Chapter Twenty-Seven: Mr Carmichael’s Homework

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Mr Carmichael’s Homework

“Sorry!” he shouted over the clocks. “Give me your hand. We’ve got to help Gideon”

But out of the corner of his eye he saw the two jackets they had draped over Kate drop to the floor as if balloons had been pricked beneath them. Peter froze, his hand still extended for her to take. Then he slowly picked up the heavy jackets one by one and stared in disbelief at the empty floor. He ignored the commotion coming from the other side of the room and searched frantically all around him for any sign of Kate. The air was thick with the chiming of an army of clocks whose relentless pendulums swung, measuring out the seconds since he had last seen Kate. He ran wildly through the crowd, pushing people out of the way, continuing to call out for her, yet all the while somehow knowing he had lost her. An invisible bond had been cut, a candle blown out. But, of course, he could not accept it.

“Kate!” he screamed, not caring what people thought. “Kate!”

He ran towards the water clock hoping to find that she was helping Gideon with Lord Luxon. People were in a state of high agitation.

“Did you see it? Am I dreaming?”

“He just vanished! He vanished off the face of the earth!”

“Should we call the police?”

“Has a crime been committed?”

“He said he was the ghost of Lord Luxon come back to haunt us!”

“Did you know him?” a woman asked Gideon. “You looked so angry!”

Gideon was backing away. Peter stood next to the water clock trying to take it all in. Kate had gone. Lord Luxon had gone. Gideon glanced at Peter and immediately understood that something terrible had happened. Peter’s face was ashen. He needed to get him away.

“Twas a magician’s trick, that is all,” Gideon called to the crowd as he pulled Peter towards the long gallery. “He has good timing, has he not, to vanish at the very moment the hour strikes? Doubtless he will be back soon to beg for your pennies…”

Gideon took hold of Peter’s arm and lead him firmly out of the crowd before anyone got any ideas about stopping them. He marched Peter through the long gallery and then into a corridor and then, when they came across a narrow wooden staircase, roped off and labelled No Entry, he unhooked the rope and pushed Peter through. They climbed up three flights of stairs to the top of the building and found themselves on a vast roof terrace that stretched the breadth of Tempest House. There was a carved stone balustrade and Peter slumped onto the floor and rested his elbows on the sun-warmed stone, panting a little after all the stairs. Gideon sat down next to him.

He waited for Peter to speak. From the movements of his back Gideon could tell he was crying. Suddenly Peter started to hit the balustrade with clenched fists.

“I let go of her!” he cried. “And now she’s gone…”

He felt Gideon’s hand on his shoulder.

“Then we will look for her,” said Gideon.

“How can we do that when she’s moving so fast she’s invisible?”

“Then…Mistress Kate will have to find us.”

Peter sat up and looked directly at Gideon, his eyes red from crying. “She would have found us by now!” he shouted. “Don’t you understand? For her, it’s probably been a hundred years since she disappeared. If she was going to come back she would have done by now. I promised not to let go of her…and I did. It’s all my fault!”

Gideon looked taken aback by Peter’s outburst and covered his own face with his hands for a moment. Peter saw that the truth of the situation had sunk in. Gideon’s blue eyes had misted over.

“So Mistress Kate is lost forever? She is beyond our help?”

Peter nodded. “And wherever she’s gone, I think she’s taken Lord Luxon with her.”

More time passed. It was Peter who broke the silence first. “Gideon, look!” he exclaimed, pointing beyond the great arch that marked the end of the gardens towards London.

Gideon heaved himself off the ground and stood up painfully. He scanned the cityscape that stretched as far as the eye could see. Peter heard Gideon’s sharp intake of breath as he saw it.

“I had hoped never to see such a thing again…”

A glowing, billowing mass pulsated over perhaps a quarter of the city on the eastern side. The sky had grown very dark over London, even though here, at Tempest House, all was blue sky and sunshine.

Below them they heard frightened cries and when they looked down at the people on the terrace, they saw that everyone was looking in the same direction.

“Another time quake!” someone shouted.

People began to hurry away from the house. They heard the sound of engines revving and tyres crunching on gravel. Soon there was a mass exodus and the drive was full of visitors and staff. It was not long before the car park had emptied and the gardens were deserted. On the horizon, lurid green lightning streaked across the city like a skeleton’s fingers. As Peter watched, a strong sense of unreality came over him. He did not even feel frightened any more.

