The Accidental Time Traveller

by Janis Mackay

  “Randolph is on ze run,” I hissed, in my Russian spy accent. “He needs to lie low for wee while so I tell him we good guys – we give him safe place. No problem!”

  “Wow!” said Robbie.

  “Wow!” echoed Will.

  “Yeah, that’s right,” I said, “double wow. Poor Randolph’s a bit shaken up. He overheard his parents say how they were going to pack him off to some boarding school, so he didn’t hang around. He’s really brave. Randolph slept the whole night in the den – on his own.”

  Robbie and Will started to look seriously impressed. Never in a billion years would they spend even half an hour in the den on their own at night. “No way?” they both said, gaping at Agatha. She nodded her head but was obviously not trusting herself to speak. Which gave me another idea.

  “Randolph’s lost his voice.”

  Agatha looked relieved. I carried on, amazed I was such an imaginative storyteller all of a sudden. “Yeah, the shock of running away, after being locked in a cupboard under the stairs, has left her, I mean him, speechless.”

  Robbie eyed me suspiciously, narrowing his eyes. “Like, how come you know all this then?”

  “He wrote it all down,” I blurted out, then quickly added, “and cause we got cold we burnt the paper.”

  “Randolph actually slept under the stairs? Wow! So, Randolph is like… Harry Potter?” Will asked.

  “Yeah… something like that. And you both have to swear on the old tree that you’ll keep dead quiet. Ok? It’ll be like an adventure,” I went on. “And it’s only for a few days. Just till Randolph decides what he wants to do next. Eh, Randolph?”

  Agatha’s eyes widened, as if I was speaking a foreign language. I nodded my head. Thankfully she got my drift and copied me.

  Will and Robbie were won round. I could tell. “Ok,” said Will, “I can bring him a few sausage rolls, and sweets. And he can have my torch.”

  “And I’ve got magazines and crosswords and paper and stuff like that,” Robbie said, smiling at Agatha. “It’ll give you something to do, Randolph.”

  Agatha smiled up at them both. “I told you you’d be welcome in our gang, Randolph,” I said, relieved.

  Then me, Robbie and Will went down to the old tree to swear an oath of silence. We went round the back of the tree, out of sight. “This is getting pretty exciting,” said Will, pressing the palm of his hand against the gnarled trunk. “So, is runaway Randolph in our gang then?”

  “For a wee while,” I replied, cupping my hand over Will’s. Robbie pressed his hand over mine. “Eyes closed,” I said and we stayed quiet like that for a few seconds. When we opened our eyes and pulled our hands away, I saw down low on the bark the worn, carved initials AB staring out at us.

  “A.B., see that? That’s old. I wonder who A.B. was?” Robbie whispered.

  Just then a twig snapped behind us. We all swung round and there stood Agatha Black. She smiled and I saw her gaze flick to the carved initials.

  The church bells rang out for quarter to eleven. “Yo! Winter Wonderland, here I come,” Robbie yelled, running off. “I’ll tell you all about it guys!” And he was gone. That left Will who seemed more nervous when Robbie wasn’t by his side.

  “Right then,” he said, “I better get going too.” Agatha was still gaping at the tree. I grabbed Will by the elbow and steered him away from her.

  “I forgot my hat,” Will said. He pushed open the creaking old shed door. I followed him into the den and saw him bend to pick up his hat, then stare at the locks of long red hair on the ground. I’d kicked them into the corner, but I’d forgotten to hide them completely. My mind went blank. I couldn’t think of one decent lie to account for the hair. But Will didn’t mention it. He just picked up his hat, gave me a confused stare, then left.

  “Thanks Will,” I shouted after him. “Thanks for helping Randolph out. Have a good time at your grandad’s.”

  Then he was gone. First thing I did was burn the hair, which completely stank out the den. But then I noticed Agatha’s dress folded up neatly in the corner of the shed. Had Will noticed that too? Then I thought of Dad. He’d be setting a place for my new mate, and stirring the beans and buttering the toast and Mum would be feeding the twins and saying, “Where’s Saul?”

