TIME QUAKE (26 page)

‘You’re at my mercy now!’ she said in as fierce a voice as she could manage. ‘I could chop all
your
fingers off if I felt like it . . .’

He continued to stare furiously back at her, defiant, fearless, indomitable. His presence was so powerful Kate took a step backwards. The brutal scar was clearly visible, even by moonlight, a vivid white through his burgeoning stubble. Seeing it so close, the scar provoked a pang of pity. What a terrible fight it must have been to have left him so disfigured.

Stillness had conferred on the Tar Man an air of unreality. He was a study in ferocity, rendered harmless by Time. He brought to mind a wax figure at Madame Tussaud’s, or a snarling, stuffed tiger in a natural history museum. When she followed his gaze, she saw a hand clinging to the edge of the boat, knuckles white and fingernails biting into the wood of the boat. Kate stood up with a start.

‘Gideon!’ she breathed.

She had misread the Tar Man’s stance. He was not about to strike with his oar; on the contrary, he had just struck. Gideon was splayed out in the water, totally submerged apart from his face and one arm. His loose hair floated about him and by the light of the moon it seemed white against the black water. He was clutching at his chest whilst trying not to lose his grip on the boat. Like his brother, Gideon was crying out, only his was a cry of pain.

All at once Kate’s heart leaped into her mouth. Where was Peter? She looked all about her, at the quayside, at the other boats, at the Thames’s glassy surface. Her gaze scoured the darkness but she could not find him. She felt the blood pulsing in her neck. What if he were already dead, drowned as in her vision?

‘Peter!’ she screamed out loud. ‘Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me here by myself!’

Kate, who had been trying for so long to keep her spirits up, felt despair wash over her. She covered Gideon’s fingers with hers. His hand was as cold and white as alabaster and made her think of graveyard angels. A single teardrop rolled down her cheek, dropped off her chin and fell, sparkling in the moonlight, onto the surface of the Thames. But even her tear was rejected, for it merely rolled away, like a bead of mercury, refusing to be assimilated, like a rebuke. As she pushed herself up something pale caught her eye in the water behind Gideon, only ten or perhaps fifteen feet away. Instantly she understood what she saw. Her vision of the future had been accurate to a fault.

‘Peter!’

His white face had already sunk below the surface. Kate screamed again with the shock of it. Her friend was dying before her eyes. She looked up at the heavens.

‘I’m
not
an oracle!’ she cried. ‘I’m not!’

Kate had been lying stretched out on the bottom of the boat for a very long time. Who could express, in this world where seconds and minutes had no meaning, how long she had lain there? Had she slept? She could not have said.

She saw no solution to her predicament. Kate had quickly given up trying to jump back to the quayside, for the boat was too small to allow a sufficient run-up. But neither could she risk immersing herself in the river – her arms and legs were not strong enough to cut through the water and if she tried to swim she might well drown. Kate now accepted that Peter alone, for reasons she did not understand, was able to ground her. But Peter was out of reach and drowning. If she tried to rescue him then she, too, would perish in
the process. And so it was checkmate: she was trapped indefinitely on this tiny boat in the unwelcome company of the Tar Man.

Kate wondered how long she could survive in this condition. Food and water had barely crossed her mind and, although she would gladly have drunk something, she was surprised not to be thirstier. Kate had considered putting some solid river water in her mouth to see if it would melt like an ice cube, but when she remembered some of the things she had seen floating in the Thames she decided to put off trying this until she was really desperate.

And so Kate sat at the bottom of the boat trying to pretend that the Tar Man was somewhere else. Searching for a meaning to it all, her mind roved over all the circumstances that had led to her sharing this boat, perhaps for eternity, with a villain who had threatened to cut her fingers off. She also thought about the fortune-teller’s assertion that she was an oracle, and she tried to see her own future, but only ever discerned a massive wall of impenetrable darkness. Only one thing came out of her prolonged meditation, and that was the intermittent sensation, which she felt as a prickle at the back of her neck, that she was being
watched
.

