by Don Trowden
“But then why did you grab Neets and try to set Schwartz free?”
David threw his apple core across the village square narrowly missing a passing dog. He shrugged. “A spur of the moment thing. He’s my dad. He may not have been a great family man, but he was still the only dad I knew and I couldn’t let him rot forever in the Time Limbo place.”
I thought for a moment then nodded in agreement. He had a point.
“As to your friend Unita, I’m sorry but she was the nearest person at hand and if I was to get out of the room and down to the cellar I needed a hostage. Believe me, though, I wouldn’t have hurt her, well certainly not intentionally. I just wanted to help my dad.”
“That’s what I thought. If I’m right you’re also a pretty good shot with a musket.” It was a bit of a stab in the dark, but I was fairly sure I was right. “It was you that fired that shot at Schwartz when he was going to stab Lewis at the Leap of Faith, wasn’t it?”
David stared at me in surprise. “Yes, but how could you have known?”
“None of us had a musket and there were no redcoats within a mile or so, plus of course whoever fired the shot stayed well away instead of making themselves known. You were the only person I couldn’t account for and I was already pretty sure there was more to you than met the eye.”
“Mr. Lewis was always good to me and I wasn’t going to let my dad kill him in cold blood, so I followed you all and fired the musket as a sort of warning rather than anything else. It was only loaded with rock salt.”
The more I talked to David, the more sympathetic I felt. It can’t have been easy being Schwartz’s adopted son. “After all that’s happened and what you tried to do a couple of days ago, the Lewis household couldn’t just welcome you back with open arms. Let’s face it that’s why you’re in the stocks eating fruit and veg, but it’s also why I’m going to make you an offer.”
David looked dubious. “Offer?”
“The partners in the Temporal Detective Agency, that’s me, Neets - sorry, I mean Unita - and Marlene, have got together and decided to make you an offer, which could work out rather well for everyone.” It took seconds for David to accept our proposal as well as the restrictions that went with it, none of which were too tough. I unlocked the stocks’ padlock and helped the newest member of the Temporal Detective Agency get to his feet.
The Olé Grill restaurant had closed for the night and Galahad was sitting at a table busily totting up the night’s taking. We’d all just arrived through the Time Portal and were sipping Merl Grey tea and nibbling extremely expensive biscuits, although Galahad had mumbled on the house with extreme difficulty and a stammer.
My Chief Superintendent Smollett had already made his farewells to take even more credit for recovering Nelson’s statue and somehow returning Marble Arch to its rightful place. He always reckoned for that lot he should have been made Assistant Commissioner at least, but as he refused to tell anyone how he got a statue onto a hundred-and-fifty-foot high column and several tons of stone into Hyde Park he decided to let the matter drop.
David was given a position in the Temporal Detective Agency for as long as he wanted on the understanding he would only go back to Port Eynon when Lewis and Marie weren’t around. After all, he’d proven he was pretty good at surveillance work and it was time to put that skill to good use for a change.
The most difficult parting was between Bryn and Neets.
On the day fixed for returning to the Olé Grill the young couple had walked for miles along the coastline talking incessantly and learning even more about each other than they already knew, which was nearly everything. Neets told me they talked about Bryn going back with her to Merl’s cave, but they both agreed now that Marie had returned he had to stay with his family. Neets suggested she could stay in Port Eynon, but the thought of leaving Marlene and me as well as all her cats and friends from Camelot was more than she could bear. They agonized all day and eventually came to a heartrending decision just as it was time to leave and for the Time Portal to be bricked up almost permanently. They agreed that Neets would pop back to see Bryn the following day using a portable portal and he would go forward in time the day after that by the same means. Temporal dating can be so difficult for teenagers.