  I dashed outside. Agatha was still staring at the tree. She was shaking her head slowly from side to side. I jumped when she spoke – I’d got used to her having no voice. “I carved my initials here in the summer. Grandfather lent me his sharp knife. He said the tree would bear my stamp for a long, long time. Indeed, he was correct.”

  That confirmed it. Agatha Black was for real. She really did come from 1812. She wasn’t crazy. I felt dizzy. Maybe it was me that was mad? “Hey, Randolph,” I said, tugging gently at her sleeve. “It’s time for some food and I’m really hungry. Let’s go.”

  But Agatha pulled away. “This is the tree that will help transport me.” She placed her hands on the gnarled old bark. “Yea could make the vapours turn bright. Yea could protect me with gold. Yea could chant the ancient song, then I can leave.”

  Do I look like the kind of person whose bedroom is filled with gold? I thought, but I didn’t want to dishearten her. “It might take a while to get all of that together, Agatha. And meanwhile you can check out life now. I can show you around.”

  “Yea are kind to me, Saul,” she said, smiling. “And yea are right. Yea have not learnt the art yet, and I dinna wish to be hurled back to the wrong time.” She stepped back from the tree and came up to me. “Of course, I wish to learn of your time and see the world. It is only that, the bond to my home being broken, I am afeart I am lost forever. The longer I am in the future the more difficult it may be to return to the past. And there is Father to think of. And dearest Pug.”

  The truth was, I didn’t want Agatha Black to go rushing off back to her time, even if I had known how to get her there. It wasn’t just that I wanted more history for my essay. There was something about her, and this adventure. I felt more excited that I’d been for ages. “I hope your father’s ok,” I said.

  “Yes, we must pray we can succeed and Father is not hanged. Will you pray?”

  “Sure,” I said. Praying was like wishing, wasn’t it? It was more or less the same thing. I’d already wished. I could wish again.

  Agatha looked relieved. She patted me on the shoulder. “Oh, dear Saul. I always longed for a real friend. Is it not amusing that I must travel two hundred years in order to find one?”

  I didn’t know what to say. I smiled at her. At the same time my stomach rumbled. “Hey, Randolph, have you ever heard of bacon and eggs?”

  “As a matter of fact, Saul,” she said, laughing, “I have.” Then she dashed up the garden and into the den. I ran after her and stood in the doorway, watching as she bent over the fire and scooped up grey ash, scattering it over the glowing embers. “This is smooring,” she explained. “It saves the warmth and makes fire safe, in case yea – I mean you – are interested.” That done, she skipped out of the den.

  I scratched my head and wondered whether Agatha, as well as being a time traveller, was also a mind reader? She was always answering my thoughts. “Come on!” I shouted, “I’m starved,” and dashed through the gap in the hedge. Agatha followed.

  As we sped over the snowy field I struggled to keep up with her. She was a girl. She was skinny. And she was fast. She clambered over the wall like she was mounting a horse. Panting hard I suggested she keep her voice lost for a wee while longer, until she got used to twenty-first-century speech.

  “Certainly, I will remain mute if that makes everything smoother,” she said, running up the lane, not out of breath at all.

  As I ran, puffing and panting, I wrote the next few essay sentences in my head.

  Scottish children two hundred years ago were fast runners. They had no cars of course so they used their legs a lot. And they said words like dreary and afeart and well-made buck, which means a fit guy, and some of them even had monkeys as pets. And th
ey didn’t travel much. The girls I mean, not the monkeys. Again this was because of cars.

  I was going to win. I was sure of it. I could practically feel the £200 in my hands. We reached my street. I hurried towards the house with Randolph at my side. At the garden gate I could smell crispy bacon waiting for me. I glanced at Agatha and saw her little nose twitch. But then her face clouded and she reached out and took my hand. “Do yea not hate as I do how the swine squeal so when we are obliged to kill them?”

  Squealing swine? I pushed opened the gate. “Yeah, sure,” I quipped, panting. “We’ve got a whole pigsty round the back. And a monkey in the house swinging from the light bulbs.”

  Her eyes lit up. “How delightful,” she trilled. “I miss my pet monkey so much. But yea have one too! Yea didna say.”

  “Only joking, Randolph. You only get monkeys in the zoo nowadays.” Her face fell. She really did miss her pipe-smoking Pug. “Right, Randolph,” I said, my hand on the door handle and my heart skipping a beat, “here goes, and remember, leave all the talking to me.”