C
HAPTER
S
IXTEEN

On the Steps of New York Public Library

In which Lord Luxon poses some
questions, Alice draws some conclusions
and Tom proves to be invaluable

Two figures emerged from the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue, blinking in the sunlight. They began to pick their way through the crowd that milled about on the stone staircase that led to the sidewalk. Alice looked about her for somewhere to sit, and found a couple of metal chairs adjacent to one of the marble lions that stood guard over the majestic edifice. Yellow cabs honked and heat radiated from the sidewalk baking in the midday sun. Alice dropped her heavy bag of books and sat down, wafting herself energetically with a card folder.

‘Do you even
own
a pair of shorts?’

Lord Luxon raised one eyebrow by way of a reply. Alice smiled. Her companion’s affirmative replies about military re-enactments and his interest in the
What If?
s of history had calmed her fears about the redcoats in Prince Street. What, precisely,
had
she imagined was going on? Was it more likely that this good-looking English milord was a visitor from another century or that he and
his friends were into military history? She thanked her lucky stars that he had not spotted her grappling with that scary dog on the emergency stairs – now
that
would have been a difficult one to explain . . .

Lord Luxon stood on the sidewalk to admire the library’s architecture.

‘I told you it was worth seeing,’ Alice called down to him.

Lord Luxon raised his hands in the air and shouted back. ‘It is a veritable temple to reading! I feel devilishly clever merely walking past such a prodigious quantity of books! Though I confess that scholars tend to bore me – and I should sooner have a tooth pulled than be forced to read a book.’

The library steps were crowded with people hunched over paperbacks and eating their lunch. Several people stopped chewing their sandwiches to give Lord Luxon hostile looks.

Alice laughed. ‘I wouldn’t have put you down as an academic underachiever!’

‘It is the truth, I assure you. For some fellows, books are as meat and drink to them, but for me, making sense of words and letters on a page is a sorry business . . .’

‘If you say so! And what do you think of Patience and Fortitude?’

Lord Luxon looked at her askance. ‘I cannot say they are my favourite virtues – though doubtless they are attractive in a maiden aunt. No, on balance, give me rather
Pleasure
and
Appetite
.’

‘I can never be sure when you’re being serious!’ said Alice. ‘Patience and Fortitude are the names of the
lions
!’

‘Ah. The lions. Then, yes, I like the lions
inordinately
.’ Lord Luxon walked over to the nearest beast and took off his straw Panama hat. ‘Is this Patience or Fortitude?’

‘Fortitude – I think.’

A lady in a sari seated above Alice leaned over and said softly into her ear, ‘I think you’ll find it’s Patience, dear.’

‘Thanks,’ replied Alice. ‘Make that Patience,’ she called.

Lord Luxon stroked Patience’s mane and growled at her. Alice reached for her mobile and took a picture.

‘You’re in a good mood! Being in America must suit you.’

‘It does. Indeed, you might say that it both gives me pleasure and stimulates my appetite.’

Lord Luxon laughed, a little louder and a little longer than Alice thought his comment deserved.

‘Well, I’m delighted that you approve of this side of the pond! How do Patience and Fortitude measure up to the lions at the bottom of Nelson’s Column that I love so much? Only they’re made of metal not stone, aren’t they?’

Lord Luxon shrugged his shoulders.

‘No, I can’t remember for sure, either,’ Alice continued. ‘You get an awesome view of them from the National Gallery. You must be able to walk to Trafalgar Square in ten minutes from your house – do you go there much? Are you an art lover?’

Alice paused, for Lord Luxon suddenly looked very uncomfortable – as if he had no idea what she was talking about and was trying to conceal the fact. Yet he’d
said
that he lived in the heart of London, in Bird Cage Walk.

Lord Luxon spoke without choosing to acknowledge her question.

‘Come, Alice, my stomach tells me it is time to eat. And I am hoping that you may be able to shed some light on a subject which has been preoccupying me.’

