so hy tink maybe hyu better schtop vorrying und accept that hyu ready.”
“Oh, my,” said Alice.
“Look. Hyu got to act normal,” said Ottokar patiently. “He not changed at all. He yust der same as he alvays has been.”
“I know that, but I'm not,” sighed Alice. “But of course I'm planning to try to act normal. Why else would I be under so much strain?”
The air shimmered in front of them, and out of it stepped Ardsley Wooster, smiling warmly, but nonetheless looking at least as strained as Alice. “Good to see you two again,” he said.
“Hyu too,” replied Ottokar. Alice murmured something under her breath.
“Hy made a chicken casserole for hyu two,” the Jäger continued. “Is vun vit beans for me. Und for aftervards dere is blackberry und apple crumble.”
“That sounds wonderful, Ottokar,” said Mr Wooster. “I can assure you that even Baron Wulfenbach doesn't have anyone who can cook as well as you.”
“Hyu too kind. Come on. Ve yust about ready.”
He led them through to the dining room and waved them into chairs. “Von't be long,” he promised, with a grin.
“So how are you, Alice?” asked Mr Wooster.
“I'm very well, thank you,” she replied, trying not to think too hard about how well that dark red jacket suited him. “But, er, Ottokar says you're having a bad time at the moment. I'm so sorry to hear that. Is there anything either of us could do to help?”
He smiled, though it did not drive the sadness out of his eyes. “You're both doing what you can already, and I appreciate that. I'm afraid things are going downhill very fast over there, and there's almost certainly nothing you or I can do about it.”
“I'm so sorry, Ardsley,” she replied, feeling a little thrill at being allowed to use the name to his face for the first time.
“Well. Can't be helped, old girl. My word, Ottokar, that looks delicious!”
Ottokar beamed, showing all his fangs. “Hy hope so.”
Once they were all sitting down and eating, Mr Wooster said, “Well, I know we don't normally like to talk shop over meals, but I think it might be sensible to make an exception here for several reasons, if you don't object.”
“Is a goot idea,” replied Ottokar promptly. “Hyu vant to know vhere ve are so far?”
“Please.”
It was probably the most sensible suggestion that Mr Wooster could have made, though of course he had no way of knowing it. Once they were talking about the case, it was a great deal easier for Alice to shift back into professional mode; it helped, of course, that they were also discussing Charles and Hilde, who were close friends of all three of them.
“Hokay,” said Ottokar. “Vell, ve got here to find dey'd disappeared vitout anyvun seeing dem leave der hotel, und all deir tings vere schtill in deir room. So, Alice has taken dat room so she can look after de tings, und hy rented dese rooms vere is private und ve can talk.”
“We know from their letters,” Alice continued, “that three sparks have been killed here so far, and their bodies were all found. There's one spark remaining alive in the area; his name is Lionel Montgomerie. We've spoken to him, and he's a nervous wreck. He almost didn't let us in for fear that we might be the spark killers.”
“Do we know who last saw them?” asked Mr Wooster.
“Well, yes and no,” replied Alice. “Yes, we've been told that a Professor Quagmire came up to see them, but we haven't yet been able to trace him. There's no Quagmire on the Salisbury electoral roll.”
“Is a schtrange enough name, though,” Ottokar added. “If he anyvhere around here, ve find him soon.”
“They were definitely at dinner,” said Alice, “and apparently this Professor Quagmire came to see them shortly afterwards. The receptionist was a little vague about how long he stayed, but she thinks it was a fairly short visit, maybe about half an hour.”
“H'mm,” said Mr Wooster, thoughtfully. “Anything more you've managed to find out about this Professor Quagmire?”
“Notting much,” replied Ottokar. “Except for vot he looks like. Is a big man vit a beard.”
“Which isn't exactly a great deal of help,” said Alice. “We do need to talk to him. Though I don't believe he killed Charles and Hilde, for what that's worth. He left the hotel alone, so, wherever they are now, he didn't take them there.”
“And when were they found to be missing?” asked Mr Wooster.
“Not long after he left. The maid came to clear up the tea and coffee cups, and found no sign of either of them. The room was on the ground floor, and there was a window open, but it was too small for anyone to have got either in or out that way. All the windows are, on that floor. It's an old building with crown glass panes; some of them have been replaced with more modern windows on the upper floors, but not at ground level.”
Mr Wooster nodded gravely. “So they didn't leave by the window, and they didn't leave by the door. We are quite certain they didn't leave by the door?”
“Dey vould have been seen,” replied Ottokar, with certainty. “De receptionist knew who dey vere.”
“You have that time travel device, though,” said Alice. “Could we go back in time and have a look to see what happened?”
“I don't know whether it will take more than one person at a time,” replied Mr Wooster. “Besides, anything Charles and Hilde couldn't deal with is likely to be dangerous. Not that I mind dealing with dangerous things in general – it is, after all, rather part and parcel of the job – but when you also add time travel into the equation, I think it's as well to be more cautious. Questions would be asked if I were to go back into the past and get myself killed there.”
“Vould cause a paradox, anyvay,” Ottokar pointed out.
“It'd cause a jolly sight more than that,” said Alice warmly.
Mr Wooster smiled. “I suspect that everything to do with time travel causes a paradox, though I'm not sure yet.”
“Hyu didn't say how hyu got der device,” Ottokar reminded him.
“Well, I'll try to keep it simple,” said Mr Wooster. “The other night... that is to say, the night before last, from where we are at the moment... I had a visit from myself. My future self. I haven't got to that point in the timeline yet, so I don't know how far ahead in the future he was from. He told me to go and see someone I know by the name of Higgs. The next morning, I got up very early and went out to a coffee shop for breakfast, only to find that Higgs was sitting in it. I think he was waiting for me.”
“Vell, he vould be, hy suppose,” replied Ottokar. “Hy mean, hyu, dat being der future hyu, vouldn't vant der present hyu to have to vaste a lot of time looking for der Higgs. So about der same time hyu go back to see hyuself, hyu'll also have to go und see der Higgs und tell him vhere to meet hyu de next morning.”
Alice blinked at the Jäger. “That's clever,” she said, “but there is one thing you haven't taken into account. Namely, that finding Mr Higgs presumably takes just as long whether it's the present Ardsley or the future one who's doing it.”
“I suspect that may be irrelevant,” replied Mr Wooster. “After all, what I know is that I – that is, present me – didn't have to go looking for him, so I have to assume that Ottokar is right and future me did. Future I did. Neither sounds quite right.”
“Anyway,” said Alice. “Never mind all that. Was it Mr Higgs who gave you the device, then?”
He nodded. “It was. He said I needed it. That was about all I could get out of him, apart from the operating instructions.”
“Und vot sort of person is he?” asked Ottokar.
“That,” replied Mr Wooster, “is the great unanswered question of Europa. He's an Airman Third Class in the pay of Baron Wulfenbach, with a blond pigtail, an aura of almost complete unflappability, and the ability to carry on regardless when suffering injuries that would be fatal to anyone else, up to and including your kind, Ottokar. And he knows things. Things out of the dim past. I used to think he must be some kind of immortal, but now I know he's got time travel, I'm not so sure.”
“If he knows you need it,” said Alice, “he must have travelled into the future and seen that.”
“But you can't travel into your own future,” replied Mr Wooster. “He was very clear about that. The only way you can travel forwards in time is if you've already gone back into the past. You can never move beyond the point where you would be if you hadn't done any time travelling.”
“In dat case,” said Ottokar, “he got to have travelled into der past und seen it. So hyu got to be going to travel into der past. Und hyu got to need to.”
“And I suppose it's probably going to be fairly soon,” added Alice, “otherwise he wouldn't have given you the device yet. Could we see it, please?” she asked, a little shyly.
“Of course!”
The rest of lunch was taken up with discussing the device, and afterwards Mr Wooster said, “But this isn't really getting us any further with the matter of Charles and Hilde. Could we please go and have a look at the room where they were staying? I imagine you'll both have gone over it pretty thoroughly, but I'd still like to get the layout of it into my head. And if you found anything out of the ordinary in there, I'd like to see that too, although I suppose you didn't, did you?”
“Depends what you call ordinary for sparks,” replied Alice. “We found a few cogs and gears and things on the floor, but then they did disappear in the evening, so that was probably Charles. He's not as tidy as Hilde.” She stood up. “Come on, then. It's not far.”
Indeed, it was only round the corner. The hotel was one of those charming mediaeval buildings which fill the centre of Salisbury, and the room – in fact, two rooms – previously occupied by Charles and Hilde was at the back, looking out over a quiet courtyard. Alice asked for a few minutes to tidy up her own things, and hurried within, leaving the two others outside the door.
“Pretty place,” observed Mr Wooster.
“Ja. Very pretty. Hyu know Charles vos born here? Hilde vos saying how happy he vos to be back.”
“I didn't, actually. I knew Hilde was from Switzerland, but I didn't know exactly where Charles was born.”
“Vell, dere hyu go. Salisbury. Vhere vere hyu born?”
“York, as a matter of fact. Though I didn't live there for very long. We moved to Reading a couple of years later.”
“Ho, York. Der vhite rose. Richard Plantagenet und all dat schtuff, ja?” He grinned.
Mr Wooster smiled back. “That's right. Clearly you've been studying your history very assiduously. Especially since most people would call him Richard III.”
“Vell,” said Ottokar, “hy kind of like him. Hyu see, de books hy read at first said he vos a big villain vot killed his liddle nephews in der Tower of London. But de more hy tought about dat, de veirder it sounded, because it vouldn't have done him any goot if he had killed dem. But Henry Tudor, he vos a whole different matter. So, hy read a bit more. Hy vent back to some of de original sources. Und hy getting to tink Richard vos a preddy goot sort, as kings go, but dat Henry vosn't so goot at all, und dat vos vy he made Richard out to be a villain.”
“It's not even your history,” said Mr Wooster. “I'm amazed you're so interested.”
“But history is yust vot happens to pipple,” replied Ottokar. “Und pipple are pipple, vherever dey are.”
“That's true,” Mr Wooster agreed. “Welcome to the Yorkist camp. For what it's worth, I feel much the same way about our King Richard.”
“Hy been interested in him for a vhile,” said Ottokar. “Maybe vun day hy do all der proper research und write a book.”
Alice popped her head round the door. “Sorry about the delay, gentlemen. Please come in!”
Ottokar and Mr Wooster stepped into the outer of the two rooms, which was the parlour where Professor Quagmire had visited the Greenwoods on the night they vanished. Mr Wooster walked round it, examining everything in his unfussy professional manner, and then asked, “Alice, would you mind if I had a look at the bedroom?”
“Oh... certainly. It's why I tidied up,” she replied, brightly.
“Thank you.” He stepped inside, leaving the other two in the parlour, and came out again after a few minutes.
“Does it tell you anything?” asked Alice.
“It tells me that they didn't bring their tool belts, wherever they went,” replied Mr Wooster, frowning. “That was the first thing I looked for, and here they still are. Has either of you ever known either Charles or Hilde go out without a tool belt?”
Alice and Ottokar shook their heads. “We were worried about that too,” said Alice.
“Und de coffee machine of Charles,” added Ottokar. “Hyu know how Charles is vit der coffee.”
There was a tap on the door. Alice, who happened to be closest, opened it.
“Please, miss,” said the maid, “there's a Professor Quagmire here. I told him Mr and Mrs Greenwood had gone, but there was a friend of theirs staying here, so he wants to see you instead.”
“Really?” exclaimed Alice, astonished. “Well, that's remarkably convenient, because we would also very much like to see him. Could you please show him in?”
* * * * *
Belod and Hilde were getting somewhere. Hilde had finally managed to convey to Belod that she was in a fit state to help with whatever needed doing, and she was more than willing to do so. Consequently, they were now by the fire cooking some fish that a few of the others had brought up from the river. Belod was squatting, something she seemed to find quite comfortable, but Hilde had been given a log to sit on in deference to her injured knee.
Charles, who was suffering full-on caffeine withdrawal, had crawled back to bed for the moment. He was never at his best first thing in the morning, but the combination of temporal dislocation on a scale of millennia, the fact that almost everyone around him was speaking a language he couldn't even vaguely relate to anything he knew, and a hammering headache, was more than even the most sunny-natured person could handle all at once.
Hilde brought him a piece of fish. “Breakfast, darling?” she ventured.
Charles groaned, rolled over, and opened one eye. “Thank you, darling. I'll try it.”
“Not hungry?”
“Not yet. But I ought to eat something, I suppose. I have the most infernal headache.”
“Poor sweetheart. Do you think a strip of Belod's willow bark will help?”
“Unfortunately, I doubt it. It's caffeine I need here, not salicylates.”
“All right,” said Hilde. “But if you get chilly, come out and sit by the fire. There's a good blaze going now.”
Belod smiled as she took her place again, and raised an enquiring eyebrow. Hilde shrugged and made the sort of face which she hoped was able to convey “he's no better at the moment, but it's honestly nothing serious”. She took another fish, skewered it on a stick the way Belod had shown her, and held it up to the fire.
Over breakfast, Hilde learned the names of the rest of the group. One of them, in particular, interested her; the tenor soloist of last night, who also proved to have been the young man who initially addressed them, was called Ghyn. Once Charles was feeling a little better, she was determined to steer Ghyn in his direction, for, second only to being a spark, Charles was a fine musician. If he and Ghyn could manage to get a discussion going about music, even if it had to involve a lot of gestures and whistling, it would do a great deal to keep up his spirits.
Once breakfast was over, the entire group – except for the afflicted Charles – made the short journey to Stonehenge. They were by no means the only group present. Many others, who had been camping around the periphery of the site in similar fashion, were still arriving, and some had already started work. There were people hitching up teams of oxen, people climbing up the vertiginous wooden scaffolding frames lashed to two of the uprights, and one person with a hammer and nails going over them and checking to see if any repairs were needed. An ox-cart was arriving filled with jars and pitchers of water from the river. There were ropes, picks, mattocks, shovels, and any number of flint hand-axes; the only thing that was missing, of course, was metal. This was the Neolithic Age, and the craft of smelting had not yet been discovered. But what they had, they were using with all the ingenuity they possessed.
Hilde looked at Belod enquiringly to see if she could be of any help. Belod, for answer, produced a bone needle and mimed sewing movements.
Hilde nodded enthusiastically. Yes; of course she could sew. Belod smiled, found a boulder for her to sit on near one of the small fires that were dotted about the site, and said something in a loud clear voice to those in the vicinity. Then she gave Hilde the needle, a leather thimble, and a little bag containing thread wound onto wooden spools.
It appeared that Hilde, being for the moment too disabled to do any of the heavy work, had been given the job of repairing things. That suited her ideally. She quite enjoyed sewing, and it also gave her the opportunity to study and analyse what was going on from an overall perspective. Perhaps she might be able to think of a way to make the job easier. By all the signs, today one of the great cross-pieces was going to be hoisted into its place atop the two uprights with the scaffolding. They could do it, no doubt about that; one of them was already in its place. Still, it was going to take a huge amount of work from both people and oxen, and the whole point of being a spark was to make things better for other people. Or, at least, it was in Hilde's book.
Belod hurried off to a spot near the centre of the circle, where she found a stray piece of wood, stuck it into the ground, and attached a piece of yellow cloth to the top of it. And that, I suppose, thought Hilde, is the first aid station. She can't be the only one on duty, though? Surely there are more healers?
There were, and they came and gathered around the yellow flag, each with a bag slung over his or her shoulder. They sat on the turf, chatting among themselves in small groups. A little way away, other people were unloading the ox cart and setting up a water station, and beyond that some tables had been set up on trestles and were now being loaded with shallow baskets containing fruit, nuts, eggs, shellfish, and a few other things Hilde could not recognise at this distance. There was also a big clay bowl full of what might have been some kind of kefir or curd cheese. The carcasses of sheep and goats were brought in on poles and transferred to spits over the various fires, where those whose job it was to tend the fires turned them now and again. It was all so highly organised, without the least appearance that there was anyone there who was doing the organising, that Hilde suspected it was routine. She wondered whose job she was taking over, or whether there were several repairers dotted around the site.
There certainly were people organising the actual construction work. There was a lot of shouting and arm-waving going on in the vicinity of the stone which was to be lifted, and the construction workers were scurrying around doing various things in response. At the moment it was difficult to see exactly how they were planning to raise the stone, but there was clearly a lot of wood involved in the process. More scaffolding, probably, although surely the existing arrangement couldn't be part of it; it looked completely insufficient to cope with the weight of a stone that size.
A man came running up to her, interrupting her reflections. He was holding a torn blanket and talking very fast. Hilde held up a hand to stop him, then nodded and showed him the needle and thread.
He nodded back, looking puzzled, and then asked a question. He stared at her clothes. Naturally, he hadn't been the first person here to do that.
Hilde smiled, and reached out her hand for the blanket. The man passed it over, still looking bemused, but at least satisfied that he was going to get it repaired. From the look of it, someone had accidentally put a flint axe through it, because it was a very clean cut. Hilde had seen some of those axes at close quarters already, and they were sharp.
The repairs kept her busy all morning. People occasionally tore clothes or blankets, but much more often she was called on to repair the slings that were used to carry tools, materials and occasionally people up the scaffolding. Every now and again, a child would come running up with a clay beaker full of water for her, and by mid-morning she was confident enough to ask one of them for a snack using gestures. The child, not being able to understand exactly what sort of snack she wanted, brought a bowl of some kind of porridge and a handful of berries. It was good enough, and the child seemed to know that Hilde was thanking her.
Charles wandered down to the site around midday, still looking groggy. He squatted at her side. “Hallo, darling,” she said. “Feeling any better?”
“Only marginally,” he replied. “You seem to have settled in very well, though.” He smiled.
“Yes. I got Belod to teach me some words earlier. I don't know if you heard.”
“I did, but they didn't go in,” he confessed. “I'm afraid I was far too busy trying to keep my brain from battering a hole in my skull at the time.”
“If it's settled down enough, I could teach you them now,” she offered.
“It has a little, and that would be useful, thank you,” he said. “I am not, as you know, a vindictive type, but if I ever get my hands on Tryggvassen...”
“I do believe that's the first time you've ever sworn revenge in your life, dear,” said Hilde. “Well done!”
“Well,” said Charles. “I've had people set deadly clanks on me, try to blow me up, beat me senseless, wreck my inventions... but this is the first villain who has ever deprived me of coffee.”
“With any luck,” said Hilde, “I'll get him first. With the parasol.” Hilde's parasol had been known to do significant damage to a large armed clank, so this was not the toothless threat it sounded. “Anyway. Let's do some words, and then you may have a better idea of whether this language is likely to be a distant ancestor of anything you recognise. Oh! And at some point I want you to meet Ghyn. He's the Purcell voice.”
Charles immediately brightened. “Wonderful! And, of course, one thing with talking about music is that often you don't need words. You can just hum it.”
Hilde proceeded to teach her husband all the words she knew so far. A little later, she asked, “So, why do you think we're here instead of dead?”
“Well, that's clear enough, darling,” said Charles, surprised. “Trygvassen's invention went wrong somewhere.”
“Of course, dear, but hasn't it occurred to you that that is a very strange way for it to go wrong?” asked Hilde. “How many death rays have you ever come across that sent people thousands of years back in time when they malfunctioned?”
“H'mm,” said Charles. “Now you put it like that, it does seem odd.”
“I've been thinking,” said Hilde, “that it was a dual capability device. A death ray, but with a time travel attachment. It would certainly explain how he killed those other sparks without being detected, especially given the fact that one of them was in a locked room. He usually used the time travel himself, but somehow or other he turned it on us instead.”
“That makes sense,” Charles agreed. “I suppose it's too much to hope that he also turned the death ray on himself?”
“Probably,” replied Hilde, regretfully. “You see, if he's insane enough to want to kill all sparks, he may well come back in time to look for us, if he knows where we ended up. When, I should say. And we need to be ready if that does happen, because as far as I can make out, he's the only chance we have of getting back. We need to think of a way to get that device away from him so we can use it ourselves.”
“Tall order,” said Charles, doubtfully. “I mean, he looks very strong, and he's obviously not stupid. But when my head clears, I'll certainly give it some thought.”
“I'm still wondering where Ottokar and the others fit in,” said Hilde. “Professor Quagmire said he met us all at Stonehenge, but that was ten years or so before the point we left from, not here and now.”
Charles looked across at the workers. “Ottokar would be right in his element here,” he said, with a smile. “I'm sure he'd love to help.”
“Ottokar is in his element almost everywhere,” replied Hilde.
“That's true. Oh! Good heavens. With everything that's been happening, I had completely forgotten about the letter.”
“What, from Ottokar and Alice?” asked Hilde.
“No.” Charles reached into an interior jacket pocket. “It's from Mr Wooster. I picked it up as we were going out yesterday morning and it went straight out of my head. Good to hear from him.”
“Well, have you opened it, dear?” asked Hilde.
“Not yet.” Charles proceeded to do so, and then read in silence for a few minutes.
“Oh dear,” he said, his amiable face creased with worry. “He wants us to call him Ardsley from now on. Largely because he thinks he's going to be either dead or permanently exiled in a very short time. Here, have a look.”
Hilde read the letter with a deepening frown. “Poor young man,” she said, sympathetically. “I'd heard some rumours, but I had no idea it was getting quite so bad over there. Surely they ought to recall him now? After all, they're always saying there's a shortage of agents, and I would have thought he was one they were especially anxious not to lose.”
“Which reminds me,” said Charles. “I wonder who they've got on our tail now? Whoever it is, I feel very sorry for them. I think they must have an impossible task.”
“Well, that doesn't seem to be so unusual in the Service, does it?” said Hilde rather tartly, gesturing at the letter. “Anyway, if we ever manage to get back to our own time, I'm going to put in a word for Mr... that is, Ardsley. It's going to take a little getting used to calling him that. And I shall send him something nice to cheer him up. What do you suggest, dear?”
“You could always send him one of your special fruit cakes,” suggested Charles. “He loves those, and they keep very well, so there won't be a problem putting it in the post.”
“I was thinking more along the lines of clothing,” replied Hilde. “Perhaps a nice elegant waistcoat with lots of gold buttons and a special protective layer to ensure he isn't fried by some insane clank.”
“H'mm. Well, it would last longer than a fruit cake,” agreed Charles.
“I am not sending him a fruit cake, darling,” said Hilde. “From the sound of it, he's already surrounded by them.”
VI. A Philosophical Quagmire
“Why, Miss Davenport!” exclaimed Professor Quagmire. “What an extraordinary coincidence!”
“I'm... sorry?” said Alice, stunned.
“And Ottokar. Good to see you again. And Mr Wooster! How in the world did you get here so quickly?”
Mr Wooster thought quickly. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Have you, by any chance, just seen me somewhere else?”
Quagmire stared at him. “You mean you don't remember?”
“Humour me,” said Mr Wooster. “This is probably more important than you realise. When and where did you see me, and how was I dressed?”
Quagmire blinked. “You were dressed the same as you are now, sir. I saw you at...” he checked his watch. “About a quarter to two, corner of Brown Street and Winchester Street.”
“Good. Let me make a note of that. Thank you, Professor.”
Light dawned on Quagmire. “Oh, of course! How stupid of me. It's not like me to make the same mistake twice.” He bowed to Alice and Ottokar. “My apologies. From your point of view, we have not, in fact, met before, but we shall do.”
“When?” asked Mr Wooster, his pen poised over his notebook.
“A little over ten years ago.”
“All right,” said Mr Wooster. “I won't press you for details now, but I warn you I shall be doing later. Please, have a seat.”
“Vot der dumboozle?” demanded Ottokar.
The Professor eased his big frame into a chair and looked at Mr Wooster. “I realise it's my job to explain,” he said, “but I think it may be slightly less confusing if you start and I fill in the details.”
“I'm not so sure about that,” replied Mr Wooster, “but at least I now have a good idea which questions I need to ask. Let's start at the beginning. You were, apparently, the last person to see Charles and Hilde Greenwood before they disappeared.”
There was no mistaking the astonishment on Quagmire's face. “They disappeared? You didn't tell me that a few minutes ago!”
“Well, no. With all respect, I'm not stupid. I had to get you here before I could tell you that, or you wouldn't have come. Don't tell me, let me guess: I asked you to come here and find the Greenwoods urgently, or, failing that, someone who knew them. Correct?”
Quagmire nodded slowly. “Yes. That's pretty much exactly what you said, Mr Wooster.”
“I thought so. Excuse me one moment. I have to write that down.”
“Ardsley,” said Alice, “what in the world is going on here?”
He gave her a grin which was meant in perfect innocence, but caused her to flip open her fan and start using it vigorously. “Have patience,” he replied. “With your intelligence, you'll soon make sense of it.”
“Is hokay,” said Ottokar. “Hy confused too.”
“All right, Professor,” said Mr Wooster. “When you went to visit the Greenwoods, did they initially recognise you, or were they as bewildered as my two friends here? I'm guessing no, after your remark about making the same mistake twice.”
“And you'd guess correctly,” replied Quagmire. “May I ask a question in turn?”
“Be my guest,” said Mr Wooster.
“Is this the first time you've met me in your own timeline?”
“It is.”
“Hyu a time traveller?” asked Ottokar.
“No,” replied the Professor. “Sadly not. I only wish I had that ability, since I am an archaeologist by profession. It would be invaluable. However, it appears I have met time travellers, including, of course, yourselves and the Greenwoods.”
“There's some mistake,” said Alice. “I, for one, haven't travelled in time.”
“No,” said Ottokar. “Don't hyu see? Dis means hyu vill.”
“The Greenwoods hadn't either, when I met them,” said Quagmire, “so, as you correctly guessed, they didn't recognise me. If they've disappeared, I can only assume that they have now.”
“Wait a minute,” said Alice, who had been thinking intensely. “Ardsley. You're implying that you must have gone back from somewhere in the future to tell Professor Quagmire to come here so that we could all talk to him. That's right, isn't it?”
Mr Wooster nodded. “That's correct, and that's why I'm making notes. When I come to do that, I can hardly afford to get it wrong.”
“But how does the future version of you know what Professor Quagmire looks like?” she asked.
“Well, that's obvious. I've just met him now, so of course I'll be able to remember what he looks like.”
“But... but... the only reason you've just met him now is that the future version of you came back to talk to him,” Alice protested. “That is to say, if the future version of you didn't know what he looked like, you wouldn't know what he looked like now, but the only reason the future version of you knows what he looks like is that you do. And that's a completely nonsensical causal loop.”
“You know, I don't really mind, so long as it works,” replied Mr Wooster.
“But there's no reason why it should work!”
“And the same goes for almost every spark invention ever, as far as I can tell,” said Mr Wooster, completely unruffled. “I'm quite aware it's a paradox. I'm just going to carry on riding the paradoxes until they fall over. After all, what other choice have we got?”
Ottokar grinned. “Hy like hyu attitude.”
“So,” said Professor Quagmire. “You say Mr and Mrs Greenwood disappeared shortly after I spoke to them?”
“It appears so, yes,” replied Mr Wooster.
“And obviously you can travel in time too, right now, even if the other two can't do it yet?”
“Again correct,” replied Mr Wooster.
“In that case, I can tell you more or less where to find them,” said Quagmire. “I was leading a dig at Stonehenge a few years ago. It was late at night and the other archaeologists had all gone home, but I thought I'd found the top of an important tomb in the trench I was working on, so I continued by torchlight. They were big oil torches, designed to be stuck upright in the ground for just such a purpose. However, there wasn't room for them in the trench, so the best I could do was to rig up a sort of tent arrangement out of white canvas, soak it with water to fireproof it as best I could, and stand the torches at the top of the trench in the hope of at least getting some decent reflected light from the canvas. It worked quite well, but it had been very wet, and one of the torches worked loose while I was concentrating on the dig and fell into the trench. My clothes caught fire, and if it hadn't been for the five of you turning up out of nowhere when you did, I wouldn't be here to tell the tale.”
“A few years,” Mr Wooster repeated. “How long ago, more precisely?”
“Now that I can't tell you,” said the Professor, rather embarrassed. “All I know was that it was over ten years ago. I'm good with thousand-year periods, but a bit shaky with individual years.”
“Ah,” said Mr Wooster. “I do appreciate the fact that you're trying to help, but that's not going to locate them, I'm afraid.”
“And even if it did, how would we all get to them?” asked Alice. “Your time travel device doesn't work for more than one person. You said that yourself.”
“Und is a flaw here,” said Ottokar. “Hy mean, how likely is it dat dey vould turn up in dat place und at dat time, und ve vould arrive to rescue dem at exactly de same moment? Hy tink is much more likely dat vun of der two groups vould have been around longer dan de odder.”
“Oh, I see what you mean, Ottokar,” said Mr Wooster. “Yes. If all five of us were involved in rescuing the Professor here, that would rather suggest we arrived at about the same time. Unless you remember any differently, Professor Quagmire.”
“No. I think you did all arrive together,” he replied, frowning. “This is extremely odd.”
A surge of adrenalin coursed through Mr Wooster's veins. He smiled. Now this, he thought – this is more like it. He felt like a hound on a scent. He had leads, he had a very good idea of how to go about following them, he had first-rate companions, and he was in England. Whatever chaos he had left behind him tomorrow, here and now he felt ready for anything.
“What did you say the name of that spark was?” he asked. “The one who got away?”
“Lionel Montgomerie,” replied Alice.
“Good,” said Mr Wooster. “Please lead us to him. And if you can spare the time to join us, Professor, I think you may find it worth your while.”
Lionel Montgomerie lived on the outskirts of the city, so they had to take a couple of cabs. Alice contrived to get herself into the cab with Mr Wooster and regretted it almost instantly in case she said something foolish; that left Professor Quagmire to share the other cab with Ottokar, who rapidly got into a lively but quite genial argument with him about “Richard Plantagenet”, as he insisted on calling him. Naturally Ottokar, having got a real live archaeologist all to himself, wanted to hear about any recent discoveries that might relate to his current favourite monarch. Quagmire, however, not only specialised in prehistory but turned out to believe without question everything Shakespeare had written about Richard III. The Jäger was not going to let this go without taking up metaphorical arms on behalf of King Richard.
The other cab was much quieter. Mr Wooster hardly spoke because he was thinking, and Alice hardly spoke because she was sneaking sideways glances at Mr Wooster and wondering why she had never fully appreciated his profile in the past. She wondered if she dared ask him to sit for a portrait. Those cheekbones, she felt, should definitely be immortalised – but was she up to the task herself?
Lionel Montgomerie was elderly, constitutionally nervous even at the best of times, and obsessed with gardening. This was reflected in the majority of his inventions. His garden positively bristled with mechanical watering devices, automatic weeders, soil analysers, and some disturbing-looking gadgets which he had explained on their last visit were for training runner beans. Alice privately mused that even vegetables probably responded much better to kindness. He did not look altogether happy to see her and Ottokar again, but he was also no fool. He saw something in Mr Wooster's eyes which told him that it might not be the best idea to turn him away, although he was perfectly pleasant and polite.
“This is Mr Wooster,” said Alice, “and this is Professor Quagmire.”
“Ah. Yes, yes. Pleased to meet you both,” said Montgomerie. “Now, what can I do for you?”
“Well, Mr Montgomerie,” replied Mr Wooster, “as you're aware, we're trying to catch the person who has been killing sparks in the area. Naturally, it would be in your own interest to help us with that, would it not?”
“Ah. That is, ah, quite correct. You'd better come in.”
They filed down the narrow, cluttered hall into Mr Montgomerie's parlour. It was small, and even more cluttered. As well as gardening, Mr Montgomerie also collected china dogs, and it was perfectly clear that he did not know when to stop. There were two huge china dogs on the hearth, scowling at each other across the fireplace. There were china dogs on every inch of the mantelpiece. There were china dogs on the windowsill, and on the what-not in the corner, and on the shelves, and even on the tea table in the middle of the room. Their expressions covered almost the entire gamut of emotions from contemptuous hostility to benevolent imbecility.
“Great Scott,” said Quagmire, before he could stop himself. He then performed a remarkably adroit conversational salvage tactic by adding cheerfully, “Why, just think. Probably in a few hundred years someone will excavate all those and give them pride of place in a museum, what?”
“Professor Quagmire is an archaeologist,” Mr Wooster explained, stifling a smile.
“I am rather proud of them,” said Montgomerie modestly. “They've all got names, you know.”
“Fascinating as the subject undoubtedly is,” said Mr Wooster smoothly, “I'm afraid I haven't got a great deal of time, so, with your permission, I shall have to get to the point quickly. You're aware, of course, that Mr and Mrs Greenwood have recently vanished? We think they may well not be dead. In fact, we think it's considerably more likely that they have travelled backwards in time.”
That got Montgomerie's full attention. “Really?” he said. “They built a gadget?”
“No,” replied Mr Wooster. “From the timings involved, they couldn't possibly have done. They didn't have time to do so. You see, the Professor here left them only a few minutes before they disappeared, as far as we can establish, and when they met him at that point there was some confusion on both sides because they didn't recognise him. Had they been intending to travel in time when they met him, they would not have been surprised to meet someone who appeared to know them but whom they had no memory of meeting.”
“Couldn't have put it better myself,” said Quagmire.
“In that case, how did they travel in time?” asked Montgomerie.
“I think someone else moved them,” replied Mr Wooster. “Not necessarily intentionally. Someone, perhaps, with a spark weapon they didn't fully understand.”
“The killer?”
Mr Wooster nodded. “It does seem likely.”
“If the killer could travel in time,” Alice put in, “it would certainly explain how one of the sparks came to be killed in a locked room.”
Montgomerie shuddered. “So they could, at least in theory, go back now and kill me yesterday, and I'd just disappear?”
“Ach, lieber Gott,” said Ottokar, shaken out of his usual calm. “Vot if dat happened to Charles und Hilde?”
“No, it's all right, old man,” said Mr Wooster. “It's not like that. As far as I can tell, if someone went back now and killed someone yesterday, they'd have been killed yesterday in everyone's timeline.”
“But if they were killed yesterday, then surely the person doing the killing wouldn't need to go back in time and kill them, because they'd already be dead?” asked Alice.
Mr Wooster thought about it. “I think they would. I'm starting to get a more intuitive feel for how all this works. The one thing that seems to be inescapable is that if your future self has gone back and done something, then you have to make sure you go and do it when you reach that time. If you know you did it, then it's awkward because you have to take notes to make sure you get it right. But if you don't... I suspect you probably find you do it anyway.”
“And what happens if you deliberately don't go back and do something you know you went back and did?” asked Montgomerie, fascinated.
“I don't know,” replied Mr Wooster. “I haven't tried. And I don't intend to.”
“You have time travel?” Montgomerie was suddenly in full spark mode. “Show it to me!”
“I will. But I do have some conditions.” Mr Wooster's voice, though still unfailingly polite, was suddenly velvet wrapped around a steel core. “First, you give me the device back the moment I request it, no matter what you are doing. Understood?”
“I'm a spark!” roared Montgomerie indignantly.
Mr Wooster reached into a pocket, extracted his official papers, and flipped them open under Montgomerie's nose in one smooth action. “And I'm Ardsley Wooster, on behalf of Her Undying Majesty,” he replied. “I regret the implied threat. However, if you do not co-operate, my two friends and colleagues here will be in the unfortunate position about which you just enquired, and I am not prepared to risk that. I'm sure I don't have to spell out the possible historical consequences to you, of all people.”
Montgomerie stared at him. Mr Wooster coolly returned his gaze. In the end, it was the spark who looked away first.
“So what are your other conditions?” he demanded.
“I would like you to make this device able to transport other people, and I would also like some means of locating specific people within time,” replied Mr Wooster. “Only those who have moved relative to their normal time stream, naturally, otherwise it would become immensely confusing. And I would like those two things to be done as fast as humanly possible.” He paused. “Once again, I have to apologise for taking this tone. It's not as if you threatened me first, after all. But I did think it necessary to impress upon you the fact that avoiding damage to the time stream is more important than, say, growing cucumbers out of season.”
“Strawberries,” said Montgomerie sulkily. “It was strawberries I was thinking of.”
“When you've done what I've asked of you,” said Mr Wooster, “you'll have the technology and you'll be able to use it to create all the horticultural time-shifters your imagination can devise, and you will also be alive to do it. If the killer travels in time, we have no chance of stopping them without your help.”
“All right,” said Montgomerie. “I agree to your conditions. Now, show me the device!”
Mr Wooster tucked away his official papers and brought out the time device. Montgomerie whistled appreciatively. “Beautiful piece of work,” he observed.
“Isn't it? Now, let me explain how it works, and then you can take it from there.”
While they were studying the device, Ottokar turned to Alice. “Hyu know vot?” he said. “Dis is going to get complicated.”
“Well, naturally. It is time travel, after all,” she replied.
“Not yust der time travel. Hy mean Mister Vooster, er, Ardsley. He not really supposed to be here. Hy damn glad he is, because hy preddy sure ve couldn't solve dis vun vitout him. But vot are ve going to put in der official report?”
“Ah,” said Alice. “I see what you mean.”
“Hy don't like telling lies,” said Ottokar. “So ve going to have to be very creative.”
“Maybe we should just ask for his permission to make a clean breast of it?” Alice suggested. “After all, he isn't actually leaving his post at all. Not from the point of view of anyone in that timeline.”
“But he already said he didn't vant to be mentioned. Und hy get de impression he got some goot reasons for dat.”
Alice sighed. “Yes, I'm afraid you're probably right.”
“Ho vell,” said Ottokar, philosophically. “Hy expect ve got de brains among us to vork it out.”
“We've got a lot more to work out than that,” said Alice. “And I really hope Ardsley's theory of time travel is the right one. It's plausible, but it's not the only alternative.”
Ottokar raised an eyebrow. “Goot to see hyu not lost hyu critical tinking. Veirdly enough, hy tink he probably schpot on.”
“Why?” asked Alice.
