Sands of Time

by Barbara Erskine

  Only this morning on the train to the airport it had happened. Admittedly Derek had been there with her, but buried in his Financial Times he had seen nothing and been no distraction. The scenario which caught her attention had been so small no one else had seen it, or if they had, they had ignored it. The woman sitting opposite them was pale and drawn, her eyes sunken and miserable. Covertly Amanda studied her face. She was, she could be, incredibly beautiful beneath the ugly baseball cap which had been pulled down to cover her hair. As she sat, staring into space, her mobile phone rang. The opening bars of the ‘William Tell’ overture (presumably chosen as ringing tone in more optimistic mood) rang out with increasing urgency and volume in the quiet carriage. At first the woman ignored it, pretending it had nothing to do with her, then as its insistence grew more obtrusive she pounced on her bag, rummaged, found the phone and, instead of switching it off, wrapped it in her scarf and buried it at the bottom of the bag. Rossini’s electronic masterpiece diminuendoed to an angry and still audible squeak. When at last it stopped the woman delved back into her bag, retrieved her phone, punched in a short number and returned it to its place. Two angry spots of colour had flared over her cheekbones. At the next stop she got off, leaving Amanda agog with curiosity. Presumably the number she had put into the phone would block the call from that person? But why not switch off the phone? And if not switch it off, who was it whose call she was hoping for? Who? What? Where?

  As she settled into the seat of the 767, peering down over the dull panorama of West London, she reached automatically for her notebook.

  Unless you have had a chance to study them in the departure lounge before you leave it is hard to get an overview of your fellow passengers on a plane. The one sitting next to you is of crucial importance – particularly if their personal habits are unpleasant or if they turn out to be an Olympic talker. Or if they are under the age of reasonable restraint. The rest are only glimpsed in tiny cameos if they stand up or move about or as they sit in serried ranks facing you as you pick your way to the loo, making the most of every second of blessed freedom before slotting yourself carefully back into place.

  Amanda, on this the longest flight she had as yet made, unbelievably, grew bored. It was not as though she had a holiday to look forward to. The journey would end in a series of meetings. And tricky ones she was fronting for her cowardly boss. She was tired of the view of the seat in front. She could not see the screen with the film – which at any rate seemed to be about delinquent baseball players, not her favourite subject. She ate. She slept. She read. She studied cloud formations and she looked down at the beauty of the deep blue crepe which stretched on every side far below as they flew west over the Atlantic Ocean.

  Her somnolent boredom was interrupted by the pilot. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we are just flying in across the coast of Labrador. It might interest you to know the temperature down there now is minus twenty-eight degrees.’

  Amanda’s eyes flew open. She leaned towards the window and peered down. The endless shining blue had disappeared. Far, far below the sea was grey and white and broken with ice and rock. Very soon there was no sea at all. All was ice. She shivered despite the fact that the temperature in the cabin must have been approaching plus twenty-eight degrees. The emptiness, the bleakness, the purity and wildness of that endless landscape was breathtakingly beautiful.

  Across the aisle Amanda’s neighbour stood up, stretching. Unnoticed he had been studying her on and off from behind his newspaper. He cleared his throat and hovered. ‘Excuse me.’

  She did not hear him. She was totally absorbed in the landscape below.

  Smiling, he turned back to his seat nodding to himself. She was in a world of her own. The perfect place to be.

  The plane was lower now. If there had been people there to see, she would have seen them as small black dots, indistinguishable from the stumps of felled trees or, she thought suddenly, bears. She craned closer to the window. She could see a road now, dead straight, cutting like a ruler across the landscape below. Lower and she could see that there was only one car in that whole desolate scene and near it she could see two small specks moving away from it. Who? Why? Where? The familiar mantra echoed in her brain. They were too far apart to be together and yet in that whole vast landscape how could they be separate?