Lord Luxon stepped towards the street and hailed a taxi. As Alice got into the yellow cab next to her companion a cold feeling of dread passed over her. She gave an involuntary shiver which prompted Lord Luxon to ask if anything was the matter.

‘No, I’m fine. Someone just walked over my grave, that’s all.’

Could he be a con man who had smelled the scent of money and had made up his identity and his address and this stilted manner of speaking? Or had Lord Luxon just not heard her question over the traffic noise? Get a grip, Alice, she told herself as she pulled herself together.

‘It was good of you to pick me up from the library,’ she said. ‘After all that studying I could eat a horse – well, a club sandwich at any rate. Where are we going for lunch?’

The inviting table for two overlooking the lake in Central Park revived Alice’s spirits. They both leaned back in wicker chairs on the wooden deck and surveyed the view. Ducks quacked. Sunshine glowed on the white linen tablecloth and sparkled on the water. Were it not for the skyscrapers towering over the trees in the distance, it would have been difficult to believe that they were lunching in the heart of Manhattan. Lord Luxon was studying the menu. Alice sipped her glass of chilled wine and watched ducks and swans gliding lazily on the water and the antics of two girls in a rowing boat.

‘This is lovely,’ Alice sighed. She stretched her arms above her head and rubbed her neck, stiff from poring over piles of books in the reading room. She looked up at the light streaming through the red and white striped awning above them. The wine and the hum of conversations and hunger were all making her feel a little light-headed. Suddenly she was aware of Lord Luxon’s keen blue gaze cutting into her. She came to with a jerk and sat up straight.

‘Thank you for bringing me here. It’s been so long since I’ve been to the Boathouse,’ she said. ‘I’ve always loved eating in the park.’

‘I know. Your aunt told me . . .’

Alice raised her glass. ‘Well, thank you, good sir.’

Lord Luxon raised his own glass. ‘The pleasure is all mine, Alice . . .’

Alice took another picture of her companion against a sunny Central Park.

‘I confess that something has been troubling me since our last meeting. It regards your advice about how best to sabotage the Revolutionary War . . .’

A tiny frown appeared on Alice’s forehead. ‘Go on – what’s been troubling you?’

Lord Luxon opened his mouth to speak but before he could get a word out a waiter appeared at their table.

‘What can I get for you folks today?’ he asked with a warm smile.

‘I’ll have the Grilled Chicken Caesar Salad,’ said Alice.

‘And for you, sir?’

Lord Luxon glared at him, furious at the interruption.

‘Chef ’s specials today are Sesame Crusted Salmon Fillet served on a bed of shiitake fried rice, with poached scallion and a reduced ginger soy glaze, or sirloin steak gently braised with organic root vegetables from Vermont, black pepper sauce and—’

‘Sir, I have come here to
eat
. I desire neither a list of ingredients nor instructions on how to prepare the dish.’

The smile withered on the waiter’s face. Alice’s shocked expression prompted Lord Luxon to soften his tone.

‘Be so good as to fetch me some meat and some bread – and some vegetables if you must – the precise combination is all the same to me.’

The waiter started to ask if he could be a little more specific but Lord Luxon waved him away. ‘The name of the dish, the
provenance of the ingredients and the method of preparation are, I assure you, all matters of
utter
indifference to me.’

‘Anything you say. Sir.’

Alice smiled weakly at the disgruntled waiter who turned on his heels and walked away down the wooden deck.

‘Are you always this rude to waiters?’

Lord Luxon sighed. ‘You disapprove. But, I am unrepentant. Servants should cultivate a soothing presence. It is vexing in the extreme to be lectured on what your palate might presently discover for itself.’

‘He’ll spit in your soup . . .’

‘Pish pash! Enough of waiters. You told me that if you had a mind to sabotage the Revolutionary War, your first choice would be to act on Christmas night, 1776, when Washington succeeded in crossing the Delaware River . . .’