“Because ve all been talking about time travel, but he de only vun of us vot has actually done it,” replied Ottokar. “Und hyu know as vell as hy do vot he normally like. He very logical, very goot at tinking. He looks at all der alternatives. Der fact dat he's picked vun of der possibilities dis time vitout going into all der logic, vhich, hyu got to admit, vould probably be a qvick vay to go mad if hyu tried it anyvay... vell, dat makes me tink is a liddle bit like becoming a Jäger. Ven hyu human, hyu might have all sorts of teories about Jägers, but ven hyu get to be vun hyuself, hyu yust know some tings.”
“H'mm,” said Alice. “Metalogic.”
“Ja, if hyu like. Is as goot a name for it as any.”
“Whatever you call it,” said Alice, “it's testable, at least to some extent. If we travel in time ourselves and we both find we're instinctively agreeing with Ardsley, that's probably evidence in favour of his theory. Unless, of course, travelling through time just happens to make you feel a certain way about travelling through time, in which case we end up going in virtual circles.”
“Hy get der feeling is probably best not to tink about it too much,” replied Ottokar.
“Well, he's got to,” said Alice in an undertone, inclining her head slightly in the direction of Lionel Montgomerie.
“Ho, he all right,” replied Ottokar with a grin. “He mad as a hatter already.”
VII. Time Travel and Cucumbers
It was late. Alice had fallen asleep in one of Montgomerie's jacquard armchairs; Ottokar was ensconced in another with a book. Ardsley Wooster was vertical but yawning. He looked as though he dared not sit down in case he fell asleep.
Ottokar looked up from his book and raised an eyebrow at him. “Hyu not tinking dis trough,” he observed. “If hyu veren't so tired, hyu'd know hyu had an option.”
Mr Wooster blinked at the Jäger. “What do you mean?” he asked, curiously.
“Go back to tomorrow. Get hyuself some sleep. Den come back here from der day after. Hyu can do dat, remember?”
“Of course,” said Mr Wooster. “Yes. Thank you, Ottokar, for preventing me from being a complete idiot. I shall do that right now.”
“Hy expect hyu to return de favour ven hy need it,” replied Ottokar, with a grin. “Ve all have idiot moments.”
Mr Wooster took out the time device. There was a brief shimmer in the air, and he suddenly looked vastly refreshed, not to mention shaved. “How did I do?” he asked. “Did I hit the same moment?”
“Ja. Hy didn't see hyu go. Hyu yust moved a bit.”
“Good. Then I'll go and have another look at how our friend Mr Montgomerie is getting on.”
Montgomerie was still working like a demon, as only a spark can. Slumped in a chair in a corner of his workshop was Professor Quagmire, half asleep under a travelling rug, for the workshop was in a shed at the bottom of the garden and the night was growing chilly. He opened one eye as Mr Wooster walked in and looked at him reproachfully.
“If I'd known this was going to take half the bally night, Mr Wooster,” he said, “I'd have brought my hip flask.”
“I'm sorry, Professor,” said Mr Wooster. “I didn't know either.”
“Well, you look as fresh as a daisy,” the Professor grumbled. “But then I suppose it's nothing to a young fellow like you. You just wait till you get to my age.”
Mr Wooster lapsed into a guilty silence. Fortunately, Montgomerie looked up at that point. “We're nearly there,” he said. “Well, nearly somewhere, at any rate.”
“Nearly somewhere?” demanded Quagmire.
“Nearly at the point where we can test this thing and you can go home,” said Montgomerie.
“Ha! Well, that's better news,” said Quagmire, recovering some of his usual cheer.
The point of all this was that the date and time of Quagmire's rescue were still not known, and they had to be established so that, at some future time, Mr Wooster and the others could visit that point in the timeline in order to effect the rescue. Since the person best qualified to establish these details was Quagmire himself, he had agreed to do the testing, exploring the timeline on the site of the dig until he found the time of the accident. While he was doing that, Montgomerie would then test the locator to ensure that it was able to find Quagmire accurately.
“Good,” said Mr Wooster. “Please call me when it's ready. Alice is asleep in a chair and I don't want to disturb her, but Ottokar is still awake, so he'll probably want to come and watch the testing.”
He walked back through to the parlour, where Ottokar was poking the fire. The light glinted on Alice's brown hair, giving it hints of chestnut that it never had in daylight. She looked peaceful in repose, though Mr Wooster feared that she would wake up with cramp, given the position she was in. He nodded to Ottokar. “Do you think we might ease a cushion under her elbow without waking her?” he enquired, in a low voice.
“Better not. She very vell trained now,” replied Ottokar. “She can hit. Und if she didn't realise who she vos hitting, she vouldn't be happy ven she found out.”
“She always could hit,” Mr Wooster pointed out. “But, yes, I'm sure the training has improved her reflexes.”
“How dey doing in dere?”
“Close to testing, apparently. I've asked to be told when they're ready. Will you want to come and watch?”
“Hyu bet,” replied Ottokar enthusiastically. “Hy bored vit dis book. Der Montgomerie got no taste.”
“What is it you're reading?”
“Vun of dose Gothic novels. He got a schtack of dem, und not vun of dem is by Vilkie Collins. Vot is der point of reading Gothic novels if hyu don't read de only person vot writes dem properly?”
“Only person? That's a bit extreme,” replied Mr Wooster, with a smile.
“Vell, maybe it is, but he de only person vot can write Gothic novels hy vant to read,” said the Jäger. “Hy mean, look at dis. Yust about every time de heroine opens a cupboard, dere's a schkull in it. Vot sort of person keeps a house like dat?”
“Bangladesh Dupree?”
“Hyu not being serious.”
“I really hope you're right. I'm sure she'd like mine on her mantelpiece. Well, usually. Apparently I'm not on the death wish list just at the moment, although she has now got me in her sights for... well, a fate worse than death. Think black widow spider.”
Ottokar considered this. “Vell, hy suppose at least dat's some kind of compliment.”
“It's not a welcome one. I have enough on my mind at the moment without the amorous intentions of a serial killer. I hope she gets bored with the idea quickly.”
“She a serial killer?”
“Well... not exactly, I suppose. More like a parallel killer. She does seem to like to achieve as high a body count as possible.”
Alice opened one eye. “Would you care for any help with this troublesome young woman, Ardsley?” she asked. “Because it would be my great pleasure to do her damage on your behalf.”
“That's a very chivalrous offer, Alice, but no, thank you,” replied Mr Wooster. “For a start she's a long way away from here, and for another thing I don't think you're quite ready to go up against her yet. You've seen her sister. She's worse.”
“Then I'll train till I can make her swallow her own pirate hat,” said Alice.
“Vaste of a goot hat,” said Ottokar. “Hyu vant to choke her, dere are better tings.”
At that moment, Professor Quagmire came hurrying into the parlour. “The testing is ready to begin,” he announced.
Alice pulled herself the rest of the way to full consciousness and stood up. “Excellent! Lead us to it, Professor.”
Montgomerie was waiting for them in the workshop. “All right,” he said, without ceremony. “The first thing that happens is that the Professor goes back to an agreed point on the time line so that I can calibrate the locator. He will then search for the accident and return when he's pinpointed it. Meanwhile, we track him on the locator. Everything should stay synchronised, but there is a small probability that it will drift, and the time point he identifies won't be the same as the one on the locator. If that happens, obviously I shall have to do some major alterations.”
“Hy hope it doesn't,” said Ottokar. “Is already past vun in der morning.”
“Quite so,” agreed Quagmire. “So the sooner we get on with it, the better. I'm ready.”
“Good. Here's the device,” said Montgomerie. “And here's where you're aiming for.”
Quagmire nodded. He moved the dials and vanished, and at the same moment a spot appeared on the screen of the locator. Montgomerie nodded in satisfaction, tweaked a few of the dials on the locator, and announced to the others, “There. The locator is now calibrated.”
Another spot appeared on the screen, but the first one stayed where it was. Then another, and another, until soon the dots coalesced into a thick line. “Vy don't de dots fade ven he moves?” asked Ottokar.
“Because if you went back to any of those points from here, you'd still find a time-shifted Professor Quagmire,” replied Mr Wooster. “From our point of view, he hasn't left any of the points where he ended up. It's only from his that he's moving. From ours, he's multiplied.”
“Hyu certainly returned dat favour qvickly,” said Ottokar, with a grin.
Quagmire popped back into the room; the display on the screen, however, was still filling with dots. “Did I arrive somewhere near the moment I left?” he asked.
“There was an appreciable gap,” replied Montgomerie.
“Ah. That was over-caution,” said Quagmire. “I didn't want to risk landing back before I left and occupying the same space. That could have been messy.” He handed back the piece of paper with the co-ordinates, which now had another set scribbled on it. “Here you are. Took me ages to find it. The locator probably won't stop recording dots for a while, I warn you. Is it all right if I go home?”
“If you've found the accident, I suppose there's no reason we can't recalibrate if the locator does turn out to be off,” said Mr Wooster. “Thank you for all your help.”
“Well, it was after all in my own interest,” replied Quagmire. “I don't fancy burning to death several years ago.”
“I am still trying to wrap my head around all the paradoxes,” Alice sighed, as the Professor slipped out.
“Hy got a qvestion,” said Ottokar. “Hy can see how hyu vere locating der Professor, because he got der device. But Charles und Hilde, if de killer sent dem back in time, dey not got a device. So how ve find dem?”
“They don't need to have a device,” replied Montgomerie. “This will locate anyone who has moved out of place within time. Look. Here's what last week looks like in the Salisbury area.” He made some adjustments, and the screen was suddenly full of dots. He blinked.
“Great Scott, that's a lot of time travel,” he said. “I suppose some of it will be the killer, but surely not all of it.”
“Well, some of it is definitely me,” replied Mr Wooster. “And how exactly do you tell who is who? Ottokar has a very good point.”
“It's not difficult if you know their starting co-ordinates,” said Montgomerie. “We know the place from which your friends disappeared, and the approximate time; all we need to do is to find anyone who left within that window, and see where they ended up.” He flipped it back to the original display.
“All right,” said Alice. “I suppose the locator is working correctly? The Professor came back with the right co-ordinates? Well, I mean, obviously he must have done, but they are showing correctly on the locator?”
“It still hasn't finished,” replied Montgomerie, with a touch of impatience. “As soon as it does, if everything is correct, I'll feed in the details for your friends.”
It took a while, and Alice was yawning again by the time it finished. But finally, Montgomerie peered at the locator and turned round triumphantly. “It works!” he declared. “We are now ready for the next stage.”
“And we have a ready-made way of confirming that it really is Charles and Hilde,” said Mr Wooster. “If we identify them correctly, we know they'll show up at the scene of Professor Quagmire's rescue.”
“What about the killer?” asked Alice. “Will they show up too?”
“No, because we don't know their original starting point on the timeline,” replied Montgomerie. “If we're right in thinking they were responsible for sending your friends back in time, then they must have travelled in time to do it, since they don't seem to have got into the room in the usual way.”
“Once we get Charles and Hilde back, it should be a lot easier to find the killer,” said Mr Wooster. “For a start, they presumably know who this person is.”
“All right,” said Montgomerie. “Here we are... yes. Good. We've got a clear point of departure, and they're showing up at the rescue point as you predicted. There should really be two dots, but it's impossible to determine that at this scale. Unless they move a significant distance apart, they're going to appear as a single dot. Now, let's zoom out a bit in time, and see where else they show up. It's definitely somewhere prior to the rescue.”
“Vould dey also have moved in schpace, hyu tink?” asked Ottokar.
“Probably not if we're looking at an accident,” replied Montgomerie. “But if we don't find them near here, we'll have to look elsewhere.” He frowned. “H'mm. Not finding them yet, and the zoom's out over two hundred years now.”
“How far is it possible to go back?” asked Alice.
“No idea. I've never done it. Yet.” He paused. “That's a thought. Some of those dots on the screen from last week were quite probably me. Or will be.”
“Yust as vell is not common, or hyu vould never know vhich of somevun hyu vere talking to,” Ottokar observed. “Is bad enough dere are now probably about a hundred Professor Qvagmires running around Schtonehenge.”
“Not all at the same time,” Mr Wooster pointed out, amused at the mental image that conjured up.
“Ach nein. But anyvun going back in time around dat point vould probably meet at least vun of dem.”
“All right, we're around the time of the Norman Conquest and I'm still not seeing them,” said Montgomerie. “I'm going to have to switch to logarithmic. Hold on.”
There was a pause. Then he whistled. “Great Scott!”
“Have you found them?” asked Alice eagerly.
“Oh yes. Look. They're here.” He pointed to a dot on the display.
“Und vhere exactly is here?” asked Ottokar.
“About... the scale's too small to get a precise figure, but we're looking at about four thousand, three hundred years ago, plus or minus a hundred or so either way. Fortunately I don't need to be able to see it. I can get the locator to feed it straight into the device. I will, however, tweak it just a little forward to allow for error, which is likely to happen when you're travelling over such a long time period. The thing is, you don't want to arrive before they do and be waiting, because if that happens you won't know how long you need to wait. You need to get there a little after, so that you know you'll be safe and in a position to get them away.”
“Four... thousand... three hundred?” echoed Alice.
“Yes. We're looking at somewhere in the Neolithic.”
There was a brief, stunned silence. Then Mr Wooster said, “Well. We'd better get on with it.”
“Here's your time gadget, then,” said Montgomerie. “I think it's only fair to warn you that, although it should be able to take a maximum of five people now, there's no way of testing it other than actually trying to use it to move five people through time.”
“If it moves only two or three, we can always work it in relays,” said Mr Wooster. “Thank you, Mr Montgomerie.”
“Good! I've done what you asked, and now I can put my new knowledge to good use.” Montgomerie cackled manically. “Sidney Willett won the prize this year for Best Cucumber in Show, but I'll show him. I'll show them all!”
“You have the secret of time travel,” said Alice, “and all you're really concerned about is fruit and vegetables?”
“Well,” said Montgomerie, “someone's got to be.”
VIII. The British Panther
It was now clear what was going on. The purpose of the light scaffolding was to enable workers to get to the top of the upright stones so that they could haul on ropes from above when this was needed. On the other side of the uprights, a far more substantial platform was being constructed, the ends of which jutted out well beyond the edges of the upright stones. The lintel stone was being moved up this platform as it was built, alternating from one side to the other, being both pushed from below and hauled from above.
Hilde was now up on the platform with Belod, who had hurriedly summoned her about half an hour ago. Initially she had been puzzled, wondering what there was up there that could not be brought down for repairs; but the answer had soon become clear. One of the workers had slipped and fallen, gashing his leg wide open. Belod and another healer had been called up to help; Belod had taken one look at the leg and realised it was going to take a neat stitcher, and it just so happened that there was a very neat one down there. So Hilde was now stitching up the unfortunate man's leg with pieces of animal sinew while the two healers did what they could for his other injuries. Nothing appeared to be broken, but he had also taken a nasty knock to the head and was confused and groggy.
Charles, who was feeling just about well enough to offer to help now, was down at the bottom hauling on a pulley. It was one of the lighter jobs; this pulley was reserved for delivering food and water. Once he had done that for a while and recovered a little more, his aim was to go and offer a hand on one of the heavy pulleys, the ones which were busily engaged in lifting up construction materials and occasionally fresh tools. Though he was a short man, he was also strong and wiry, and he was perfectly willing to use that strength to help as soon as he was able.
A short distance away, on a low hill, behind the cover of a row of trees, the air shimmered and three figures appeared. They stared awestruck at the scene before them for several minutes before anyone spoke.
It was Alice who broke the silence. “This is amazing,” she breathed. “So that's how they did it!”
“What a terrible shame Professor Quagmire didn't stay,” Mr Wooster murmured. “He would have loved to see this.”
“Hy can see Hilde!” said Ottokar. “Up dere, on de platform.”
“So she is,” said Mr Wooster. “Where's Charles?”
“If Hilde's here, he won't be far away,” replied Alice.
There was a sudden flash of green light in front of them and a triumphant shout. Mr Wooster was aware that someone had appeared in front of them and was apparently firing at them, but there was no sign that anyone was hurt, and within seconds the figure spun round and turned its fire across the scene before them. Mr Wooster kept running. He lunged at the figure, though it was at least as tall as he was and much more solid, and gathered enough momentum to knock the weapon out of its hands. The thing, whatever it was, went scudding off downhill across the turf, past stacks of wood and coils of heavy rope.
“What the hell?” demanded the figure, swinging round on its assailant. Mr Wooster saw that he was dealing with a formidably built man of indeterminate age, with light grey hair, a beard and a sun visor. I might have known, he thought. Tryggvassen. Now it all makes sense. Well, insofar as any situation with him involved ever does.
“Well, now we're equal, Tryggvassen,” said Mr Wooster grimly. “I take it you're the one who's been killing the sparks. Suppose we fight first and I ask the questions later. It usually saves time.” He tossed his jacket into a convenient holly bush.
Tryggvassen guffawed. “Equal? Oh, you think? I don't know how you managed to escape being frozen in time like the others, but if you think you're going to win against me in a fist fight, I'm afraid you're deluding yourself, Mr... er... I can never recall your name.”
“Wooster. And I plan to give you good cause to remember it, after what you did to my friends.”
He glanced round, never taking his main gaze off his opponent. Frozen in time; yes. Everything had stopped. The workers were utterly still in the positions where the beam of Tryggvassen's weapon had caught them. A flint hammer which had just fallen off the platform was still poised in mid-air. Somewhere behind him, he knew Alice and Ottokar would be frozen like statues too. Presumably his own time device had saved him from the same fate, though at the moment he had not the faintest idea how.
“Well,” said Tryggvassen cheerfully, “since I'm going to kill you anyway, I may as well spend a little time gloating. It is, after all, traditional. Wouldn't you like to know how I found out where the Greenwoods had gone?”
“The same way as we did, I imagine,” replied Mr Wooster cautiously, wondering about his Service pistol. Technically, since he had just disarmed his opponent, he probably ought to drop it, especially since Tryggvassen had specifically mentioned a fist fight. On the other hand, it was not at all unlikely that the man had other weapons about his person, and he was known to be cunning bordering on outright sneaky when it suited him. He decided to keep it for now.
“I very much doubt it.” Tryggvassen beamed. “I used you.”
“What?”
“Simple. I knew I must have accidentally sent them a long way back, and I thought someone would probably work out where they were and go looking for them sooner or later. So I built a device to track time journeys of more than a thousand years in the Salisbury area, and, bingo! You obliged.”
“I see,” said Mr Wooster. He said nothing more, but his waistcoat went to join the jacket.
“You really think you can fight me, don't you?” said Tryggvassen. “That's good. That's excellent! I like a bit of desperate courage. You do know I've taken on three Jägers and won? I see you've brought one with you, incidentally, but he won't be much help to you in the state he's currently in. Nor will the young lady. I may let her live. I like her face.”
Mr Wooster started to roll up his sleeves, very neatly and deliberately.
“I expect you'll want to know what I'm planning to do,” said Tryggvassen. “Well, once you're out of the way, I am going to unfreeze the rock and the platform. Then I'm going to set fire to the platform. The moment I unfreeze the rest of the scene, the people around those uprights will either fall, burn or be crushed to death. Or any combination thereof.”
“There must be two to three hundred people around those uprights,” said Mr Wooster, through his teeth. “I thought you had some kind of rudimentary code of ethics that didn't allow you to kill innocent bystanders?”
“Well, usually,” replied Tryggvassen. “But in this case it was all so long ago, wasn't it? Besides, haven't you ever wanted to change history?”
Mr Wooster stared. “What?!”
“Just think about it,” Tryggvassen enthused. “You're probably descended in some way from pretty much every single person in that area, and so is everyone else you know in England, except for a few recent immigrants. The population of these islands at this point is really not high. A significant proportion of it is here building the henge. The moment I kill those people, you won't exist. You won't ever have existed. Of course, other people will exist who wouldn't have existed otherwise, but that will mean that British history is all totally different. If you had the power to do that, wouldn't you want to use it just to see what happened?”
“You want to wipe out the entire history of my country, just to see what else happens in its place?” Mr Wooster exploded. “You're not even within hailing distance of sanity, are you?”
He can't have done it, a voice in his head reminded him. Otherwise, you wouldn't be here to try to stop him in the first place. You'd never have existed. That fact hasn't occurred to him yet.
But, obviously, you do still have to stop him.
“Oh, come on,” protested Tryggvassen. “If I were completely insane, I'd be doing this to my own country. But enough chatting. Time to get on with things.”
“I think not,” replied Mr Wooster, very softly.
And charged at him.
Mr Wooster's guess about other weapons had been entirely correct. Just as a start, Tryggvassen turned out to be equipped with a formidable set of spiked brass knuckles which left a neat row of small wounds in Mr Wooster's shoulder. He was already too fired up on adrenalin to notice. Tryggvassen followed up with a wicked-looking knife; Mr Wooster brought up his pistol to shield himself, and the knife rang against it. He then swung the pistol at his opponent's ear. There was a satisfying thwack, but the Norwegian clearly had a skull like rock. If he could get a little way clear, he might be able to fire the pistol, but right now it was still useful in its secondary capacity as a solid, heavy lump of metal.
Metaphors regarding British lions or British bulldogs have been used in plenty; but if any of the people responsible for those metaphors had seen Mr Wooster in action, they might instead have been tempted to refer to a British panther, a concept which, after all, is no more out of place than a lion. His opponent visibly outweighed him, was considerably stronger, and was also better armed. Unless something very unexpected happened, there was really only one way this fight was going to go. But Mr Wooster was giving it his very best shot, and, not only that, he was doing it gracefully. Tryggvassen had the bulk and brute force of a bear, but Mr Wooster had the elegance and agility of a big cat. He was swift and nimble on his feet, though now he was beginning to lose some speed; his fine white linen shirt was ripped and bloodied, his hair unkempt, his face bruised and battered.
“Not bad,” said Tryggvassen. “Tell you what. If you give up now, I'll stab you through the heart, nice and quick. Better than just leaving you to die of your wounds, eh?”
Mr Wooster did not waste his breath on a response. “Oh, have it your own way,” said Tryggvassen, his affable tone sounding even more incongruous than usual. He lunged again at Mr Wooster, who dodged, but not fast enough. The blow connected squarely with his right side, sending him flying. He landed heavily on the turf, winded, sprawling like a rag doll.
Tryggvassen towered over him. “You can't get up, can you? In that case, you may as well stay where you are while I go and finish things off. After all, soon enough you won't exist.” He turned and started walking down the hill. “You underestimated me,” he called over his shoulder. “Let that be a lesson to you. Never underestimate Othar Tryggvassen, GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER!!!”
A fly buzzed around Mr Wooster's nose. Painfully, he raised a hand to swat it away.
“It's mutual, Tryggvassen,” he murmured, under his breath.
With an effort of will, he forced himself into a sitting position. Damn. Broken ribs, almost certainly. But he could still move if he had to, and, most importantly, he still had the time device. And he was getting good at using that. He wouldn't have to move far.
You couldn't go into your own future. But you could, very definitely, go into the future from here...
Now. Over there, by that coil of rope. Good. And next, there, near the woodpile. With the strength he had left, he wouldn't be able to do Tryggvassen any major damage, but he didn't have to. Just startle him. That was enough.
Better do it a few more times, just to make sure. One injured Wooster might not be a match for Tryggvassen... but half a dozen of them, shifted in time? Now that was a different matter.
The version of him near the woodpile pulled himself to his feet and picked up a trimmed branch. “Tryggvassen!” he shouted. “I haven't finished with you yet.”
Tryggvassen swung round. “How the hell did you get over there so fast?”
He charged. It was what the other Woosters had been waiting for. Two of them each had an end of rope, and they threw it over him. The others added what strength remained to them. Unable to stop himself, he fell, and found himself being trussed up by six equally grim-looking Ardsley Woosters, each with a bloodstained shirt and a determined gleam in his eyes.
“You... you... you utter bastard,” he spluttered. “You time-shifted!”
“Well, you hardly left me a choice,” replied one of the Woosters. “And if I were you, I'd look at changing your trademark. Whatever else you are, you are not a gentleman.”
Once Tryggvassen was safely tied up, the most recent Mr Wooster shifted back a few seconds, coalescing with his predecessor, and the process was repeated until only one of him was left. He was just mustering the energy to walk down the hill and look for Tryggvassen's weapon when he heard a voice behind him.
“Very well done, sir,” it said.
At moments like this, it is customary to spin round on one's heel, but Mr Wooster was well aware that if he tried that in his current state he would probably go crashing to the turf again. He settled for a slow, deliberate turn. Facing him was Axel Higgs, puffing his pipe with an air of absolute contentment.
“Mr Higgs,” said Mr Wooster.
“Correct, sir.”
“How long, exactly, have you been here?”
“That rather depends on your timeline, sir.” He took out his other hand from behind his back. “I think you probably want this, sir, and the way you're looking at the moment, I thought I ought to save you the walk.” He handed over Tryggvassen's weapon.
“He damn nearly killed me,” said Mr Wooster.
“Yes, sir. But I knew that one way or another, you were going to win this. I just didn't know exactly how. So I came to help, but only if you really needed me. I was just going to stop him when you had the idea of using the time device. That was a neat one, sir.”
“Some help before that might have been... appreciated,” said Mr Wooster, raising an eyebrow tiredly. He was aware that he was swaying on his feet.
“Didn't want to unless there was no alternative, sir,” replied Higgs, apologetically. “It was really your fight. You've just saved your country.”
“Would you mind giving me a little time to digest that?” said Mr Wooster, making an effort not to slur his speech. “Here. You'd better have this thing back. People need unfreezing. I have no idea how to do it.”
Higgs looked at it. “I think it's this,” he said, pointing the device at Ottokar and Alice.
“You'd... better... be right, Higgs.”
Higgs was right. Ottokar and Alice burst forwards at the same time. “What happened there?” Alice demanded. “Oh... Ardsley...”
Ottokar put on a burst of speed and caught Mr Wooster just as he fell, lowering him gently to the soft turf. His eyes then fell on the bound and furious form of Tryggvassen. He looked up at Higgs.
“Hokay,” he said. “Hy don't know who hyu are, but hyu better be goot at giving explanations.”
“'sallright,” said Mr Wooster. “He's... a friend. Higgs. Toldyouabout.”
Higgs calmly unfroze the rest of the scene, then handed the weapon to Ottokar. “His,” he said, jabbing a booted toe in the direction of Tryggvassen. “Careful with it. It's a weapon as well as a time device.”
“Was he the one who hurt Ardsley?” demanded Alice, arms akimbo and fire in her eyes.
“Certainly was, miss. But your Mr Wooster turned out to be cleverer than he was. And him a spark, too. Tch.” Higgs gave one of his rare little smiles.
Alice strode over to Tryggvassen. “I hope these people sacrifice you to their gods,” she hissed. Then she swung round and squatted down by Mr Wooster's side. “How badly hurt are you? Can I do anything?”
There was no reply. “He out cold,” said Ottokar. “Und he lost a lot of bloot. Ve better get him some help qvick.”
“But we're in the middle of the Neolithic! We've got to get him home, only... only he's the only one of us who knows how to operate the time device,” said Alice.
“Hyu not being logical,” said Ottokar gently. “Hyu say, ve in der middle of der Neolitic. So ve are. Und right in front of us dere's pipple building dis huge ting vit blocks of schtone even hy couldn't move, und hyu tink maybe dey don't have any pipple vot can treat him?”
“I'll help,” offered Higgs, and sprinted away down the hill, his pigtail bouncing on the nape of his neck. He returned with a small crowd of people, including Hilde, Charles, and Belod. It seemed that he knew a few words of the local language too, though where and how he had picked them up was anybody's guess.
Alice was doing her best; she had discreetly removed her petticoat and torn it into shreds, and now she was using it to clean and bind the most severe and obvious of Mr Wooster's wounds. Belod took one look at him and started giving orders. Within minutes, a litter of branches had been brought, covered with blankets. They rolled him carefully onto the litter, covered him with more blankets, and carried him to the nearest fire, where some water was already being heated in a clay kettle. Belod was pointing urgently to a large gash on his left thigh and rattling out instructions.
“Hy tink hyu might vant to back off here,” said Ottokar to Alice in a low voice. “Dey going to have to undress him to look at dat.”
“Oh. Yes. Well, she, er, does look as though she knows what she's doing,” said Alice, blushing furiously. “I'll just leave her to it, then.”
“Now,” said Hilde. “I have gathered that the reason he got into that state was Tryggvassen, who, as I'm sure you've all guessed, was also the person who killed the other sparks and sent us back here. But we are still missing a few details.”
Two of the group in attendance on Mr Wooster moved slightly apart so that Belod's face could appear between them. “Hilde!” she called.
There was no mistaking the tone of voice. “Ouch,” said Hilde. “I'm wanted for stitching. Good job I've already had some practice. Coming!” She hurried into the middle of the group, needle at the ready.
“I'll pass on the explanations later,” Charles promised. He was looking dishevelled and rather dirty, but much happier than he had been earlier in the day. “First of all, how on earth did you find us?”
“Long story,” replied Alice. “We'd probably better sit down.”
Between them, she and Ottokar told him as much of the story as they could, occasionally aided by Higgs, who had chosen not to sit on the grass but stood throughout, puffing serenely at his pipe. They had not long finished when Hilde finally emerged from the huddle around the fire, beaming.
“I think he'll be fine,” she said. “I've stitched up his leg and the other wounds that needed it, and now all I have to do is repair his trousers.” They were hanging over her left arm. “He's conscious, he doesn't seem to be concussed, and Belod is making him chew willow bark. I doubt that will do much, since he thinks he has some broken ribs, but it may at least be better than nothing.”
“Is he... um... decent?” asked Alice.
“Good heavens, yes. They've wrapped him in blankets. Couldn't have him getting chilled.”
“Could I see him, then?”
“If Belod will let you,” replied Hilde, with a smile.
Belod would. She was now quite satisfied that her latest patient was stable, and content to leave him in the care of his friends while she returned to the platform to resume attending to the fallen worker, who was still groggy but in no danger of bleeding to death as Mr Wooster had been. Alice hurried to him and knelt at his side.
“Ardsley,” she said.
Mr Wooster removed the piece of willow bark from his mouth and put it to one side. “Hallo, Alice. Did they get Tryggvassen?”
“Not yet,” replied Alice. “But Mr Higgs is over there talking to some people, and he's pointing in that direction. And somehow I think Mr Higgs is making himself understood. I don't think Tryggvassen is going to get a nice litter with blankets.”
“I suppose Higgs told you what happened?”
“Oh, yes.” Alice's eyes shone. “He said you shifted yourself a few seconds in time, so that by the time you'd finished there were six of you, which meant that even though you were so badly injured you were able to bring him down with the rope. Now that's clever.”
“I had no choice. I had to win, or he'd have destroyed everything and everyone I've ever cared about. Well, almost. Of course I do have good friends in Europa too.”
“There ought to be a band here playing Land of Hope and Glory or something,” said Alice.
“Dear Lord. I hope not. I know you mean it as nothing but a compliment, but I never could stand that one. Have you ever listened to the words? 'Wider still and wider may thy bounds be set'? I'm not Gil Wulfenbach, fond as I am of him when he's not ranting. I don't want expansion and empire. I don't want England taking over the world. I just want to preserve... all this.” His eyes ranged around him. “All that we have and know and love. Not to go taking over what is equally dear to other people.”
“And now you have,” she said. “You've saved it. Everything. Now Salisbury will be built, and one day a little boy called Charles Greenwood will be born in it. York will be built, and you'll be born there. And in between, there will be all the things we learnt about from the history books, both good and bad. The Romans. The Saxons. The Normans. Richard the Lionheart, and bad King John and the Magna Carta. Wars with Scotland and France and Spain. Ottokar's Richard Plantagenet and the Battle of Bosworth. The Tudors. Shakespeare and Newton and Dowland and so many others. And all the millions of ordinary people who tilled the earth and fought the wars and sailed the seas and ate and slept and loved and prayed and rejoiced and grieved.”
“And will never know my name,” said Mr Wooster, with a little smile. “Don't look like that, Alice. I prefer it like that.”
“But...”
“Every time I walk on English soil, that will be my reward for defeating Tryggvassen. The knowledge that England is still England, because I did that. No, I know what you're going to say. You're going to tell me I'm a hopeless romantic and I should want something more tangible. But what, in fact, could be more tangible than a whole country?”
“But,” said Alice, “when you get back...”
“I know. I'll still be a semi-disgraced spy who looks like turning into either a fully disgraced spy or a very dead one. And do you realise something, Alice? I don't care.”
“Well, I care!” she exploded. “How can you put up with that sort of injustice when you're the one who saved England?”
“Because I'm the one who saved England. That's who I am now, even if nobody else knows it. It would be who I am even if you and Charles and Hilde and Ottokar and the increasingly enigmatic Mr Higgs didn't know it. It'll still be who I am even if I end up sent to some miserable outpost or thrown out of the Service or blown into a pink mist... Alice?”
There were tears in her eyes. “You might not care, but other people do,” she said fiercely. “Hadn't you noticed?”
There was a long pause. Then: “Oh,” he said. “Oh, Alice. I'm so sorry.”
She looked away. “That's not a promising start,” she said, trying to sound stiff and formal to save her dignity. She succeeded only in sounding infinitely sad.
“I... I really don't know what to say,” he said.
She sniffed. “Well. I'm astonished I was able to keep it from you for so long.”
“The possibility simply never occurred to me.” This was far more painful than the broken ribs. “I mean... you're such a remarkable young woman. Intelligent, brave, sensible and generous. I have occasionally wondered why you didn't have young men swarming around you bearing flowers, but I absolutely never considered... not for one moment...”
“Then, if you think so well of me...?”
“You yourself reminded me what I'm going into when we go back,” he said, sadly. “If that were not the case, things could perhaps have been different. But I can't take you into all that, I wouldn't if I could, and I will not ask you to wait for me. If I did, I'd have to promise to wait for you too. I don't think I can do that. Not when I rate my chances of survival as low as I do at the moment. Better to mourn a smaller loss now than a greater one later.”
“You're tough and resilient, and you've survived so far,” she said, gently.
“I think there will be a lot of people who won't,” he replied. “And even if I do, well, who knows how long it will be before I can officially return home? I can certainly use the time device to make occasional visits, but I can't do it too often or for very long. I realised that when I went back to my own time to get some sleep while we were at Mr Montgomerie's house. Did you notice that I had had a shave? If not, I'm sure other people did.”
“Yes, I did, but I thought you'd just gone up to the bathroom,” she said, puzzled.
“No. From my personal point of view, I was gone for some ten hours, and I returned to the same moment I left, but rested and shaved. It was a moment or so later that I realised my appearance must have changed from everyone else's point of view. If I keep using the time device, I'm going to appear to age faster than normal, because I'll still have exactly the same life, but I'll be spending some of it in the past. So I'll have to save it for when I really need it.”
She smiled. “When you're desperate for tea and muffins?”
“That,” he admitted, returning the smile, “is a strong possibility.”
Ottokar came running up at this point. “Hy hope hy not interrupting anyting serious,” he said, “but is someting hyu probably ought to know.”
“What's that?” asked Mr Wooster, instantly back in professional mode.
“Dat Mister Higgs,” said Ottokar. “He disappeared. Ve all saw him.”
“Well, he's free to come and go as he wishes,” replied Mr Wooster.
“But he took der veapon!” Ottokar protested. “Vos der murder veapon. Ve needed it for evidence.”
Mr Wooster closed his eyes. “I must admit, I don't envy you when you come to write your official report. I wouldn't have thought the disappearance of the murder weapon made a great deal of difference by comparison to the other factors. And, if nothing else, it's now well away from Tryggvassen. I consider that a positive point. However, I will talk to Higgs when I next see him and see if I can get it back.”
“Ve... might need a liddle bit of help vit dat report,” said Ottokar. “If hyu hokay vit dat.”
“Least I can do,” Mr Wooster assured him.
Belod came bustling up to check on him, noticed the strip of bark on the ground, picked it up, put it back in his mouth and treated him to a lecture of which he could not understand a single word, but that hardly mattered. Her tone of voice made its import absolutely clear. He chewed the bark meekly while she harangued him and fussed over him, checking his pupils, running a practised hand over his forehead to make sure he was not either chilled or starting a fever, and generally ensuring that there were no signs that he might need further attention at the moment. Then she hurried off to treat her next patient. Alice smiled.
“A doctor's a doctor, in any language,” she said. “I must admit, though, I'm surprised at the lack of incantations.”
“If she does them at all, I expect she does them when there isn't so much hurry,” replied Mr Wooster, temporarily pouching the bark in his cheek, since he dared not take it out again just yet. “She's busy. Lots of people to treat. She's got to stick with the basics.”
“Seeing it under construction certainly gives you a feel for how dedicated everyone is,” said Alice. “Was. You know what I mean. It's pretty dangerous up there.”
“Ho, look!” exclaimed Ottokar. “Dey got Tryggvassen.”
They had. As Alice had correctly predicted, he had not been given a nice litter with blankets. Someone had tied another rope around his ankles and was currently dragging him across the turf by it, quite casually. He did not appear to be enjoying it.
“Vell, dat sets him a nize liddle puzzle,” said Ottokar, with a certain relish. “Hy vonder how he going to get back vitout his liddle toy? In der meantime, he as schtrong as an ox, so maybe dey make goot use of him und harness him to a cart, hey?”
Charles and Hilde finally arrived on the scene. Hilde's patience had just been rewarded; the tenor Ghyn had taken a break and some food, giving her the opportunity to introduce him to Charles. It had gone as might be expected, with a lot of enthusiastic gestures and excited swapping of melodies. Ghyn had just that moment gone back to work, and so Charles and Hilde were able to rejoin the others.
“How are you feeling now?” asked Hilde solicitously. “I hope you didn't come round before I finished stitching you up. It would have been most painful otherwise, I'm afraid. Those bone needles aren't as sharp as I'm used to.”
“I'm all right, thank you,” Mr Wooster replied. “I'm not in too much pain as long as I keep still, and when I do move it's my ribs that hurt, not the stitches so much.”