  In the seat across the gangway Amanda’s neighbour glanced towards her seat and frowned suddenly. He hadn’t seen her get up and leave her place. He turned, craning towards the back of the plane. No sign. Excellent! Smiling, he faced the front once more, wondering where she had gone and how long she would be.

  The bite of the cold air and the crunch of snow beneath her feet, was so sudden, the moan of the wind so desolate, she was for a moment incapable of reacting. Near her she could see the woman. She was wearing a fur-trimmed parka and thick trousers but her gloves were gone, her hands like her face, chapped and raw. ‘Help me!’ Her breath was coming in tight raw gasps.

  ‘What is it? What’s happened?’ Amanda could feel the ice riming her eyelashes. The wind tore the words from her lips.

  ‘He’s going to kill me!’ The woman looked over her shoulder and following her gaze Amanda saw a figure in the distance labouring through the snow.

  ‘Help me!’

  There was nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide, just one chance as the wind whipped the top coat of snow from the road like spume from the sea. ‘Down here – maybe we can hide in the snow.’ She caught the woman’s arm and pushed her down into a drift at the side of the road. A few frantic scoops and she was hidden.

  No time to hide herself. Trembling she turned to face him; saw the angry, blotched features, the snarling mouth, the hair whipped free of his hood, beaded with ice. There was a gun in his gloved hand.

  ‘Where are you, Mary-Anne?’

  He ran towards Amanda without seeing her. ‘All I wanted was that you loved me!’ She could see the tears freezing on his cheeks, hear the despair in his voice. ‘Was that too much to ask?’ He staggered to a stop, staring round the empty landscape, still not seeing Amanda. His lungs were heaving, his sobs coming in raw anguished gulps. Suddenly hurling the gun out into the whirling whiteness he collapsed onto his knees.

  Beside her there was a flurry of snow. ‘Andy!’ The woman was clawing her way back towards him. ‘Andy, I’m sorry. I love you. I love you!’

  He was holding out his arms. They were both crying now. The wind grew stronger. Behind them the car was out of sight.

  ‘Go back! Get in the car!’ Amanda pleaded. She squinted through narrowed eyes up at the sky. Was that her plane up there, silver against the billowing snow cloud? Panic knifed through her stomach. The couple were staggering up the road into the wind away from her. In a moment they would be out of sight and she would be alone. ‘Wait!’ Her voice was torn to shreds by the wind and spun away to nothing. ‘Wait – ’

  She couldn’t breathe. The air was hot. Stale. Her out-flung hand caught against the window next to her ear. She had been asleep. Dreaming! Disorientated she pulled herself to her feet and clambered over the empty seat next to her, intent on finding the loo. It may have been a dream, an imaginary interlude, but her hands and face were chapped and frozen, her breath still rasping in her chest.

  The man across the aisle smiled. ‘So, where did you get to then?’

  She stared at him, puzzled.

  ‘Looks as though you popped out for a breath of air.’ He was looking at her feet.

  Following his gaze she gasped. Her shoes were wet with melting snow. Snags of ice clung to the bottom of her trousers.

  Looking up she met his eyes and he saw the first dawning hints of fear. ‘Go and freshen up,’ he said. ‘I’ll order you a drink.’

  When she came back to her seat he had ordered her a whisky and ginger but he did not move to the seat next to her. Instead he leaned across the aisle. ‘OK?’ His smile was gentle. Unthreatening.

  ‘What happened to me?’ Her hands had begun to shake.

  He shrugged.
‘A dream? Out of body experience? Lucid trance? Writing your own script?’ He nodded at her book of snippets still lying open on the seat beside her, the pen cradled against the wire spiral at its centre.

  ‘You make it sound quite normal!’

  ‘Who is to say it isn’t?’

  ‘It’s never happened to me before.’ She was still very shaken.

  ‘Perhaps only in your dreams.’

  She took a sip from her glass, feeling the bite of warmth through her veins and looked at him properly for the first time. Before, she had noticed him of course. Had seen he was about her own age – good-looking – had assumed he was trying to pick her up. Now she saw he was older than she had thought and she sensed genuine interest, kindness, in his glance.

