Chapter 13
Blackfriars Wood, Wealdshire. Saturday 16 May 1998
Chris stood, open-mouthed, staring at the place where Josie had been standing with her manacle-bracelet clutched tightly in her hands. For a second or two he felt as if his brain had closed down, unable to interpret the data which it had received from his eyes. Sisters do not suddenly vanish into thin air (however hard their brothers sometimes wish it would happen).
There had to be a rational explanation.
He called Josie's name.
There was no response.
He looked to left and right.
No sign of her anywhere.
She'd not had time to run anywhere so that left only one possibility — she was still at the place where she had been standing.
Chris raced through the bracken expecting to find Josie lying on the ground.
She wasn't there.
Neither had a hole mysteriously opened up to swallow her.
He called again, 'Josie! Josie! Where are you?'
He began to turn slowly, to scan the wood in every direction.
He was halfway round, and feeling himself about to start panicking, when he heard his name — right behind him. He whirled round.
'Josie!' he gasped. 'Where were you?'
'What do you mean, 'Where was I?' Where were you!'
'I haven't been anywhere — I was here all the time. You're the one who vanished.'
'I didn't vanish — you did!' Josie retorted. 'It started raining again, and you disappeared.'
Chris shook his head. He couldn't decide whether to laugh because Josie was safe or scream because something really weird was going on. 'I don't understand this. How can we both think the other one disappeared.'
'I don't know — but it's too scary for me. I want to go home.'
'I think I do, too,' agreed Chris. 'Let's go.'
Josie sat on Chris's bed. Chris stood at the window. Neither had said anything for ages. In fact, they'd said very little to each other since they'd raced to their bikes and pedalled home as fast as they could.
Chris finally broke the silence when he made a fist, punched the air, and shouted, 'Yes!'
He whipped round and looked at Josie, his eyes aglow with excitement.
'What is it?' she asked.
'I've got it! I know what happened this morning. At least, I think I know what happened. If we go back — I can prove it — if I'm right.'
Josie pursed her lips and frowned. 'I don't know about going back. It scared the pants off me.'
Chris walked over to the bed and sat down next to his sister. He took a deep breath and said, 'I think you went back in time.'
Josie's face was a picture. She was straining so hard to avoid bursting out laughing that her cheeks turned purple and her eyes began to water. Chris gave her a friendly punch on the arm. 'Don't laugh. I'm serious.'
Josie wiped her eyes on her sleeve, managed to compose herself, and said, 'Go on, then. Tell me why you think I'm a time traveller,' before collapsing back on the bed and rolling from side to side hugging her chest. 'I'm sorry . . . Chris . . . I can't help laughing. It's just so . . . ridiculous.'
Chris was offended. 'I can't believe you!' he jeered. 'You discover lines that you think are magic. Then you go to the place where they meet and you're disappointed because it doesn't look special. You disappear and get rained on. Or I disappear. And then, when I offer you the only logical explanation — you just laugh yourself silly and say that I'm being ridiculous.'
Josie sat up. 'I'm sorry. It's probably just that I don't want to believe what you're saying. It's too frightening. It's spooky.'
She put her hands on her thighs with elbows pointing outwards — took a deep breath — jerked her head upwards — took another deep breath — then said, 'Okay. I'm all right now. Tell me about your idea.'
Somewhat mollified by Josie's explanation of her behaviour, Chris began to explain his theory.
'I stayed where I was — in the present. Nothing changed around me. The only thing that happened is that you disappeared. So you must have been somewhere — or some time — else. Right?'
Josie nodded her agreement and Chris continued. 'You said you stayed in the same place, but it looked different because the sky suddenly went cloudy and it was pouring with rain. And I wasn't there. Yes?'
Josie nodded again.
'You'd been thinking about last weekend, when it had rained. So . . . I'm suggesting that you went back in time to last weekend.'
Josie stared straight ahead, her face giving no indication about what she thought of her brother's idea. She looked down at her hands. Her eyes strayed to the bracelet on her right wrist. With her left hand she began to stroke the smooth metal. She looked up at Chris. 'Do you think this was responsible?'
'The bracelet?' Chris queried. 'It would make sense, I suppose. It's strange how you got it just before we found the leys. Almost as if it was planned.'
'Planned?' she echoed. 'Who could have planned it?'
'I've no idea. But if someone — or something — has arranged it all — and they haven't done us any harm so far — how about if we go with it?'
'Chris . . . I've just thought of something. I think you may be right.'
'What do you mean?'
'Look at the inscription on the bracelet — 'Time will make you free as a bird.''
'Yes yes yes!' Chris exclaimed. 'Time! It means it will let you travel through time!'
'What about the 'free as a bird' bit?' Josie asked. 'What do you think that means?'