“Ah! Well, I think I may be able to help a little with the ribs. Once we get back to our own time, I've got an idea for a kind of corset. Not a pressure one, naturally, but a support. There's not a great deal one can do for ribs, but it should at least stop you injuring them any further.”
“Thank you,” he said. “And also, of course, for the stitching. Can you thank Belod for me, too?”
“Oh, I think she knows you're grateful,” replied Hilde with a smile. “She reads faces very well.”
“How soon do you think you'll be able to move enough to go back to our own time?” asked Charles. “Belod is obviously excellent at what she does with what she has available, and I don't in the least want to take that away from her, but I still think you ought to be in a modern hospital.”
“They're all excellent at what they do with what they have available,” said Hilde.
“Well, quite so,” Charles agreed. “And I must admit that I personally would like to stay a little longer and have another chat with Ghyn. Listen to this!” He whistled a few bars of melody. “It shifts from five-four to seven-eight back into five-four again, and then it settles into four-four. It sounds like a natural speech rhythm, doesn't it?”
“Is veird,” Ottokar decided. “But goot veird.”
“Before Charles gets completely distracted, I'd better let you know I've mended your trousers,” said Hilde, putting them down on the blanket. “And you'll need a shirt, or, well, a tunic, which is what they have here. I'm going to try negotiating for one for you. Your old one was in such a bad state that it's going to have to be torn up for bandages. It's soaking in water at the moment to get all the blood out of it.”
“Thank you,” said Mr Wooster. “And, in answer to Charles' question, I could probably move quite soon, if Belod will allow it. I'll just need some help standing up. There's nothing broken other than the ribs.”
“Hyu did lose a lot of bloot,” said Ottokar. “Hy tink maybe hyu should at least schtay here for de night. Ve don't vant hyu fainting.”
“That's sensible,” Hilde agreed. “Very well. I've got some silver coins with me; they'll probably set some value on silver, and I'll try to get a tunic for you in exchange.”
“Is that a good idea?” asked Charles diffidently. “Isn't it going to confuse history if someone like Professor Quagmire comes along in four thousand-odd years and digs up a silver coin dating from the Neolithic with the image of Her Undying Majesty?”
Hilde shook her head. “No, because as far as I can tell they don't have coins. They'll melt them down or beat them into foil, and use them for decoration. I think even in the Neolithic they could melt silver and gold.”
“Und hy going to give dem a hand vit der vork,” said Ottokar. “Dey could do vit somevun vot is really schtrong.” He paused. “Hy yust vish dey vould schtop bowing to me.”
Alice laughed. “They probably think you're a god, Ottokar.”
“Ho. Hyu tink?” Ottokar sounded disconcerted.
“Well, something supernatural, anyway. And I don't suppose you'll exactly disabuse them of that idea if you're going to go round casually lugging megaliths around the place.”
“Ho.” He considered. “Vell. In dat case, hy suppose hy'd better go und be a goot gott.”
The other three walked away in various directions, leaving Alice once more alone with Mr Wooster. He looked up at her.
“On reflection,” he said, “there is, at any rate, one promise I'd like to ask you for, if I may. It would help me to sleep better at night if I knew you were going to keep it.”
“Anything you ask,” she said, ardently.
“Be careful,” he warned her, sadly. “You don't know what it is yet.”
“But if it'll help you sleep at night...” she said.
“Well, it's just this. The next time you fall in love...”
“There won't be a next time,” she interrupted, firmly.
“All right. I could have put that better. If, by any chance, given the strange vicissitudes of the world that we live in... if you should ever happen to fall in love again, I'd like you to promise me this. That you will inform the lucky gentleman at the earliest possible opportunity.”
“And how will that help you sleep at night?” she asked, not looking at him. “Not that it is, of course, going to happen.”
“Because I am starting to have a very faint idea of what you've been putting yourself through, and it is making me shudder,” he replied. “Next time, tell him. Tell him as soon as you're sure of it yourself. If he reciprocates, you'll have more happiness than you would otherwise have done, and if he doesn't you'll have far less pain. Promise me, Alice.”
“Very well. If it makes you happy, I promise. But I'm quite certain there will never be an occasion when I need to put that promise into practice.”
“Just remember,” he said, “I want the best for you. Which includes not being prepared to allow you to become your own worst enemy again.”
There was a long pause. Then she said, “That's a kind of love, too. Obviously not the kind I had hoped for... but that doesn't mean I appreciate it any less than I should.”
“I'm glad,” said Mr Wooster, simply. And, pain notwithstanding, he meant it with all his heart.
IX. Home by an Inevitable Detour
They stayed with Belod and Ghyn and the others that night, and Charles made himself very popular when the time came to sing songs around the fire; he had a good voice and was delighted to teach the others any song that they happened to like. Mr Wooster did not join in, since he was naturally still in a good deal of pain, but he did ask to be allowed to lie near the fire so that he could listen, and everyone was happy to let him. It seemed that Higgs had done a competent job of explaining exactly what he had done for them, because they all treated him with enormous respect and kindness. When Hilde had brought up the matter of a tunic for him, a good one had been immediately found, and nobody would hear of taking her silver for it; so, instead, she gave the coins to Belod as a souvenir. Belod was delighted with them, and indicated that she would have them made into jewellery, though Hilde was not quite clear from the gestures whether she was simply going to punch holes in them and hang them around her neck or have something more complicated made from them.
The next morning, Mr Wooster, who had slept surprisingly well all things considered, tried walking around the camp, and discovered that he could manage it as well as was necessary. Everything still hurt like the very devil, but at least he was no longer feeling light-headed. He did feel he could do with a cane, but once he mentioned this to Ottokar, the Jäger wasted no time in finding a suitably sized piece of spare timber and whittling it to an appropriate shape and smoothness with the knife he had bought at Mrs Chatterjee's circus. Once that was ready, the party took their leave of Belod and the others with many smiles and gestures. Hilde got a hug from Belod, which she warmly reciprocated.
Mr Wooster had set the time device to return to the morning after they had all left, but in Ottokar's lodgings rather than Montgomerie's house, to save the trouble of having to order a cab at such a late hour. It was, therefore, rather disconcerting when the only apparent effects of operating the device were that the sky went dark and Stonehenge, as far as could be seen, suddenly built itself.
“What happened there?” asked Alice.
A familiar voice greeted them. “Oh, there you are!” It was Quagmire, running towards them. “Look. Over there – that canvas tent thing, do you see? I'm underneath it, or rather the past version of me is, and the accident is just happening... now. I'd better get out of the way before I notice myself. Goodbye!”
“Ah,” said Mr Wooster. “This thing is going to need looking at. It must have taken a pounding in the fight.”
The other four were already running. Mr Wooster had no hope of keeping up, but he followed as best he could. There was a scream of pain from under the canvas. Ottokar got there first and yanked the whole mass of soaking canvas out of the ground so that the others could get to the stricken man faster. Alice spotted a bucket still half full of water and passed it to Charles, who threw it over the version of Quagmire in the trench. Hilde caught his arms and helped him out, and Ottokar caught him and rolled him up in the canvas, quenching the last remaining flames. As Mr Wooster caught up, breathing heavily and leaning hard on the cane, the rescue was completed.
There were, of course, the inevitable introductions, all five of them duly acting as though they had never seen Professor Quagmire before in their lives. He was not, as it turned out, badly hurt, but he was nonetheless far too shaken to continue with his dig, so he decided to stay the night at the nearest inn and then return the following morning to his home in Winchester. (And that, thought Alice, would be why we couldn't find him anywhere in Salisbury. He doesn't live there.) Charles adroitly fended off awkward questions by saying they were camping nearby. Once he had finally gone, Mr Wooster held up the time device.
“This thing is playing up a little,” he said. “I don't suppose either of you can fix it, can you?”
“We haven't any tools with us, I'm afraid,” replied Charles.
“But in the meantime, we can recalibrate,” Hilde pointed out. “The error, very roughly, is ten years in four thousand three hundred, or one in four hundred and thirty. Ten years is about three thousand six hundred days, so that's... er... about eight and a half days. If we set the device to subjective present and allow for the fact that you've been here for maybe twelve hours, we should get back about a week behind where we should be. Knowing that, we can iterate and work out when we're on the right day.”
“There's a slight problem with that,” said Mr Wooster. “And that is that we didn't... oh, wait. We probably did. I was forgetting that Montgomerie did a scan showing all time travel in the Salisbury area over the last week, from the point where we were then, and quite a lot of it showed up. Some of it could well have been us.”
“But he was specifically looking for Charles and Hilde as well, and they didn't show up,” Alice objected. “That is to say, they didn't show up a week behind on the timeline he was searching on. They just appeared at the rescue scene and in the Neolithic.”
“In that case, using the subjective present setting will probably get us back without any problems,” said Charles. “It is, after all, a fixed point.”
“Is goot to know,” said Ottokar.
“It certainly is,” said Charles, with feeling. “I don't know about anyone else, but I need a cup of coffee.”
“Perhaps we should reintroduce you to that gradually, darling,” suggested Hilde.
There was some further tweaking of the device and a certain amount of collective agonising over whether or not it would reliably get them to Ottokar's lodgings; normally this would not have been a great problem, but Mr Wooster could not walk too far at the moment. At last they tried the setting they had decided on, and, to everyone's great relief, they succeeded. That is to say, they had definitely succeeded in getting the right location, and it looked very much as though the time was at least within reasonable limits, since Ottokar's possessions were around the place.
“Now,” said Ottokar. “Charles und Hilde, ve been looking after all hyu tings for hyu. Alice took over hyu rooms at der hotel. Ardsley, hyu going to need to schtay vit me for a vhile. Hyu can't go back to hyu own time in dat schtate, or pipple going to ask a lot of annoying qvestions.”
“That is a point,” Mr Wooster agreed. “And, after all, I'm going to need to help you with your report.”
“Before hyu even tink of dat, hyu seeing a doctor,” Ottokar insisted. “If notting else, dey may be able to give hyu someting better for der pain dan dat villow bark.”
Alice led Charles and Hilde off to the hotel, while Ottokar bustled around ensuring that his guest would be as comfortable as possible. “Just a minute,” said Mr Wooster. “Isn't that your bed you're giving me?”
“Ja. But hyu need it. Hy be yust fine on de sofa. Hy not been knocked about by a mad Norvegian vit a Gott complex.”
“Well. You're very kind. Thank you.”
Once he had arranged everything to his complete satisfaction, Ottokar hailed a passing child in the street and sent her running for a doctor. The doctor, who was obese and ponderous and in almost every way unlike the brisk Belod, examined the patient thoroughly and declared that there was no need for him to be admitted to hospital, but wrote him a prescription for something to help with the pain. Naturally, he also asked what had happened.
“He vos set upon by a ruffian,” replied Ottokar. It was essentially, though not quite literally, true. The ruffian in question had indeed been a threat, but Mr Wooster had struck the first blow.
By the time the doctor had finished with Mr Wooster, it was lunchtime, and Ottokar went to look in the pantry. “Goot news,” he called. “Ve definitely on de right day. De mushrooms und tomatoes are here vot hy bought yesterday. Is no meat in der house, because hy did not know hy vould have a guest, but how hyu fancy an omelette?”
“Sounds like heaven, Ottokar,” replied Mr Wooster. “Thank you. I didn't like to mention it in case our friends caught the gist, but I'm not good with variably cooked meat.”
“Ja. Not much control ven hyu do it on a schpit,” said Ottokar. “Did hyu try der kefir schtuff? Dat vos qvite nize. Vent preddy goot vit der fruit.”
“No, but I did have the porridge. That was good, actually. I couldn't work out what sort of grain they were using, but I liked it better than regular oat porridge. They put honey in it.”
“Vos rye, hy tink. Tasted a liddle like it. Ve had rye bread in der Army. Goot schtuff. Is dark und heavy und fills hyu up goot. Now, vot hyu vant in hyu omelette? Hy got tomatoes, mushrooms, onions, und dere's also some cheese if hyu vant, but hy not sure is goot to eat eggs und cheese togedder.”
Mr Wooster smiled. “I'll risk it, I think. I don't tend to get digestive problems from either food. Could I have a cheese and tomato omelette, please? With maybe a little onion if you're having some in yours?”
“Sure hyu can have onion in it. Hy going to have a mushroom und onion omelette. Vit lots of pepper.”
Mr Wooster came and sat in the kitchen while his host was cooking. He leaned forward on his cane, this being slightly more comfortable at the moment than sitting back in his chair. There was a thoughtful silence for a while.
“Anyting on hyu mind in particular?” asked Ottokar conversationally, cracking eggs into a bowl.
Mr Wooster nodded. “Yes, actually. Alice.”
“Ho. So hyu know at last, den. Goot. Vot hyu plan to do about it?”
“Well, there's really nothing I can do,” replied Mr Wooster regretfully. “You know what my situation is.”
“Ja. Hy had a feeling hyu'd say that.” Another egg slipped into the bowl with the others. “Hy sorry.”
“You'll keep a good eye on her, won't you? She's... she's a remarkable young woman. I made her promise that if this sort of thing ever happened again, she'd tell the gentleman straight away. I think perhaps you ought to know that, just in case, you know, she forgets.”
“Hyu did?” asked Ottokar.
“Well, I... I had some inkling of what she must have put herself through.”
“Hyu a goot man,” said Ottokar, who had, of course, a great deal more than an inkling, and was not going to make his friend feel any worse by going into detail.
“The thing is,” said Mr Wooster, “I do care about her a great deal. Which I somehow managed to get across to her while at the same time explaining that nothing would be able to happen between us. I'm grateful for that, because I wasn't sure I could do it. I'm... not well used to having to communicate that kind of thing. I don't think I love her in the way that she would like me to, but if we were around each other all the time, I suspect I probably would soon enough.”
“Hyu not been in love before?” asked Ottokar, curiously.
“Well, not properly. Not to the point where it was necessary to discuss the matter with the lady in question.” Mr Wooster was uncomfortably aware that he was blushing. “I wasn't much more than a boy at the time, anyway.”
“Dat got to have been difficult,” said Ottokar, sympathetically.
“It was, but, you know, you go through these things and come out the other side. I expect you've done the same.”
It was Ottokar's turn to be somewhat embarrassed. “Vell, no,” he replied.
“What, never?”
“Never. Alice asked me about it vunce. Hy yust said hy probably hadn't met de right girl yet und dere vos no hurry. But hy don't tink hy do der whole romance ting at all.”
“That's a bit sad,” said Mr Wooster.
“Hy don't tink so,” replied Ottokar. “Hy mean, hy yust fine. Hy got some really goot friends, such as hyu for instance, und hy don't get my heart broken. Dey say is love dat makes der vorld go round, und dey got a goot point, but dey alvays forget dere is different sorts of love.”
“You're right, as usual,” said Mr Wooster. “I, however, may need to spend a bit of time untangling them in the near future.”
X. Retrospective
There were a few things Mr Wooster had to do once he was properly recovered. The first, of course, was to return to the point in time he had left, which now meant that he was going back in time, due to the recovery period. The very first thing he did when he had a free moment was to go and see Higgs.
“Yes, sir?” said Higgs, respectful as ever.
“Mr Higgs,” said Mr Wooster. “Do you by any chance recall having gone back to Stonehenge, near Salisbury in England, while it was being built, or is that in your future?”
“No, sir, I recall it quite clearly.” Higgs allowed himself a brief grin. “And a fine job you did too, sir. I hope you're now fully recovered?”
“Still some pain around the ribs from time to time, but most of me is in decent shape again, thank you,” replied Mr Wooster. “I've come to ask you for Tryggvassen's device, if you don't mind. You can have it back later if you wish, but it is a murder weapon and so we're going to need it for the report.”
“Oh,” said Higgs. “Can't do that, sir, I'm afraid.”
“Why not?” asked Mr Wooster. “What happened to it?”
“Well, sir, if you recall, I've been helpful to the Lady Heterodyne a few times,” said Higgs.
“That's something of an understatement. Go on.”
“So I took her Tryggvassen's device and asked her if she wouldn't mind doing me a little favour,” Higgs explained. “I asked if she could take it apart and convert it into a device that did nothing but time travel, without the weaponry attached. Of course, being Her Ladyship, she took the whole thing apart and rebuilt it completely, as you saw for yourself.”
“As I saw?” asked Mr Wooster.
“Yes, sir. When I gave it to you.”
“So you've still got another one like it?”
“No, sir. There was only ever one device. I went back in time and took it from Tryggvassen, with your help. But then I had to give it to you so that you could go back in time and defeat Tryggvassen, and I knew that having a weapon attached to it wouldn't give you an advantage. He's got some remarkable defensive technology, sir. You can't do a lot to him with weapons. So if you didn't have a weapon, you would have to use your brain, which is of course exactly what you did.”
Mr Wooster took out the device in question. “You are seriously telling me that this was originally Tryggvassen's weapon?”
“You can ask the Lady Heterodyne if you don't believe me, sir.”
“I would never accuse you of lying to me, Mr Higgs. It's more that I'm having some trouble wrapping my head around all this. By the way, did I go and see you a couple of weeks ago and ask you to wait for my former self in a coffee bar near here at some ungodly hour of the morning?”
“Half past five, sir, to be exact, and yes, you did,” replied Higgs.
“Good. I had better go and sort that out, then. Thank you.”
Mr Wooster went and sorted that out. It was an extremely weird feeling to start a new conversation with Higgs as if he had not just been talking to him, but then, from Higgs' point of view, he had not. That conversation was still in the future for him. He had originally intended to go and visit his momentarily suicidal former self first, but then a thought struck him. He had a good idea that Dupree would have gone straight back to her room after having had the conversation with that same former self through the closed bedroom door, so he set the location carefully and materialised in her room a few moments before she was due to arrive there. The door duly opened, and Dupree gasped.
“Mr... Wooster?” she said.
The spectacle of Bangladesh Dupree looking utterly bewildered was one that he could have relished for a long time, had it not been so dangerous to try. Instead, he slipped into full-on polite British mode and bowed. “So sorry, madam,” he said formally. “Wrong location.”
And vanished before her eyes.
Now there was just... himself... to deal with. That was going to be interesting.
He appeared at the end of the bed. His other self, for the moment, had his eyes closed. He looked tired and absolutely crushed, and Mr Wooster remembered that he had also been crying, though that did not show on his face. Perhaps it would when he opened his eyes. The hand of his past self twitched towards the pillow.
“Ardsley, old man,” he said gently. “Don't.”
His past self blinked and stared at him. “What?”
Yes. It did show. Good Lord, thought Mr Wooster, what a state I was in.
“I said, don't,” he repeated. “I know what you're thinking. Don't do it. If you do, more lives are going to be lost than just yours. Trust me on this. I'm you, after all.”
“You're me? Well, you're certainly a very good imitation. But how on earth did you get in here?”
“That's kind of complicated,” Mr Wooster explained to his past self. “But I assure you, you will find out. Later.”
I can't tell me too much, he thought, or I won't believe me. And I need to tell me to go and see Higgs, but not straight away. It has to be just as I'm going, otherwise I will ask questions and I can't really answer myself.
“That is not entirely reassuring,” replied the past Mr Wooster.
“Would it help if I told you I'd just confused the life out of Dupree?”
“That rather depends on how she reacted,” said his former self nervously. “She's just... er...”
Mr Wooster winced sympathetically. “Yes, I know what she's just done. But it's all right. She thinks I'm a hallucination too. I didn't give her time to find out otherwise.”
“Good,” said his past self. “I think.”
“It is. She'll avoid you for a bit, and that will be good for your mental health. Do you have the faintest idea how badly stressed you are at the moment?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry. Rhetorical question. If you weren't badly stressed, you wouldn't be thinking about that pistol. Oh, you'll want to know about the pendant. It's just distance coupled with some poor reception at the moment. There are thunderstorms. It does work, sometimes. You're not totally cut off from your friends. And there is a way you'll be able to see them again, as long as you can at least manage to stay alive. Even get home from time to time.”
And the only reason I know that, thought Mr Wooster slowly, is that I came back and told myself when I was where he is. Although I did check it the following morning, so I suppose that didn't come completely out of nowhere.
The previous Mr Wooster eyed him thoughtfully. “How do I know you're not just a figment of my overheated imagination?” he asked. “Telling me what I want to hear?”
Mr Wooster sighed. “I'm so suspicious, I can't even trust myself, apparently,” he said. “Here. Shake hands. See if I'm a figment.” He thrust out a hand.
His past self took it gingerly, and seemed somewhat reassured by its solidity. “Have you got one of those pendants?” he asked, apparently out of the blue.
Mr Wooster pulled it out from under his collar. “Naturally. I have the same pendant that you have. I am you.”
“All right. Call Ottokar.”
“I can't. Not from here. Thunderstorms, remember?” And besides, he reflected, they don't work if you're at different points on the timeline. I know. I've tried. But right now I'd better not confuse me with that.
“Oh, yes. Thunderstorms.”
“All right. Got to go before you start asking too many questions. You'll certainly ask them, but you need to get the answers on your own.” Mr Wooster smiled. “Just remember. You've got to live. It's crucial. That's why I took all the trouble to tell you. Oh, and... see Higgs.”
He slipped back to his own time before the past version of himself could open his mouth again. That, if he was not mistaken, was all the loose ends tied up now. And that was a huge relief, because he did not want to have to think about anything to do with time travel for a long time. There was too much happening in the here and now, and all of it was bad. There were now rumours flying that the Baron was dead, and, though he personally doubted them – his private view was that anything capable of finishing off old Klaus Wulfenbach would probably bring about, if not the actual end of the world, at least the end of a very large chunk of it – it was still abundantly clear that nothing good was happening.
And then he stepped out of his room and almost cannoned into Dupree.
“Gil wants a little chat,” she announced. “I should go carefully.” For once, she seemed almost friendly.
“Oh. Thank you. I think.” He paused. “What about the Baron? Is he...?”
Dupree shrugged. “You tell me. Nobody knows. My bet is the Baron's not sure himself. If he's undead now, whoa boy, are we going to have fun round here.”
Mr Wooster could not decide whether she was being serious, joking or sarcastic. “Well. I... suppose I'd better go and see Gil, then. Thank you for letting me know.”
“All right. Hey... that trick you did a few weeks back. I keep meaning to ask you about that.”
“What trick?”
“Where you turned up in my room and suddenly vanished. How did you do that?”
“Trade secret,” said Mr Wooster. “Oh, don't look at me like that. It's not necessarily repeatable.”
“Pity,” replied Dupree. “I'd kind of like you to repeat it some time. Only maybe stay a bit longer, hey?”
Mr Wooster stared at her. “You've tried to kill me more than once.”
“So? Maybe right now I feel like not killing you. You ought to be grateful. Anyway, something's changed about you. I don't know exactly what it is, but I'm kind of liking it. For now.”
“Dupree, I am not going to bed with you. Not now, not ever.”
“Awwwwww. Not even if I promise to wear the short satin nightie with the little lace skulls?”
Mr Wooster recoiled in horror at this mental image. There was, he felt, a time and a place for his characteristic smooth, elegant, polite approach, and this was absolutely not it.
“Get wound, Dupree,” said the man who had saved England.
* * * * *
“Thank you both,” said Elizabeth Chadwick. She was still in her heavy mourning, still ramrod-straight as she always was, but something had changed about her too. She looked older, somehow. Ottokar and Alice had both noticed it the moment they had walked into her office.
“Vell,” said Ottokar, “since Ardsley insisted hyu ought to know der real schtory, is probably him hyu really ought to tank.”
She smiled faintly. “I suppose he helped you write the report? There isn't a single actual untruth in it, based on what you've just told me. That would be like him.”
“Of course he did,” said Alice.
Mrs Chadwick sighed. “It's a work of art. And he's a hero. I am now even more angry with the Service than I was when you walked in here. I hadn't realised that was possible.”
“Vy hyu angry?” asked Ottokar.
“Oh,” she said. “So you haven't had your official letters yet? No, I suppose you probably wouldn't have, thinking about it.”
“What's happened?” asked Alice.
“Baron Wulfenbach is said to be dead, although nobody actually seems to be quite certain. All we do know is that his son has taken over his duties, and almost the first thing he did was to get rid of Mr Wooster. I fully accept Mr Wooster's explanation for what happened, and I'm prepared to back him up; he could not have acted differently. Nonetheless, we do need to get a new agent in there, and whoever it is, I don't envy them. Europa is in chaos.”
“So what have they done to Ardsley?” asked Alice.
“Well,” replied Mrs Chadwick heavily, “the best way I can put it is that it's less than they would have done if I hadn't intervened. You know the way of it. In the Service, we're all about results. Mr Wooster... didn't get them. You and I know it wasn't his fault he didn't get them, and I made that one hundred per cent clear. I also produced his record and pointed out, at some length, that he had been getting extremely good results up to that point. So all they did, in the end, was to demote him and pack him off to the most obscure posting they could find.” She curled her lip bitterly. “All they did. Yes, I know. Believe me, I feel the same about it as you two do, but at least they stopped short of throwing him out of the Service.”
“That's completely unfair,” said Alice angrily. “He got results at Stonehenge, didn't he? If he hadn't got those results, there'd be no Service for him to be getting results for, as likely as not.”
“But ve can't tell dem dat,” Ottokar reminded her. “Und, remember. He knows he did it. Is like hyu say, unfair und all wrong, but it von't break him.”
“There is more,” said Mrs Chadwick heavily. “They also demoted me, because I recalled him to London at the point I did and allowed him to remain in order to train you. Never mind the fact that if I hadn't, we'd still have one of the Other's agents wandering around the country with that circus, and Mr Sherlock Holmes would be dead in the Thames; and there was also the other case, the one you weren't involved with, which obviously I'm not at liberty to tell you about, but suffice it to say we needed an agent who could be passed off convincingly as coming from the Baron, and I would very much like to know who was better qualified for that than he was. Apparently the Wulfenbach situation was much more important than any of that. I personally don't agree. The Wulfenbach situation is crucially important, obviously, but not more so than the other three matters put together. However, my opinion wasn't important to our superiors, so I am now effectively replacing Mr Wooster at the level he was at before they demoted him. Which means that, in addition to training you, I am also now a field agent again... at least in theory.”
“Oh, Mrs Chadwick,” said Alice. “I am so sorry. You don't deserve that either.”
She smiled grimly. “Don't worry about me too much. I'm old and I have savings. Once I have completed your training, I intend to retire. I very much doubt they will send me into the field before that task is finished, because one thing they do get right is that they try to avoid interfering with people's training unless it is absolutely necessary. Training is, apparently, very important. Once you're fully trained, it's a different game.”
Alice considered for a few moments. Then she said, “Mrs Chadwick, do you think it may be possible that the Service has been infiltrated in some way?”
“It's crossed my mind, and I have been incautious enough to mention it,” replied Mrs Chadwick. “If you have any sense at all, you will never say that out loud again. I happen to believe you do have some sense.”
“Except to you or Ottokar. Obviously.”
“Even then, I should be careful. It is not the kind of remark you want to be overheard. However, I also suggest that you keep your eyes open. Anyone who forms a hypothesis has a duty to test it, even if that testing has to be done with extreme discretion.”
“Yes, madam,” said Alice, with a gleam in her eye. Mrs Chadwick gave the faintest hint of a smile in response.
* * * * *
Somewhere in the vicinity of Mechanicsburg, a tall, slim figure walked purposefully across a wild stretch of abandoned countryside. High above and far away, a pair of mauve eyes watched him through a crack in the mountainside.
The owner of the pair of eyes, whose name was Maxim, turned to his two companions. “He definitely coming dis vay,” he announced.
“Hyu know who it is?” asked Dimo, the leader. “Anyvun ve know?”
Maxim shrugged, his long hair cascading elegantly over his shoulders. “Hy can't tell from here. He schtill a long vay off. But he tall und schkinny, und he might have got dark hair but hy can't see vell because he vearing a hat.”
“If is not red hair, at least he not a Sturmvoraus,” opined Oggie, the third member of the group. “Dey trouble.”
“Hyu don't have to be a Sturmvoraus to be trouble, eediot,” said Dimo. “Out of der vay, Maxim. Let me see.”
Maxim obligingly moved aside to let Dimo see. A moment later, Dimo exploded. “Hy can't believe hyu don't know who dat is!”
“Hyu know?” asked Maxim, astonished. “Hyu got goot eyes, Dimo!”
“Hyu don't need goot eyes,” Dimo retorted. “Hyu only got to look at der vay he valks. No-vun else valks like dat. Is Mister Vooster!”
“Mister Vooster?” said Oggie. “Vot's he doing here?”
“Hy dun know, but he shouldn't be valking out dere all by himself. Dere is dangerous tings. Let's go und meet him.”
“Ja!” said Maxim enthusiastically. “Dere is dangerous tings. Ve is dangerous tings too, but ve is goot dangerous tings.”
The three Jägers hurried down to the well-concealed exit from the caves, and strode forward to meet their friend. Mr Wooster recognised them from a long way away; there might well be only one hat in the world quite like Maxim's. Despite his tiredness, he hastened his steps to meet them.
“Mister Vooster!” they chorused, as he approached.
“Dimo! Maxim! Ognian! Good to see you all again,” he said. “How have you chaps been getting on?”
“Better dan hyu probably tink,” replied Dimo, with a grin. “De caves are qvite cosy. Hyu coming to stay?”
“For an indefinite period, by the look of it,” replied Mr Wooster. “If you've got room for me, of course.”
“Plenty of room,” said Maxim. “Ve find hyu a really nize room. Ve even got running vater here, but of course hyu got to varm it up.”
“Ja, liddle underground schtreams everyvhere,” said Oggie. “Und stal... stalag... dose mineral deposit tings.”
“So,” said Dimo shrewdly, “hy kind of guessing hyu not running avay like most pipple. Hyu dun look like hyu running avay. Dat means someting vent wrong, ja?”
“You're right, Dimo,” replied Mr Wooster. “I suppose you know I'm a British agent? Everyone else does by now.”
“Ho ja. Hyu in trouble vit der folks at home, den?”
“You could say that. Apparently I was supposed to have stopped Europa from sliding into chaos. I do my best, but I don't do miracles. Oh yes, and I've also been sent away under threat by Gil, or, as I should now call him, Baron Wulfenbach. He touched an even rawer nerve than he knew. Still, when I tell you that the reason he sent me away was because he wanted me to find and protect the Lady Heterodyne, perhaps you'll find it in you to forgive him.” He smiled. “I have done so, though I am certainly still taking his threat very seriously.”
“Vy did he need to treaten hyu to get hyu to do dat?” asked Dimo. “Hyu vould have done it anyvay.”
“As far as I could without leaving his side, yes. The rest I would have had to trust to you chaps. I'm in a cleft stick; I couldn't keep the Service even remotely happy if I didn't stay with him, and I couldn't keep Gil even remotely happy if I didn't leave him. Consequently nobody is particularly happy, and I've been posted here, where I am hoping at some point to be able to pick up on Gil's, that is to say, the Baron's commission.”
“Hyu seem very calm about it,” said Maxim.
“Well, it's that, have a nervous breakdown, or shoot myself,” replied Mr Wooster. “And I've rejected the other two options.”
“Ve got to find de Lady Heterodyne before ve can protect her,” said Oggie. “No-vun knows vhere she is right now.”
“Wherever she is, I have no doubt she's looking after herself pretty well,” said Mr Wooster. “I wonder how Gil would react if he discovered that she had sent someone to protect him?”
Dimo grinned. “Has she?”
“I don't know, but it strikes me that he assumes a little too easily that women need protecting more than men do. Why, there's a young lady I know in England who... well, let's just say that if I ever feel I need protecting, she will be high on my list of people to ask.”
“Ho ja?” said Oggie, knowingly.
“Let's put it this way,” said Mr Wooster, forging ahead determinedly in a reasonably successful effort to forestall a blush. “She's already expressed a desire to fight Dupree. One day I expect her to be able to do that.”
“Ve all need protecting sometimes,” said Dimo. “Men or vomen.”
“But maybe not so much der young Baron, because he got all dose armies und minions und great big clanks,” said Maxim.
“Hoo boy,” said Oggie. “Vy does she vant to fight Dupree?”
“Oh... personal reasons,” replied Mr Wooster.
“Hey, Mister Vooster,” said Maxim suddenly. “Hyu been in England not so long ago, ja?”
“That's right, Maxim,” said Mr Wooster.
“Hyu didn't happen to meet a friend of mine, did hyu? Daggy. She lives in London. She a builder.”
“I didn't, but I do know the name,” replied Mr Wooster. “She's a friend of another friend of mine, Ottokar, whom I very much hope you chaps are going to meet one day.”
Maxim almost squeaked with excitement. “Ottokar! Hyu know Ottokar? She been telling me all about him in her letters. Hy really vant to meet him. She said he a really goot fighter und he also der best Jäger cook in de whole of London. Vhen she wrote about his ant patties, hy dun mind telling hyu, Mister Vooster, my mout vos vatering.”
“H'mm,” said Dimo. “Does he cook food dat is goot for humans as vell as for Jägers?”
“He certainly does,” replied Mr Wooster. “I can personally vouch for that.”
“Und... does der young Baron schtill keep sacking his chefs like de old vun did?”
“Good Lord,” said Mr Wooster, as the implications of this remark hit him. “As a matter of fact, I have no idea. I had to leave... rather rapidly.”
“Vell,” said Dimo. “It may be vorth finding out, don't hyu tink?”
“Ja,” Maxim chimed in. “Goot idea. Ve happy to help hyu friend.”
“Hy'd like him to teach me,” said Oggie. “Hy no goot at it. Last time hy tried to boil an egg, it exploded.”
“Is because hyu supposed to use vater, eediot,” said Dimo.
“Hy forgot,” said Oggie plaintively.
“He not keeding,” said Maxim. “Hyu should have seen der mess, Mister Vooster.”
Soon, they arrived at the cave entrance. Dimo took charge immediately. “Hokay,” he said. “Ve got a schpecial svuite reserved for de Lady Heterodyne in case ve find her. Maxim is in der room next door on vun side und Oggie is in der room on de odder. Dere are two rooms opposite. Hy sleep in vun of dem und hyu getting de odder.”
“Thank you,” said Mr Wooster.
“Hyu velcome. Is a nize room. Hy tink hyu like it.”
“What I would like most at this moment,” said Mr Wooster, “is a bath. I've walked a long way. Can that be arranged?”
“No problem!” grinned Maxim. “Hyu got a tub in hyu room. Ve bring hyu de hot vater.”
“Und den dere's dinner,” said Dimo, “but is hokay. Oggie didn't cook it.”
Oggie looked wounded.
When you have Jägers bringing you hot water, you can be sure that it will be hot enough, since a Jäger can quite easily fill the whole bath for you and carry it back to your room. Oggie insisted on doing the honours, no doubt to underline the fact that he was still useful despite his inability to master the culinary arts, and then went to rejoin the others in Dimo's room, since Dimo had packed someone else off to do lookout duty for a while.
These were caves. Many of the walls were solid rock, and the ones that weren't were still, for the most part, soundly built; after all, there was plenty of stone conveniently lying around just asking to be used for construction purposes, and it was usually much more practical to use that where possible than to bring in timber from the surrounding forest. Nonetheless, certain sounds did echo. If Mr Wooster had simply been talking to someone in his room, Dimo and the others would never have heard a sound; but he was not talking. He was, in the immemorial tradition, singing in the bath.
“A wand'ring minstrel I, a thing of shreds and patches...”
Charles Greenwood might have experienced a slight jolt to hear that being sung by a baritone, and therefore out of its usual key, but the Jägers did not know it and therefore had no such reservations. “Hoo,” said Maxim. “Nize voice. Didn't know he could sing.”
“Hy suppose is not much reason to sing ven hyu vit Master Gil all der time,” Oggie observed.
The song tailed off. Mr Wooster, in common with most ablutionary vocalists over the whole of time and space, did not know all the words. A few moments later, he started up again.
“Täubchen, das entflattert ist,
Stille mein Verlangen;
Täubchen, das ich oft gekusst,
Lass dich wieder fangen!
Täubchen... er...”
The singing broke off abruptly. “Hy know dat vun!” said Maxim. “Shall hy go und tell him der next line?”
“Vot, und let him know ve listening?” demanded Dimo. “Hyu schtupid or someting?”
“He not got a bad accent, for a British person,” said Oggie.
“Vot vos dat song anyvay?” asked Dimo. “Is notting hy ever heard.”
“Is out of an operetta,” replied Maxim.
“Hyu vent to an operetta?”
“Vell, der vos dis girl,” explained Maxim, with a grin. “She liked operetta. Und she said hy vos preddy. Hy prefer handsome myself, but hy take vot hy can get.”
“Is veird,” Dimo decided. “Hy mean, not hyu, und probably not hyu leddy friend. Der operetta. Vot sort of person in deir right mind goes round singing about keesing liddle doves? Hyu dun vant to do dat. Yust wring deir neck und pop dem in der pot.”
“Is not a real liddle dove,” replied the knowledgeable Maxim. “Is a leddy called Rosalinde vot is married to an eediot. Der eediot behaves very badly in der operetta und Rosalinde knows about it, but in de end dey get reconciled. Hy vos disappointed. Hy tought she should have gone off vit der yentleman vot sang her der aria about der liddle dove.”
Mr Wooster's voice was suddenly raised in song again from the adjacent room.
“Why do the nations so furiously rage together;
Why do the people imagine a vain thing?”
“Ja,” said Dimo. “Damn goot qvestion, dat.”
There was no question this time of Mr Wooster forgetting either the words or the music. The remaining words, after all, were mostly repeats, and the music was from Handel's Messiah, with which he was so familiar that he could probably have sung the whole thing from beginning to end, albeit in solid baritone. He had, as Maxim had mentioned, a good voice, but it was not trained; he frequently ran out of breath in the middle of a phrase, and most of the melismas were distinctly too much for him. Nonetheless, there was no mistaking the fact that he was putting his heart and soul into it.
The Jägers listened in silence until he had finished, and remained in silence for a little while afterwards. It was Oggie who finally spoke.
“He changed,” he said. “Hy dun know how. But he has.”
“Ja,” said Dimo, thoughtfully. “Is like dere's more to him now.”