  12

  I pushed the front door open, muttered, “Hey-ho, here-we-go,” and stepped onto the Welcome Home mat. Agatha was kicking her boots against the front step to shake the snow free. “I’m back,” I shouted, pulling her in. Agatha, her eyes wide as saucers, gazed around the hallway. She reached out to touch the photograph on the wall of five-year-old me, first day in my school uniform. Then she jumped in fright at a large plastic rose in a glass vase. She shuddered at the whiteness of the light bulb above her head. “Agatha,” I hissed, “don’t look so surprised at everything, ok?”

  Agatha bit her lip and nodded, her blue eyes like a rabbits in headlights. “Ok,” she whispered back.

  “Right. Just do what I do.” I nudged the kitchen door open with my elbow, a big smile ready and heart beating fast. Mum was sitting at the table with a crying Esme in one arm and Ellie in the other. She was about to say something, when I leapt in with my next storytelling performance.

  “Hi, Mum. Sorry I’m late. You’ll so never guess what happened. I was sledging on Randolph’s – oh, by the way, this is Randolph, and I was on his sledge. We veered off course and crashed bang into a thorny hedge. Well, the good news is we’re ok, but we lost the sledge. Anyway I invited Randolph back for breakfast. You’re always saying how you like to see who I’m hanging out with. And poor Randolph – his parents are away at some convention today. They trust him.” I flashed her a look. “And he’s kind of just hanging about, so I brought him home. Oh, and he just got his tonsils out, so he can’t speak.”

  Through all this super-fast speech, Mum was examining Agatha, Dad was dishing out breakfast and Agatha was gaping at the twins who had stopped crying and were gazing straight at her.

  “Great to meet you, Randolph,” Dad said, slopping beans onto a plate. “A friend of Saul’s is always welcome. I hope you like beans?”

  I made a tiny nod of my head. Agatha did the same. “Good lad,” Dad said. “Now why don’t you come and sit down.”

  “Convention?” Mum was staring at Randolph. “What kind of convention?”

  I didn’t miss a beat. “Model trains,” I said and smiled at Agatha who promptly smiled back.

  “Takes all sorts,” I heard Mum mutter under her breath. She spooned up mashed banana then stared at Agatha’s clothes. “Those look familiar,” she said.

  “Me and Randolph like the same style.” I hastily patted the seat next to me. Agatha took the hint and sat down. As she did, Ellie let out a whopper of a scream and that, I can tell you, was music to my ears. It distracted Mum and gave Agatha a chance to relax. I made a big deal of picking up my cutlery, hoping she would copy me and not start tearing the food with her hands.

  But I didn’t need to worry about that. Agatha Black had better table manners than me. Better even than Mum. If anything, she was too posh. It was only a fry-up. She sat ram-rod straight and after every mouthful dabbed her mouth with her hanky and kept smiling at the babies. The twins, who had calmed down, acted like they were bewitched by her.

  “They like you, Randolph,” Mum said. “I couldn’t get them to settle ten minutes ago. Now look at them: good as gold.”

  I swallowed at the mention of gold and saw Agatha’s eyes light up.

  “So, where’s Randolph from then?” Dad asked, pouring tea from the pot into his cup.

  “Actually,” I began, frantically trying to think of somewhere, “he’s from… England. He’s new around here.” I felt like Pinocchio. If I was Pinocchio, my nose would be ten feet long by now.

  “Well, that’s a big place,” Dad said, reaching for another slice of toast. “Where in England exactly?”

  I racked my brains trying to think of places. I said the only place I could think of. “London,” I blurted out.

  Mum suddenly looked impressed. “The big city!” she said. “What brings Randolph to a wee place like Peebles after grand London town?”

  “The country air,” I said, wiping the tomato sauce on my plate with a crust of toast. I noticed Agatha copy me. “You see,” I went on, in full flow now, “poor Randolph’s quite pale and small. His parents thought the hills of the Borders would make him healthier.”

  Mum seemed happy with that explanation because she smiled at Randolph who smiled back. Mum winked at me then got up from the table, saying how nappies needed changed and how us lads should have a fun time and how I was not to lead Randolph astray.