“Kate was right,” said Peter. “We’ve damaged Time – and who is going to mend it? Even if Lord Luxon can’t cause any more damage, the time quakes aren’t going to stop. It’s too late.”

Gideon looked as sad as Peter had ever seen him. “Come,” he said. “I grow weary of this place. I need to find you food and water and a roof for your head.”

What’s the point? Peter was about to say. We might just as well lie down now and wait for it all to be over. We’re all alone, with no means of getting home, in a world that’s falling apart in front of our eyes! What’s the point of doing anything? It’ll only prolong the agony… But he bit his lip. He felt suddenly ashamed. For the first time he considered what Gideon might be feeling.

“We need to find food and water and a roof for our heads,” said Peter.

“What is it?”

Gideon pointed. A large white vehicle, a van of some kind, had come into view at the opposite side of the park. It was heading towards the house. It was still some way away and, unwilling to draw any attention to themselves, Gideon pulled Peter behind the nearest cover which happened to be a large barrel. It was painted white, and contained a clipped bay tree. They crouched down behind the barrel and peeped out. The van approached the house, drove right past it and continued onto the lawn.

“They’re heading for the anti-gravity machine!” said Peter incredulously. “But why? Why do they want to shift a broken machine now, when they don’t even know what it is and when half of London is in meltdown?”

Gideon started to smile. “I know who it is.”

Peter looked at him, puzzled, and then the penny dropped.

“Do you really think he’d come back?”
The Tar Man jumped out of the van and ordered the driver to direct his headlights at the anti-gravity machine. From their hiding place, some fifty yards away, Peter and Gideon saw him kick over the canes, take hold of the trunk of the birch tree, and drag it away. Then the Tar Man called to the driver to help him. They picked up the heavy weight between them and loaded it onto the back of the vehicle. The driver got back into the van and started up the engine.

“Surely you’re going to tell him we’re here?” hissed Peter.

Gideon put his finger to his lips and continued to watch.

The Tar Man did not get in the van but slowly turned around in a full circle. Then he stepped into the yellow beam of the van’s headlights, so that he was spot-lit for all to see, cupped his hands to his mouth, and shouted: “Gid-e-on! Gid-e-on!” till it echoed all around the valley.

Gideon laughed out loud. “Upon my word, Peter, Nathaniel is full of surprises!”

“Nathaniel?”

“It is his name.”

Gideon leapt up and hollered. “Here!” he cried.

The Tar Man ran forward to meet him. Peter thought he looked very pleased to see them, or pleased to see Gideon, at least, yet he stopped short of actually greeting him.

“I wagered you would have need of my help.”

“Greetings, Nathaniel! What has brought you back to Tempest House? Is blood thicker than water or was it the device that you sought?”

“Do not flatter yourself, Gideon, I have come for the device.”

“I did not doubt it,” said Gideon.

“It is broken - yet I may find someone to mend it in this strange future.”

Gideon pointed to the amorphous, semi-luminous mass over London. “You have seen the city?”

“Do you think I am deaf and blind? Yes, I have seen the city. It seems that Nature is angry, in this century just as in our own.”

“I fear that Lord Luxon has made much use of the device,” said Gideon.

“Yes, damn his eyes! He has changed the future and I do not care for it! I scarcely recognise his London!”

“Yet you contrive to get what you need,” said Gideon indicating the van and the driver.

“Human nature is the same no matter what the century. Besides,” he said, patting his pockets, “all the panic in the city has made for easy pickings. But it does not please me here. Would that the machine was not broken, I would”

“How can you talk like that?” burst out Peter. “Can’t you see that the universe is disintegrating around our ears because of time travel? How can you think about easy pickings when the earth is about to end?”

The Tar Man looked directly at Peter for the first time.

“Peter speaks the truth, Nathaniel,” said Gideon.

“By the laws, Gideon, do not think to lecture me! The world is strong enough by far to survive such things. Fear begets fear, has life not taught you that, at least? I recall that when I first lived in London I felt a tremor beneath my feet. Twas strong enough to cause a few fish to leap out of the Thames and to cause some plates to fall to the floor. I heard of no injuries to speak of, yet it struck so much terror into people’s hearts that it sent half of the city scurrying into the countryside like frightened mice! How I laughed to see the crowds creeping back the next morning, all foolish, when another day had dawned”

“There’ll be no countryside to scurry back to, you stupid man!” exclaimed Peter.