“Glad hyu said dat. Hy tought hy vos imagining schtuff,” said Maxim.
“Maybe he yust better ven he not got Master Gil schtanding over him,” said Dimo.
“Hy got no idea,” said Oggie. “But hy glad ve got him on der team.”
* * * * *
I. Unrelated Ironies
“Wooster,” said Gilgamesh Wulfenbach.
Mr Wooster returned his gaze with a practised impassivity beneath which, nonetheless, lurked an undercurrent of empathy. For some reason, Gil was annoyed by it. He was just about to open his mouth and express that annoyance when Mr Wooster forestalled him by saying, “Yes, Master Gilgamesh?”
“Oh, leave it out,” snapped Gil. “You know very well you don't have to pretend to be a butler any more. We all know exactly who you are.”
“Force of habit,” replied Mr Wooster. He thought, but did not add: and, besides, you clearly haven't had anything like enough sleep in my absence, and you are in an even worse mood than usual. I don't blame you. You're too young for the load on your shoulders at this moment.
I know that feeling.
“Besides,” Gil continued, “I'm amazed you can go back to Butler Mode after the fine brass neck you showed my father while you were away. That telegram! Oh yes, I saw it. I have to concede, somewhat reluctantly, that I was impressed.”
Mr Wooster raised a very well-bred eyebrow. “I asked the Baron an honest question. He returned an honest answer. The exchange benefited both sides, or I would hardly have begun it. His information enabled my team to catch and neutralise the Other's agent, meaning that his own agent was now no longer at risk. I imagine he will want to take her out of the circus and post her elsewhere now. But at least he still has the option of a live agent to do that with.”
Gil half smiled. “I've got to hand it to you. You do have a certain style. What did your superiors think? Are you in even deeper trouble now?”
“On the contrary. I'm in considerably less trouble. I... appear to have made a good impression over there. There are even noises about recalling me for longer next time.”
“Huh,” said Gil. “In that case, I had better see about getting you into some more trouble.”
Mr Wooster looked pained. “I trust you were joking. You are, after all, speaking to one who is exiled from his homeland.”
Gil sighed. “I was, Wooster, but you can't blame me for wanting to keep you. You're a good deal more sensible than some people round here.”
“I'm very flattered. Now, I suppose you did ask to see me for a reason?”
“Just checking that Her Britannic Majesty hasn't sent you back here with an extra pair of mechanical arms and a death ray.”
“That would be a little too much like your father's way of thinking. Her Majesty is... original.”
Gil slumped into the nearest chair. “Sometimes you're too damn right too damn often. And for your information, that remark was actually intended to be another joke. Clearly my famous repartee is losing its cutting edge.”
“With the greatest of respect,” said Mr Wooster, “I believe you are too tired to joke effectively.”
Gil sighed. “Damn right I'm tired. There's too much going on here right now.”
“And would that, actually, be why you wanted to see me?”
“Yes, it would.” Gil stood up again and paced across the room, his hands behind his back, his elegant long coat hanging open. “Fate is a strange goddess, Wooster. She laughs at me. Me, Gilgamesh Wulfenbach. Of all the vast numbers of people here who have sworn loyalty solely to my father, and of course by extension to me, sometimes the only one I can trust is a known foreign agent. Ironic, yes?”
“Ironic, but I am honoured,” replied Mr Wooster.
“You do right to be honoured, but it's a two-edged sword. I am now going to rant, swear and moan at you about the current state of affairs for...” Gil stopped to glance at his watch. “Probably about the next half hour. And then I shall have to rush back to my laboratory. I have things to do there.”
“Rant, swear and moan away,” said Mr Wooster. “I'm listening.”
“Good. Because you have been away for over a month, and I intend to get that full month's worth into the half-hour.” He gestured absently. “You'd better sit.”
“Thank you.”
Gil launched into his tirade, and Mr Wooster listened, politely but with increasing concern.
This was really not good. There were some swear words in there that Mr Wooster didn't even know.
* * * * *
“Now,” said Mrs Chadwick briskly. “This afternoon, we shall not be doing any training. We have an invitation to tea instead.”
The taller, and distinctly greener, of her two students grinned, showing all his fangs. Ottokar was a Jäger, currently the only one in Her Britannic Majesty's special forces. The other student, Alice Davenport, merely raised her eyebrows.
“An invitation to tea?” she asked. “Presumably quite a special one, to be allowed to interrupt training.”
“Oh, indeed. Quite a special one. Mrs Adelaide Buckingham, the lady you recently rescued from her husband's kidnap attempt, has found out who you are and now wishes to meet you. I have accepted on behalf of all of us.”
You might at least have asked us, thought Alice sullenly. Not that I don't want to go, but that's high-handed. As usual.
“Vill be goot,” said Ottokar cheerfully. “It vill be nize to see her again ven ve are not being distracted by pirates und rogue Jägers und schtuff like dat.”
“Distracted is, I suppose, one way of putting it,” said Mrs Chadwick, who had been present herself during the rescue. “And there was really only one pirate.”
“Ho ja. But she vos really goot at pirating,” replied Ottokar, unfazed.
“Well,” said Mrs Chadwick. “You had both better go home and dress for the occasion. Miss Davenport, you recall where Mrs Buckingham's house is? I'm aware you went there during the investigation.”
“I remember,” replied Alice.
“Then I'll meet you there. Half past three.”
It was the beginning of September. The recent heatwave had, thankfully, passed, and there was now the first hint of autumn on the London breeze. As they stepped into the street, the sky was cloudier than it had been half an hour ago while they were eating lunch, and there was a faint scent of rain.
“Hyu schtill don't like her, do hyu,” said Ottokar flatly.
“I don't suppose that matters, as long as she doesn't know,” replied Alice. “And you've got to admit, I'm good at not showing it.”
“Hy can see it.”
“Yes, but you know it's there.” She paused, and sighed. “And you know why it's there. Nobody else does. Even so, she's not making it any better. She just went and accepted the invitation on our behalf without asking us? Really?”
“Hy not offended,” said Ottokar. “Hy vant to go. Und so do hyu, don't hyu? Und she knows dat. Dat's vy she didn't ask.”
“Well, maybe. But when you consider the way she treated Mr Wooster...”
“Listen,” said Ottokar. “Hy been tinking about dat qvite a lot. But right now, do ve vant a cab or an airship?”
Alice considered. “The airship will be quick enough at this time of day. Let's get that.”
“Hokay.” They walked down to the airship platform at the street corner, by the old pump, and stepped into the lift. It rattled and clanked its way to the platform.
“So what have you been thinking about Mr Wooster?” asked Alice.
“Hy been tinking she vos actually qvite goot to him,” said Ottokar, reasonably. “Look. Ve don't know exactly vot happened. All ve know is he made some kind of mischtake, vhich, like hyu say, vos underschtandable vit all der schtuff he got to do, und he vos in trouble for it. But she calls him back here because she knows he der best person for der task, und den she lets him go to Kendal to sort out dat business vit der circus, und den she lets him schtay longer to train us. She doesn't send him back to vhere he vos originally until tings schtart going really wrong dere, und even den, she lets him schtay long enough to say gootbye to both of us. Dat doesn't seem so unfair to me.”
“But if she's so good to him, why was he in so much trouble in the first place when it can't have been his fault?” Alice demanded.
“Gott knows. Maybe it vosn't even her at all. Maybe it vos her boss. Or her boss' boss. Ve yust don't know. All ve got to go on is der vay ve seen her treat him, und dat's novhere near so bad as hyu reckon.”
Alice turned to face her Jäger friend. “Why are you so bothered, anyway?”
He shrugged. “Hy don't like pipple being unfair any more dan hyu do. Hyu should know dat by now.”
Alice frowned, but said nothing. The rebuke, gentle as it was, had stung a little coming from him.
“Is our bus,” said Ottokar.
The airship pulled up to the platform, and the two of them boarded it and bought tickets from the conductor.
“I wonder what he's doing right now?” said Alice, a little wistfully.
“Serving der Qveen,” replied Ottokar.
“Well, obviously.” Alice could not help smiling a little. “You know, Ottokar, in spite of that accent, sometimes you come over as more British than the British.”
He beamed. “Is a compliment, dat. Hy like it here.”
“I don't think he likes it all that much over there.” She sighed. “Oh, come on. Pull yourself together, Alice, and stop sounding like a third-rate impression of a Jane Austen heroine.”
“Hy should tink is difficult sometimes,” said Ottokar sympathetically.
Alice looked at him curiously as the airship slid away into the London air. “Don't you ever fall in love? I mean, first there was Sally at the circus who seemed to be pretty keen on you. And now there's Drauka. Oh, my, Drauka. I like her, but she's... really not subtle, is she?”
Ottokar coughed, embarrassed. “Ja. Drauka. Hy had to sit her down und have der liddle tok vit her about how hy like her yust fine as a friend, but if she can't keep her hands off, hy von't be going in her bar no more.”
“Well,” said Alice, “my point is that you're clearly not unattractive to women. I mean, Sally wasn't even a Jäger, for goodness' sake.”
Ottokar, who was considerably better informed than Alice on that last point, summoned a magnificent poker face as he replied, “Vell, hy don't know. Maybe hy yust not met der right girl yet. Ve live a long time, so vot's der hurry?”
“Aren't you lonely?” asked Alice.
“Vot a veird qvestion!” said Ottokar. “Vy vould hy be lonely? Hy got lots of goot friends now. Und most nights hy go to Drauka's und ve have a goot brawl.”
Alice shook her head. “Each to their own. I don't mind fighting when I have to, but I don't think I'll ever enjoy it for its own sake.”
“Dat's because hyu don't see fighting der vay Jägers do,” he replied. “Is like a schport. De bar brawls, is no malice in dem. Ven ve finish fighting, ve all buy vun anodder drinks und schtart singing. After ve put de furniture back, obviously.”
“Yes, but... well, not all of your people are so nice about it,” said Alice. “I mean, I think maybe the nicer ones end up over here, where there's no real warfare for them to be involved in. But I have heard about the wild ones.”
“Ja,” said Ottokar sombrely. “But is like hy alvays say. Any kind of pipple, der going to be goot vuns und bad vuns. Is how it goes.”
When they reached their lodgings, a Service house discreetly disguised under the name of the “Park Hotel”, Alice turned to Ottokar as she was unlocking the door. “What shall I wear?” she asked.
“Hy don't know,” replied Ottokar. “At least hyu know hyu not going to clash vit Mrs Chadvick, votever hyu vear.”
“That's what makes it rather difficult. Mrs Chadwick's mourning, that is. I don't want to be too gaudy, even if I do dislike the woman. I suppose she hasn't mentioned to you who she's mourning yet, has she? She seems to like you.”
Ottokar shrugged. “Is probably not a polite qvestion to ask.”
Alice considered. “I'll wear the grey, I think. A bit monochrome, but at least she can't accuse me of making her look drab. And my pearls. Pearls are good for a smart afternoon tea.”
“Ve going for schmot?” asked Ottokar.
“Yes, but not evening smart,” replied Alice. “If you want my advice, I suggest that waistcoat with the matching cravat.”
“Goot!” exclaimed Ottokar. “Hy like vearing dat, but hyu alvays say is too schmot for der office.”
“Not exactly too smart,” said Alice. “More like too fancy. But it'll be perfect for this afternoon.”
She vanished into her room, and Ottokar into his. He was the first to emerge, but only by a narrow margin; once Alice had decided what to wear, she could change surprisingly fast, especially considering all the awkward fastenings. She looked at him with an approving smile.
“Quite the Jäger about town,” she said. “All you need now is a cane.”
“But hy can valk yust fine!” Ottokar protested.
Alice rolled her eyes. “Not for walking. For fashion. Haven't you seen all those foppish young men who lounge around Piccadilly with nothing to do? Every last one of them's got a cane, and they all suck the ends, too, for some strange reason. I'm not suggesting you do that, but a cane, in itself, is an elegant accessory. It would be the finishing touch to that splendid outfit you're wearing.”
“Ja, but hyu got to carry it, und it takes up vun hand,” Ottokar objected. “Hy like both hands free. Anyvay, hy not an idle rich fop. Hy a vorking Jäger.”
Alice grinned. “Have it your own way. Come on. We'd better get a cab from here.”
They were, in the end, comfortably on time, and Mrs Chadwick joined them a few minutes later from another cab. She was still, of course, in mourning, but it was now silk rather than her usual sombre crape, and she had on a more elaborate hat than usual, though it was still black.
The door was opened by a mechanical footman, who took their cards upstairs and returned in a few moments to show them up to the parlour. The inventor of Buckingham's Buckram, clad in a dark green silk gown, rose to greet them. Her sister Constance remained on the chaise longue by the window, working on some embroidery.
“I'm so pleased to meet you,” said Adelaide Buckingham, stepping forward to shake their hands. “I'm sorry Constance is unable to stand. She is a little unwell at the moment, but she wanted to see you.”
Constance, who did look extremely pale, smiled and greeted them. On the mend, thought Alice, with a quick glance at her eyes; I expect she's had that stomach problem that's been going round.
Adelaide ushered them into chairs. As they sat down, Alice said, “I'm very honoured to meet you, too. Your buckram is a wonderful invention. I made this hat with it.”
Adelaide beamed. “Oh, you did a beautiful job! I would never have known it wasn't professionally made. The little flowers – did you make those too?”
“Yes. I cut out all the petals, hung them from a wire hoop and dip-dyed them using madder to get the gradient, then I made little clay forms, curved the petals over those and used the wand.”
“What a pity you're not a spark,” said Adelaide, admiringly. “With that artistic eye and attention to detail, you could build some really beautiful machines.”
Alice smiled. “Two of my best friends are sparks, and I'm content with that.”
“Oh! Anyone I know?”
“Charles and Hilde Greenwood.”
“Doesn't ring a bell,” replied Adelaide, “but then, sparks don't all know one another. Now, er... Ottokar, isn't it? That's a little informal. Do you have another name?”
“Ja, but hy a Jäger,” replied Ottokar. “Hy yust go by Ottokar.”
“Well, I certainly owe you special gratitude, considering you were the one who personally got me off that terrible woman's ship,” she said. “And I must apologise for flinching when I first saw you. Those other three...”
“Don't hyu vorry,” said Ottokar. “Dose odder tree vere bad Jägers, und if hyu hadn't met any goot vuns, how vere hyu to know?”
“You may like to know,” said Mrs Chadwick, “that the terrible woman will now be standing trial in March. It would have been January, but a few more charges have been added to the sheet in the meantime. Her ship was searched very thoroughly, and I won't upset Miss Temple here by going into detail about what they found, since she is feeling delicate.”
“I think I can guess,” said Constance, with a shudder.
“Will she hang?” asked Adelaide. It was said curiously rather than vindictively.
“She should by rights,” replied Mrs Chadwick, “but she's hired herself an excellent lawyer, so I'm afraid if there is any loophole at all she may escape through it.”
Adelaide rang the bell. “Perhaps it might be a good thing to turn our minds to more pleasant subjects, such as tea. While we're waiting for the maid to bring it in, I have some little tokens of appreciation for you.” She went to the mantelpiece and returned with something in her hands. When she opened them, the three agents saw that she was holding three pendants on gold chains, each with a large cabochon stone in a green like new beech leaves.
“You worked out, among yourselves, what my two chalcedony pendants did,” she explained, “and that helped you to rescue both me and Mr Holmes. These, therefore, seem to be particularly appropriate for you, especially given the nature of your work. They are made from peridot, a mineral with some very interesting properties; I could use almost any mineral for the basic matrix, but the peridot has allowed me to create an enhanced version. Incidentally, I have also given pendants to Mr Holmes and Dr Watson, but those are independent of yours. They do not communicate with them.”
She handed them each a pendant as the maid came in with the tea, and all murmured their thanks. Mrs Chadwick assumed her most professional smile as Ottokar and Alice immediately fastened theirs around their necks, Ottokar slipping his under the cravat.
“I am most appreciative of your kindness, Mrs Buckingham,” she said, “but I trust you understand I am not able to wear your beautiful gift just at the moment, since I am in mourning.”
“Of course I understand, Mrs Chadwick,” replied Adelaide, “and please accept my sincere condolences on your loss. Had I known, I would have considered using black onyx; it is not quite as powerful as the peridot for what I had in mind, but it would have been appropriate to your situation.”
Mrs Chadwick put the pendant into her reticule with great care to avoid tangling the chain. “You are most thoughtful,” she said, “and I can assure you that when it is possible for it to be used, it will be invaluable.”
They took tea, and also cake in most cases; the exception was Constance, which went some way to confirming Alice's suspicions about her illness. They chatted about a number of lighter things, in particular about Mr Sherlock Holmes, who, it appeared, had now become something approaching a friend of Adelaide's; which was to say, he called once a week when not too busy, talked a little about his work, and encouraged her to talk a lot about her inventions.
Ottokar grinned. “Dat sounds like Mister Holmes,” he observed. “He not a schpark, but hyu bet he vishes he vos.”
They all laughed. “He is very intelligent, even so,” said Adelaide. “I enjoy his company. Although I've had to ask him not to smoke in here. It makes me cough.”
“Oh!” said Constance. “That reminds me. Last time they were here, Dr Watson was wanting to know how he could contact Mr Wooster. He says he's disappeared again. You three know him; could you pass on a message?”
“Of course,” said Alice.
“Well, one of the Baker Street Irregulars, as they call them, provided an especially vital clue in finding where Mr Holmes had been taken,” Constance explained. “Her name was Maisie Arkwright. She couldn't read, but she could draw, so she copied down the number of the cab in which she saw Mr Holmes. Mr Wooster promised that if Mr Holmes was found, he would see to it that she got an education. Dr Watson would just like Mr Wooster to know that she has started school and says she is really enjoying it.”
Alice smiled. “I shall most certainly let him know next time I write. Thank you for telling us.”
“Did he, now?” asked Mrs Chadwick, with interest. “That was not something he put in his official handover report.”
Ottokar shrugged. “Hy don't suppose he needed to. Vos his own money, after all.”
“Ah,” said Mrs Chadwick, half smiling. “And you arranged it on his behalf, did you?”
“Vell, he could hardly do it himself. He vos elsevhere,” replied Ottokar simply.
Alice took refuge behind her fan, aware of the triumphant expression which was doing its best to take over her face.
It was only when they were finally back outside in the street, after a very pleasant and convivial afternoon, that Mrs Chadwick reached into her reticule again and took out the peridot pendant. She held it up, letting it glint in the inconstant afternoon sunlight.
“Well,” she said. “Obviously I couldn't possibly offend Mrs Buckingham when she has been so generous, but naturally I can't wear this.”
“So the mourning was merely an excuse, then?” asked Alice drily. She had to work hard to keep the hostility out of her voice.
“Of course it was. What sort of person do you take me for?”
I could answer that one if you really want, thought Alice.
“I can't wear it,” Mrs Chadwick went on, “because it is not mine to wear. I did not earn it. I was in command of that rescue vessel only by force of circumstances beyond the control of any of us. This pendant belongs to Mr Ardsley Wooster, and I should be much obliged if one of you could send it to him at the earliest opportunity.”
Alice's jaw dropped.
“Well, I don't see what you're so surprised about, Miss Davenport,” said Mrs Chadwick tartly. “I trust you haven't taken a dislike to him or anything.”
II. Mr Wooster Has Visitors
“Dis is going to be fun,” said Ottokar, back at the Park Hotel.
“What is?” asked Alice. She was still in something approaching a state of shock.
“Hyu know. Vorking out exactly vot dese tings do. Hy like dat Mrs Buckingham. She knew ve'd vant to vork it out ourselves.”
Alice considered this. “Well, she did say they were an improvement on the originals, but that's about par for the course with a spark.” A thought struck her. “Do they, er, actually do the same as the originals as well? Because if they do, I suppose I owe you an apology for making you see double when Mrs Chadwick dropped her bombshell.”
“Heh,” said Ottokar. “No. Vhich is probably a goot ting if Mr Vooster's getting vun.”
Alice blushed scarlet. “Ottokar!”
“Vell, hy can't help it if de original vuns vere activated by schtrong emotions,” he said.
“All right, I do take your point,” said Alice, hastily recovering her dignity. “It could indeed have been quite embarrassing. Especially if he doesn't know, as we think.”
“Hy suppose he got to find out sooner or later,” said Ottokar, “but probably dat not der best vay.” He considered. “Mind hyu, is a bit ambiguous. Vit der previous design, if his pendant suddenly schtarted vorking, he vouldn't know if hyu vos in deadly peril or yust having vun of hyu Yane Austen moments.”
“Oh, Lord,” said Alice. “And neither would you. I'm really glad she's improved the design, because it could all have got distinctly theatrical otherwise.”
Ottokar fished out his pendant from beneath his cravat. “Hokay. So ve see vot dey do now.”
The pendant seemed to glow a little more as he touched it than it should have done given the ambient lighting, but nothing else appeared to happen. Alice held her own pendant; it did likewise.
“Now what?” she said.
“Vell, it doesn't vork yust off emotions, so probably dat means dere's some vay of controlling it,” replied Ottokar logically.
“I know that, but how?”
Ottokar took out the third pendant from his top waistcoat pocket and laid it down on the kitchen table. “Hokay. Ve got tree of dem. Maybe ve don't alvays vant to talk to both de odders at vunce. So hy reckon, first ting ve got to do is tell de pendants who dey belong to.” He held his up in front of his face. “Hy Ottokar. Hyu got dat?”
“Ottokar,” said a genderless alto voice from somewhere within its depths. “Confirmed.”
“Ve getting somevhere,” grinned Ottokar.
Alice did the same. “I'm Alice.”
“Alice,” said her pendant, in an identical voice. “Confirmed.”
“Do you think we should set Mr Wooster's for him or leave him to do that himself?” asked Alice. “I mean, normally the answer would be obvious, but I'm thinking about security. If we set it for him, nobody else can take it and use it.”
“Ja,” said Ottokar, “but how vill it know it's de real him ven it meets him? Hy say ve leave it.”
“All right,” said Alice. “That makes sense.” She gazed into the green depths of her own pendant. “Alice speaking. I would like to talk to Ottokar, please.”
“Confirmed,” said the pendant. It seemed to have a very limited vocabulary of its own.
Ottokar's pendant immediately glowed so brightly that there was no mistake. “Alice, for Ottokar,” it said.
“Hallo, Ottokar,” said Alice, a little self-consciously. Her words echoed through the pendant, an instant behind the original speech.
“Hy say ve go into our rooms und try from dere,” said Ottokar. That echoed too, back through Alice's pendant.
“No need. It's clear it works,” replied Alice and her echo. “How do you shut it off?”
“Close der link,” Ottokar tried. It worked. “Vell,” he said, “dat vos simple enough. Hy expect dere are odder phrases ve can use.”
“I hope it works well over a long distance,” said Alice. “It won't be a lot of use Mr Wooster having one if we can't talk over it.”
“Only vun vay to find out,” replied Ottokar. “Hyu vant to send it, hy expect?”
“Well... I'm not sure. It might look a bit odd from me, even though of course it's from Mrs Buckingham really. Would you like to send it?”
“Hy don't mind, vhichever vay,” said Ottokar equably.
“Still,” said Alice thoughtfully, “I suppose it is a good excuse to write a letter out of turn. Yes. Perhaps I will send it, after all.”
“Hy not sure dis whole romance ting isn't more trouble dan it vorth,” said Ottokar.
“Well, really, we haven't actually got a romance at the moment,” replied Alice, a little hotly. “That is the main problem.”
“Vould be a big problem even if hyu had,” Ottokar pointed out, in his usual pragmatic way. “Vot vit him being vherever he is, und hyu being here.”
“Yes, well,” said Alice, “I'm not the only one, after all. There are plenty of people who are in love with sailors and people like that. If they can handle it, so can I.”
Ottokar shrugged. “Hokay. Hyu vant cottage pie for dinner?”
Alice narrowed her eyes. “Sometimes, you do take things a good deal too literally.”
“Vot hyu expect? Hy a Jäger. Is not like ve really do subtle.”
“I'm sure you genuinely believe that, but as a matter of fact you can be as subtle as anyone when you like,” said Alice. “Just because you have the physical strength of ten...”
“At least tventy. Please.”
“However many. It doesn't matter. Just because you have superhuman strength, then, doesn't mean you also have to barge through metaphor and allusion all the time like a bull in a china shop. You were quick enough to notice I was in love with him in the first place.”
“Vell, hokay,” said Ottokar. “But even if hyu vant to sit like Patience on a monument schmiling at grief, hy schtill vant to know vot hyu fancy for dinner.”
Alice gaped at him. “That's Shakespeare. You quoted Shakespeare!”
“Ja. Und...?”
“Well, bang goes your 'I'm just a great big blundering Jäger' argument right there.”
“Hyu got a point,” agreed Ottokar amiably. “Hokay. Hy yust a great big blundering Jäger vot can qvote bits of Shakespeare. Now, hyu vant cottage pie or hyu don't? Yust let me know und hyu can go right back on hyu monument.”
Alice laughed in spite of herself, which had evidently been Ottokar's intention all along. “You are quite impossible sometimes,” she said. “And cottage pie would be lovely. Thank you. What are you having?”
“Nearly de same ting, but vit green lentils. Is very tasty.”
* * * * *
“Damn,” muttered Ardsley Wooster. “Damn, damn, damn. And possibly again damn.”
He was well aware that this lacked something in sheer inventiveness by comparison to Gil's tirade the other night, but then he was not Gil, and he was unused to swearing at all. It was something he normally only ever did when he was, as now, safely in the privacy of his own room, and very rarely even then.
He could see the future looming up ahead of him like an enraged battle clank. It was even less attractive. Gil's tirade had been one thing; things invariably seemed a lot worse to Gil when he was in one of his moods, and Mr Wooster was quite used to that. The disquieting thing was that it wasn't just Gil. He had talked to a number of people since his return; that was his job, after all. Talking to people, and listening to the answers he got. They had not been comforting answers.
Just when he'd been thinking he might be able to dig himself out of the trouble he'd got into by being unmasked by the Baron. Just when he'd been starting to congratulate himself on the fact that he'd even managed to turn that to general advantage. Oh, Gil wouldn't need to get him into any extra trouble in order to keep him. That would happen all by itself. Unless some miracle happened, the whole of Europa was about to get... really messy.
And he'd get the blame for failing to stop it.
Oh, not from Mrs Chadwick. She'd trained him, just like he'd been training Ottokar and Alice. She believed in him. She was proud of him; he was the youngest agent at his level of seniority in the Service, and that was mostly her doing. But her superiors were a very different matter.
It wasn't that they were in any doubt that he was a good agent. It was just that, knowing that, they expected perfection.
Mr Wooster lay back on the bed and heaved a sigh. He remembered, only a few weeks ago, though it seemed like years, clattering down the steep hill from Oxenholme station into Kendal in Charles and Hilde Greenwood's dual-powered jalopy Bertha, talking to Ottokar. And one of the very first things Ottokar had said to him was, “Hyu a goot man. But hyu yust Mister Vooster. Hyu not Gott.”
“It's my bosses you need to say that to, Ottokar,” Mr Wooster murmured sadly. “I'm not the one who needs convincing.”
There was a tap on the door. “Who's that?” he called.
“It's meeeeee!” said a cheerful voice. Cheerful, that is, with a side order of hellish.
“I'm sorry, Dupree,” he said. “You can't come in. I'm in my night clothes.”
“Oooh!”
Mr Wooster groaned and put a hand to his brow. “Stop that. You've tried to kill me more than once. I am not interested in a seduction attempt, least of all from you. Go away, Dupree.”
“Well,” she said. “Don't ever call me unreasonable. I'll give you a choice. I can break the door down and ogle you, or you can tell me what happened to my dear sister, because I think you might just have some idea.”
“Oh, well, that's easier than most of your choices,” replied Mr Wooster. “Although I do reserve the right to call you unreasonable, following your various murder attempts. Your dear sister was arrested in London on charges of... let me see if I can remember them all... attempted murder, kidnapping, piracy, smuggling, theft, causing an affray... oh, and I do believe there were a few more added later after they finished searching her ship. It was all in the papers.”
“And might you perchance have had anything to do with her arrest?” asked Dupree, with perilous sweetness.
Mr Wooster was well aware that the door provided very little real protection. However, he was no coward. He reached under the pillow for his Service pistol, just in case it should be required.
“Yes,” he said, simply.
“Oooh!” squealed Dupree. “Then I might just not kill you after all.” There was a beat. “You suuuuuure you don't want to let me in? I mean, you've been looking a bit careworn since you got back. You wouldn't care for a little light entertainment?”
Mr Wooster shuddered. “No. Thank you.”
“Oh, have it your own way.” Mr Wooster could picture the toss of the head now. “But, hey, you got my sister. I reckon that deserves a little respect.” She paused again. “For now. Goodnight!”
“Goodnight, Dupree,” said Mr Wooster, with the politeness that was second nature to him. As her footsteps vanished away down the corridor, he added in an undertone, “Good Lord.”
He carefully replaced the pistol and flicked out the reading lamp. It had probably been showing under the door, and he did not want any more visitors tonight. It was a little early to attempt to sleep, but perhaps...
Tap. Tap.
“Goodnight, Dupree,” he said, through his teeth.
“Do I look like Dupree?” snapped an irritable voice on the other side of the door.
Mr Wooster sighed, flicked the lamp on again, got out of bed and opened the door. “No,” he replied. “But you have to admit I was in no position to tell.”
“I don't have to admit anything,” retorted Krosp. “You'd better be nice to me. You've got bare legs.”
Mr Wooster shut the door behind the cat. “I am not in a good mood myself, Krosp, and as you might be able to deduce, I have just been further rattled by a visit from our friend the pirate queen. If you scratch my legs, I will bowl you down that corridor as though there were a set of ninepins at the other end.”
Krosp blinked. He was not used to this from Mr Wooster. “All right, all right. No need to be like that.” He looked at him sidelong. “What did Dupree want? Your guts for garters?”
“Not quite as much as usual. She wanted to know if I'd helped to get her sister arrested. I had.”
“And you told her?”
“Yes. She seemed quite happy about it. Apparently they don't get on.” Mr Wooster sat down on the edge of the bed. “So what do you want, Krosp? I was just about to turn in.”
“...that's actually quite a nice nightshirt,” said the cat. “I mean, if you just had a pair of trousers to go with it, it'd almost look like, well, sleep uniform.”
“Get on with it, Krosp,” sighed Mr Wooster. “I know you're a cat, but do you think you could manage to avoid running after distractions just this one time?”
“Well, you don't often see a nightshirt like that,” said Krosp.
“And you're a connoisseur of them, are you? - no, don't answer that. Don't even think about answering that. Just tell me what you're doing here. That's all I need.”
“It's the collar,” said Krosp. “Gives it a real air of distinction. I mean, you could sew on a pair of epaulettes...”
“KROSP!”
“Oh, all right.” The cat reached inside his military-looking jacket. “Here. For you. This one's got something in it, so I thought I'd better make double sure it didn't get intercepted.”
Mr Wooster deflated a little. “Oh. Thank you.” He took the letter; the handwriting was Alice's.
“Well?” said Krosp. “Aren't you going to open it?”
Mr Wooster hesitated momentarily, and then thought, “Well, what does it matter? The whole of Europa appears to be going to the devil in any case. I don't suppose this will make things go any more wrong.” He slit the envelope open with a blunt thumbnail. Out fell the green peridot pendant.
“Well, that's extraordinary,” he said, turning to the letter. “Oh, I see! It's from the lady I helped to, er, unkidnap, if you like.”
“She's got nice writing,” said Krosp.
“Not hers. She sent it through someone else.”
“You're not going to wear it, are you?” asked Krosp. “It's a bit girly.”
“If you honestly think my masculinity is going to be threatened by a piece of jewellery, you must have some very strange ideas about humans,” replied Mr Wooster, rather loftily.
“Not just my ideas, kiddo. Can you picture someone like Martellus von Blitzengaard wearing a thing like that?”
“It would clash with his hair,” said Mr Wooster, deadpan. He fastened the pendant around his neck. “If it makes you feel any better, there's a Jäger wearing one of these things back in London. He also helped rescue the lady.”
“Yeah, well, I suppose if a Jäger decides something's masculine, it's masculine,” said Krosp.
“I trust Your Feline Majesty is going to allow me the same privilege?” said Mr Wooster. He immediately felt a little bad about it. He disliked sarcasm in general, and preferred to avoid using it even on Krosp, who, heaven knew, asked for it enough.
“I might,” replied Krosp. Mr Wooster relaxed. The cat was impervious.
“Good,” he said. “Now, thank you again, and this has been a most delightful conversation, but if you don't mind I am cranky and tired, and I want to sleep.”
“Oh, all right. I'll just push off and catch a few rats, then.”
“You do that,” said Mr Wooster, getting up again to open the door. “Before they all leave the sinking ship.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Bad mood. Goodnight, Krosp.”
He settled back into bed and read the letter more thoroughly, with increasing interest. The information about the pendant was obviously both important and comforting, but it was even more immediately warming to see that there was no trace in this letter of the rather poorly concealed dislike of Mrs Chadwick which had struck a sour note in most of her previous letters. That, at least, was a relief, whatever else might be going wrong. It was also much more like the Alice he knew, who was generally a pretty shrewd judge of character.
He re-read the instructions one more time. Then he raised the pendant, which glowed slightly, and opened his mouth to speak.
He closed it again. He had been going to say “I am Wooster,” but in the circumstances it suddenly seemed ridiculously formal. If he managed to survive the impending cataclysm, the odds were good that he would never see his home or his friends again. If all he could ever do was talk to two of them from afar, was he really going to want them to call him Wooster for whatever remained of his life?
The pendant seemed to be looking at him, waiting. Just his imagination, perhaps.
“I am Ardsley,” he said, firmly.
“Ardsley,” it repeated back to him. “Confirmed.”
“This is Ardsley. I would like to talk to Ottokar.”
He waited. The pendant glowed more brightly, but nothing happened. He rolled onto his side and peered at his alarm clock in the dim light. Which way did the time difference go, again? He could never remember. But either way, there was a good chance that the Jäger would by now be happily throwing punches in Drauka's bar without an atom of malicious intent.
If only all fights were like those.
“Close the link, please,” he said. “This is Ardsley. I would like to talk to Alice.”
She would be in. She would answer. When she was settled in one place and had nothing particular to do, she enjoyed going to evening lectures, but she did not do that in London; the training was quite enough, especially since in her case it leaned towards the military. All she wanted to do in the evenings at the moment was curl up with a good book, or sometimes do a little needlework. It was, unsurprisingly, hats at the moment. Alice had a talent for making hats. She was so good at the tiny details.
The pendant was still glowing.
Still nothing. No friendly voice. Nothing but that little glow of light like an otherworldly spring.
“Alice?”
“Unable to connect,” said the pendant, without emotion. “Ceasing attempt. Ceased. Confirmed.”
Mr Wooster let the pendant fall onto his chest, bowed his head, and realised he was doing something he had not done since the death of his mother, back when he was nine years old. He was crying.
Well, he was on his own, and maybe at least the tears would be some release. He let them flow, slowly, as though they were being squeezed out of him; racking sobs, though less dignified, might have done the job more effectively, but they would not come and he had no intention of forcing them. He pulled a handkerchief from the other side of the pillow and wiped the tears from his face. He realised that he had never felt so utterly wretched, powerless and alone in his entire life.
He recalled the pistol. The tears ceased.
Well. It might be better than any of the other possibilities.
To be, or not to be? That was, suddenly, the question.
A voice almost made him jump out of the bed. “Ardsley, old man,” it said. “Don't.”
The voice was his own.
He blinked. This had to be some kind of hallucination, brought on by his unusually overwrought condition. Standing at the foot of the bed was... Ardsley Wooster. This version of him was dressed in a high-collared shirt, like the ones he usually wore, and his dark red jacket with the gold buttons.
“What?” he managed. It wasn't very polite, but, after all, he was talking to himself. Apparently.
“I said, don't. I know what you're thinking. Don't do it. If you do, more lives are going to be lost than just yours. Trust me on this. I'm you, after all.”
“You're me? Well, you're certainly a very good imitation. But how on earth did you get in here?”
“That's kind of complicated,” said Wooster Mark II. “But I assure you, you will find out. Later.”
“That is not entirely reassuring,” replied Wooster Mark I.
“Would it help if I told you I'd just confused the life out of Dupree?”
“That rather depends on how she reacted,” said Wooster Mark I nervously. “She's just... er...”
Wooster Mark II winced sympathetically. “Yes, I know what she's just done. But it's all right. She thinks I'm a hallucination too. I didn't give her time to find out otherwise.”
“Good,” said Wooster Mark I. “I think.”
“It is. She'll avoid you for a bit, and that will be good for your mental health. Do you have the faintest idea how badly stressed you are at the moment?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry. Rhetorical question. If you weren't badly stressed, you wouldn't be thinking about that pistol. Oh, you'll want to know about the pendant. It's just distance coupled with some poor reception at the moment. There are thunderstorms. It does work, sometimes. You're not totally cut off from your friends. And there is a way you'll be able to see them again, as long as you can at least manage to stay alive. Even get home from time to time.”
Wooster Mark I eyed his doppelganger thoughtfully. “How do I know you're not just a figment of my overheated imagination?” he asked. “Telling me what I want to hear?”
The other Wooster sighed. “I'm so suspicious, I can't even trust myself, apparently,” he said. “Here. Shake hands. See if I'm a figment.” He thrust out a hand.
Wooster Mark I took it gingerly. It was solid enough. A thought struck him. “Have you got one of those pendants?” he asked.
Wooster Mark II pulled it out from under his collar. “Naturally. I have the same pendant that you have. I am you.”
“All right. Call Ottokar.”
“I can't. Not from here. Thunderstorms, remember?”
“Oh, yes. Thunderstorms.”
“All right. Got to go before you start asking too many questions. You'll certainly ask them, but you need to get the answers on your own.” The doppelganger smiled. “Just remember. You've got to live. It's crucial. That's why I took all the trouble to tell you. Oh, and... see Higgs.”