  I was clearing the table when Agatha turned green and threw up Dad’s fantastic fry-up all over the kitchen floor.

  “I thought it was maybe a bit much for a wee guy like that,” Dad said, while I groaned and Agatha found a cloth and wiped up the mess, with Dad’s help.

  Once the sick was cleaned up, Dad said fresh air would be a tonic and how about a snowball fight for me and Agatha grinned like she knew what a snowball fight was.

  She did! Despite having thrown up, she got right into it and whacked me loads and was an even better aim than Dad. It occurred to me, seeing her running around, scooping up snow and hurling her snowballs through the air, that she was a tomboy. And maybe in 1812 it wasn’t so easy for a girl to be tomboy? Maybe me and Agatha could stay pals and she could stay in the future for ever? She was better fun than Robbie and Will (Robbie, who at this very moment would be skating like a pro with a hot-dog in his hand in Edinburgh’s Winter Wonderland…).

  I tried not to think about Winter Wonderland. After we’d pelted each other with snow for ages, Agatha suddenly shouted out, “Let us make a snowman!”

  Dad was in the middle of brushing snow off his jacket. He glanced up at Agatha, looking a bit bewildered that voiceless Randolph had suddenly recovered. “Let us make a snowman!” I yelled, trying to sound just like Agatha.

  Dad scratched his head and looked from me to Agatha. Then he grinned and joined in. “Yeah, let us make a snowman!”

  And that’s what we did. Dad rolled the biggest bit for the body. I patted it smooth and Agatha rolled up the head. She lifted the round white ball and plonked it down on top of the body. Then we all ran around finding branches for arms, and pebbles for eyes, and I ran into the kitchen and found a carrot for a nose. Agatha carved lips into the face, and ran her fingers across the top of the head, giving the snowman hair. It was a great snowman. Agatha couldn’t keep a huge smile off her face.

  When we eventually went inside Dad made everyone hot chocolate, then, without warning, he picked up the remote control and flicked on the TV. Suddenly men were running across a football pitch chasing a ball and the crowd was cheering. Poor Agatha dropped her hot chocolate, screamed and turned pale.

  As I gaped at the pool of brown liquid on the carpet, I thought maybe I would have to change some bits of the essay. Children from the past, though they are quite brave, would be scared by things we are used to, things that are fast or loud. Agatha, I was learning, was very scared of modern inventions. Cars made her scream. Fizzy juice made her sneeze. TV made her panic. The phone ring
ing made her jump out of her skin.

  I looked from the puddle of hot chocolate, to her black-laced boots, then up to her pale face. She was still shivering with the shock of the TV and Dad, down on his hands and knees, was once again cleaning up after her. Agatha, her teeth chattering, couldn’t peel her eyes away from the screen. I found the remote control and switched it off. She slumped back and seemed to relax after that. Then seeing my dad on his hands and knees she gasped, jumped up and helped him. So did I, mumbling how poor Randolph was not himself, tonsils and all that.

  After the TV fiasco I took Agatha to my room and set about explaining life in the twenty-first century to her. I showed her the radiator, which, although it was painted white, was hot like a fire. She touched it, yelped and jumped backwards. I laughed and so did she. That’s something I liked about her. She had a good sense of humour. I showed her my phone and flicked through photos, mostly of me, Robbie and Will making silly faces.

  She looked discombobulated (I like that word). I told her so, thinking I would impress her. She just nodded and said if I was transported 200 years would not I also be feeling discombobulated? She peered at the phone, scratched her head and said, “But how does this work?”

  “It’s simple,” I said, “you just click this button.”

  She shook her head. “No, Saul. But how does this little contraption make these likenesses?”

  “Well… umm…” my voice trailed off. “It’s chips,” I answered, lamely.

  She looked confused. “Chips?”

  I shrugged. “It’s like your dad’s time travel. It’s a mystery.”

  She touched the screen and winced. “It isna really you. It is like someone painted your likeness. And it has a bleak feel.”

  “It’s called technology,” I said, breezily, as though that explained everything. “We’ve got a lot of it.” But Agatha shook her head, either still confused or not interested, I wasn’t sure which.