  ‘Was I really not here. Out of my seat?’ She glanced down at her still-damp shoes.

  He nodded.

  ‘I don’t want it to happen again.’

  ‘I’m not sure you can stop it.’ He frowned. ‘There are things you can do to help. I could write down the titles of some books for you to read.’

  ‘How come you know so much about it?’

  ‘I lecture on these things.’ He smiled. ‘I’m giving a talk in Toronto on parapsychology.’

  ‘What a coincidence.’ She took another sip of the drink then a thought struck her. She turned in her seat and stared at him. ‘It is a coincidence, isn’t it? You didn’t beam me down there or something.’

  He laughed. ‘If only such things were possible, my dear.’

  ‘And those people in the snow. Did that really happen?’

  He shrugged. ‘What people? What snow?’

  She slumped back against her seat, defeated.

  There was a moment’s silence then he leant across towards her again, raising his voice slightly against the roar of the engines. ‘The snow was real. I saw it on your boots.’

  ‘So I’m not going mad?’

  He shook his head. ‘Never worry about that. You have a talent – perhaps ability is a better word. Cultivate it if you dare. It could be exciting.’

  ‘No one will ever believe me.’

  ‘No. But you’re a writer. Write about it. Tell the story. Let those who want to, believe. The others can read and enjoy and maybe even wonder.’

  He had been looking at her notebook. She picked it up thoughtfully. He had assumed she was a writer and it was true. After all, she spent every spare second of her life writing. She would talk it over with Derek. Tell him what had happened. No, he would never believe her. Her unknown friend was right. If she was to write her snippet at all for general consumption it would have to be as fiction. As a dream in a magazine article perhaps. Or maybe as a novel? Already, without realising she had done it, she had picked up her pen.

  But deep inside her something has changed. Without knowing it she has become afraid of travelling alone. She has encountered passion and fear and she has realised how detached her own life has been. Her relationship with Derek when she gets home will be closer, more dependent. When he asks her to marry him in six months’ time she will say yes.

  Across the aisle Jack Kennedy smiled. He too had reached for his notebook. His was electronic.

  Case 128: Subject’s name: Amanda Jones. He had seen her name on the label of her cabin bag. Estimated sensitivity: 7/10. Actual: 10/10. Verifiable facts: Maybe corroboration from two people on road? Check date and location. He smiled quietly.

  He had learned from experience to provide aftercare for his guinea pigs. Whisky and ginger for those visiting the snowy wastes. Iced gin and lime for those who landed in the Sahara. Chilblain cures or sunburn. And of course a signed copy of his own book on trans-and bi-location, with an e-mail address where they could reach him with news of life/career changes resulting from their experience and for advice when it happened again – as it always did …

  Of course there was always a risk. Always the possibility one day one of them would fail to return to their seat near his on the aircraft. That would be interesting. Probably unfortunate. Definitely worth an appendix on its own in his next book. A snippet. He smiled as he thought of the word scrawled across the cover of her notebook. It was funny how he often picked writers in his otherwise random selection of victims. Two novelists, a travel writer and four journalists to date. All travelling alone.

  As he filled in the last detail and closed down his computer he lay back in his seat. Across the way Amanda was writing hard. He smiled thoughtfully. Perhaps he should ensure his next subject – no. 129 – did stay down there. His return flight to London in three days’ time might be an ideal opportunity. Imagine the furore when they found a passenger had disappeared. Imagine the puzzlement. Imagine the sense of power as he selected someone who this time would be the victim of the perfect crime. Because, even if it was in the name of science, it would be murder. There was no doubt at all about that.

  On the Way to London

  They think I’m sitting on the train

  But I’m not.

  I’m walking in the woods

  With the wind caressing my face.

  The sound in my ears is

  The sough of the breeze in the branches.