He vanished.
Mr Wooster stared for several minutes into the void his doppelganger had just been occupying, then muttered, “I give up,” flicked off the light again, and buried his head under the covers. He was, he decided, probably losing his mind. Perhaps a good sleep would encourage it to come back. He needed it.
III. The Greenwoods Also Have Visitors
Hilde Greenwood was knitting. This was not, in itself, an unusual occupation for a respectable middle-aged lady such as Hilde, but it has to be remembered that she was a spark. That explained, insofar as anything ever possibly could, why the knitting was floating gently in the air in front of her, rather than hanging down in the usual way into her lap.
“Doesn't it make it awkward to knit?” asked her husband Charles. “I mean, doesn't it lift the needles in your hands?”
“It may if I knit a large enough sample,” replied Hilde. “But this is just a test run.”
“What are you planning to use it for?” His blue eyes gleamed with excitement. “Could you make an actual flying carpet?”
“Possibly, dear,” said Hilde placidly. “But I thought flying sweaters might be quite fun.”
“It's got so much potential!” Charles exclaimed. “Does it have to be textiles, or could it...? You know, this could revolutionise our entire fleet of airships!”
She looked over her glasses. “I think you're running a little ahead of yourself, darling.”
“But can you lend me a little of it? I've got to do some experiments with it, now!”
“Only if you promise to do them outside, away from any buildings. You know what very nearly happened last night.”
Charles glanced out of the window. “It's raining.”
“Then you can borrow some tomorrow afternoon, when we're out and about anyway. I really don't think it's safe for you to invent things in hotels. Not when you're short of sleep, at any rate.”
“Short of sleep is relative,” Charles pleaded. “I really don't do so badly on two hours.”
“You ought to see yourself in the morning. Honestly. Now, are there any possible clues in the local paper?”
He sighed. “None at all. I think this is the most intractable case we've ever dealt with, don't you? There's not a shred of evidence anywhere. Just three sparks, all dead, in various parts of Salisbury.”
“What sort of person goes round killing sparks in this country?” asked Hilde, not for the first time. “On the Continent, I admit I can sort of understand it, but here?”
“Any maniac can take it into their head to kill sparks,” replied Charles. “What's really puzzling me is how they manage, in one of our three cases, to get into a locked room to do it.”
“Yes, and it's still puzzling the police,” said Hilde. “Oh, I haven't told you yet, have I? I didn't really want to talk shop over dinner. I finally managed to talk to the inspector in charge of the case. She has a rather odd theory. She thinks it's another spark.”
Charles blinked. “Why?”
“Well, because a spark weapon was used,” replied Hilde, “but of course we knew that. And there are plenty of those around that don't need a spark to use them. But she thinks it could be some kind of rogue spark who's jealous of other sparks. I suppose we can't totally discount the idea, but there's now only one spark left in the area and he seems to be genuinely afraid for his life.”
A maid tapped at the door. “Mr and Mrs Greenwood?”
“Yes?” said Hilde.
“Gentleman to see you. Professor Quagmire.”
They exchanged puzzled glances. “All right,” said Charles. “Please show him in.”
The maid hurried off, returning shortly with a large, bluff, bearded man wearing a decidedly battered-looking hat. “Well, well, well!” he exclaimed happily. “I saw your names in the visitors' book, so of course I couldn't possibly fail to come and see you. What a delightful surprise! And how are you both keeping? How are Miss Davenport and Mr Wooster and, er... the Jäger, I'm so sorry, I've forgotten his name, most remiss of me?”
They both stared blankly at him. “Um... the maid said your name was Professor Quagmire,” said Charles. “Is that correct? I'm terribly sorry, but I'm afraid I have no recollection of you at all.”
Quagmire stared back. “You don't remember me? Horace Rutherford Quagmire, DPhil? The one whose life you saved a few years ago, not far from this very city? Don't you recall the dig at Stonehenge?”
“You're an archaeologist?” Hilde hazarded.
He looked absolutely crushed. “You don't remember me in the slightest, do you? I'm so sorry for disturbing you.” He turned to leave.
“No, no, wait,” said Charles quickly. “There is something going on here that we don't understand, and perhaps if you stay we might get to the bottom of it. Please, Professor, take a seat.”
Quagmire sat down, very self-consciously. “You don't even recognise me,” he said.
“No, we don't,” replied Charles, “but I think there may be a good reason for that. Please rest assured that if circumstances were normal, you would be absolutely unforgettable. You have a very distinctive name and appearance. Therefore, we can safely conclude that circumstances are not normal.”
Quagmire relaxed a little. “Well, I can assure you, I remember both of you very well, and the other three. The Jäger... was he Otto? It was something like that.”
“Close,” replied Hilde. “His name is Ottokar.”
“Thank you. And a remarkable character he was, too.”
“He is,” agreed Charles. “But I suspect that neither he nor the others will remember you any better than we do. You see, I was born here in Salisbury, and that is why I happen to recall Alice – that is, Miss Davenport – mentioning that she had never been here.”
Quagmire frowned. “But that's extraordinary! I met all of you here. Well, Stonehenge, at least, which is hardly a million miles away. Are you certain she hasn't been to Stonehenge?”
“I'm afraid so, Professor,” replied Hilde. “I remember that conversation. Charles said that if she did visit Salisbury, Stonehenge was one of the places she should see, and she said she would very much like to go. And this was... well, about June, I believe.”
“What, June this year?” asked Quagmire. “But it must be over ten years since you saved my life!”
“Ah!” exclaimed Hilde. “Over ten years? How old, at a rough guess, was Miss Davenport at the time?”
“Well, er, I don't like to guess a lady's age, but... early twenties?”
“Good grief,” said Charles. “And Ottokar has been a Jäger for only a few months. I see what's been happening.”
“Absolutely,” said Hilde. “Professor Quagmire, Miss Davenport is twenty-two years old at the moment. Therefore, at the time you were rescued, our version of her would have been no more than a child.”
Quagmire blinked. “Your version? There are two?”
“It's time travel,” Charles explained. “I don't understand how it comes about, but that is what has to have happened. The events you are talking about, which are over ten years in your past, have not happened to us yet. They are in our future.”
Quagmire gaped. “But that's remarkable! I suppose it does make sense, looking at you. You both ought to be at least sixty now, but you haven't changed in the slightest respect since I saw you last.” He looked at Hilde more closely. “Why, that's even the same dress.”
“Oh dear,” said Hilde. “That does rather suggest it's about to happen quite soon.”
“Indeed,” said Charles. “We hadn't actually planned any time travelling. Although, of course, if it means we save your life, we'll be quite happy to do so. We'd just... um... quite like to know when it starts.”
“At least we've now got a warning, dear,” said Hilde. “That's something.”
“Well!” said Quagmire. “This is extraordinary.”
“It is, rather,” Charles admitted. “I mean, we've not actually done it before.”
“We did try once,” added Hilde, “but something crucial exploded.”
“I probably hadn't had enough coffee,” said Charles, lugubriously.
“Do you suppose we need to start building another device?” asked Hilde.
“Well, possibly,” said Charles, “but what's puzzling me is the other three. Ottokar and Alice are in London at the moment, at least as far as we know, and Mr Wooster is very definitely out of the country.”
“Yes,” said Hilde. “Poor Alice does seem rather upset about that. I do wonder, you know.”
“I can't imagine Mr Wooster is feeling much better about it himself,” replied Charles. To be fair to him, the suggestion would not normally have whooshed straight over his head, but he was thinking extremely hard about time travel, which is enough to distract any spark.
“Well. Er,” said Quagmire. “Should I, perhaps, take my leave? I'm sorry to have been the author of any confusion.”
“You really needn't apologise, Professor,” said Hilde warmly. “You were a great deal more confused than we were, and you've done us a service, albeit unwittingly.”
“Well. Happy to,” replied Quagmire. “After all, you did save my life. That is, will save my life. Er... will have saved my life. Will save my life in the past? I'm afraid this business makes tenses a little awkward.”
“Have saved it from your point of view, will save it from ours,” said Hilde practically. “And we're very happy to. To have. To be going to.”
Quagmire considered this. “What happens if you don't, though?”
“Why wouldn't we?” asked Charles, much more surprised than offended.
“Well. Something might go wrong. You might miss the right time. You mightn't see what was going on. All sorts of things might happen. We don't know, because from your point of view it's all in the future, after all.”
“Yes, but for you it's already happened and you're here to prove it,” Hilde pointed out. “If we didn't save your life in our future, you couldn't be coming here to see us now.”
“Oh dear,” said Quagmire. “This is giving me a headache. I think, if you don't mind, I'll go to bed.”
“We don't, but it's been absolutely lovely to meet you, Professor,” said Hilde. “And thank you so much again for letting us know. Even if that wasn't remotely what you thought you were doing.”
“Well, goodnight, both of you. I do hope you get it sorted out,” he said, a little nervously.
When he had left, the Greenwoods exchanged puzzled looks. “Ottokar, Alice and Mr Wooster,” said Charles.
“I know,” said Hilde. “That's the strangest part of the whole thing.”
Charles was just opening his mouth to say something when there was a green flash in the air, and there appeared within it a tall figure with a mop of pale grey hair and a beard to match. He wore a chunky blue sweater and some kind of sun visor; he was beaming from ear to ear and displaying a mouthful of perfect white teeth; and he was carrying what looked suspiciously like some kind of death ray.
“Good evening, unfortunate sparks!” he exclaimed. “Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Othar Tryggvassen, GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER!”
“So why 'unfortunate'?” asked Charles.
“And why the capital letters?” added Hilde.
“Well, you're unfortunate because I'm about to kill you,” explained Othar heartily, “but it's only polite to introduce myself first. As for the capital letters, well, trademark, you know?”
“Killing people doesn't seem terribly gentlemanly to me,” said Charles, rather severely. “Which school did you go to?”
“My dear,” said Hilde, “he's... Norwegian, or something. They may have totally different ideas about what constitutes a gentleman in Norway.”
“Congratulations, madam!” exclaimed Othar, beaming even more broadly. “Yes, I am indeed from Norway.”
“So why,” asked Hilde, “are you planning to kill us?”
“Because I must kill all sparks!” he replied. “It is the great mission of my life to eradicate this terrible evil from the world. And then, of course, when I have killed all the others, it will be my solemn duty to kill myself, for, I confess, I too am a spark.”
Charles stared at him. “You're insane,” he said. “We're not evil. Ask anyone.”
“Of course I'm insane!” exploded Othar. “Doesn't it go with the territory?”
“Well, we're not,” said Hilde. “And I suppose you killed those other sparks.”
“Of course,” said Othar, proudly.
“But you...” Charles began.
“Enough talk! We do not want your quaintly named Professor to decide to come wandering back in again. Besides, I happen to want an early night. Now, just stand over there, please, both together, and we'll get it over with. You see, nobody can say I'm not considerate. Neither of you will have to watch the other die.”
“But...” said Hilde.
“Move!” roared Othar.
They moved. There seemed no other alternative.
“Um,” said Charles.
Hilde slipped an arm round his waist. “Well,” she said. “We've had a lovely thirty years together, haven't we, darling?”
“Yes. Oh, yes, we have indeed. But I was actually just going to ask if I could, er, have a last request.”
“Nothing sparky,” warned Othar.
“Oh, no, absolutely nothing like that,” Charles assured him. “I would just very much like another cup of coffee.”
“Oh, for goodness' sake! No,” said Othar. “I can see you've been drinking it all evening. Do you want to go into whatever afterlife you believe in completely strung out on caffeine?”
“Actually, yes,” replied Charles. “I'm not sure I can think of a better way of doing it.”
“Well, no,” said Othar. “It's a waste of time.” So saying, he levelled the death ray at them, staring along the sights through his visor.
“Sorry, darling,” whispered Charles. “I was hoping...”
“I know.” She squeezed his hand.
There was a loud fzzzzzzzzt noise.
There was a green flash. When it cleared, there was no sign of either Charles or Hilde.
Othar threw down the weapon theatrically. “Oh, damn and blast!” he exclaimed. “How in the world could I have been so careless?”
* * * * *
The thunder rolled ominously. Mr Wooster woke up and pulled his head straight with an effort. Yes, that was only thunder; he was in bed, and that was rain lashing against the window. It was not, as his subconscious had just been trying to insist, the rumble of a battle clank so mighty that it dwarfed even Castle Wulfenbach.
Lightning flashed, and he took advantage of it to consult his alarm clock. Ten past five. An ungodly hour, but he was wide awake now and certain that would not be changing until much later. He switched off the alarm and dragged himself out of bed. He felt dehydrated, and he had a headache.
At least he'd slept. It hadn't felt like it, but he must have done at some point or the thunder couldn't have woken him up.
Thunderstorms. Oh yes. There were thunderstorms, and that was why his pendant hadn't worked last night.
Had he dreamt that?
He had a good wash, which was usually quite an effective tactic for separating dream and reality. It seemed not to be working quite so well this time. He'd been visited by Dupree (he shuddered at the recollection), and then Krosp... well, Krosp had brought the pendant, and he was still wearing it, so that was real enough. But then he'd seen... himself? And himself had talked him out of committing suicide? Really?
Well, he was alive. He did have to concede that. He was pretty sure that if he had shot himself, he wouldn't have woken up in the same bedroom, however exactly the afterlife worked.
And there was Higgs. His doppelganger had told him to see Higgs.
Coffee, he decided. Coffee would be a good idea. And then find Higgs and see what light the enigmatic airman could shed on the case. Higgs was such a weird unknown quantity that, at the very least, he probably wouldn't be fazed by being told that Mr Wooster had been visited by another Mr Wooster and told to go and see him. That was the kind of thing he'd just take in his stride.
He dressed, located his umbrella, then slipped out into the storm and the dark. There were coffee houses round here that opened at all hours. One of them might even have croissants or something of that nature. He primarily needed liquid, but food would be good too.
He stepped into the first one that showed a light. Somehow, he wasn't surprised to notice a blond figure sitting in the corner, his hair tied into a neat nautical pigtail with a red ribbon.
He went to the counter and ordered coffee and toast, then walked over to the other man's table. “Morning, Higgs,” he said.
“Morning, sir,” said Higgs. “You're abroad early.”
“I could say the same for you,” replied Mr Wooster. “And less of the 'sir'. This isn't going to be a formal conversation.” He half smiled.
“So what can I do for you, Mr Wooster?” asked Higgs, motioning him into the chair opposite.
“Well,” said Mr Wooster. “Something very puzzling happened to me last night, but I think a walk in the rain has helped me make at least a tiny amount of sense out of it. I had a visitor.”
“Krosp?” asked Higgs.
“Well, yes, Krosp,” replied Mr Wooster, filing away for future reference the question of how on earth Higgs knew that. “But much stranger than that. Me.” He paused. “What do you know about time travel, Mr Higgs?”
“Ah!” said Higgs. “I was wondering when you'd ask.”
Mr Wooster stared at him, but the man's face was, as ever, impassive almost to the point of ennui. “Higgs,” he said. “Are you going to tell me you're behind all this?”
“Me? If you visited yourself last night, I didn't make you do it.”
Mr Wooster sighed. “I hope the coffee shows up quickly. This is getting confusing. But you do know something, don't you?”
“Yes, I know something, but if you don't mind we'll wait for your order. I don't want to be interrupted while I'm explaining.”
“All right. I can live with that.”
The coffee and toast arrived. Mr Wooster thanked the waitress, and then, once she was out of earshot, observed, “Coffee and toast. It's all right, but I'm already missing hot buttered muffins.”
Higgs reached into a leather bag that hung over the back of his chair. “You might want this,” he observed, handing Mr Wooster a curious brass item resembling nothing so much as an astrolabe.
Mr Wooster wiped his fingers carefully on a napkin and took the device. Whatever exactly it was, it was a work of art as well as craft; the curiously meshing gears were a wonder to behold. “I'll take your word for it that I might want it,” he said, “but do you think it might be helpful to explain what I might want it for?”
“Well,” said Higgs, “obviously you need some means of travelling in time now, otherwise you can't go back and talk yourself... tell yourself whatever it was you had to tell yourself. That would cause a paradox, wouldn't it? We can't have that. Causes all sorts of problems, that, sir.”
“Quite so,” replied Mr Wooster. He had a horrible feeling that he knew exactly what Higgs had been going to say when he corrected himself. The airman would be really disturbing sometimes, if he weren't so invariably helpful. “And this is it? This is the time travel mechanism?”
“That's right, sir. You use these dials here to set the time you want to travel to. Once that's set up, you can use these to set the location, but that's relative to the time, so the time always has to be set first. Otherwise, you'd probably end up off the earth altogether due to the fact that it's orbiting about the sun. Oh, and you can store relative locations using this dial here. Push it in to store a location, and turn it to retrieve them. You'll have noticed the minus sign, by the way. Once you go back in time, it'll disappear and you can go forward again, but only as far as the moment you left. Press this button to take you back to the location you originally left when you went back in time, and use the dial as normal if you need to go to another location.” He gave a hint of a smile. “And that's about it, sir. Use it wisely. As if you wouldn't.”
Mr Wooster took a gulp of his coffee. “Well... thank you, Mr Higgs. But I do have a lot more questions.”
Higgs raised a blond eyebrow. It was difficult to tell whether that was supposed to be inviting the questions or forestalling them. Mr Wooster decided to go with the former. “First of all, might I ask where you got this and why you're giving it to me?”
“Not at liberty to answer the first one, sir, but the second one is easy enough. You've got it because you need it.”
And that, thought Mr Wooster, looking at Higgs, is all I'm going to get. The one thing I can read in him is when he's closing up. He's doing that now. He's still perfectly friendly, but he's closing up. Like a steel safe full of secrets. “Why do I need it?” is not going to get any answer right now, so I'm not even going to ask it.
“Well. Thank you again.” Another thought struck him. “You were waiting for me here, weren't you? You knew I would come in here. That's more than I did until a few minutes before I went in. Are you by any chance a future version? There's another Axel Higgs from the present timeline, currently asleep in his bed?”
“Maybe, sir,” replied Higgs politely.
Click. That steel safe was locked now. It was beyond any skill of Mr Wooster's to open it.
He could, he supposed, go and check. Find out where Higgs slept, and see if he was still there. But somehow it seemed rather impolite, after this kindness. At least, he assumed it was probably a kindness. Higgs had always been on his side before, inasmuch as he was on anyone's side. He carefully put the disc down and bit into a slice of toast. As a final attempt, he asked, “Is there anything else I need to know?”
“Nothing you won't work out for yourself, sir.” There was that half smile again. “I've got confidence in you.”
Well, that was reassuring. Maybe. “Thank you for the compliment,” replied Mr Wooster.
“And if you'll excuse me, sir, I've got to go now,” said Higgs. “You know how it is with airships. Always something to do.”
“At this hour?”
Higgs gave the faintest of shrugs. “Probably at all hours from now on, sir. Reckon things are going to get a bit warm for a while, don't you?”
“Yes,” replied Mr Wooster sombrely, “and I know for a fact you're not talking about the weather.”
Higgs nodded. “Indeed, sir. Be seeing you.”
Mr Wooster watched him step out into the rain, a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in... well, apparently a body capable of knocking a Jäger out cold and recovering from the kind of damage that would instantly kill anyone else he could think of, up to and including an armoured clank. He'd seen Higgs in battle mode a few times, and heard plenty of stories from others. Heaven only knew why he was still only an Airman, Third Class.
He finished his breakfast, paid, and then started walking back to his room. It was in a hotel which had been temporarily commandeered by the Baron and his forces. For a moment he felt reluctant to go back into the building in case he met Dupree again, but he pulled himself together quickly. That was just stupid. It wasn't logical to be able to cope when she was trying to kill him, but absolutely terrified when she was trying to seduce him.
Well, maybe it was, actually, this being Dupree. He wondered idly whether she ate her lovers, like the black widow spider. He would not have put it past her.
By some strange chance, the first person of any importance he met in the corridors was, indeed, Dupree. By an even stranger chance, she lost her habitual smile, grew very wide-eyed, and then turned away hastily down a side route that Mr Wooster was quite sure she had not originally intended to take.
Now that was gratifying. He remembered what his doppelganger had said the previous night about having startled her, or something. Clearly he had done a fine job of it. With the first real smile of the day on his face, he walked up to his room, closed the door, and took out the pendant again. The thunder had died away over breakfast, though it was still raining quite hard outside.
“This is Ardsley,” he said. “I would like to speak to Ottokar.”
The green depths of the pendant glowed, and after a few moments the Jäger's voice came over the link, though very faintly.
“Is hyu!” he exclaimed, happily. “Is vorking. Ve tried last night und notting.”
“There were thunderstorms,” replied Mr Wooster, “and we're a long way apart. You're extremely faint. Can you hear me?”
“Ja. Hy got goot ears.”
“Good. How are you and Alice?”
“Vell,” replied Ottokar, “is goot news und is bad news. Vhich hyu vant first?”
“The way I've been feeling lately, I think I'll take the good news first to cushion me somewhat against the bad news,” said Mr Wooster.
“Ho. Hyu been feeling bad?” asked Ottokar, all concern.
“I'm afraid so. I'm afraid things are going to descend into absolute chaos over here, and there isn't a thing I can do about it. Well,” he amended, “probably not. I've had something rather extraordinary happen over the last twelve hours or so. I'm not at all sure I understand it myself, but the short story is that I've got a time travel device and I definitely know that I will use it in the future at some point. But even with that, I don't think I can go back in time to stop it all going wrong, because I don't know where things started to unravel.”
“Hyu got a...?! How?”
“I think I'd better put it all in a letter,” replied Mr Wooster. “I'll be able to get it all down more coherently. But I'm sorry; you were going to tell me your good news and then your bad news.”
“Ho, ja! Vell, der goot news is ve got our first big assignment. Hyu know, vitout supervision on de scene. Mrs Chadwick reckons ve goot enough to handle it even vitout having finished all our formal training yet.”
“I think Mrs Chadwick is absolutely right,” said Mr Wooster warmly. “Well done, both of you. You deserve it. So what's the assignment?”
“Vell,” said Ottokar mournfully, “dat vould be der bad news.”
“Oh dear,” said Mr Wooster. “What's wrong?”
“Is Charles und Hilde,” Ottokar explained. “Hyu know dey vere investigating who vos killing de schparks in Salisbury? Vell... dey disappeared.”
Mr Wooster's heart skipped a beat. “Oh, no!”
“Is vy ve vere sent,” said Ottokar. “Since ve know dem und ve get letters und schtuff, ve vere de obvious pipple. But, ve don't tink dey dead. No bodies. All de odder schparks, dey vos very clearly dead, because pipple found dem.”
“So... are you two in Salisbury at the moment?”
“Ja.” Ottokar gave the name of their hotel.
“Right. I think I need to come over for a chat. Would you be free for lunch tomorrow?”
“But hyu got to be over dere!” Ottokar protested. “Hyu leave now, dey put hyu in a cell.”
“The time device,” replied Mr Wooster. “Higgs... I'll tell you about him later... Higgs said I could set the location as well. It can move me in space as well as time, just so long as I move in time first. And it can bring me back to the moment I left. I will leave the day after tomorrow, come and see you and Alice tomorrow, and return to the day after tomorrow when we've had lunch. Nobody will notice I've left, even if they're looking at me at the time.”
“Dat,” said Ottokar, “is clever, Mister Vooster.”
“Ardsley. That's how I've set it on the pendant communicator. I did it in a morbid mood last night, thinking I might be blown to shreds within the week; but I would like to keep it that way. I wish to be Ardsley to both of you from now on.” He paused. “To be honest, I might easily still be blown to shreds, irrespective of any morbid mood. And if I am, I don't want to go out being Mister-Woostered by two of my best friends.”
“Hokay,” said Ottokar. “But if hyu get blown to shreds, hy going to have someting to say to de pipple vot did de blowing.”
Mr Wooster smiled. “Good to know, even though it won't bring me back. But, well, enough of this. I don't want to drag you down; you've got enough on your plates as it is. Give my best regards to Alice, and tell her I'll be with you at half past twelve tomorrow, if that's all right.”
“Hy vill! Vill be goot to see hyu again. Und hy really looking forvard to seeing de time travel gadget ting, too.”
“Oh, and... this had better not go into the official report. I would have no problem explaining my presence in two places at once to Mrs Chadwick, but I wouldn't want it to go any higher. I doubt it would go down well.”
“Hyu can count on us,” Ottokar assured him robustly.
“Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow, then.”
IV. This Is Still Salisbury?
There was a puzzled silence. Hilde was the first to break it.
“Well,” she said. “I'm fairly sure we're not dead, darling. I think if this were either heaven or hell, there would be a lot more going on.”
She had a point. They were standing on short, springy turf, surrounded by gently rolling chalk downs as far as the eye could see. At least, it was reasonable to assume they were chalk, given the fact that there were lumps of it lying around here and there. The sun was sinking softly in a watercolour cloudscape, and small, scruffy sheep and goats grazed here and there. The daisies at their feet had already folded their petals for the night.
“It looks English enough,” observed Charles. “But I can't think where we are. Somehow it looks extremely familiar, but I can't say why. It's chalk, but it's not a view I know.”
“Well, there's chalk in other areas too,” Hilde pointed out. “We needn't be anywhere near Salisbury. We could just as easily be in, say, Sussex.”
“Wherever it is, it does look very deserted,” said Charles. “And we can't sleep out here in the open; it feels as though it's going to get cold tonight. We'd better go and look for some kind of shelter.”
“There are people round here somewhere, at least,” said Hilde. “There's a fence. Maybe we could try following it and see if there's a farmhouse?”
“Better to follow the river, I think.” Charles pointed to a glint of water winding through a cluster of trees. “If we do that, we're bound to find a town eventually.”
“Good idea,” agreed Hilde. “You're right that it's getting chilly, dear. I wish I had my wrap.”
He took her hand in his, and smiled. “We'll get warm walking. And we're not dead yet, in spite of that Norse lunatic. I don't know what he got wrong, but clearly he's not unstoppable.”
They followed the river for a while, but when they reached one of the higher hills, Charles decided to climb it to see if he could get a better view of the surrounding territory before the light altogether failed. Hilde remained at the bottom, since her knee, once again, was starting to give her some trouble. She sat on a chalk outcrop in the lee of the hill, huddling with her knees against her chest for warmth.
It was some time before her husband returned, and, when he did, he looked almost as pale as the chalk around them. “Well, darling,” he said, in a rather strained voice, “I now know where we are.”
“You don't sound as though that's very reassuring,” said Hilde slowly.
“It isn't.” He came and sat down beside her, putting an arm round her. “I looked back to where we started walking from, and then it all clicked into place. I knew this scene looked familiar, but I couldn't understand why. I know now.” He pulled the long face he had, which was usually comic exaggeration; there was no comedy in it at this moment. “This hill. I must have been up it hundreds of times when I was a boy. I know all the outlines of the land. What threw me initially was the buildings. There aren't any buildings. Nothing. Not even the Cathedral.”
Hilde stared at him. “You mean... this is still Salisbury?”
“Well, we're a little outside it now. But yes. Where we started from, that was Salisbury. Except that it obviously isn't at the moment.” He considered. “We probably ended up in the exact corresponding location. Thank the Lord we were on the ground floor when whatever that was happened, or we could have dropped out of the air.”
“Time travel?” said Hilde, after a few moments.
“It's looking like it. But, if so, we must have gone a very long way back indeed for there to be nothing on the site of Salisbury at all. I mean, parts of the cathedral are... I'm not certain, but I have a feeling we're looking at the tenth century, and there would have had to be a thriving settlement here before that. People don't normally build major cathedrals in the middle of nowhere.”
“Darling,” said Hilde sympathetically, “this must be awful for you.”
“Well, it's awful for both of us,” he said, a little surprised.
“No, but you were born here. That makes a difference.”
“You're right,” he admitted. “It does, rather. It was the most frightful wrench when it hit me.”
Hilde hugged him for a little while before she spoke again. Then she asked gently, “What's the oldest building around here that you know? Apart from the cathedral, of course?”
“That's easy enough,” replied Charles. “Stonehenge. It's a fair walk from here, but we could do it before bedtime, I think.”
“All right,” said Hilde. “Then I think that's where we need to go. If we're so far back that there's no Salisbury, then any settlements here are likely to be around Stonehenge.”
“Good idea. But will your knee be all right?”
“I'm afraid it'll have to be. I would rather have a sore knee than hypothermia.”
Charles nodded soberly. “Very well. You can always lean on me if you need to. Now let's see if I can get us there the straightest way.”
They started walking. The journey was rather longer than Charles remembered, although his sense of direction did not fail him; even without the familiar roads and landmarks to guide him, he kept them moving steadily in the right direction. It was fully dark long before they were anywhere close, and they were able to continue only by the faint light of a gibbous moon. Once they crossed a river, possibly the same one they had briefly followed; it took them some time to find a place where they could safely ford it, but Charles was determined. Failure to cross could cost their lives.
Hilde was mostly silent on the journey, conserving her energy as much as possible and fighting the increasing pain in her knee. That joint had given her problems since a tussle involving an out-of-control clank six years earlier. Charles, well aware of this, did not try to encourage her into unnecessary conversation.
He drew to a halt. “Look,” he said. “Over there. Am I seeing things, or is that a fire somewhere over there?”
Hilde peered into the darkness. “There does seem to be a faint glow. I think there are trees in the way.”
“There do seem to be a lot of trees,” said Charles. “Far more than I recall. But never mind that; if that's really a fire, we need to be heading for it.”
She nodded. “Yes. I'm pretty sure it is.”
He took her arm again. “Come on, then. Last lap.”
She smiled. “It'll be good to see some human faces. It's much too lonely round here.”
“Yes; sheep do have their limitations as company,” said Charles.
It was a fire. That became ever more obvious as they drew nearer. Soon, to their utter relief and delight, they heard voices raised in song; it was difficult to tell exactly how many people there were, but there were enough of them to sound like a reasonable choir. The harmonies were strange in places, but they were, nonetheless, recognisably harmonies. A light, clear tenor voice soared above them in a short solo passage.
Hilde frowned. “What language is that?” she asked.
“Nothing I recognise,” said Charles, with a slight frown. “I suppose if we're as far back as we think, it's probably a Celtic language, and I'm not well up on those. Although that tenor is wonderful. He's got a Purcell voice, don't you think?”
“I was thinking Dowland, but I know what you mean.”
“Well, yes, also Dowland, of course, but somehow he makes me think of Purcell in particular. Which is quite ridiculous, of course, since Purcell won't exist for several hundred years.”
“How,” asked Hilde, “do you suppose we're going to talk to them?”
“Sign language, I suppose. And if they've got anything to draw with...”
“They will. If nothing else, we can always scratch pictures in the chalk.”
“I hope we don't look too strange to them,” said Charles.
“We will,” replied Hilde. “The question is more how much they'll mind us looking strange. I hope we can manage some very diplomatic sign language.”
“We've got to try,” said Charles.
As they drew towards the fire, the singing stopped raggedly. About a dozen pairs of eyes, glinting in the firelight, stared at them. Charles and Hilde both held out their hands in front of them, palms upwards, fingers spread, in token of peace.
A young man stepped forward and asked them a question. It was completely incomprehensible. Charles did a sort of stage Italian shrug.
“I can't make out a single word,” he said to Hilde. “It doesn't even sound Celtic to me, though I'm no expert, of course.”
Hilde pointed to her knee and pulled an agonised face. That hardly required any acting skill; she had been trying not to pull the same kind of face for at least the last three miles. Another man stood up and spoke to the first one.
There was a puzzled confabulation between several of the people around the fire, which seemed at times, judging by the tones of voice, to verge on actual argument. Finally, one woman spoke in a very authoritative way for some minutes.
That appeared to settle it. The conversation stopped, and the woman came up to Charles and Hilde with a smile. She was possibly the oldest member of the group, although it was not clear exactly how old she was; she was wrinkled, but there was something about her face which suggested she might still be younger than either Charles or Hilde. She wore a long plaid skirt, a large shawl in a different plaid fastened with a bone pin, and, from the look of it, a brown tunic under the shawl with long sleeves. Over her shoulder was slung a bag, which was made of something similar to coarse sacking, but neatly made and decorated with embroidered spirals. She rummaged in it for a moment, and then produced a piece of bark and handed it to Hilde.
Hilde stared at the bark, and then at the woman. “Thank you,” she said, uncertainly.
The woman looked puzzled. Then she turned to her companions and said something. There was laughter, and Hilde understood that she was the butt of it, though it sounded quite good-natured.
“I'm getting something wrong,” she said to Charles. “I ought to know what to do with this. Is it a ritual, do you think?”
“Let me see, darling.” He leaned closer. “Oh! I know. I think that's willow bark. Try chewing it.”
“Salicylates,” said Hilde. “Of course! They know I'm in pain.” She smiled at the woman. “Thank you,” she said again, and put the bark in her mouth.
The woman beamed back as Hilde started chewing. The stuff tasted foul, but that was hardly a surprise. The woman pointed to herself. “Belod,” she said, with the accent on the last syllable.
Hilde nodded acknowledgement. “Hilde,” she said, pointing to herself in turn. “Charles.” She indicated her husband.
“Hilde,” Belod repeated, pronouncing it perfectly; Hilde was Swiss, and, on the rare occasions when anyone in England other than Charles or Ottokar pronounced it, it tended to come out as “Hilda”, which made her cringe a little inside. Belod had slightly more trouble saying “Charles”, inserting a schwa between the two final consonants. She gestured to Hilde to sit down on a fallen tree trunk, which she did with some difficulty and a little assistance from Charles. She then proceeded to lift Hilde's skirts to examine the affected knee. Hilde was momentarily nonplussed, given that there were men present, but she had enough sense to understand that this was a completely different culture, and, besides, her knee was still throbbing despite the willow bark.
It was noticeably swollen. Belod tut-tutted under her breath, then pulled some strips of cloth from her bag and bound it expertly. The others, in the meantime, had been banking up the fire with turf and were starting to move away. Belod motioned to Charles and Hilde to come with her, and they followed the rest of the party.
“That was some luck,” said Charles. “We seem to have fallen in with the local doctor. I still can't work out the time period, though.”
“Maybe that'll be clearer in the morning, dear,” replied Hilde. “I can't even see Stonehenge at the moment.”
“I caught a glimpse of it through the trees earlier,” said Charles. “It's there all right.”
“That's something, anyway,” said Hilde.
There was a little cluster of tents not very far away, and Belod led her two charges into one of them. It smelt of leather and herbs. She helped them to a corner of the tent, where they found blankets and furs. She said something to them, and both replied, “Goodnight.” It seemed to be the appropriate response.
Both sparks were so tired that they fell asleep almost immediately, and, as usual, it was Hilde who woke first. The tent flap was open, and the morning light streamed in. Belod was already up and about, and when she saw Hilde moving she smiled, pointed to her knee, and asked some question.
Hilde got up as carefully as she could, to avoid disturbing Charles. She indicated the knee, nodded and smiled; it did feel noticeably better. Belod beamed back at her. Charles rolled over, groaned, and blinked.
“Coffee,” he muttered.
“Ahh,” said Hilde. “I'm afraid... that could be a bit of a problem, darling.”
Charles pulled himself blearily into a sitting position. “What... er?”
“If you remember, my love, we were thrown back in time,” Hilde reminded him. “I'm fairly sure coffee didn't arrive in this country until several hundred years after Salisbury Cathedral was built.”
Charles passed a hand over his forehead. “Great Scott.”
Belod looked at him enquiringly. “Char-les?”
Hilde attempted to explain, in gestures, that her husband was just going to have to be allowed to recover by himself. How much of this got across was questionable. She turned to Charles. “Maybe you need to go outside and have a stretch, darling,” she suggested. “A little fresh air will help you to wake up.”
“Can't do any harm, I suppose.” He nodded to Belod. “I'm sorry. I'm forgetting my manners. Good morning, Belod.”
Belod, naturally, understood no word of this except her own name, but she read his face well enough to understand that she was being greeted. She smiled back and replied in her own language.
Charles stepped outside the tent, blinking again in the early sunshine. Hilde, meanwhile, had some rather more esoteric needs that she too was attempting to ignore. As usual, she had woken up sparking, and she had a marvellous idea for a new type of automatic coal-scuttle which she knew she had no more chance of implementing than Charles had of getting a cup of coffee. So, instead, she decided to see if she could turn her spark to the much more immediate problem of communication rather than inventing.
There was nothing in the tent that appeared to lend itself to drawing, so Hilde set about working with Belod to establish some basics, starting by pointing to various objects around the tent and looking questioning. She had managed to learn the words for “tent”, “blanket”, “fur”, “bowl” and the major parts of the body by the time Charles returned, looking, if anything, even more dazed than he had previously done.
“I went to look at Stonehenge,” he announced.
“Well, what's the matter, darling?” asked Hilde.
“Well. You know we were trying to establish how far back we'd come?”
“Has it given you any clues, then?” asked Hilde.
“Rather,” said Charles hollowly. “They're still building it.”
V. Mr Wooster Investigates
“Do you think the dress is all right, Ottokar?” asked Alice.
The dress in question was striped, dark green and pale gold, and very high-necked. There are women who like to dress a hint less modestly than usual when in the presence of the object of their affections, and then there are women like Alice, who are inclined to do quite the opposite. Ottokar looked at it thoughtfully.
“Is nize,” he decided. “But hy hope hyu don't vear it in a fight. De schleeves are not goot for fighting.”
“I'm not actually proposing to get into any fights today, Ottokar,” she replied, with a smile. “Though you are quite right about the sleeves.”
Alice glanced in the mirror, for what must have been the fiftieth time that morning. “Und hyu hair looks fine too,” said Ottokar, not waiting for the question. “De liddle curls at de front, dey a goot look on hyu. But he going to be here very soon, so hy tink maybe hyu better schtop vorrying und accept that hyu ready.”
“Oh, my,” said Alice.
“Look. Hyu got to act normal,” said Ottokar patiently. “He not changed at all. He yust der same as he alvays has been.”