Galahad finished counting and poured himself a flagon of mead because Camelot habits die hard. With a sigh he looked at the large palm bush that now stood where Nelson’s statue had become a favorite conversation piece and told me its disappearance had left him with two problems. Firstly, he’d had to buy a very ordinary looking rack to put his menus in, which for a celebrity chef was a bit of an indignity. Secondly, and probably more important, he had no idea what he was going to do with the great big diamond he’d found under Nelson’s eye patch, though cut properly it would make a nice tiepin and cufflink set for him and a not too ostentatious pendant for me. He hadn’t meant to keep it of course, but the statue had suddenly disappeared and my two-minute warning had given him no chance to put the stone back. Meanwhile, it would be safe in the tea caddy and the hardboiled egg he’d put in the statue’s eye socket would almost certainly never be discovered.
Marlene’s office wall had always looked a bit bare with a very noticeable and unsightly damp area. As a sort of farewell present Lewis had given her a portrait of a woman painted on a piece of wood that now covered the patch perfectly. The copy was in the Louvre in Paris, but somehow I didn’t think Leonardo da Vinci would mind; after all he hadn’t even bothered to paint the Mona Lisa on canvas.
Marlene looked at her little band as we made ourselves at home. She smiled with satisfaction and settled back in her easy chair, because everything had gone rather well, all things considered.
Neets had grown into a young woman, had a young man in tow and yet she and I seemed closer than ever. We were Merl’s Girls after all. I was officially guest teacher at Port Eynon Junior High School and was now considering writing a textbook on my experiences. I already had the title, Tertia’s Cylcepodica, and Marlene reckoned it could be the first book to be published simultaneously in a number of different centuries and languages. She also knew from her researches in the future parish records that Lewis would lead a long and healthy life in Port Eynon, though even with all the parish records at her disposal she hadn’t managed to find out whether Neets played a greater part in creating the Lewis family tree, but then some mysteries are best left unsolved. For the time being at least.
Then of course there was David.
He was certainly smart, definitely sneaky enough for the Agency and best of all he and I got on. From David’s point of view staying in Port Eynon would have been impossible. He would have been an outcast and would probably have been forced out of the area anyway. Best of all he’d be able to watch his father through PortalVision and one day Marlene was sure they would be able to release him, but not for a long time yet.
Marlene picked up the battered tin cup and spoke quietly into it. “Merlin? Hallo, it’s Marlene. Just touching base as it were. Can you hear me?”
There was a muffled crackling like tissue paper being crumpled and then a voice came from a long way away, or at least a thousand years in the past.
“Marlene! Lovely to hear from you. How is everybody?”
“We’re fine, Merl. We’ve just had a lovely holiday and solved a mystery or two. The girls are fine and Galahad’s making a fortune. How’s Arthur?”
“Oh, he’s Arthur. Still my lovely Arthur, still king, and we’re both very happy. In fact I haven’t told him yet, but I think there could be a little prince on the way.”
I could hear the excitement in Merl’s voice. “Merlin, that’s wonderful news! I always wanted to be an auntie.”
There was a pause.
“Are you busy at the moment, Marlene?” Something in Merlin’s voice said this was more than an idle query. “It’s nothing major you understand. It’s just that Camelot’s having a few problems at the moment. Conspiracies, marauding knights and some say the odd dragon ap
parently. We’re going to see what we can do, but we’re a bit stuck, because to top it all someone’s stolen Excalibur and without the Sword we’re helpless. You and the Agency couldn’t help out, could you?”
I grinned. We were going home to do business and this time we might even get paid, which made it the best combination of all. Though this was royalty we were talking about and they never have ready cash.
Next day out of curiosity I looked through PortalVision.
High up on the top of Marble Arch a puzzled workman cleaning the stone found a Sioux arrow and what was definitely desert sand, while nearby in Trafalgar Square the sun glinted off the boiled egg that replaced the statue’s right eye. Neither the pigeons, nor Nelson seemed at all worried that Galahad had a nice new pair of cufflinks, I had a pendant and that hundreds of people queued every day to see the fake Koh-i-noor diamond in the Tower of London.
After all, it was only a Leap of Faith.