Chris breathed in hard through his nose. 'I would say it means that it makes you free to travel through time to wherever you want to go.'
'Not wherever,' Josie corrected him. 'Whenever. I stayed in the same place, didn't I?'
'Hmmm. You're right. So you won't be zipping off to ancient Egypt. Well, you could, but you'd have to walk there from ancient England.'
The twins looked at each other and, with their identically-huge grins, looked like a mirror and its reflection.
It was early afternoon when the twins stood once more at the mysterious location in Blackfriars Wood. They had devised some experiments which they were eager to try out. Josie stood on the spot while Chris waited a few steps away. She held the bracelet in her hands, closed her eyes, and tried to imagine the hands on her watch moving backwards.
'Yes!' Chris whooped as Josie disappeared. And 'Okay!' as she returned a second later.'
'Did anything happen?' asked Josie, expectantly.
'Did anything happen! Did anything happen! Too right it did. You went. You vanished. What did you see?'
'Nothing, I'm afraid. I kept my eyes shut.'
'Well try again, and keep your eyes open. Look at the sky while you're doing it.'
'The clouds changed!' exclaimed Josie, ecstatically. 'For a moment the sky changed completely, and then it was back as it was.'
Chris couldn't resist a look of triumph. 'Well then, twin sister of mine. Are you convinced now that you can travel through time?'
Josie looked at Chris and nodded. 'I can't think of any other explanation. What now?'
'First thing,' he replied, 'is to see if I can do it — if you don't mind letting me borrow your bracelet.'
Josie handed the bracelet-manacle to Chris and he slipped it onto his wrist. 'I'll see if I can do it without holding the bracelet in my hand.'
It worked.
'Hey hey!' hollered Chris. 'We can both do time travel. We're the time-travelling twins!'
'In that case,' suggested Josie, 'Perhaps we ought to try doing it together. Let's hold hands and see what happens.'
'Okay,' agreed Chris, 'But you put the bracelet on and you do the time thinking. If we both thought of a time — and the times were different — I don't know what might happen.'
The experiment worked. Both twins had realised that it wasn't just the sky changes which showed they had time-travelled. There were subtle changes all around them. The leaves on the trees suddenly looked different, the breeze came from a different direction, and the air felt either cooler or warmer.
'Let's try going back to last night,' suggested Josie. 'You do it this time.'
They held hands and Chris imagined time going back to the early hours of the morning. Immediately, everything went dark.
'I've got an idea,' Chris whispered in the darkness, although he wasn't sure why he was whispering. 'Let's move away from the spot and see what happens.'
'Okay,' agreed Josie, 'But not too far.'
Still holding hands they stepped away from the spot. 'That proves we can move about in the past,' Josie said, 'But can we get back to the present from here?'
'How do we usually get back?' Chris asked.
'I'm not sure. I think we sort of tell ourselves we want to go back now.'
'Let's try it, then. Think about returning.'
'Nothing's happening!' Josie suddenly panicked. 'I'm trying to get back but I can't. We're trapped!'
'No we're not. Let's walk back to where we were.'
They quickly stepped back to where they had started and, in a flash, were back in the daylight.
'Phew! That was a bit worrying!' exclaimed Josie. 'So now we know that we can only travel if we're on this spot. We need to give it a name.'
Both thought for a while until Josie suggested 'time gate'.
'Sounds good to me,' agreed Chris. 'Time gate it is.'
Chris took something from his pocket and held it up.
'Why have you brought a radio?' asked Josie.
'I'll show you. What day is it?'
'Saturday, of course,' Josie replied, sounding puzzled. 'Why?'
'Hold my hand,' Chris ordered. 'I'll take you on an interesting trip.'
The scene suddenly shifted slightly and the temperature dropped a few degrees. Chris turned the radio on and said, 'Let's see if I'm right.'
'. . . after the news — the serial. I'm Jenni Murray. This is Woman's Hour . . . . . . pip . . . pip . . . pip . . . pip . . . piiiiip . . . BBC News at eleven o'clock. An armed raider has . . .'
Chris switched off the radio, threw it in the air with a shout of 'Yiiiippeeee!', and caught it as it fell.
Josie looked at her watch. 'The 11 o'clock news . . . but it's 2.30.'
'Exactly!' shouted Chris. 'It's 2.30 and we've just heard the beginning of the 11 o'clock news. We've gone back in time. What's more . . . Woman's Hour isn't on on a Saturday. We've gone back to yesterday.'
'I didn't know you listened to Woman's Hour?' teased Josie. 'What else do you get up to that I don't know about?'
'I don't listen to Woman's Hour,' protested Chris. 'I looked in the Radio Times and picked a programme at random. Anyway, never mind that. The point is — we've proved we're now in yesterday.'
'How far back do you think we can go?' asked Josie.
'There's only one way to find out!' was her brother's reply.