“I know that, but I'm not,” sighed Alice. “But of course I'm planning to try to act normal. Why else would I be under so much strain?”
The air shimmered in front of them, and out of it stepped Ardsley Wooster, smiling warmly, but nonetheless looking at least as strained as Alice. “Good to see you two again,” he said.
“Hyu too,” replied Ottokar. Alice murmured something under her breath.
“Hy made a chicken casserole for hyu two,” the Jäger continued. “Is vun vit beans for me. Und for aftervards dere is blackberry und apple crumble.”
“That sounds wonderful, Ottokar,” said Mr Wooster. “I can assure you that even Baron Wulfenbach doesn't have anyone who can cook as well as you.”
“Hyu too kind. Come on. Ve yust about ready.”
He led them through to the dining room and waved them into chairs. “Von't be long,” he promised, with a grin.
“So how are you, Alice?” asked Mr Wooster.
“I'm very well, thank you,” she replied, trying not to think too hard about how well that dark red jacket suited him. “But, er, Ottokar says you're having a bad time at the moment. I'm so sorry to hear that. Is there anything either of us could do to help?”
He smiled, though it did not drive the sadness out of his eyes. “You're both doing what you can already, and I appreciate that. I'm afraid things are going downhill very fast over there, and there's almost certainly nothing you or I can do about it.”
“I'm so sorry, Ardsley,” she replied, feeling a little thrill at being allowed to use the name to his face for the first time.
“Well. Can't be helped, old girl. My word, Ottokar, that looks delicious!”
Ottokar beamed, showing all his fangs. “Hy hope so.”
Once they were all sitting down and eating, Mr Wooster said, “Well, I know we don't normally like to talk shop over meals, but I think it might be sensible to make an exception here for several reasons, if you don't object.”
“Is a goot idea,” replied Ottokar promptly. “Hyu vant to know vhere ve are so far?”
“Please.”
It was probably the most sensible suggestion that Mr Wooster could have made, though of course he had no way of knowing it. Once they were talking about the case, it was a great deal easier for Alice to shift back into professional mode; it helped, of course, that they were also discussing Charles and Hilde, who were close friends of all three of them.
“Hokay,” said Ottokar. “Vell, ve got here to find dey'd disappeared vitout anyvun seeing dem leave der hotel, und all deir tings vere schtill in deir room. So, Alice has taken dat room so she can look after de tings, und hy rented dese rooms vere is private und ve can talk.”
“We know from their letters,” Alice continued, “that three sparks have been killed here so far, and their bodies were all found. There's one spark remaining alive in the area; his name is Lionel Montgomerie. We've spoken to him, and he's a nervous wreck. He almost didn't let us in for fear that we might be the spark killers.”
“Do we know who last saw them?” asked Mr Wooster.
“Well, yes and no,” replied Alice. “Yes, we've been told that a Professor Quagmire came up to see them, but we haven't yet been able to trace him. There's no Quagmire on the Salisbury electoral roll.”
“Is a schtrange enough name, though,” Ottokar added. “If he anyvhere around here, ve find him soon.”
“They were definitely at dinner,” said Alice, “and apparently this Professor Quagmire came to see them shortly afterwards. The receptionist was a little vague about how long he stayed, but she thinks it was a fairly short visit, maybe about half an hour.”
“H'mm,” said Mr Wooster, thoughtfully. “Anything more you've managed to find out about this Professor Quagmire?”
“Notting much,” replied Ottokar. “Except for vot he looks like. Is a big man vit a beard.”
“Which isn't exactly a great deal of help,” said Alice. “We do need to talk to him. Though I don't believe he killed Charles and Hilde, for what that's worth. He left the hotel alone, so, wherever they are now, he didn't take them there.”
“And when were they found to be missing?” asked Mr Wooster.
“Not long after he left. The maid came to clear up the tea and coffee cups, and found no sign of either of them. The room was on the ground floor, and there was a window open, but it was too small for anyone to have got either in or out that way. All the windows are, on that floor. It's an old building with crown glass panes; some of them have been replaced with more modern windows on the upper floors, but not at ground level.”
Mr Wooster nodded gravely. “So they didn't leave by the window, and they didn't leave by the door. We are quite certain they didn't leave by the door?”
“Dey vould have been seen,” replied Ottokar, with certainty. “De receptionist knew who dey vere.”
“You have that time travel device, though,” said Alice. “Could we go back in time and have a look to see what happened?”
“I don't know whether it will take more than one person at a time,” replied Mr Wooster. “Besides, anything Charles and Hilde couldn't deal with is likely to be dangerous. Not that I mind dealing with dangerous things in general – it is, after all, rather part and parcel of the job – but when you also add time travel into the equation, I think it's as well to be more cautious. Questions would be asked if I were to go back into the past and get myself killed there.”
“Vould cause a paradox, anyvay,” Ottokar pointed out.
“It'd cause a jolly sight more than that,” said Alice warmly.
Mr Wooster smiled. “I suspect that everything to do with time travel causes a paradox, though I'm not sure yet.”
“Hyu didn't say how hyu got der device,” Ottokar reminded him.
“Well, I'll try to keep it simple,” said Mr Wooster. “The other night... that is to say, the night before last, from where we are at the moment... I had a visit from myself. My future self. I haven't got to that point in the timeline yet, so I don't know how far ahead in the future he was from. He told me to go and see someone I know by the name of Higgs. The next morning, I got up very early and went out to a coffee shop for breakfast, only to find that Higgs was sitting in it. I think he was waiting for me.”
“Vell, he vould be, hy suppose,” replied Ottokar. “Hy mean, hyu, dat being der future hyu, vouldn't vant der present hyu to have to vaste a lot of time looking for der Higgs. So about der same time hyu go back to see hyuself, hyu'll also have to go und see der Higgs und tell him vhere to meet hyu de next morning.”
Alice blinked at the Jäger. “That's clever,” she said, “but there is one thing you haven't taken into account. Namely, that finding Mr Higgs presumably takes just as long whether it's the present Ardsley or the future one who's doing it.”
“I suspect that may be irrelevant,” replied Mr Wooster. “After all, what I know is that I – that is, present me – didn't have to go looking for him, so I have to assume that Ottokar is right and future me did. Future I did. Neither sounds quite right.”
“Anyway,” said Alice. “Never mind all that. Was it Mr Higgs who gave you the device, then?”
He nodded. “It was. He said I needed it. That was about all I could get out of him, apart from the operating instructions.”
“Und vot sort of person is he?” asked Ottokar.
“That,” replied Mr Wooster, “is the great unanswered question of Europa. He's an Airman Third Class in the pay of Baron Wulfenbach, with a blond pigtail, an aura of almost complete unflappability, and the ability to carry on regardless when suffering injuries that would be fatal to anyone else, up to and including your kind, Ottokar. And he knows things. Things out of the dim past. I used to think he must be some kind of immortal, but now I know he's got time travel, I'm not so sure.”
“If he knows you need it,” said Alice, “he must have travelled into the future and seen that.”
“But you can't travel into your own future,” replied Mr Wooster. “He was very clear about that. The only way you can travel forwards in time is if you've already gone back into the past. You can never move beyond the point where you would be if you hadn't done any time travelling.”
“In dat case,” said Ottokar, “he got to have travelled into der past und seen it. So hyu got to be going to travel into der past. Und hyu got to need to.”
“And I suppose it's probably going to be fairly soon,” added Alice, “otherwise he wouldn't have given you the device yet. Could we see it, please?” she asked, a little shyly.
“Of course!”
The rest of lunch was taken up with discussing the device, and afterwards Mr Wooster said, “But this isn't really getting us any further with the matter of Charles and Hilde. Could we please go and have a look at the room where they were staying? I imagine you'll both have gone over it pretty thoroughly, but I'd still like to get the layout of it into my head. And if you found anything out of the ordinary in there, I'd like to see that too, although I suppose you didn't, did you?”
“Depends what you call ordinary for sparks,” replied Alice. “We found a few cogs and gears and things on the floor, but then they did disappear in the evening, so that was probably Charles. He's not as tidy as Hilde.” She stood up. “Come on, then. It's not far.”
Indeed, it was only round the corner. The hotel was one of those charming mediaeval buildings which fill the centre of Salisbury, and the room – in fact, two rooms – previously occupied by Charles and Hilde was at the back, looking out over a quiet courtyard. Alice asked for a few minutes to tidy up her own things, and hurried within, leaving the two others outside the door.
“Pretty place,” observed Mr Wooster.
“Ja. Very pretty. Hyu know Charles vos born here? Hilde vos saying how happy he vos to be back.”
“I didn't, actually. I knew Hilde was from Switzerland, but I didn't know exactly where Charles was born.”
“Vell, dere hyu go. Salisbury. Vhere vere hyu born?”
“York, as a matter of fact. Though I didn't live there for very long. We moved to Reading a couple of years later.”
“Ho, York. Der vhite rose. Richard Plantagenet und all dat schtuff, ja?” He grinned.
Mr Wooster smiled back. “That's right. Clearly you've been studying your history very assiduously. Especially since most people would call him Richard III.”
“Vell,” said Ottokar, “hy kind of like him. Hyu see, de books hy read at first said he vos a big villain vot killed his liddle nephews in der Tower of London. But de more hy tought about dat, de veirder it sounded, because it vouldn't have done him any goot if he had killed dem. But Henry Tudor, he vos a whole different matter. So, hy read a bit more. Hy vent back to some of de original sources. Und hy getting to tink Richard vos a preddy goot sort, as kings go, but dat Henry vosn't so goot at all, und dat vos vy he made Richard out to be a villain.”
“It's not even your history,” said Mr Wooster. “I'm amazed you're so interested.”
“But history is yust vot happens to pipple,” replied Ottokar. “Und pipple are pipple, vherever dey are.”
“That's true,” Mr Wooster agreed. “Welcome to the Yorkist camp. For what it's worth, I feel much the same way about our King Richard.”
“Hy been interested in him for a vhile,” said Ottokar. “Maybe vun day hy do all der proper research und write a book.”
Alice popped her head round the door. “Sorry about the delay, gentlemen. Please come in!”
Ottokar and Mr Wooster stepped into the outer of the two rooms, which was the parlour where Professor Quagmire had visited the Greenwoods on the night they vanished. Mr Wooster walked round it, examining everything in his unfussy professional manner, and then asked, “Alice, would you mind if I had a look at the bedroom?”
“Oh... certainly. It's why I tidied up,” she replied, brightly.
“Thank you.” He stepped inside, leaving the other two in the parlour, and came out again after a few minutes.
“Does it tell you anything?” asked Alice.
“It tells me that they didn't bring their tool belts, wherever they went,” replied Mr Wooster, frowning. “That was the first thing I looked for, and here they still are. Has either of you ever known either Charles or Hilde go out without a tool belt?”
Alice and Ottokar shook their heads. “We were worried about that too,” said Alice.
“Und de coffee machine of Charles,” added Ottokar. “Hyu know how Charles is vit der coffee.”
There was a tap on the door. Alice, who happened to be closest, opened it.
“Please, miss,” said the maid, “there's a Professor Quagmire here. I told him Mr and Mrs Greenwood had gone, but there was a friend of theirs staying here, so he wants to see you instead.”
“Really?” exclaimed Alice, astonished. “Well, that's remarkably convenient, because we would also very much like to see him. Could you please show him in?”
* * * * *
Belod and Hilde were getting somewhere. Hilde had finally managed to convey to Belod that she was in a fit state to help with whatever needed doing, and she was more than willing to do so. Consequently, they were now by the fire cooking some fish that a few of the others had brought up from the river. Belod was squatting, something she seemed to find quite comfortable, but Hilde had been given a log to sit on in deference to her injured knee.
Charles, who was suffering full-on caffeine withdrawal, had crawled back to bed for the moment. He was never at his best first thing in the morning, but the combination of temporal dislocation on a scale of millennia, the fact that almost everyone around him was speaking a language he couldn't even vaguely relate to anything he knew, and a hammering headache, was more than even the most sunny-natured person could handle all at once.
Hilde brought him a piece of fish. “Breakfast, darling?” she ventured.
Charles groaned, rolled over, and opened one eye. “Thank you, darling. I'll try it.”
“Not hungry?”
“Not yet. But I ought to eat something, I suppose. I have the most infernal headache.”
“Poor sweetheart. Do you think a strip of Belod's willow bark will help?”
“Unfortunately, I doubt it. It's caffeine I need here, not salicylates.”
“All right,” said Hilde. “But if you get chilly, come out and sit by the fire. There's a good blaze going now.”
Belod smiled as she took her place again, and raised an enquiring eyebrow. Hilde shrugged and made the sort of face which she hoped was able to convey “he's no better at the moment, but it's honestly nothing serious”. She took another fish, skewered it on a stick the way Belod had shown her, and held it up to the fire.
Over breakfast, Hilde learned the names of the rest of the group. One of them, in particular, interested her; the tenor soloist of last night, who also proved to have been the young man who initially addressed them, was called Ghyn. Once Charles was feeling a little better, she was determined to steer Ghyn in his direction, for, second only to being a spark, Charles was a fine musician. If he and Ghyn could manage to get a discussion going about music, even if it had to involve a lot of gestures and whistling, it would do a great deal to keep up his spirits.
Once breakfast was over, the entire group – except for the afflicted Charles – made the short journey to Stonehenge. They were by no means the only group present. Many others, who had been camping around the periphery of the site in similar fashion, were still arriving, and some had already started work. There were people hitching up teams of oxen, people climbing up the vertiginous wooden scaffolding frames lashed to two of the uprights, and one person with a hammer and nails going over them and checking to see if any repairs were needed. An ox-cart was arriving filled with jars and pitchers of water from the river. There were ropes, picks, mattocks, shovels, and any number of flint hand-axes; the only thing that was missing, of course, was metal. This was the Neolithic Age, and the craft of smelting had not yet been discovered. But what they had, they were using with all the ingenuity they possessed.
Hilde looked at Belod enquiringly to see if she could be of any help. Belod, for answer, produced a bone needle and mimed sewing movements.
Hilde nodded enthusiastically. Yes; of course she could sew. Belod smiled, found a boulder for her to sit on near one of the small fires that were dotted about the site, and said something in a loud clear voice to those in the vicinity. Then she gave Hilde the needle, a leather thimble, and a little bag containing thread wound onto wooden spools.
It appeared that Hilde, being for the moment too disabled to do any of the heavy work, had been given the job of repairing things. That suited her ideally. She quite enjoyed sewing, and it also gave her the opportunity to study and analyse what was going on from an overall perspective. Perhaps she might be able to think of a way to make the job easier. By all the signs, today one of the great cross-pieces was going to be hoisted into its place atop the two uprights with the scaffolding. They could do it, no doubt about that; one of them was already in its place. Still, it was going to take a huge amount of work from both people and oxen, and the whole point of being a spark was to make things better for other people. Or, at least, it was in Hilde's book.
Belod hurried off to a spot near the centre of the circle, where she found a stray piece of wood, stuck it into the ground, and attached a piece of yellow cloth to the top of it. And that, I suppose, thought Hilde, is the first aid station. She can't be the only one on duty, though? Surely there are more healers?
There were, and they came and gathered around the yellow flag, each with a bag slung over his or her shoulder. They sat on the turf, chatting among themselves in small groups. A little way away, other people were unloading the ox cart and setting up a water station, and beyond that some tables had been set up on trestles and were now being loaded with shallow baskets containing fruit, nuts, eggs, shellfish, and a few other things Hilde could not recognise at this distance. There was also a big clay bowl full of what might have been some kind of kefir or curd cheese. The carcasses of sheep and goats were brought in on poles and transferred to spits over the various fires, where those whose job it was to tend the fires turned them now and again. It was all so highly organised, without the least appearance that there was anyone there who was doing the organising, that Hilde suspected it was routine. She wondered whose job she was taking over, or whether there were several repairers dotted around the site.
There certainly were people organising the actual construction work. There was a lot of shouting and arm-waving going on in the vicinity of the stone which was to be lifted, and the construction workers were scurrying around doing various things in response. At the moment it was difficult to see exactly how they were planning to raise the stone, but there was clearly a lot of wood involved in the process. More scaffolding, probably, although surely the existing arrangement couldn't be part of it; it looked completely insufficient to cope with the weight of a stone that size.
A man came running up to her, interrupting her reflections. He was holding a torn blanket and talking very fast. Hilde held up a hand to stop him, then nodded and showed him the needle and thread.
He nodded back, looking puzzled, and then asked a question. He stared at her clothes. Naturally, he hadn't been the first person here to do that.
Hilde smiled, and reached out her hand for the blanket. The man passed it over, still looking bemused, but at least satisfied that he was going to get it repaired. From the look of it, someone had accidentally put a flint axe through it, because it was a very clean cut. Hilde had seen some of those axes at close quarters already, and they were sharp.
The repairs kept her busy all morning. People occasionally tore clothes or blankets, but much more often she was called on to repair the slings that were used to carry tools, materials and occasionally people up the scaffolding. Every now and again, a child would come running up with a clay beaker full of water for her, and by mid-morning she was confident enough to ask one of them for a snack using gestures. The child, not being able to understand exactly what sort of snack she wanted, brought a bowl of some kind of porridge and a handful of berries. It was good enough, and the child seemed to know that Hilde was thanking her.
Charles wandered down to the site around midday, still looking groggy. He squatted at her side. “Hallo, darling,” she said. “Feeling any better?”
“Only marginally,” he replied. “You seem to have settled in very well, though.” He smiled.
“Yes. I got Belod to teach me some words earlier. I don't know if you heard.”
“I did, but they didn't go in,” he confessed. “I'm afraid I was far too busy trying to keep my brain from battering a hole in my skull at the time.”
“If it's settled down enough, I could teach you them now,” she offered.
“It has a little, and that would be useful, thank you,” he said. “I am not, as you know, a vindictive type, but if I ever get my hands on Tryggvassen...”
“I do believe that's the first time you've ever sworn revenge in your life, dear,” said Hilde. “Well done!”
“Well,” said Charles. “I've had people set deadly clanks on me, try to blow me up, beat me senseless, wreck my inventions... but this is the first villain who has ever deprived me of coffee.”
“With any luck,” said Hilde, “I'll get him first. With the parasol.” Hilde's parasol had been known to do significant damage to a large armed clank, so this was not the toothless threat it sounded. “Anyway. Let's do some words, and then you may have a better idea of whether this language is likely to be a distant ancestor of anything you recognise. Oh! And at some point I want you to meet Ghyn. He's the Purcell voice.”
Charles immediately brightened. “Wonderful! And, of course, one thing with talking about music is that often you don't need words. You can just hum it.”
Hilde proceeded to teach her husband all the words she knew so far. A little later, she asked, “So, why do you think we're here instead of dead?”
“Well, that's clear enough, darling,” said Charles, surprised. “Trygvassen's invention went wrong somewhere.”
“Of course, dear, but hasn't it occurred to you that that is a very strange way for it to go wrong?” asked Hilde. “How many death rays have you ever come across that sent people thousands of years back in time when they malfunctioned?”
“H'mm,” said Charles. “Now you put it like that, it does seem odd.”
“I've been thinking,” said Hilde, “that it was a dual capability device. A death ray, but with a time travel attachment. It would certainly explain how he killed those other sparks without being detected, especially given the fact that one of them was in a locked room. He usually used the time travel himself, but somehow or other he turned it on us instead.”
“That makes sense,” Charles agreed. “I suppose it's too much to hope that he also turned the death ray on himself?”
“Probably,” replied Hilde, regretfully. “You see, if he's insane enough to want to kill all sparks, he may well come back in time to look for us, if he knows where we ended up. When, I should say. And we need to be ready if that does happen, because as far as I can make out, he's the only chance we have of getting back. We need to think of a way to get that device away from him so we can use it ourselves.”
“Tall order,” said Charles, doubtfully. “I mean, he looks very strong, and he's obviously not stupid. But when my head clears, I'll certainly give it some thought.”
“I'm still wondering where Ottokar and the others fit in,” said Hilde. “Professor Quagmire said he met us all at Stonehenge, but that was ten years or so before the point we left from, not here and now.”
Charles looked across at the workers. “Ottokar would be right in his element here,” he said, with a smile. “I'm sure he'd love to help.”
“Ottokar is in his element almost everywhere,” replied Hilde.
“That's true. Oh! Good heavens. With everything that's been happening, I had completely forgotten about the letter.”
“What, from Ottokar and Alice?” asked Hilde.
“No.” Charles reached into an interior jacket pocket. “It's from Mr Wooster. I picked it up as we were going out yesterday morning and it went straight out of my head. Good to hear from him.”
“Well, have you opened it, dear?” asked Hilde.
“Not yet.” Charles proceeded to do so, and then read in silence for a few minutes.
“Oh dear,” he said, his amiable face creased with worry. “He wants us to call him Ardsley from now on. Largely because he thinks he's going to be either dead or permanently exiled in a very short time. Here, have a look.”
Hilde read the letter with a deepening frown. “Poor young man,” she said, sympathetically. “I'd heard some rumours, but I had no idea it was getting quite so bad over there. Surely they ought to recall him now? After all, they're always saying there's a shortage of agents, and I would have thought he was one they were especially anxious not to lose.”
“Which reminds me,” said Charles. “I wonder who they've got on our tail now? Whoever it is, I feel very sorry for them. I think they must have an impossible task.”
“Well, that doesn't seem to be so unusual in the Service, does it?” said Hilde rather tartly, gesturing at the letter. “Anyway, if we ever manage to get back to our own time, I'm going to put in a word for Mr... that is, Ardsley. It's going to take a little getting used to calling him that. And I shall send him something nice to cheer him up. What do you suggest, dear?”
“You could always send him one of your special fruit cakes,” suggested Charles. “He loves those, and they keep very well, so there won't be a problem putting it in the post.”
“I was thinking more along the lines of clothing,” replied Hilde. “Perhaps a nice elegant waistcoat with lots of gold buttons and a special protective layer to ensure he isn't fried by some insane clank.”
“H'mm. Well, it would last longer than a fruit cake,” agreed Charles.
“I am not sending him a fruit cake, darling,” said Hilde. “From the sound of it, he's already surrounded by them.”
VI. A Philosophical Quagmire
“Why, Miss Davenport!” exclaimed Professor Quagmire. “What an extraordinary coincidence!”
“I'm... sorry?” said Alice, stunned.
“And Ottokar. Good to see you again. And Mr Wooster! How in the world did you get here so quickly?”
Mr Wooster thought quickly. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Have you, by any chance, just seen me somewhere else?”
Quagmire stared at him. “You mean you don't remember?”
“Humour me,” said Mr Wooster. “This is probably more important than you realise. When and where did you see me, and how was I dressed?”
Quagmire blinked. “You were dressed the same as you are now, sir. I saw you at...” he checked his watch. “About a quarter to two, corner of Brown Street and Winchester Street.”
“Good. Let me make a note of that. Thank you, Professor.”
Light dawned on Quagmire. “Oh, of course! How stupid of me. It's not like me to make the same mistake twice.” He bowed to Alice and Ottokar. “My apologies. From your point of view, we have not, in fact, met before, but we shall do.”
“When?” asked Mr Wooster, his pen poised over his notebook.
“A little over ten years ago.”
“All right,” said Mr Wooster. “I won't press you for details now, but I warn you I shall be doing later. Please, have a seat.”
“Vot der dumboozle?” demanded Ottokar.
The Professor eased his big frame into a chair and looked at Mr Wooster. “I realise it's my job to explain,” he said, “but I think it may be slightly less confusing if you start and I fill in the details.”
“I'm not so sure about that,” replied Mr Wooster, “but at least I now have a good idea which questions I need to ask. Let's start at the beginning. You were, apparently, the last person to see Charles and Hilde Greenwood before they disappeared.”
There was no mistaking the astonishment on Quagmire's face. “They disappeared? You didn't tell me that a few minutes ago!”
“Well, no. With all respect, I'm not stupid. I had to get you here before I could tell you that, or you wouldn't have come. Don't tell me, let me guess: I asked you to come here and find the Greenwoods urgently, or, failing that, someone who knew them. Correct?”
Quagmire nodded slowly. “Yes. That's pretty much exactly what you said, Mr Wooster.”
“I thought so. Excuse me one moment. I have to write that down.”
“Ardsley,” said Alice, “what in the world is going on here?”
He gave her a grin which was meant in perfect innocence, but caused her to flip open her fan and start using it vigorously. “Have patience,” he replied. “With your intelligence, you'll soon make sense of it.”
“Is hokay,” said Ottokar. “Hy confused too.”
“All right, Professor,” said Mr Wooster. “When you went to visit the Greenwoods, did they initially recognise you, or were they as bewildered as my two friends here? I'm guessing no, after your remark about making the same mistake twice.”
“And you'd guess correctly,” replied Quagmire. “May I ask a question in turn?”
“Be my guest,” said Mr Wooster.
“Is this the first time you've met me in your own timeline?”
“It is.”
“Hyu a time traveller?” asked Ottokar.
“No,” replied the Professor. “Sadly not. I only wish I had that ability, since I am an archaeologist by profession. It would be invaluable. However, it appears I have met time travellers, including, of course, yourselves and the Greenwoods.”
“There's some mistake,” said Alice. “I, for one, haven't travelled in time.”
“No,” said Ottokar. “Don't hyu see? Dis means hyu vill.”
“The Greenwoods hadn't either, when I met them,” said Quagmire, “so, as you correctly guessed, they didn't recognise me. If they've disappeared, I can only assume that they have now.”
“Wait a minute,” said Alice, who had been thinking intensely. “Ardsley. You're implying that you must have gone back from somewhere in the future to tell Professor Quagmire to come here so that we could all talk to him. That's right, isn't it?”
Mr Wooster nodded. “That's correct, and that's why I'm making notes. When I come to do that, I can hardly afford to get it wrong.”
“But how does the future version of you know what Professor Quagmire looks like?” she asked.
“Well, that's obvious. I've just met him now, so of course I'll be able to remember what he looks like.”
“But... but... the only reason you've just met him now is that the future version of you came back to talk to him,” Alice protested. “That is to say, if the future version of you didn't know what he looked like, you wouldn't know what he looked like now, but the only reason the future version of you knows what he looks like is that you do. And that's a completely nonsensical causal loop.”
“You know, I don't really mind, so long as it works,” replied Mr Wooster.
“But there's no reason why it should work!”
“And the same goes for almost every spark invention ever, as far as I can tell,” said Mr Wooster, completely unruffled. “I'm quite aware it's a paradox. I'm just going to carry on riding the paradoxes until they fall over. After all, what other choice have we got?”
Ottokar grinned. “Hy like hyu attitude.”
“So,” said Professor Quagmire. “You say Mr and Mrs Greenwood disappeared shortly after I spoke to them?”
“It appears so, yes,” replied Mr Wooster.
“And obviously you can travel in time too, right now, even if the other two can't do it yet?”
“Again correct,” replied Mr Wooster.
“In that case, I can tell you more or less where to find them,” said Quagmire. “I was leading a dig at Stonehenge a few years ago. It was late at night and the other archaeologists had all gone home, but I thought I'd found the top of an important tomb in the trench I was working on, so I continued by torchlight. They were big oil torches, designed to be stuck upright in the ground for just such a purpose. However, there wasn't room for them in the trench, so the best I could do was to rig up a sort of tent arrangement out of white canvas, soak it with water to fireproof it as best I could, and stand the torches at the top of the trench in the hope of at least getting some decent reflected light from the canvas. It worked quite well, but it had been very wet, and one of the torches worked loose while I was concentrating on the dig and fell into the trench. My clothes caught fire, and if it hadn't been for the five of you turning up out of nowhere when you did, I wouldn't be here to tell the tale.”
“A few years,” Mr Wooster repeated. “How long ago, more precisely?”
“Now that I can't tell you,” said the Professor, rather embarrassed. “All I know was that it was over ten years ago. I'm good with thousand-year periods, but a bit shaky with individual years.”
“Ah,” said Mr Wooster. “I do appreciate the fact that you're trying to help, but that's not going to locate them, I'm afraid.”
“And even if it did, how would we all get to them?” asked Alice. “Your time travel device doesn't work for more than one person. You said that yourself.”
“Und is a flaw here,” said Ottokar. “Hy mean, how likely is it dat dey vould turn up in dat place und at dat time, und ve vould arrive to rescue dem at exactly de same moment? Hy tink is much more likely dat vun of der two groups vould have been around longer dan de odder.”
“Oh, I see what you mean, Ottokar,” said Mr Wooster. “Yes. If all five of us were involved in rescuing the Professor here, that would rather suggest we arrived at about the same time. Unless you remember any differently, Professor Quagmire.”
“No. I think you did all arrive together,” he replied, frowning. “This is extremely odd.”
A surge of adrenalin coursed through Mr Wooster's veins. He smiled. Now this, he thought – this is more like it. He felt like a hound on a scent. He had leads, he had a very good idea of how to go about following them, he had first-rate companions, and he was in England. Whatever chaos he had left behind him tomorrow, here and now he felt ready for anything.
“What did you say the name of that spark was?” he asked. “The one who got away?”
“Lionel Montgomerie,” replied Alice.
“Good,” said Mr Wooster. “Please lead us to him. And if you can spare the time to join us, Professor, I think you may find it worth your while.”
Lionel Montgomerie lived on the outskirts of the city, so they had to take a couple of cabs. Alice contrived to get herself into the cab with Mr Wooster and regretted it almost instantly in case she said something foolish; that left Professor Quagmire to share the other cab with Ottokar, who rapidly got into a lively but quite genial argument with him about “Richard Plantagenet”, as he insisted on calling him. Naturally Ottokar, having got a real live archaeologist all to himself, wanted to hear about any recent discoveries that might relate to his current favourite monarch. Quagmire, however, not only specialised in prehistory but turned out to believe without question everything Shakespeare had written about Richard III. The Jäger was not going to let this go without taking up metaphorical arms on behalf of King Richard.
The other cab was much quieter. Mr Wooster hardly spoke because he was thinking, and Alice hardly spoke because she was sneaking sideways glances at Mr Wooster and wondering why she had never fully appreciated his profile in the past. She wondered if she dared ask him to sit for a portrait. Those cheekbones, she felt, should definitely be immortalised – but was she up to the task herself?
Lionel Montgomerie was elderly, constitutionally nervous even at the best of times, and obsessed with gardening. This was reflected in the majority of his inventions. His garden positively bristled with mechanical watering devices, automatic weeders, soil analysers, and some disturbing-looking gadgets which he had explained on their last visit were for training runner beans. Alice privately mused that even vegetables probably responded much better to kindness. He did not look altogether happy to see her and Ottokar again, but he was also no fool. He saw something in Mr Wooster's eyes which told him that it might not be the best idea to turn him away, although he was perfectly pleasant and polite.
“This is Mr Wooster,” said Alice, “and this is Professor Quagmire.”
“Ah. Yes, yes. Pleased to meet you both,” said Montgomerie. “Now, what can I do for you?”
“Well, Mr Montgomerie,” replied Mr Wooster, “as you're aware, we're trying to catch the person who has been killing sparks in the area. Naturally, it would be in your own interest to help us with that, would it not?”
“Ah. That is, ah, quite correct. You'd better come in.”
They filed down the narrow, cluttered hall into Mr Montgomerie's parlour. It was small, and even more cluttered. As well as gardening, Mr Montgomerie also collected china dogs, and it was perfectly clear that he did not know when to stop. There were two huge china dogs on the hearth, scowling at each other across the fireplace. There were china dogs on every inch of the mantelpiece. There were china dogs on the windowsill, and on the what-not in the corner, and on the shelves, and even on the tea table in the middle of the room. Their expressions covered almost the entire gamut of emotions from contemptuous hostility to benevolent imbecility.
“Great Scott,” said Quagmire, before he could stop himself. He then performed a remarkably adroit conversational salvage tactic by adding cheerfully, “Why, just think. Probably in a few hundred years someone will excavate all those and give them pride of place in a museum, what?”
“Professor Quagmire is an archaeologist,” Mr Wooster explained, stifling a smile.
“I am rather proud of them,” said Montgomerie modestly. “They've all got names, you know.”
“Fascinating as the subject undoubtedly is,” said Mr Wooster smoothly, “I'm afraid I haven't got a great deal of time, so, with your permission, I shall have to get to the point quickly. You're aware, of course, that Mr and Mrs Greenwood have recently vanished? We think they may well not be dead. In fact, we think it's considerably more likely that they have travelled backwards in time.”
That got Montgomerie's full attention. “Really?” he said. “They built a gadget?”
“No,” replied Mr Wooster. “From the timings involved, they couldn't possibly have done. They didn't have time to do so. You see, the Professor here left them only a few minutes before they disappeared, as far as we can establish, and when they met him at that point there was some confusion on both sides because they didn't recognise him. Had they been intending to travel in time when they met him, they would not have been surprised to meet someone who appeared to know them but whom they had no memory of meeting.”
“Couldn't have put it better myself,” said Quagmire.
“In that case, how did they travel in time?” asked Montgomerie.
“I think someone else moved them,” replied Mr Wooster. “Not necessarily intentionally. Someone, perhaps, with a spark weapon they didn't fully understand.”
“The killer?”
Mr Wooster nodded. “It does seem likely.”
“If the killer could travel in time,” Alice put in, “it would certainly explain how one of the sparks came to be killed in a locked room.”
Montgomerie shuddered. “So they could, at least in theory, go back now and kill me yesterday, and I'd just disappear?”
“Ach, lieber Gott,” said Ottokar, shaken out of his usual calm. “Vot if dat happened to Charles und Hilde?”
“No, it's all right, old man,” said Mr Wooster. “It's not like that. As far as I can tell, if someone went back now and killed someone yesterday, they'd have been killed yesterday in everyone's timeline.”
“But if they were killed yesterday, then surely the person doing the killing wouldn't need to go back in time and kill them, because they'd already be dead?” asked Alice.
Mr Wooster thought about it. “I think they would. I'm starting to get a more intuitive feel for how all this works. The one thing that seems to be inescapable is that if your future self has gone back and done something, then you have to make sure you go and do it when you reach that time. If you know you did it, then it's awkward because you have to take notes to make sure you get it right. But if you don't... I suspect you probably find you do it anyway.”
“And what happens if you deliberately don't go back and do something you know you went back and did?” asked Montgomerie, fascinated.
“I don't know,” replied Mr Wooster. “I haven't tried. And I don't intend to.”
“You have time travel?” Montgomerie was suddenly in full spark mode. “Show it to me!”
“I will. But I do have some conditions.” Mr Wooster's voice, though still unfailingly polite, was suddenly velvet wrapped around a steel core. “First, you give me the device back the moment I request it, no matter what you are doing. Understood?”
“I'm a spark!” roared Montgomerie indignantly.
Mr Wooster reached into a pocket, extracted his official papers, and flipped them open under Montgomerie's nose in one smooth action. “And I'm Ardsley Wooster, on behalf of Her Undying Majesty,” he replied. “I regret the implied threat. However, if you do not co-operate, my two friends and colleagues here will be in the unfortunate position about which you just enquired, and I am not prepared to risk that. I'm sure I don't have to spell out the possible historical consequences to you, of all people.”
Montgomerie stared at him. Mr Wooster coolly returned his gaze. In the end, it was the spark who looked away first.
“So what are your other conditions?” he demanded.
“I would like you to make this device able to transport other people, and I would also like some means of locating specific people within time,” replied Mr Wooster. “Only those who have moved relative to their normal time stream, naturally, otherwise it would become immensely confusing. And I would like those two things to be done as fast as humanly possible.” He paused. “Once again, I have to apologise for taking this tone. It's not as if you threatened me first, after all. But I did think it necessary to impress upon you the fact that avoiding damage to the time stream is more important than, say, growing cucumbers out of season.”
“Strawberries,” said Montgomerie sulkily. “It was strawberries I was thinking of.”
“When you've done what I've asked of you,” said Mr Wooster, “you'll have the technology and you'll be able to use it to create all the horticultural time-shifters your imagination can devise, and you will also be alive to do it. If the killer travels in time, we have no chance of stopping them without your help.”
“All right,” said Montgomerie. “I agree to your conditions. Now, show me the device!”
Mr Wooster tucked away his official papers and brought out the time device. Montgomerie whistled appreciatively. “Beautiful piece of work,” he observed.
“Isn't it? Now, let me explain how it works, and then you can take it from there.”
While they were studying the device, Ottokar turned to Alice. “Hyu know vot?” he said. “Dis is going to get complicated.”
“Well, naturally. It is time travel, after all,” she replied.
“Not yust der time travel. Hy mean Mister Vooster, er, Ardsley. He not really supposed to be here. Hy damn glad he is, because hy preddy sure ve couldn't solve dis vun vitout him. But vot are ve going to put in der official report?”
“Ah,” said Alice. “I see what you mean.”
“Hy don't like telling lies,” said Ottokar. “So ve going to have to be very creative.”
“Maybe we should just ask for his permission to make a clean breast of it?” Alice suggested. “After all, he isn't actually leaving his post at all. Not from the point of view of anyone in that timeline.”
“But he already said he didn't vant to be mentioned. Und hy get de impression he got some goot reasons for dat.”
Alice sighed. “Yes, I'm afraid you're probably right.”
“Ho vell,” said Ottokar, philosophically. “Hy expect ve got de brains among us to vork it out.”
“We've got a lot more to work out than that,” said Alice. “And I really hope Ardsley's theory of time travel is the right one. It's plausible, but it's not the only alternative.”
Ottokar raised an eyebrow. “Goot to see hyu not lost hyu critical tinking. Veirdly enough, hy tink he probably schpot on.”
“Why?” asked Alice.
“Because ve all been talking about time travel, but he de only vun of us vot has actually done it,” replied Ottokar. “Und hyu know as vell as hy do vot he normally like. He very logical, very goot at tinking. He looks at all der alternatives. Der fact dat he's picked vun of der possibilities dis time vitout going into all der logic, vhich, hyu got to admit, vould probably be a qvick vay to go mad if hyu tried it anyvay... vell, dat makes me tink is a liddle bit like becoming a Jäger. Ven hyu human, hyu might have all sorts of teories about Jägers, but ven hyu get to be vun hyuself, hyu yust know some tings.”