  The click of the wheels

  The constipated tinkle of phones

  Blur and fade

  As do the voices round me.

  The woman opposite me stares.

  She can’t understand

  The dream in my eyes.

  Perhaps she thinks I’m mad.

  Or asleep.

  Or just vacant. Not at home.

  She’s right. I’m not sitting on the train.

  I’m walking on the shore.

  The crash of the waves

  The rattle of shingle

  The cry of the gulls

  Drown out the sound

  Of the rails.

  I think I’m sitting on the train.

  I don’t realise that I have gone.

  The woman opposite me screams.

  The seat is empty.

  I am not there.

  They think she’s mad

  Or perhaps she dreamed.

  They pat her hand and offer counsel

  And no one – ever – looks for me.

  I am there, on my imagined shore.

  Trapped between times.

  Between existences.

  And I am late for my appointments.

  Second Sight

  There was a time tunnel at the stately home. Corinne knew it well because she had been there before. A dark leafy passage, it ran between the car park and the open area of gravel in front of the house. She paid her fee and walked through it, moving from the present into the past as she stepped from a cloak of green shade and into the sunlight. At once she saw the crowds milling around: tourists like herself wearing ordinary clothes and the people around them, who purported to come from Tudor times, wearing ornate velvets and silks or home-spun rags – some barefoot, some with intricate ruffs and elaborate jewellery.

  She loved it. It was so easy to imagine yourself in the past. If it wasn’t for the ordinary people who had just climbed out of cars and coaches, she would find it totally convincing. And she wanted to be convinced; to lose herself in the past; to forget her loneliness and anger for an afternoon at least. It had worked last time she came. For several hours she hadn’t given a single thought to him – the man she had thought of as her lover, until she had caught him cheating.

  She wandered towards the moat where a narrow bridge led towards the house itself and turning right, instead of going on into the dark, panelled rooms, she walked alongside the water where a peacock strutted and flirted its tail proudly, enamoured by its own reflections. A group of Tudor people stood there. They were playing some kind of Elizabethan game on the grass and seemed unaware of her curiosity. They were there, after all, to be stared at. One of them, a man, looked up suddenly and caught her eye. He doffed his velvet cap and gave her an elaborate bow, smiling impishly. She laughed.

  That was nice. It
was friendly. She felt attractive – something her lover’s insults had made her doubt – but not threatened. There was no way he was going to talk to her, not unless she approached him more closely and even then he would talk that wonderful mock-Shakespearean language which these people managed to improvise.

  She was very impressed with the way they did it. It showed how talented they were, how completely they had entered into the parts they had chosen to play. Something she needed to learn to do. To play the cool, independent, confident woman of the world. Then, with or without a man, she could hold her head high.

  Still managing to smile cheerfully, she walked on, leaving them to their game. Round the back of the house it was all very busy. She was heading towards her favourite places: the dairy, the kitchens, the dimly lit, dusty barns where they wove and spun and dyed their wool and did all the everyday things of life when lives were real and proper and self-sufficient, in a time when people made everything themselves. The dark shadowy areas, lit by candles and stray beams of sunlight from the high windows, filled her with excitement, inspired her. She loved to see the people chatting, gossiping, laughing round the smoky fires. She spent a long time staring at them as they worked. Then at last, overwhelmed with sudden, unexpected sadness that she was not part of a community such as this, she turned away, threading a path out of the crowd, and headed up towards the orchard to the part of the garden which was deserted. No tourists came here, because nothing ever happened. There was nothing to watch. It was empty, a place to think.

  Slowly, trying to imagine herself wearing a long velvet gown instead of her usual trousers and loose sweater, she walked into the trees – and stopped in surprise. There were things going on here after all. She could see a group of Tudor-dressed people in the distance. They were talking together quietly, urgently, and she found herself wondering if she was going to catch them out talking modern English or did they, even here away from the crowds with no one to watch and listen, still keep to the parts which they had so carefully constructed for themselves?