“Hold your tongue, you impudent young”

The Tar Man raised his hand, but Gideon caught hold of his arm.

“He is distraught…”

The Tar Man shook his arm away.

“And where is your young friend, Master Schock?” asked the Tar Man. “I do not see her.”

“Mistress Kate is lost to us,” said Gideon quickly. “We believe that Lord Luxon is… lost also.”

The Tar Man drew in his breath. “Ah. Then, I am sorry for it, Master Schock. And you say Lord Luxon, too?”

“Yes,” said Gideon. “Lord Luxon, too.”

“Upon my word…And how did this occur?”

“In truth, we do not know. Lord Luxon and Mistress Dyer vanished at the same instant. Neither has returned – and we must fear the worst.”

The Tar Man’s face revealed his shock. He rubbed his arms where Kate had touched him. Presently he said: “And Lord Luxon’s device, do you know of its whereabouts?”

“Is that all you care about? Why can’t you get it?” cried Peter. “It’s using the anti-gravity machines that’s caused that!” He pointed towards the time quake. Isn’t it obvious, even to you, that the world can’t cope with any more time travel?”

“I’ll thank you to control your young friend,” said the Tar Man to Gideon.

He looked over at the city, beginning to pace up and down as he did so. It seemed to Peter that the time quake was beginning to recede.

“Suppose for a moment that I accept that we are doomed – which, I have to say, I do not – what can be done, Master Schock, to tear us back from the brink of disaster?”

“Nothing! It’s too late!”

But even as he said it, Kate’s premonition came back to him. She said that she could not see a future for herself, but she also said that he would be all right, that when the time came he would know what to do. A spark of hope awoke within him, a glimmering of something stirred…

“In which case, Master Schock, it can surely matter little to you what I do with the time I have left to me?”

“Unless,” said Peter, “unless we really could stop the very first time event happening… But we’d need to find Lord Luxon’s anti-gravity machine”

“Stop the first time event?” repeated the Tar Man.

“The one that you and Gideon witnessed - when Kate and I were in her dad’s laboratory one minute and the next we were in the middle of nowhere in 1763. If we had not gone to help Kate’s dad that day, maybe the accidental discovery of time travel would not have happened. Or not in that way, or it might have happened later, or something”

“But you could take us back, could you not, Nathaniel?” exclaimed Gideon.

“It is possible, I suppose”

“What do you mean?” exclaimed Peter. “How?”

“Nathaniel uses objects to take him to another time”

“That’s what you were doing with Kate’s trainers!” cried Peter triumphantly.

“Ha! They were useless to me. They were made of too many parts – it confuses what I can sense. I need simple objects”

The driver got out of the van, wanting to know what was happening.

“Patience, my friend,” the Tar Man called. “You will be well-rewarded, I assure you!”

“And you could take us with you?” asked Peter.

“Nathaniel took me back in time,” said Gideon.

The Tar Man looked non-committal. “Why should I help you do such a thing?”

“If you do not, I fancy you will soon have cause to regret it,” said Gideon.

“How can I believe you?”

“You cannot.”

Peter suddenly grabbed hold of Gideon’s arm. “If the first time event did not happen, Kate would still be here!”

Gideon shook his head. “How can I understand the workings of time? I do not know…”

“But even if I were to agree to help you,” said the Tar Man, “it is a crude method. I cannot navigate time like a ship on the high seas. I cannot set a course. I am at the mercy of whatever object I have at my disposal.”

Slowly, Peter reached into his pocket and took out a crumpled piece of paper. Thank you, Kate, he said silently. Where the paper had been folded it was worn and grubby.

“On the last day of term, Mr Carmichael handed this out. It was our English homework for us to do over the Christmas holidays. It was the next day that I met Kate and we went to visit her dad’s laboratory and got catapulted back to 1763.”

Peter held out the piece of paper to the Tar Man but then took it back again.

“What’s wrong, Peter?” Gideon saw the happiness fade abruptly from Peter’s face.

“I don’t know if it will work…Lord Luxon changed the future. I don’t know if we can get back to that time… Perhaps it never happened.”

The Tar Man took the piece of paper from Peter’s hand.

“Do you remember being given this piece of paper?”

Peter nodded.

“Do you remember the first time event, as you call it?”

“Yes.”

“Then, can you doubt that it happened?”

“If I am minded to help you, the object will do,” he said.

Peter grabbed hold of Gideon’s arm. “But we’d have to go to Derbyshire”