“H'mm,” said Alice. “Metalogic.”
“Ja, if hyu like. Is as goot a name for it as any.”
“Whatever you call it,” said Alice, “it's testable, at least to some extent. If we travel in time ourselves and we both find we're instinctively agreeing with Ardsley, that's probably evidence in favour of his theory. Unless, of course, travelling through time just happens to make you feel a certain way about travelling through time, in which case we end up going in virtual circles.”
“Hy get der feeling is probably best not to tink about it too much,” replied Ottokar.
“Well, he's got to,” said Alice in an undertone, inclining her head slightly in the direction of Lionel Montgomerie.
“Ho, he all right,” replied Ottokar with a grin. “He mad as a hatter already.”
VII. Time Travel and Cucumbers
It was late. Alice had fallen asleep in one of Montgomerie's jacquard armchairs; Ottokar was ensconced in another with a book. Ardsley Wooster was vertical but yawning. He looked as though he dared not sit down in case he fell asleep.
Ottokar looked up from his book and raised an eyebrow at him. “Hyu not tinking dis trough,” he observed. “If hyu veren't so tired, hyu'd know hyu had an option.”
Mr Wooster blinked at the Jäger. “What do you mean?” he asked, curiously.
“Go back to tomorrow. Get hyuself some sleep. Den come back here from der day after. Hyu can do dat, remember?”
“Of course,” said Mr Wooster. “Yes. Thank you, Ottokar, for preventing me from being a complete idiot. I shall do that right now.”
“Hy expect hyu to return de favour ven hy need it,” replied Ottokar, with a grin. “Ve all have idiot moments.”
Mr Wooster took out the time device. There was a brief shimmer in the air, and he suddenly looked vastly refreshed, not to mention shaved. “How did I do?” he asked. “Did I hit the same moment?”
“Ja. Hy didn't see hyu go. Hyu yust moved a bit.”
“Good. Then I'll go and have another look at how our friend Mr Montgomerie is getting on.”
Montgomerie was still working like a demon, as only a spark can. Slumped in a chair in a corner of his workshop was Professor Quagmire, half asleep under a travelling rug, for the workshop was in a shed at the bottom of the garden and the night was growing chilly. He opened one eye as Mr Wooster walked in and looked at him reproachfully.
“If I'd known this was going to take half the bally night, Mr Wooster,” he said, “I'd have brought my hip flask.”
“I'm sorry, Professor,” said Mr Wooster. “I didn't know either.”
“Well, you look as fresh as a daisy,” the Professor grumbled. “But then I suppose it's nothing to a young fellow like you. You just wait till you get to my age.”
Mr Wooster lapsed into a guilty silence. Fortunately, Montgomerie looked up at that point. “We're nearly there,” he said. “Well, nearly somewhere, at any rate.”
“Nearly somewhere?” demanded Quagmire.
“Nearly at the point where we can test this thing and you can go home,” said Montgomerie.
“Ha! Well, that's better news,” said Quagmire, recovering some of his usual cheer.
The point of all this was that the date and time of Quagmire's rescue were still not known, and they had to be established so that, at some future time, Mr Wooster and the others could visit that point in the timeline in order to effect the rescue. Since the person best qualified to establish these details was Quagmire himself, he had agreed to do the testing, exploring the timeline on the site of the dig until he found the time of the accident. While he was doing that, Montgomerie would then test the locator to ensure that it was able to find Quagmire accurately.
“Good,” said Mr Wooster. “Please call me when it's ready. Alice is asleep in a chair and I don't want to disturb her, but Ottokar is still awake, so he'll probably want to come and watch the testing.”
He walked back through to the parlour, where Ottokar was poking the fire. The light glinted on Alice's brown hair, giving it hints of chestnut that it never had in daylight. She looked peaceful in repose, though Mr Wooster feared that she would wake up with cramp, given the position she was in. He nodded to Ottokar. “Do you think we might ease a cushion under her elbow without waking her?” he enquired, in a low voice.
“Better not. She very vell trained now,” replied Ottokar. “She can hit. Und if she didn't realise who she vos hitting, she vouldn't be happy ven she found out.”
“She always could hit,” Mr Wooster pointed out. “But, yes, I'm sure the training has improved her reflexes.”
“How dey doing in dere?”
“Close to testing, apparently. I've asked to be told when they're ready. Will you want to come and watch?”
“Hyu bet,” replied Ottokar enthusiastically. “Hy bored vit dis book. Der Montgomerie got no taste.”
“What is it you're reading?”
“Vun of dose Gothic novels. He got a schtack of dem, und not vun of dem is by Vilkie Collins. Vot is der point of reading Gothic novels if hyu don't read de only person vot writes dem properly?”
“Only person? That's a bit extreme,” replied Mr Wooster, with a smile.
“Vell, maybe it is, but he de only person vot can write Gothic novels hy vant to read,” said the Jäger. “Hy mean, look at dis. Yust about every time de heroine opens a cupboard, dere's a schkull in it. Vot sort of person keeps a house like dat?”
“Bangladesh Dupree?”
“Hyu not being serious.”
“I really hope you're right. I'm sure she'd like mine on her mantelpiece. Well, usually. Apparently I'm not on the death wish list just at the moment, although she has now got me in her sights for... well, a fate worse than death. Think black widow spider.”
Ottokar considered this. “Vell, hy suppose at least dat's some kind of compliment.”
“It's not a welcome one. I have enough on my mind at the moment without the amorous intentions of a serial killer. I hope she gets bored with the idea quickly.”
“She a serial killer?”
“Well... not exactly, I suppose. More like a parallel killer. She does seem to like to achieve as high a body count as possible.”
Alice opened one eye. “Would you care for any help with this troublesome young woman, Ardsley?” she asked. “Because it would be my great pleasure to do her damage on your behalf.”
“That's a very chivalrous offer, Alice, but no, thank you,” replied Mr Wooster. “For a start she's a long way away from here, and for another thing I don't think you're quite ready to go up against her yet. You've seen her sister. She's worse.”
“Then I'll train till I can make her swallow her own pirate hat,” said Alice.
“Vaste of a goot hat,” said Ottokar. “Hyu vant to choke her, dere are better tings.”
At that moment, Professor Quagmire came hurrying into the parlour. “The testing is ready to begin,” he announced.
Alice pulled herself the rest of the way to full consciousness and stood up. “Excellent! Lead us to it, Professor.”
Montgomerie was waiting for them in the workshop. “All right,” he said, without ceremony. “The first thing that happens is that the Professor goes back to an agreed point on the time line so that I can calibrate the locator. He will then search for the accident and return when he's pinpointed it. Meanwhile, we track him on the locator. Everything should stay synchronised, but there is a small probability that it will drift, and the time point he identifies won't be the same as the one on the locator. If that happens, obviously I shall have to do some major alterations.”
“Hy hope it doesn't,” said Ottokar. “Is already past vun in der morning.”
“Quite so,” agreed Quagmire. “So the sooner we get on with it, the better. I'm ready.”
“Good. Here's the device,” said Montgomerie. “And here's where you're aiming for.”
Quagmire nodded. He moved the dials and vanished, and at the same moment a spot appeared on the screen of the locator. Montgomerie nodded in satisfaction, tweaked a few of the dials on the locator, and announced to the others, “There. The locator is now calibrated.”
Another spot appeared on the screen, but the first one stayed where it was. Then another, and another, until soon the dots coalesced into a thick line. “Vy don't de dots fade ven he moves?” asked Ottokar.
“Because if you went back to any of those points from here, you'd still find a time-shifted Professor Quagmire,” replied Mr Wooster. “From our point of view, he hasn't left any of the points where he ended up. It's only from his that he's moving. From ours, he's multiplied.”
“Hyu certainly returned dat favour qvickly,” said Ottokar, with a grin.
Quagmire popped back into the room; the display on the screen, however, was still filling with dots. “Did I arrive somewhere near the moment I left?” he asked.
“There was an appreciable gap,” replied Montgomerie.
“Ah. That was over-caution,” said Quagmire. “I didn't want to risk landing back before I left and occupying the same space. That could have been messy.” He handed back the piece of paper with the co-ordinates, which now had another set scribbled on it. “Here you are. Took me ages to find it. The locator probably won't stop recording dots for a while, I warn you. Is it all right if I go home?”
“If you've found the accident, I suppose there's no reason we can't recalibrate if the locator does turn out to be off,” said Mr Wooster. “Thank you for all your help.”
“Well, it was after all in my own interest,” replied Quagmire. “I don't fancy burning to death several years ago.”
“I am still trying to wrap my head around all the paradoxes,” Alice sighed, as the Professor slipped out.
“Hy got a qvestion,” said Ottokar. “Hy can see how hyu vere locating der Professor, because he got der device. But Charles und Hilde, if de killer sent dem back in time, dey not got a device. So how ve find dem?”
“They don't need to have a device,” replied Montgomerie. “This will locate anyone who has moved out of place within time. Look. Here's what last week looks like in the Salisbury area.” He made some adjustments, and the screen was suddenly full of dots. He blinked.
“Great Scott, that's a lot of time travel,” he said. “I suppose some of it will be the killer, but surely not all of it.”
“Well, some of it is definitely me,” replied Mr Wooster. “And how exactly do you tell who is who? Ottokar has a very good point.”
“It's not difficult if you know their starting co-ordinates,” said Montgomerie. “We know the place from which your friends disappeared, and the approximate time; all we need to do is to find anyone who left within that window, and see where they ended up.” He flipped it back to the original display.
“All right,” said Alice. “I suppose the locator is working correctly? The Professor came back with the right co-ordinates? Well, I mean, obviously he must have done, but they are showing correctly on the locator?”
“It still hasn't finished,” replied Montgomerie, with a touch of impatience. “As soon as it does, if everything is correct, I'll feed in the details for your friends.”
It took a while, and Alice was yawning again by the time it finished. But finally, Montgomerie peered at the locator and turned round triumphantly. “It works!” he declared. “We are now ready for the next stage.”
“And we have a ready-made way of confirming that it really is Charles and Hilde,” said Mr Wooster. “If we identify them correctly, we know they'll show up at the scene of Professor Quagmire's rescue.”
“What about the killer?” asked Alice. “Will they show up too?”
“No, because we don't know their original starting point on the timeline,” replied Montgomerie. “If we're right in thinking they were responsible for sending your friends back in time, then they must have travelled in time to do it, since they don't seem to have got into the room in the usual way.”
“Once we get Charles and Hilde back, it should be a lot easier to find the killer,” said Mr Wooster. “For a start, they presumably know who this person is.”
“All right,” said Montgomerie. “Here we are... yes. Good. We've got a clear point of departure, and they're showing up at the rescue point as you predicted. There should really be two dots, but it's impossible to determine that at this scale. Unless they move a significant distance apart, they're going to appear as a single dot. Now, let's zoom out a bit in time, and see where else they show up. It's definitely somewhere prior to the rescue.”
“Vould dey also have moved in schpace, hyu tink?” asked Ottokar.
“Probably not if we're looking at an accident,” replied Montgomerie. “But if we don't find them near here, we'll have to look elsewhere.” He frowned. “H'mm. Not finding them yet, and the zoom's out over two hundred years now.”
“How far is it possible to go back?” asked Alice.
“No idea. I've never done it. Yet.” He paused. “That's a thought. Some of those dots on the screen from last week were quite probably me. Or will be.”
“Yust as vell is not common, or hyu vould never know vhich of somevun hyu vere talking to,” Ottokar observed. “Is bad enough dere are now probably about a hundred Professor Qvagmires running around Schtonehenge.”
“Not all at the same time,” Mr Wooster pointed out, amused at the mental image that conjured up.
“Ach nein. But anyvun going back in time around dat point vould probably meet at least vun of dem.”
“All right, we're around the time of the Norman Conquest and I'm still not seeing them,” said Montgomerie. “I'm going to have to switch to logarithmic. Hold on.”
There was a pause. Then he whistled. “Great Scott!”
“Have you found them?” asked Alice eagerly.
“Oh yes. Look. They're here.” He pointed to a dot on the display.
“Und vhere exactly is here?” asked Ottokar.
“About... the scale's too small to get a precise figure, but we're looking at about four thousand, three hundred years ago, plus or minus a hundred or so either way. Fortunately I don't need to be able to see it. I can get the locator to feed it straight into the device. I will, however, tweak it just a little forward to allow for error, which is likely to happen when you're travelling over such a long time period. The thing is, you don't want to arrive before they do and be waiting, because if that happens you won't know how long you need to wait. You need to get there a little after, so that you know you'll be safe and in a position to get them away.”
“Four... thousand... three hundred?” echoed Alice.
“Yes. We're looking at somewhere in the Neolithic.”
There was a brief, stunned silence. Then Mr Wooster said, “Well. We'd better get on with it.”
“Here's your time gadget, then,” said Montgomerie. “I think it's only fair to warn you that, although it should be able to take a maximum of five people now, there's no way of testing it other than actually trying to use it to move five people through time.”
“If it moves only two or three, we can always work it in relays,” said Mr Wooster. “Thank you, Mr Montgomerie.”
“Good! I've done what you asked, and now I can put my new knowledge to good use.” Montgomerie cackled manically. “Sidney Willett won the prize this year for Best Cucumber in Show, but I'll show him. I'll show them all!”
“You have the secret of time travel,” said Alice, “and all you're really concerned about is fruit and vegetables?”
“Well,” said Montgomerie, “someone's got to be.”
VIII. The British Panther
It was now clear what was going on. The purpose of the light scaffolding was to enable workers to get to the top of the upright stones so that they could haul on ropes from above when this was needed. On the other side of the uprights, a far more substantial platform was being constructed, the ends of which jutted out well beyond the edges of the upright stones. The lintel stone was being moved up this platform as it was built, alternating from one side to the other, being both pushed from below and hauled from above.
Hilde was now up on the platform with Belod, who had hurriedly summoned her about half an hour ago. Initially she had been puzzled, wondering what there was up there that could not be brought down for repairs; but the answer had soon become clear. One of the workers had slipped and fallen, gashing his leg wide open. Belod and another healer had been called up to help; Belod had taken one look at the leg and realised it was going to take a neat stitcher, and it just so happened that there was a very neat one down there. So Hilde was now stitching up the unfortunate man's leg with pieces of animal sinew while the two healers did what they could for his other injuries. Nothing appeared to be broken, but he had also taken a nasty knock to the head and was confused and groggy.
Charles, who was feeling just about well enough to offer to help now, was down at the bottom hauling on a pulley. It was one of the lighter jobs; this pulley was reserved for delivering food and water. Once he had done that for a while and recovered a little more, his aim was to go and offer a hand on one of the heavy pulleys, the ones which were busily engaged in lifting up construction materials and occasionally fresh tools. Though he was a short man, he was also strong and wiry, and he was perfectly willing to use that strength to help as soon as he was able.
A short distance away, on a low hill, behind the cover of a row of trees, the air shimmered and three figures appeared. They stared awestruck at the scene before them for several minutes before anyone spoke.
It was Alice who broke the silence. “This is amazing,” she breathed. “So that's how they did it!”
“What a terrible shame Professor Quagmire didn't stay,” Mr Wooster murmured. “He would have loved to see this.”
“Hy can see Hilde!” said Ottokar. “Up dere, on de platform.”
“So she is,” said Mr Wooster. “Where's Charles?”
“If Hilde's here, he won't be far away,” replied Alice.
There was a sudden flash of green light in front of them and a triumphant shout. Mr Wooster was aware that someone had appeared in front of them and was apparently firing at them, but there was no sign that anyone was hurt, and within seconds the figure spun round and turned its fire across the scene before them. Mr Wooster kept running. He lunged at the figure, though it was at least as tall as he was and much more solid, and gathered enough momentum to knock the weapon out of its hands. The thing, whatever it was, went scudding off downhill across the turf, past stacks of wood and coils of heavy rope.
“What the hell?” demanded the figure, swinging round on its assailant. Mr Wooster saw that he was dealing with a formidably built man of indeterminate age, with light grey hair, a beard and a sun visor. I might have known, he thought. Tryggvassen. Now it all makes sense. Well, insofar as any situation with him involved ever does.
“Well, now we're equal, Tryggvassen,” said Mr Wooster grimly. “I take it you're the one who's been killing the sparks. Suppose we fight first and I ask the questions later. It usually saves time.” He tossed his jacket into a convenient holly bush.
Tryggvassen guffawed. “Equal? Oh, you think? I don't know how you managed to escape being frozen in time like the others, but if you think you're going to win against me in a fist fight, I'm afraid you're deluding yourself, Mr... er... I can never recall your name.”
“Wooster. And I plan to give you good cause to remember it, after what you did to my friends.”
He glanced round, never taking his main gaze off his opponent. Frozen in time; yes. Everything had stopped. The workers were utterly still in the positions where the beam of Tryggvassen's weapon had caught them. A flint hammer which had just fallen off the platform was still poised in mid-air. Somewhere behind him, he knew Alice and Ottokar would be frozen like statues too. Presumably his own time device had saved him from the same fate, though at the moment he had not the faintest idea how.
“Well,” said Tryggvassen cheerfully, “since I'm going to kill you anyway, I may as well spend a little time gloating. It is, after all, traditional. Wouldn't you like to know how I found out where the Greenwoods had gone?”
“The same way as we did, I imagine,” replied Mr Wooster cautiously, wondering about his Service pistol. Technically, since he had just disarmed his opponent, he probably ought to drop it, especially since Tryggvassen had specifically mentioned a fist fight. On the other hand, it was not at all unlikely that the man had other weapons about his person, and he was known to be cunning bordering on outright sneaky when it suited him. He decided to keep it for now.
“I very much doubt it.” Tryggvassen beamed. “I used you.”
“What?”
“Simple. I knew I must have accidentally sent them a long way back, and I thought someone would probably work out where they were and go looking for them sooner or later. So I built a device to track time journeys of more than a thousand years in the Salisbury area, and, bingo! You obliged.”
“I see,” said Mr Wooster. He said nothing more, but his waistcoat went to join the jacket.
“You really think you can fight me, don't you?” said Tryggvassen. “That's good. That's excellent! I like a bit of desperate courage. You do know I've taken on three Jägers and won? I see you've brought one with you, incidentally, but he won't be much help to you in the state he's currently in. Nor will the young lady. I may let her live. I like her face.”
Mr Wooster started to roll up his sleeves, very neatly and deliberately.
“I expect you'll want to know what I'm planning to do,” said Tryggvassen. “Well, once you're out of the way, I am going to unfreeze the rock and the platform. Then I'm going to set fire to the platform. The moment I unfreeze the rest of the scene, the people around those uprights will either fall, burn or be crushed to death. Or any combination thereof.”
“There must be two to three hundred people around those uprights,” said Mr Wooster, through his teeth. “I thought you had some kind of rudimentary code of ethics that didn't allow you to kill innocent bystanders?”
“Well, usually,” replied Tryggvassen. “But in this case it was all so long ago, wasn't it? Besides, haven't you ever wanted to change history?”
Mr Wooster stared. “What?!”
“Just think about it,” Tryggvassen enthused. “You're probably descended in some way from pretty much every single person in that area, and so is everyone else you know in England, except for a few recent immigrants. The population of these islands at this point is really not high. A significant proportion of it is here building the henge. The moment I kill those people, you won't exist. You won't ever have existed. Of course, other people will exist who wouldn't have existed otherwise, but that will mean that British history is all totally different. If you had the power to do that, wouldn't you want to use it just to see what happened?”
“You want to wipe out the entire history of my country, just to see what else happens in its place?” Mr Wooster exploded. “You're not even within hailing distance of sanity, are you?”
He can't have done it, a voice in his head reminded him. Otherwise, you wouldn't be here to try to stop him in the first place. You'd never have existed. That fact hasn't occurred to him yet.
But, obviously, you do still have to stop him.
“Oh, come on,” protested Tryggvassen. “If I were completely insane, I'd be doing this to my own country. But enough chatting. Time to get on with things.”
“I think not,” replied Mr Wooster, very softly.
And charged at him.
Mr Wooster's guess about other weapons had been entirely correct. Just as a start, Tryggvassen turned out to be equipped with a formidable set of spiked brass knuckles which left a neat row of small wounds in Mr Wooster's shoulder. He was already too fired up on adrenalin to notice. Tryggvassen followed up with a wicked-looking knife; Mr Wooster brought up his pistol to shield himself, and the knife rang against it. He then swung the pistol at his opponent's ear. There was a satisfying thwack, but the Norwegian clearly had a skull like rock. If he could get a little way clear, he might be able to fire the pistol, but right now it was still useful in its secondary capacity as a solid, heavy lump of metal.
Metaphors regarding British lions or British bulldogs have been used in plenty; but if any of the people responsible for those metaphors had seen Mr Wooster in action, they might instead have been tempted to refer to a British panther, a concept which, after all, is no more out of place than a lion. His opponent visibly outweighed him, was considerably stronger, and was also better armed. Unless something very unexpected happened, there was really only one way this fight was going to go. But Mr Wooster was giving it his very best shot, and, not only that, he was doing it gracefully. Tryggvassen had the bulk and brute force of a bear, but Mr Wooster had the elegance and agility of a big cat. He was swift and nimble on his feet, though now he was beginning to lose some speed; his fine white linen shirt was ripped and bloodied, his hair unkempt, his face bruised and battered.
“Not bad,” said Tryggvassen. “Tell you what. If you give up now, I'll stab you through the heart, nice and quick. Better than just leaving you to die of your wounds, eh?”
Mr Wooster did not waste his breath on a response. “Oh, have it your own way,” said Tryggvassen, his affable tone sounding even more incongruous than usual. He lunged again at Mr Wooster, who dodged, but not fast enough. The blow connected squarely with his right side, sending him flying. He landed heavily on the turf, winded, sprawling like a rag doll.
Tryggvassen towered over him. “You can't get up, can you? In that case, you may as well stay where you are while I go and finish things off. After all, soon enough you won't exist.” He turned and started walking down the hill. “You underestimated me,” he called over his shoulder. “Let that be a lesson to you. Never underestimate Othar Tryggvassen, GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER!!!”
A fly buzzed around Mr Wooster's nose. Painfully, he raised a hand to swat it away.
“It's mutual, Tryggvassen,” he murmured, under his breath.
With an effort of will, he forced himself into a sitting position. Damn. Broken ribs, almost certainly. But he could still move if he had to, and, most importantly, he still had the time device. And he was getting good at using that. He wouldn't have to move far.
You couldn't go into your own future. But you could, very definitely, go into the future from here...
Now. Over there, by that coil of rope. Good. And next, there, near the woodpile. With the strength he had left, he wouldn't be able to do Tryggvassen any major damage, but he didn't have to. Just startle him. That was enough.
Better do it a few more times, just to make sure. One injured Wooster might not be a match for Tryggvassen... but half a dozen of them, shifted in time? Now that was a different matter.
The version of him near the woodpile pulled himself to his feet and picked up a trimmed branch. “Tryggvassen!” he shouted. “I haven't finished with you yet.”
Tryggvassen swung round. “How the hell did you get over there so fast?”
He charged. It was what the other Woosters had been waiting for. Two of them each had an end of rope, and they threw it over him. The others added what strength remained to them. Unable to stop himself, he fell, and found himself being trussed up by six equally grim-looking Ardsley Woosters, each with a bloodstained shirt and a determined gleam in his eyes.
“You... you... you utter bastard,” he spluttered. “You time-shifted!”
“Well, you hardly left me a choice,” replied one of the Woosters. “And if I were you, I'd look at changing your trademark. Whatever else you are, you are not a gentleman.”
Once Tryggvassen was safely tied up, the most recent Mr Wooster shifted back a few seconds, coalescing with his predecessor, and the process was repeated until only one of him was left. He was just mustering the energy to walk down the hill and look for Tryggvassen's weapon when he heard a voice behind him.
“Very well done, sir,” it said.
At moments like this, it is customary to spin round on one's heel, but Mr Wooster was well aware that if he tried that in his current state he would probably go crashing to the turf again. He settled for a slow, deliberate turn. Facing him was Axel Higgs, puffing his pipe with an air of absolute contentment.
“Mr Higgs,” said Mr Wooster.
“Correct, sir.”
“How long, exactly, have you been here?”
“That rather depends on your timeline, sir.” He took out his other hand from behind his back. “I think you probably want this, sir, and the way you're looking at the moment, I thought I ought to save you the walk.” He handed over Tryggvassen's weapon.
“He damn nearly killed me,” said Mr Wooster.
“Yes, sir. But I knew that one way or another, you were going to win this. I just didn't know exactly how. So I came to help, but only if you really needed me. I was just going to stop him when you had the idea of using the time device. That was a neat one, sir.”
“Some help before that might have been... appreciated,” said Mr Wooster, raising an eyebrow tiredly. He was aware that he was swaying on his feet.
“Didn't want to unless there was no alternative, sir,” replied Higgs, apologetically. “It was really your fight. You've just saved your country.”
“Would you mind giving me a little time to digest that?” said Mr Wooster, making an effort not to slur his speech. “Here. You'd better have this thing back. People need unfreezing. I have no idea how to do it.”
Higgs looked at it. “I think it's this,” he said, pointing the device at Ottokar and Alice.
“You'd... better... be right, Higgs.”
Higgs was right. Ottokar and Alice burst forwards at the same time. “What happened there?” Alice demanded. “Oh... Ardsley...”
Ottokar put on a burst of speed and caught Mr Wooster just as he fell, lowering him gently to the soft turf. His eyes then fell on the bound and furious form of Tryggvassen. He looked up at Higgs.
“Hokay,” he said. “Hy don't know who hyu are, but hyu better be goot at giving explanations.”
“'sallright,” said Mr Wooster. “He's... a friend. Higgs. Toldyouabout.”
Higgs calmly unfroze the rest of the scene, then handed the weapon to Ottokar. “His,” he said, jabbing a booted toe in the direction of Tryggvassen. “Careful with it. It's a weapon as well as a time device.”
“Was he the one who hurt Ardsley?” demanded Alice, arms akimbo and fire in her eyes.
“Certainly was, miss. But your Mr Wooster turned out to be cleverer than he was. And him a spark, too. Tch.” Higgs gave one of his rare little smiles.
Alice strode over to Tryggvassen. “I hope these people sacrifice you to their gods,” she hissed. Then she swung round and squatted down by Mr Wooster's side. “How badly hurt are you? Can I do anything?”
There was no reply. “He out cold,” said Ottokar. “Und he lost a lot of bloot. Ve better get him some help qvick.”
“But we're in the middle of the Neolithic! We've got to get him home, only... only he's the only one of us who knows how to operate the time device,” said Alice.
“Hyu not being logical,” said Ottokar gently. “Hyu say, ve in der middle of der Neolitic. So ve are. Und right in front of us dere's pipple building dis huge ting vit blocks of schtone even hy couldn't move, und hyu tink maybe dey don't have any pipple vot can treat him?”
“I'll help,” offered Higgs, and sprinted away down the hill, his pigtail bouncing on the nape of his neck. He returned with a small crowd of people, including Hilde, Charles, and Belod. It seemed that he knew a few words of the local language too, though where and how he had picked them up was anybody's guess.
Alice was doing her best; she had discreetly removed her petticoat and torn it into shreds, and now she was using it to clean and bind the most severe and obvious of Mr Wooster's wounds. Belod took one look at him and started giving orders. Within minutes, a litter of branches had been brought, covered with blankets. They rolled him carefully onto the litter, covered him with more blankets, and carried him to the nearest fire, where some water was already being heated in a clay kettle. Belod was pointing urgently to a large gash on his left thigh and rattling out instructions.
“Hy tink hyu might vant to back off here,” said Ottokar to Alice in a low voice. “Dey going to have to undress him to look at dat.”
“Oh. Yes. Well, she, er, does look as though she knows what she's doing,” said Alice, blushing furiously. “I'll just leave her to it, then.”
“Now,” said Hilde. “I have gathered that the reason he got into that state was Tryggvassen, who, as I'm sure you've all guessed, was also the person who killed the other sparks and sent us back here. But we are still missing a few details.”
Two of the group in attendance on Mr Wooster moved slightly apart so that Belod's face could appear between them. “Hilde!” she called.
There was no mistaking the tone of voice. “Ouch,” said Hilde. “I'm wanted for stitching. Good job I've already had some practice. Coming!” She hurried into the middle of the group, needle at the ready.
“I'll pass on the explanations later,” Charles promised. He was looking dishevelled and rather dirty, but much happier than he had been earlier in the day. “First of all, how on earth did you find us?”
“Long story,” replied Alice. “We'd probably better sit down.”
Between them, she and Ottokar told him as much of the story as they could, occasionally aided by Higgs, who had chosen not to sit on the grass but stood throughout, puffing serenely at his pipe. They had not long finished when Hilde finally emerged from the huddle around the fire, beaming.
“I think he'll be fine,” she said. “I've stitched up his leg and the other wounds that needed it, and now all I have to do is repair his trousers.” They were hanging over her left arm. “He's conscious, he doesn't seem to be concussed, and Belod is making him chew willow bark. I doubt that will do much, since he thinks he has some broken ribs, but it may at least be better than nothing.”
“Is he... um... decent?” asked Alice.
“Good heavens, yes. They've wrapped him in blankets. Couldn't have him getting chilled.”
“Could I see him, then?”
“If Belod will let you,” replied Hilde, with a smile.
Belod would. She was now quite satisfied that her latest patient was stable, and content to leave him in the care of his friends while she returned to the platform to resume attending to the fallen worker, who was still groggy but in no danger of bleeding to death as Mr Wooster had been. Alice hurried to him and knelt at his side.
“Ardsley,” she said.
Mr Wooster removed the piece of willow bark from his mouth and put it to one side. “Hallo, Alice. Did they get Tryggvassen?”
“Not yet,” replied Alice. “But Mr Higgs is over there talking to some people, and he's pointing in that direction. And somehow I think Mr Higgs is making himself understood. I don't think Tryggvassen is going to get a nice litter with blankets.”
“I suppose Higgs told you what happened?”
“Oh, yes.” Alice's eyes shone. “He said you shifted yourself a few seconds in time, so that by the time you'd finished there were six of you, which meant that even though you were so badly injured you were able to bring him down with the rope. Now that's clever.”
“I had no choice. I had to win, or he'd have destroyed everything and everyone I've ever cared about. Well, almost. Of course I do have good friends in Europa too.”
“There ought to be a band here playing Land of Hope and Glory or something,” said Alice.
“Dear Lord. I hope not. I know you mean it as nothing but a compliment, but I never could stand that one. Have you ever listened to the words? 'Wider still and wider may thy bounds be set'? I'm not Gil Wulfenbach, fond as I am of him when he's not ranting. I don't want expansion and empire. I don't want England taking over the world. I just want to preserve... all this.” His eyes ranged around him. “All that we have and know and love. Not to go taking over what is equally dear to other people.”
“And now you have,” she said. “You've saved it. Everything. Now Salisbury will be built, and one day a little boy called Charles Greenwood will be born in it. York will be built, and you'll be born there. And in between, there will be all the things we learnt about from the history books, both good and bad. The Romans. The Saxons. The Normans. Richard the Lionheart, and bad King John and the Magna Carta. Wars with Scotland and France and Spain. Ottokar's Richard Plantagenet and the Battle of Bosworth. The Tudors. Shakespeare and Newton and Dowland and so many others. And all the millions of ordinary people who tilled the earth and fought the wars and sailed the seas and ate and slept and loved and prayed and rejoiced and grieved.”
“And will never know my name,” said Mr Wooster, with a little smile. “Don't look like that, Alice. I prefer it like that.”
“But...”
“Every time I walk on English soil, that will be my reward for defeating Tryggvassen. The knowledge that England is still England, because I did that. No, I know what you're going to say. You're going to tell me I'm a hopeless romantic and I should want something more tangible. But what, in fact, could be more tangible than a whole country?”
“But,” said Alice, “when you get back...”
“I know. I'll still be a semi-disgraced spy who looks like turning into either a fully disgraced spy or a very dead one. And do you realise something, Alice? I don't care.”
“Well, I care!” she exploded. “How can you put up with that sort of injustice when you're the one who saved England?”
“Because I'm the one who saved England. That's who I am now, even if nobody else knows it. It would be who I am even if you and Charles and Hilde and Ottokar and the increasingly enigmatic Mr Higgs didn't know it. It'll still be who I am even if I end up sent to some miserable outpost or thrown out of the Service or blown into a pink mist... Alice?”
There were tears in her eyes. “You might not care, but other people do,” she said fiercely. “Hadn't you noticed?”
There was a long pause. Then: “Oh,” he said. “Oh, Alice. I'm so sorry.”
She looked away. “That's not a promising start,” she said, trying to sound stiff and formal to save her dignity. She succeeded only in sounding infinitely sad.
“I... I really don't know what to say,” he said.
She sniffed. “Well. I'm astonished I was able to keep it from you for so long.”
“The possibility simply never occurred to me.” This was far more painful than the broken ribs. “I mean... you're such a remarkable young woman. Intelligent, brave, sensible and generous. I have occasionally wondered why you didn't have young men swarming around you bearing flowers, but I absolutely never considered... not for one moment...”
“Then, if you think so well of me...?”
“You yourself reminded me what I'm going into when we go back,” he said, sadly. “If that were not the case, things could perhaps have been different. But I can't take you into all that, I wouldn't if I could, and I will not ask you to wait for me. If I did, I'd have to promise to wait for you too. I don't think I can do that. Not when I rate my chances of survival as low as I do at the moment. Better to mourn a smaller loss now than a greater one later.”
“You're tough and resilient, and you've survived so far,” she said, gently.
“I think there will be a lot of people who won't,” he replied. “And even if I do, well, who knows how long it will be before I can officially return home? I can certainly use the time device to make occasional visits, but I can't do it too often or for very long. I realised that when I went back to my own time to get some sleep while we were at Mr Montgomerie's house. Did you notice that I had had a shave? If not, I'm sure other people did.”
“Yes, I did, but I thought you'd just gone up to the bathroom,” she said, puzzled.
“No. From my personal point of view, I was gone for some ten hours, and I returned to the same moment I left, but rested and shaved. It was a moment or so later that I realised my appearance must have changed from everyone else's point of view. If I keep using the time device, I'm going to appear to age faster than normal, because I'll still have exactly the same life, but I'll be spending some of it in the past. So I'll have to save it for when I really need it.”
She smiled. “When you're desperate for tea and muffins?”
“That,” he admitted, returning the smile, “is a strong possibility.”
Ottokar came running up at this point. “Hy hope hy not interrupting anyting serious,” he said, “but is someting hyu probably ought to know.”
“What's that?” asked Mr Wooster, instantly back in professional mode.
“Dat Mister Higgs,” said Ottokar. “He disappeared. Ve all saw him.”
“Well, he's free to come and go as he wishes,” replied Mr Wooster.
“But he took der veapon!” Ottokar protested. “Vos der murder veapon. Ve needed it for evidence.”
Mr Wooster closed his eyes. “I must admit, I don't envy you when you come to write your official report. I wouldn't have thought the disappearance of the murder weapon made a great deal of difference by comparison to the other factors. And, if nothing else, it's now well away from Tryggvassen. I consider that a positive point. However, I will talk to Higgs when I next see him and see if I can get it back.”
“Ve... might need a liddle bit of help vit dat report,” said Ottokar. “If hyu hokay vit dat.”
“Least I can do,” Mr Wooster assured him.
Belod came bustling up to check on him, noticed the strip of bark on the ground, picked it up, put it back in his mouth and treated him to a lecture of which he could not understand a single word, but that hardly mattered. Her tone of voice made its import absolutely clear. He chewed the bark meekly while she harangued him and fussed over him, checking his pupils, running a practised hand over his forehead to make sure he was not either chilled or starting a fever, and generally ensuring that there were no signs that he might need further attention at the moment. Then she hurried off to treat her next patient. Alice smiled.
“A doctor's a doctor, in any language,” she said. “I must admit, though, I'm surprised at the lack of incantations.”
“If she does them at all, I expect she does them when there isn't so much hurry,” replied Mr Wooster, temporarily pouching the bark in his cheek, since he dared not take it out again just yet. “She's busy. Lots of people to treat. She's got to stick with the basics.”
“Seeing it under construction certainly gives you a feel for how dedicated everyone is,” said Alice. “Was. You know what I mean. It's pretty dangerous up there.”
“Ho, look!” exclaimed Ottokar. “Dey got Tryggvassen.”
They had. As Alice had correctly predicted, he had not been given a nice litter with blankets. Someone had tied another rope around his ankles and was currently dragging him across the turf by it, quite casually. He did not appear to be enjoying it.
“Vell, dat sets him a nize liddle puzzle,” said Ottokar, with a certain relish. “Hy vonder how he going to get back vitout his liddle toy? In der meantime, he as schtrong as an ox, so maybe dey make goot use of him und harness him to a cart, hey?”
Charles and Hilde finally arrived on the scene. Hilde's patience had just been rewarded; the tenor Ghyn had taken a break and some food, giving her the opportunity to introduce him to Charles. It had gone as might be expected, with a lot of enthusiastic gestures and excited swapping of melodies. Ghyn had just that moment gone back to work, and so Charles and Hilde were able to rejoin the others.
“How are you feeling now?” asked Hilde solicitously. “I hope you didn't come round before I finished stitching you up. It would have been most painful otherwise, I'm afraid. Those bone needles aren't as sharp as I'm used to.”
“I'm all right, thank you,” Mr Wooster replied. “I'm not in too much pain as long as I keep still, and when I do move it's my ribs that hurt, not the stitches so much.”
“Ah! Well, I think I may be able to help a little with the ribs. Once we get back to our own time, I've got an idea for a kind of corset. Not a pressure one, naturally, but a support. There's not a great deal one can do for ribs, but it should at least stop you injuring them any further.”
“Thank you,” he said. “And also, of course, for the stitching. Can you thank Belod for me, too?”
“Oh, I think she knows you're grateful,” replied Hilde with a smile. “She reads faces very well.”
“How soon do you think you'll be able to move enough to go back to our own time?” asked Charles. “Belod is obviously excellent at what she does with what she has available, and I don't in the least want to take that away from her, but I still think you ought to be in a modern hospital.”
“They're all excellent at what they do with what they have available,” said Hilde.
“Well, quite so,” Charles agreed. “And I must admit that I personally would like to stay a little longer and have another chat with Ghyn. Listen to this!” He whistled a few bars of melody. “It shifts from five-four to seven-eight back into five-four again, and then it settles into four-four. It sounds like a natural speech rhythm, doesn't it?”
“Is veird,” Ottokar decided. “But goot veird.”
“Before Charles gets completely distracted, I'd better let you know I've mended your trousers,” said Hilde, putting them down on the blanket. “And you'll need a shirt, or, well, a tunic, which is what they have here. I'm going to try negotiating for one for you. Your old one was in such a bad state that it's going to have to be torn up for bandages. It's soaking in water at the moment to get all the blood out of it.”
“Thank you,” said Mr Wooster. “And, in answer to Charles' question, I could probably move quite soon, if Belod will allow it. I'll just need some help standing up. There's nothing broken other than the ribs.”
“Hyu did lose a lot of bloot,” said Ottokar. “Hy tink maybe hyu should at least schtay here for de night. Ve don't vant hyu fainting.”
“That's sensible,” Hilde agreed. “Very well. I've got some silver coins with me; they'll probably set some value on silver, and I'll try to get a tunic for you in exchange.”
“Is that a good idea?” asked Charles diffidently. “Isn't it going to confuse history if someone like Professor Quagmire comes along in four thousand-odd years and digs up a silver coin dating from the Neolithic with the image of Her Undying Majesty?”
Hilde shook her head. “No, because as far as I can tell they don't have coins. They'll melt them down or beat them into foil, and use them for decoration. I think even in the Neolithic they could melt silver and gold.”
“Und hy going to give dem a hand vit der vork,” said Ottokar. “Dey could do vit somevun vot is really schtrong.” He paused. “Hy yust vish dey vould schtop bowing to me.”
Alice laughed. “They probably think you're a god, Ottokar.”
“Ho. Hyu tink?” Ottokar sounded disconcerted.
“Well, something supernatural, anyway. And I don't suppose you'll exactly disabuse them of that idea if you're going to go round casually lugging megaliths around the place.”
“Ho.” He considered. “Vell. In dat case, hy suppose hy'd better go und be a goot gott.”
The other three walked away in various directions, leaving Alice once more alone with Mr Wooster. He looked up at her.
“On reflection,” he said, “there is, at any rate, one promise I'd like to ask you for, if I may. It would help me to sleep better at night if I knew you were going to keep it.”
“Anything you ask,” she said, ardently.
“Be careful,” he warned her, sadly. “You don't know what it is yet.”
“But if it'll help you sleep at night...” she said.
“Well, it's just this. The next time you fall in love...”
“There won't be a next time,” she interrupted, firmly.
“All right. I could have put that better. If, by any chance, given the strange vicissitudes of the world that we live in... if you should ever happen to fall in love again, I'd like you to promise me this. That you will inform the lucky gentleman at the earliest possible opportunity.”
“And how will that help you sleep at night?” she asked, not looking at him. “Not that it is, of course, going to happen.”
“Because I am starting to have a very faint idea of what you've been putting yourself through, and it is making me shudder,” he replied. “Next time, tell him. Tell him as soon as you're sure of it yourself. If he reciprocates, you'll have more happiness than you would otherwise have done, and if he doesn't you'll have far less pain. Promise me, Alice.”
“Very well. If it makes you happy, I promise. But I'm quite certain there will never be an occasion when I need to put that promise into practice.”
“Just remember,” he said, “I want the best for you. Which includes not being prepared to allow you to become your own worst enemy again.”
There was a long pause. Then she said, “That's a kind of love, too. Obviously not the kind I had hoped for... but that doesn't mean I appreciate it any less than I should.”
“I'm glad,” said Mr Wooster, simply. And, pain notwithstanding, he meant it with all his heart.
IX. Home by an Inevitable Detour
They stayed with Belod and Ghyn and the others that night, and Charles made himself very popular when the time came to sing songs around the fire; he had a good voice and was delighted to teach the others any song that they happened to like. Mr Wooster did not join in, since he was naturally still in a good deal of pain, but he did ask to be allowed to lie near the fire so that he could listen, and everyone was happy to let him. It seemed that Higgs had done a competent job of explaining exactly what he had done for them, because they all treated him with enormous respect and kindness. When Hilde had brought up the matter of a tunic for him, a good one had been immediately found, and nobody would hear of taking her silver for it; so, instead, she gave the coins to Belod as a souvenir. Belod was delighted with them, and indicated that she would have them made into jewellery, though Hilde was not quite clear from the gestures whether she was simply going to punch holes in them and hang them around her neck or have something more complicated made from them.
The next morning, Mr Wooster, who had slept surprisingly well all things considered, tried walking around the camp, and discovered that he could manage it as well as was necessary. Everything still hurt like the very devil, but at least he was no longer feeling light-headed. He did feel he could do with a cane, but once he mentioned this to Ottokar, the Jäger wasted no time in finding a suitably sized piece of spare timber and whittling it to an appropriate shape and smoothness with the knife he had bought at Mrs Chatterjee's circus. Once that was ready, the party took their leave of Belod and the others with many smiles and gestures. Hilde got a hug from Belod, which she warmly reciprocated.
Mr Wooster had set the time device to return to the morning after they had all left, but in Ottokar's lodgings rather than Montgomerie's house, to save the trouble of having to order a cab at such a late hour. It was, therefore, rather disconcerting when the only apparent effects of operating the device were that the sky went dark and Stonehenge, as far as could be seen, suddenly built itself.
“What happened there?” asked Alice.
A familiar voice greeted them. “Oh, there you are!” It was Quagmire, running towards them. “Look. Over there – that canvas tent thing, do you see? I'm underneath it, or rather the past version of me is, and the accident is just happening... now. I'd better get out of the way before I notice myself. Goodbye!”
“Ah,” said Mr Wooster. “This thing is going to need looking at. It must have taken a pounding in the fight.”
The other four were already running. Mr Wooster had no hope of keeping up, but he followed as best he could. There was a scream of pain from under the canvas. Ottokar got there first and yanked the whole mass of soaking canvas out of the ground so that the others could get to the stricken man faster. Alice spotted a bucket still half full of water and passed it to Charles, who threw it over the version of Quagmire in the trench. Hilde caught his arms and helped him out, and Ottokar caught him and rolled him up in the canvas, quenching the last remaining flames. As Mr Wooster caught up, breathing heavily and leaning hard on the cane, the rescue was completed.
There were, of course, the inevitable introductions, all five of them duly acting as though they had never seen Professor Quagmire before in their lives. He was not, as it turned out, badly hurt, but he was nonetheless far too shaken to continue with his dig, so he decided to stay the night at the nearest inn and then return the following morning to his home in Winchester. (And that, thought Alice, would be why we couldn't find him anywhere in Salisbury. He doesn't live there.) Charles adroitly fended off awkward questions by saying they were camping nearby. Once he had finally gone, Mr Wooster held up the time device.
“This thing is playing up a little,” he said. “I don't suppose either of you can fix it, can you?”
“We haven't any tools with us, I'm afraid,” replied Charles.
“But in the meantime, we can recalibrate,” Hilde pointed out. “The error, very roughly, is ten years in four thousand three hundred, or one in four hundred and thirty. Ten years is about three thousand six hundred days, so that's... er... about eight and a half days. If we set the device to subjective present and allow for the fact that you've been here for maybe twelve hours, we should get back about a week behind where we should be. Knowing that, we can iterate and work out when we're on the right day.”
“There's a slight problem with that,” said Mr Wooster. “And that is that we didn't... oh, wait. We probably did. I was forgetting that Montgomerie did a scan showing all time travel in the Salisbury area over the last week, from the point where we were then, and quite a lot of it showed up. Some of it could well have been us.”
“But he was specifically looking for Charles and Hilde as well, and they didn't show up,” Alice objected. “That is to say, they didn't show up a week behind on the timeline he was searching on. They just appeared at the rescue scene and in the Neolithic.”
“In that case, using the subjective present setting will probably get us back without any problems,” said Charles. “It is, after all, a fixed point.”
“Is goot to know,” said Ottokar.
“It certainly is,” said Charles, with feeling. “I don't know about anyone else, but I need a cup of coffee.”
“Perhaps we should reintroduce you to that gradually, darling,” suggested Hilde.
There was some further tweaking of the device and a certain amount of collective agonising over whether or not it would reliably get them to Ottokar's lodgings; normally this would not have been a great problem, but Mr Wooster could not walk too far at the moment. At last they tried the setting they had decided on, and, to everyone's great relief, they succeeded. That is to say, they had definitely succeeded in getting the right location, and it looked very much as though the time was at least within reasonable limits, since Ottokar's possessions were around the place.
“Now,” said Ottokar. “Charles und Hilde, ve been looking after all hyu tings for hyu. Alice took over hyu rooms at der hotel. Ardsley, hyu going to need to schtay vit me for a vhile. Hyu can't go back to hyu own time in dat schtate, or pipple going to ask a lot of annoying qvestions.”
“That is a point,” Mr Wooster agreed. “And, after all, I'm going to need to help you with your report.”
“Before hyu even tink of dat, hyu seeing a doctor,” Ottokar insisted. “If notting else, dey may be able to give hyu someting better for der pain dan dat villow bark.”
Alice led Charles and Hilde off to the hotel, while Ottokar bustled around ensuring that his guest would be as comfortable as possible. “Just a minute,” said Mr Wooster. “Isn't that your bed you're giving me?”
“Ja. But hyu need it. Hy be yust fine on de sofa. Hy not been knocked about by a mad Norvegian vit a Gott complex.”
“Well. You're very kind. Thank you.”
Once he had arranged everything to his complete satisfaction, Ottokar hailed a passing child in the street and sent her running for a doctor. The doctor, who was obese and ponderous and in almost every way unlike the brisk Belod, examined the patient thoroughly and declared that there was no need for him to be admitted to hospital, but wrote him a prescription for something to help with the pain. Naturally, he also asked what had happened.
“He vos set upon by a ruffian,” replied Ottokar. It was essentially, though not quite literally, true. The ruffian in question had indeed been a threat, but Mr Wooster had struck the first blow.
By the time the doctor had finished with Mr Wooster, it was lunchtime, and Ottokar went to look in the pantry. “Goot news,” he called. “Ve definitely on de right day. De mushrooms und tomatoes are here vot hy bought yesterday. Is no meat in der house, because hy did not know hy vould have a guest, but how hyu fancy an omelette?”
“Sounds like heaven, Ottokar,” replied Mr Wooster. “Thank you. I didn't like to mention it in case our friends caught the gist, but I'm not good with variably cooked meat.”
“Ja. Not much control ven hyu do it on a schpit,” said Ottokar. “Did hyu try der kefir schtuff? Dat vos qvite nize. Vent preddy goot vit der fruit.”
“No, but I did have the porridge. That was good, actually. I couldn't work out what sort of grain they were using, but I liked it better than regular oat porridge. They put honey in it.”
“Vos rye, hy tink. Tasted a liddle like it. Ve had rye bread in der Army. Goot schtuff. Is dark und heavy und fills hyu up goot. Now, vot hyu vant in hyu omelette? Hy got tomatoes, mushrooms, onions, und dere's also some cheese if hyu vant, but hy not sure is goot to eat eggs und cheese togedder.”
Mr Wooster smiled. “I'll risk it, I think. I don't tend to get digestive problems from either food. Could I have a cheese and tomato omelette, please? With maybe a little onion if you're having some in yours?”
“Sure hyu can have onion in it. Hy going to have a mushroom und onion omelette. Vit lots of pepper.”
Mr Wooster came and sat in the kitchen while his host was cooking. He leaned forward on his cane, this being slightly more comfortable at the moment than sitting back in his chair. There was a thoughtful silence for a while.
“Anyting on hyu mind in particular?” asked Ottokar conversationally, cracking eggs into a bowl.
Mr Wooster nodded. “Yes, actually. Alice.”
“Ho. So hyu know at last, den. Goot. Vot hyu plan to do about it?”
“Well, there's really nothing I can do,” replied Mr Wooster regretfully. “You know what my situation is.”
“Ja. Hy had a feeling hyu'd say that.” Another egg slipped into the bowl with the others. “Hy sorry.”
“You'll keep a good eye on her, won't you? She's... she's a remarkable young woman. I made her promise that if this sort of thing ever happened again, she'd tell the gentleman straight away. I think perhaps you ought to know that, just in case, you know, she forgets.”
“Hyu did?” asked Ottokar.
“Well, I... I had some inkling of what she must have put herself through.”
“Hyu a goot man,” said Ottokar, who had, of course, a great deal more than an inkling, and was not going to make his friend feel any worse by going into detail.
“The thing is,” said Mr Wooster, “I do care about her a great deal. Which I somehow managed to get across to her while at the same time explaining that nothing would be able to happen between us. I'm grateful for that, because I wasn't sure I could do it. I'm... not well used to having to communicate that kind of thing. I don't think I love her in the way that she would like me to, but if we were around each other all the time, I suspect I probably would soon enough.”
“Hyu not been in love before?” asked Ottokar, curiously.
“Well, not properly. Not to the point where it was necessary to discuss the matter with the lady in question.” Mr Wooster was uncomfortably aware that he was blushing. “I wasn't much more than a boy at the time, anyway.”
“Dat got to have been difficult,” said Ottokar, sympathetically.
“It was, but, you know, you go through these things and come out the other side. I expect you've done the same.”
It was Ottokar's turn to be somewhat embarrassed. “Vell, no,” he replied.
“What, never?”
“Never. Alice asked me about it vunce. Hy yust said hy probably hadn't met de right girl yet und dere vos no hurry. But hy don't tink hy do der whole romance ting at all.”
“That's a bit sad,” said Mr Wooster.
“Hy don't tink so,” replied Ottokar. “Hy mean, hy yust fine. Hy got some really goot friends, such as hyu for instance, und hy don't get my heart broken. Dey say is love dat makes der vorld go round, und dey got a goot point, but dey alvays forget dere is different sorts of love.”
“You're right, as usual,” said Mr Wooster. “I, however, may need to spend a bit of time untangling them in the near future.”
X. Retrospective
There were a few things Mr Wooster had to do once he was properly recovered. The first, of course, was to return to the point in time he had left, which now meant that he was going back in time, due to the recovery period. The very first thing he did when he had a free moment was to go and see Higgs.
“Yes, sir?” said Higgs, respectful as ever.
“Mr Higgs,” said Mr Wooster. “Do you by any chance recall having gone back to Stonehenge, near Salisbury in England, while it was being built, or is that in your future?”
“No, sir, I recall it quite clearly.” Higgs allowed himself a brief grin. “And a fine job you did too, sir. I hope you're now fully recovered?”
“Still some pain around the ribs from time to time, but most of me is in decent shape again, thank you,” replied Mr Wooster. “I've come to ask you for Tryggvassen's device, if you don't mind. You can have it back later if you wish, but it is a murder weapon and so we're going to need it for the report.”
“Oh,” said Higgs. “Can't do that, sir, I'm afraid.”
“Why not?” asked Mr Wooster. “What happened to it?”
“Well, sir, if you recall, I've been helpful to the Lady Heterodyne a few times,” said Higgs.
“That's something of an understatement. Go on.”
“So I took her Tryggvassen's device and asked her if she wouldn't mind doing me a little favour,” Higgs explained. “I asked if she could take it apart and convert it into a device that did nothing but time travel, without the weaponry attached. Of course, being Her Ladyship, she took the whole thing apart and rebuilt it completely, as you saw for yourself.”
“As I saw?” asked Mr Wooster.
“Yes, sir. When I gave it to you.”
“So you've still got another one like it?”
“No, sir. There was only ever one device. I went back in time and took it from Tryggvassen, with your help. But then I had to give it to you so that you could go back in time and defeat Tryggvassen, and I knew that having a weapon attached to it wouldn't give you an advantage. He's got some remarkable defensive technology, sir. You can't do a lot to him with weapons. So if you didn't have a weapon, you would have to use your brain, which is of course exactly what you did.”
Mr Wooster took out the device in question. “You are seriously telling me that this was originally Tryggvassen's weapon?”
“You can ask the Lady Heterodyne if you don't believe me, sir.”
“I would never accuse you of lying to me, Mr Higgs. It's more that I'm having some trouble wrapping my head around all this. By the way, did I go and see you a couple of weeks ago and ask you to wait for my former self in a coffee bar near here at some ungodly hour of the morning?”
“Half past five, sir, to be exact, and yes, you did,” replied Higgs.
“Good. I had better go and sort that out, then. Thank you.”
Mr Wooster went and sorted that out. It was an extremely weird feeling to start a new conversation with Higgs as if he had not just been talking to him, but then, from Higgs' point of view, he had not. That conversation was still in the future for him. He had originally intended to go and visit his momentarily suicidal former self first, but then a thought struck him. He had a good idea that Dupree would have gone straight back to her room after having had the conversation with that same former self through the closed bedroom door, so he set the location carefully and materialised in her room a few moments before she was due to arrive there. The door duly opened, and Dupree gasped.
“Mr... Wooster?” she said.
The spectacle of Bangladesh Dupree looking utterly bewildered was one that he could have relished for a long time, had it not been so dangerous to try. Instead, he slipped into full-on polite British mode and bowed. “So sorry, madam,” he said formally. “Wrong location.”
And vanished before her eyes.
Now there was just... himself... to deal with. That was going to be interesting.
He appeared at the end of the bed. His other self, for the moment, had his eyes closed. He looked tired and absolutely crushed, and Mr Wooster remembered that he had also been crying, though that did not show on his face. Perhaps it would when he opened his eyes. The hand of his past self twitched towards the pillow.
“Ardsley, old man,” he said gently. “Don't.”
His past self blinked and stared at him. “What?”
Yes. It did show. Good Lord, thought Mr Wooster, what a state I was in.
“I said, don't,” he repeated. “I know what you're thinking. Don't do it. If you do, more lives are going to be lost than just yours. Trust me on this. I'm you, after all.”
“You're me? Well, you're certainly a very good imitation. But how on earth did you get in here?”
“That's kind of complicated,” Mr Wooster explained to his past self. “But I assure you, you will find out. Later.”
I can't tell me too much, he thought, or I won't believe me. And I need to tell me to go and see Higgs, but not straight away. It has to be just as I'm going, otherwise I will ask questions and I can't really answer myself.
“That is not entirely reassuring,” replied the past Mr Wooster.
“Would it help if I told you I'd just confused the life out of Dupree?”
“That rather depends on how she reacted,” said his former self nervously. “She's just... er...”
Mr Wooster winced sympathetically. “Yes, I know what she's just done. But it's all right. She thinks I'm a hallucination too. I didn't give her time to find out otherwise.”
“Good,” said his past self. “I think.”
“It is. She'll avoid you for a bit, and that will be good for your mental health. Do you have the faintest idea how badly stressed you are at the moment?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry. Rhetorical question. If you weren't badly stressed, you wouldn't be thinking about that pistol. Oh, you'll want to know about the pendant. It's just distance coupled with some poor reception at the moment. There are thunderstorms. It does work, sometimes. You're not totally cut off from your friends. And there is a way you'll be able to see them again, as long as you can at least manage to stay alive. Even get home from time to time.”
And the only reason I know that, thought Mr Wooster slowly, is that I came back and told myself when I was where he is. Although I did check it the following morning, so I suppose that didn't come completely out of nowhere.
The previous Mr Wooster eyed him thoughtfully. “How do I know you're not just a figment of my overheated imagination?” he asked. “Telling me what I want to hear?”
Mr Wooster sighed. “I'm so suspicious, I can't even trust myself, apparently,” he said. “Here. Shake hands. See if I'm a figment.” He thrust out a hand.
His past self took it gingerly, and seemed somewhat reassured by its solidity. “Have you got one of those pendants?” he asked, apparently out of the blue.
Mr Wooster pulled it out from under his collar. “Naturally. I have the same pendant that you have. I am you.”
“All right. Call Ottokar.”
“I can't. Not from here. Thunderstorms, remember?” And besides, he reflected, they don't work if you're at different points on the timeline. I know. I've tried. But right now I'd better not confuse me with that.
“Oh, yes. Thunderstorms.”
“All right. Got to go before you start asking too many questions. You'll certainly ask them, but you need to get the answers on your own.” Mr Wooster smiled. “Just remember. You've got to live. It's crucial. That's why I took all the trouble to tell you. Oh, and... see Higgs.”
He slipped back to his own time before the past version of himself could open his mouth again. That, if he was not mistaken, was all the loose ends tied up now. And that was a huge relief, because he did not want to have to think about anything to do with time travel for a long time. There was too much happening in the here and now, and all of it was bad. There were now rumours flying that the Baron was dead, and, though he personally doubted them – his private view was that anything capable of finishing off old Klaus Wulfenbach would probably bring about, if not the actual end of the world, at least the end of a very large chunk of it – it was still abundantly clear that nothing good was happening.
And then he stepped out of his room and almost cannoned into Dupree.
“Gil wants a little chat,” she announced. “I should go carefully.” For once, she seemed almost friendly.
“Oh. Thank you. I think.” He paused. “What about the Baron? Is he...?”
Dupree shrugged. “You tell me. Nobody knows. My bet is the Baron's not sure himself. If he's undead now, whoa boy, are we going to have fun round here.”
Mr Wooster could not decide whether she was being serious, joking or sarcastic. “Well. I... suppose I'd better go and see Gil, then. Thank you for letting me know.”
“All right. Hey... that trick you did a few weeks back. I keep meaning to ask you about that.”
“What trick?”
“Where you turned up in my room and suddenly vanished. How did you do that?”
“Trade secret,” said Mr Wooster. “Oh, don't look at me like that. It's not necessarily repeatable.”
“Pity,” replied Dupree. “I'd kind of like you to repeat it some time. Only maybe stay a bit longer, hey?”
Mr Wooster stared at her. “You've tried to kill me more than once.”
“So? Maybe right now I feel like not killing you. You ought to be grateful. Anyway, something's changed about you. I don't know exactly what it is, but I'm kind of liking it. For now.”
“Dupree, I am not going to bed with you. Not now, not ever.”
“Awwwwww. Not even if I promise to wear the short satin nightie with the little lace skulls?”
Mr Wooster recoiled in horror at this mental image. There was, he felt, a time and a place for his characteristic smooth, elegant, polite approach, and this was absolutely not it.
“Get wound, Dupree,” said the man who had saved England.
* * * * *
“Thank you both,” said Elizabeth Chadwick. She was still in her heavy mourning, still ramrod-straight as she always was, but something had changed about her too. She looked older, somehow. Ottokar and Alice had both noticed it the moment they had walked into her office.
“Vell,” said Ottokar, “since Ardsley insisted hyu ought to know der real schtory, is probably him hyu really ought to tank.”
She smiled faintly. “I suppose he helped you write the report? There isn't a single actual untruth in it, based on what you've just told me. That would be like him.”
“Of course he did,” said Alice.
Mrs Chadwick sighed. “It's a work of art. And he's a hero. I am now even more angry with the Service than I was when you walked in here. I hadn't realised that was possible.”
“Vy hyu angry?” asked Ottokar.
“Oh,” she said. “So you haven't had your official letters yet? No, I suppose you probably wouldn't have, thinking about it.”
“What's happened?” asked Alice.
“Baron Wulfenbach is said to be dead, although nobody actually seems to be quite certain. All we do know is that his son has taken over his duties, and almost the first thing he did was to get rid of Mr Wooster. I fully accept Mr Wooster's explanation for what happened, and I'm prepared to back him up; he could not have acted differently. Nonetheless, we do need to get a new agent in there, and whoever it is, I don't envy them. Europa is in chaos.”
“So what have they done to Ardsley?” asked Alice.
“Well,” replied Mrs Chadwick heavily, “the best way I can put it is that it's less than they would have done if I hadn't intervened. You know the way of it. In the Service, we're all about results. Mr Wooster... didn't get them. You and I know it wasn't his fault he didn't get them, and I made that one hundred per cent clear. I also produced his record and pointed out, at some length, that he had been getting extremely good results up to that point. So all they did, in the end, was to demote him and pack him off to the most obscure posting they could find.” She curled her lip bitterly. “All they did. Yes, I know. Believe me, I feel the same about it as you two do, but at least they stopped short of throwing him out of the Service.”
“That's completely unfair,” said Alice angrily. “He got results at Stonehenge, didn't he? If he hadn't got those results, there'd be no Service for him to be getting results for, as likely as not.”
“But ve can't tell dem dat,” Ottokar reminded her. “Und, remember. He knows he did it. Is like hyu say, unfair und all wrong, but it von't break him.”
“There is more,” said Mrs Chadwick heavily. “They also demoted me, because I recalled him to London at the point I did and allowed him to remain in order to train you. Never mind the fact that if I hadn't, we'd still have one of the Other's agents wandering around the country with that circus, and Mr Sherlock Holmes would be dead in the Thames; and there was also the other case, the one you weren't involved with, which obviously I'm not at liberty to tell you about, but suffice it to say we needed an agent who could be passed off convincingly as coming from the Baron, and I would very much like to know who was better qualified for that than he was. Apparently the Wulfenbach situation was much more important than any of that. I personally don't agree. The Wulfenbach situation is crucially important, obviously, but not more so than the other three matters put together. However, my opinion wasn't important to our superiors, so I am now effectively replacing Mr Wooster at the level he was at before they demoted him. Which means that, in addition to training you, I am also now a field agent again... at least in theory.”
“Oh, Mrs Chadwick,” said Alice. “I am so sorry. You don't deserve that either.”
She smiled grimly. “Don't worry about me too much. I'm old and I have savings. Once I have completed your training, I intend to retire. I very much doubt they will send me into the field before that task is finished, because one thing they do get right is that they try to avoid interfering with people's training unless it is absolutely necessary. Training is, apparently, very important. Once you're fully trained, it's a different game.”
Alice considered for a few moments. Then she said, “Mrs Chadwick, do you think it may be possible that the Service has been infiltrated in some way?”
“It's crossed my mind, and I have been incautious enough to mention it,” replied Mrs Chadwick. “If you have any sense at all, you will never say that out loud again. I happen to believe you do have some sense.”
“Except to you or Ottokar. Obviously.”
“Even then, I should be careful. It is not the kind of remark you want to be overheard. However, I also suggest that you keep your eyes open. Anyone who forms a hypothesis has a duty to test it, even if that testing has to be done with extreme discretion.”
“Yes, madam,” said Alice, with a gleam in her eye. Mrs Chadwick gave the faintest hint of a smile in response.
* * * * *
Somewhere in the vicinity of Mechanicsburg, a tall, slim figure walked purposefully across a wild stretch of abandoned countryside. High above and far away, a pair of mauve eyes watched him through a crack in the mountainside.
The owner of the pair of eyes, whose name was Maxim, turned to his two companions. “He definitely coming dis vay,” he announced.
“Hyu know who it is?” asked Dimo, the leader. “Anyvun ve know?”
Maxim shrugged, his long hair cascading elegantly over his shoulders. “Hy can't tell from here. He schtill a long vay off. But he tall und schkinny, und he might have got dark hair but hy can't see vell because he vearing a hat.”
“If is not red hair, at least he not a Sturmvoraus,” opined Oggie, the third member of the group. “Dey trouble.”
“Hyu don't have to be a Sturmvoraus to be trouble, eediot,” said Dimo. “Out of der vay, Maxim. Let me see.”
Maxim obligingly moved aside to let Dimo see. A moment later, Dimo exploded. “Hy can't believe hyu don't know who dat is!”
“Hyu know?” asked Maxim, astonished. “Hyu got goot eyes, Dimo!”
“Hyu don't need goot eyes,” Dimo retorted. “Hyu only got to look at der vay he valks. No-vun else valks like dat. Is Mister Vooster!”
“Mister Vooster?” said Oggie. “Vot's he doing here?”
“Hy dun know, but he shouldn't be valking out dere all by himself. Dere is dangerous tings. Let's go und meet him.”
“Ja!” said Maxim enthusiastically. “Dere is dangerous tings. Ve is dangerous tings too, but ve is goot dangerous tings.”
The three Jägers hurried down to the well-concealed exit from the caves, and strode forward to meet their friend. Mr Wooster recognised them from a long way away; there might well be only one hat in the world quite like Maxim's. Despite his tiredness, he hastened his steps to meet them.
“Mister Vooster!” they chorused, as he approached.
“Dimo! Maxim! Ognian! Good to see you all again,” he said. “How have you chaps been getting on?”
“Better dan hyu probably tink,” replied Dimo, with a grin. “De caves are qvite cosy. Hyu coming to stay?”
“For an indefinite period, by the look of it,” replied Mr Wooster. “If you've got room for me, of course.”
“Plenty of room,” said Maxim. “Ve find hyu a really nize room. Ve even got running vater here, but of course hyu got to varm it up.”
“Ja, liddle underground schtreams everyvhere,” said Oggie. “Und stal... stalag... dose mineral deposit tings.”
“So,” said Dimo shrewdly, “hy kind of guessing hyu not running avay like most pipple. Hyu dun look like hyu running avay. Dat means someting vent wrong, ja?”
“You're right, Dimo,” replied Mr Wooster. “I suppose you know I'm a British agent? Everyone else does by now.”
“Ho ja. Hyu in trouble vit der folks at home, den?”
“You could say that. Apparently I was supposed to have stopped Europa from sliding into chaos. I do my best, but I don't do miracles. Oh yes, and I've also been sent away under threat by Gil, or, as I should now call him, Baron Wulfenbach. He touched an even rawer nerve than he knew. Still, when I tell you that the reason he sent me away was because he wanted me to find and protect the Lady Heterodyne, perhaps you'll find it in you to forgive him.” He smiled. “I have done so, though I am certainly still taking his threat very seriously.”
“Vy did he need to treaten hyu to get hyu to do dat?” asked Dimo. “Hyu vould have done it anyvay.”
“As far as I could without leaving his side, yes. The rest I would have had to trust to you chaps. I'm in a cleft stick; I couldn't keep the Service even remotely happy if I didn't stay with him, and I couldn't keep Gil even remotely happy if I didn't leave him. Consequently nobody is particularly happy, and I've been posted here, where I am hoping at some point to be able to pick up on Gil's, that is to say, the Baron's commission.”
“Hyu seem very calm about it,” said Maxim.
“Well, it's that, have a nervous breakdown, or shoot myself,” replied Mr Wooster. “And I've rejected the other two options.”
“Ve got to find de Lady Heterodyne before ve can protect her,” said Oggie. “No-vun knows vhere she is right now.”
“Wherever she is, I have no doubt she's looking after herself pretty well,” said Mr Wooster. “I wonder how Gil would react if he discovered that she had sent someone to protect him?”
Dimo grinned. “Has she?”
“I don't know, but it strikes me that he assumes a little too easily that women need protecting more than men do. Why, there's a young lady I know in England who... well, let's just say that if I ever feel I need protecting, she will be high on my list of people to ask.”
“Ho ja?” said Oggie, knowingly.
“Let's put it this way,” said Mr Wooster, forging ahead determinedly in a reasonably successful effort to forestall a blush. “She's already expressed a desire to fight Dupree. One day I expect her to be able to do that.”
“Ve all need protecting sometimes,” said Dimo. “Men or vomen.”
“But maybe not so much der young Baron, because he got all dose armies und minions und great big clanks,” said Maxim.
“Hoo boy,” said Oggie. “Vy does she vant to fight Dupree?”
“Oh... personal reasons,” replied Mr Wooster.
“Hey, Mister Vooster,” said Maxim suddenly. “Hyu been in England not so long ago, ja?”
“That's right, Maxim,” said Mr Wooster.
“Hyu didn't happen to meet a friend of mine, did hyu? Daggy. She lives in London. She a builder.”
“I didn't, but I do know the name,” replied Mr Wooster. “She's a friend of another friend of mine, Ottokar, whom I very much hope you chaps are going to meet one day.”
Maxim almost squeaked with excitement. “Ottokar! Hyu know Ottokar? She been telling me all about him in her letters. Hy really vant to meet him. She said he a really goot fighter und he also der best Jäger cook in de whole of London. Vhen she wrote about his ant patties, hy dun mind telling hyu, Mister Vooster, my mout vos vatering.”
“H'mm,” said Dimo. “Does he cook food dat is goot for humans as vell as for Jägers?”
“He certainly does,” replied Mr Wooster. “I can personally vouch for that.”
“Und... does der young Baron schtill keep sacking his chefs like de old vun did?”
“Good Lord,” said Mr Wooster, as the implications of this remark hit him. “As a matter of fact, I have no idea. I had to leave... rather rapidly.”
“Vell,” said Dimo. “It may be vorth finding out, don't hyu tink?”
“Ja,” Maxim chimed in. “Goot idea. Ve happy to help hyu friend.”
“Hy'd like him to teach me,” said Oggie. “Hy no goot at it. Last time hy tried to boil an egg, it exploded.”
“Is because hyu supposed to use vater, eediot,” said Dimo.
“Hy forgot,” said Oggie plaintively.
“He not keeding,” said Maxim. “Hyu should have seen der mess, Mister Vooster.”
Soon, they arrived at the cave entrance. Dimo took charge immediately. “Hokay,” he said. “Ve got a schpecial svuite reserved for de Lady Heterodyne in case ve find her. Maxim is in der room next door on vun side und Oggie is in der room on de odder. Dere are two rooms opposite. Hy sleep in vun of dem und hyu getting de odder.”
“Thank you,” said Mr Wooster.
“Hyu velcome. Is a nize room. Hy tink hyu like it.”
“What I would like most at this moment,” said Mr Wooster, “is a bath. I've walked a long way. Can that be arranged?”
“No problem!” grinned Maxim. “Hyu got a tub in hyu room. Ve bring hyu de hot vater.”
“Und den dere's dinner,” said Dimo, “but is hokay. Oggie didn't cook it.”
Oggie looked wounded.
When you have Jägers bringing you hot water, you can be sure that it will be hot enough, since a Jäger can quite easily fill the whole bath for you and carry it back to your room. Oggie insisted on doing the honours, no doubt to underline the fact that he was still useful despite his inability to master the culinary arts, and then went to rejoin the others in Dimo's room, since Dimo had packed someone else off to do lookout duty for a while.
These were caves. Many of the walls were solid rock, and the ones that weren't were still, for the most part, soundly built; after all, there was plenty of stone conveniently lying around just asking to be used for construction purposes, and it was usually much more practical to use that where possible than to bring in timber from the surrounding forest. Nonetheless, certain sounds did echo. If Mr Wooster had simply been talking to someone in his room, Dimo and the others would never have heard a sound; but he was not talking. He was, in the immemorial tradition, singing in the bath.
“A wand'ring minstrel I, a thing of shreds and patches...”
Charles Greenwood might have experienced a slight jolt to hear that being sung by a baritone, and therefore out of its usual key, but the Jägers did not know it and therefore had no such reservations. “Hoo,” said Maxim. “Nize voice. Didn't know he could sing.”
“Hy suppose is not much reason to sing ven hyu vit Master Gil all der time,” Oggie observed.
The song tailed off. Mr Wooster, in common with most ablutionary vocalists over the whole of time and space, did not know all the words. A few moments later, he started up again.
“Täubchen, das entflattert ist,
Stille mein Verlangen;
Täubchen, das ich oft gekusst,
Lass dich wieder fangen!
Täubchen... er...”
The singing broke off abruptly. “Hy know dat vun!” said Maxim. “Shall hy go und tell him der next line?”
“Vot, und let him know ve listening?” demanded Dimo. “Hyu schtupid or someting?”
“He not got a bad accent, for a British person,” said Oggie.
“Vot vos dat song anyvay?” asked Dimo. “Is notting hy ever heard.”
“Is out of an operetta,” replied Maxim.
“Hyu vent to an operetta?”
“Vell, der vos dis girl,” explained Maxim, with a grin. “She liked operetta. Und she said hy vos preddy. Hy prefer handsome myself, but hy take vot hy can get.”
“Is veird,” Dimo decided. “Hy mean, not hyu, und probably not hyu leddy friend. Der operetta. Vot sort of person in deir right mind goes round singing about keesing liddle doves? Hyu dun vant to do dat. Yust wring deir neck und pop dem in der pot.”
“Is not a real liddle dove,” replied the knowledgeable Maxim. “Is a leddy called Rosalinde vot is married to an eediot. Der eediot behaves very badly in der operetta und Rosalinde knows about it, but in de end dey get reconciled. Hy vos disappointed. Hy tought she should have gone off vit der yentleman vot sang her der aria about der liddle dove.”
Mr Wooster's voice was suddenly raised in song again from the adjacent room.
“Why do the nations so furiously rage together;
Why do the people imagine a vain thing?”
“Ja,” said Dimo. “Damn goot qvestion, dat.”
There was no question this time of Mr Wooster forgetting either the words or the music. The remaining words, after all, were mostly repeats, and the music was from Handel's Messiah, with which he was so familiar that he could probably have sung the whole thing from beginning to end, albeit in solid baritone. He had, as Maxim had mentioned, a good voice, but it was not trained; he frequently ran out of breath in the middle of a phrase, and most of the melismas were distinctly too much for him. Nonetheless, there was no mistaking the fact that he was putting his heart and soul into it.
The Jägers listened in silence until he had finished, and remained in silence for a little while afterwards. It was Oggie who finally spoke.
“He changed,” he said. “Hy dun know how. But he has.”
“Ja,” said Dimo, thoughtfully. “Is like dere's more to him now.”
“Glad hyu said dat. Hy tought hy vos imagining schtuff,” said Maxim.
“Maybe he yust better ven he not got Master Gil schtanding over him,” said Dimo.
“Hy got no idea,” said Oggie. “But hy glad ve got him on der team.”
* * * * *