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  ‘My mum said you would be able to tell me because the Time Police know everything.’

  I don’t think she was quite sure how to take that.

  ‘Yes,’ he continued, his piping voice clearly audible to everyone in the Map Room, if not the entire bloody building. ‘She says the Time Police think they know everything, but actually they couldn’t find their own arse with both hands.’

  Oh great – months of taciturn silence and now he decides to get chatty.

  ‘And a torch.’

  To her enormous credit, because she didn’t know I was standing behind her, she made a real effort. ‘I think . . .’

  ‘And a map.’

  ‘Perhaps we could . . .’

  ‘And a team of Sherpas.’

  ‘Yes. Enough.’

  There was a short silence. I could feel Ellis shaking with laughter beside me.

  The Map Master took a deep breath and soldiered on. ‘Obviously, the Time Map can only show what we put in and . . .’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. I could see the shifting colours flickering across his upturned face. One minute his face was brilliantly lit – the next moment in deep shadow. ‘But you’ve put some of it in wrong.’

  ‘Indeed,’ she said, a trifle frostily, I thought. ‘Well, I expect we can discuss that later. What I wanted to talk about today – and I know this is difficult for you to understand – but if you try to imagine space-time as being like a rubber sheet . . .’

  He interrupted. ‘. . . Distorted by the presence of heavy objects.’

  ‘Exactly. Well, much the same thing can happen to Time . . .’

  He started to walk towards the Map. ‘Where Time is distorted?’

  ‘Yes, and . . .’

  ‘What sort of heavy objects?’

  ‘Well, usually it’s human intervention or . . .’

  ‘What happens when it stretches? Does it snap? What makes it snap? What happens when it snaps?’

  She looked down at him. ‘You do remind me of your mother.’

  He looked up at her, puzzled. ‘Whose mother should I remind you of?’

  I swear I don’t know if he does these things by accident or not.

  ‘Well, anyway,’ she said, soldiering on again. Perhaps she had children of her own. ‘This is our Time Map and . . .’

  ‘It’s different from the one at St Mary’s.’

  ‘Yes. That’s because we’re not so much interested in history as Time itself. We really don’t care if Odysseus took twenty years to get home or the Vikings landed in Nova Scotia in . . .’

  ‘Mum says History’s important.’

  ‘Well, I daresay she does, but . . .’

  ‘Because when History goes wrong everything goes wrong.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure, but . . .’

  He frowned and pointed. ‘Like that bit there.’

  ‘Anyway, today we . . . What?’

  He pointed. ‘That bit’s wrong.’

  She smiled. ‘I don’t think so.’

  He put down his scratchpad. ‘Yes, it is. Can’t you see? You have the funny criss-cross lines but they criss-cross in the wrong place. Look.’ He pointed again. ‘They should be . . . there . . . which makes that line wrong . . . which makes that bit wrong . . . which makes . . .’ He pulled on the gauntlets she’d left lying on a console and moved his hands.

  ‘Stop,’ she said sharply. ‘Don’t touch the Map.’ But it was too late. He stood, a little dark figure in front of the massive luminous Map and waved his arm. A section disengaged. He waved his arms to enlarge it and made a series of wide scything actions. Various lines either disappeared or rearranged themselves. The disengaged segment took on a different shape.

  Around the Map Room, lights began to flash on various consoles. Someone got to his feet, calling a warning. The humming noise increased in volume and pitch. He didn’t let that stop him, raising his voice to be heard. ‘Look. Now you can see that this area here is wonky. The History has gone all funny. My mum says you must never discount History.’

  The Map Master wasn’t listening. She was standing helplessly, watching quite a large section of her precious Map disintegrate before her very eyes.

  Everyone was standing helplessly watching quite a large section of the Map disintegrate before their very eyes.

  The disturbance began to spread outwards – like an ink blob on blotting paper. More lines buckled or twisted and what had been a complicated and intricate dance became chaos. Lines broke away and waved aimlessly, lacking a destination before slowly fading away completely. A darkness began to spread. Somewhere, a harsh alarm sounded. And then another.

  The Map Master wheeled around and strode from console to console, barking out a series of orders. People hunched over their screens, their hands a blur as they sought to keep up. To compensate. The heart of darkness spread further. More alarms sounded. The humming increased. People were running hither and thither, shouting instructions to each other.

  ‘Freeze it. Freeze it,’ she shouted and I understood. Unable to keep pace with the changes, she’d ordered the Map frozen until they could understand the extent of the problem and work out how to fix it.

  In the meantime . . . I began to work my way towards ­Matthew, getting there just as the Map Master, glitter-eyed with rage, rounded on him.

  To be fair to her, she was presiding over a catastrophe but I don’t really think she would have hit him. However, I wasn’t taking any chances. I slipped between her and him, saying quietly, ‘Yes? Can I help you?’

  She was beside herself with fury. ‘Did you see what he did?’ She wheeled on Matthew. ‘You’re banned. Forever. Get out of my sight. Now. Don’t ever let me catch you in here again.’

  I could feel him shaking. He doesn’t deal well with anger and he’d been in here often enough to know what he’d done.

  Other officers congregated around us, shouting and gesturing. We were surrounded by a ring of hostility. I felt him press close to me and it suddenly occurred to me that no matter how well he was treated, the black and violent days of his early life would never really leave him.

  I dropped my hand lightly on his shoulder and said, ‘I think I’ll take him away now. You can thank him later.’

  She stopped in mid-sentence. ‘Thank him?’

  ‘Yes. I’ll admit his method was a little crude, but you know as well as I do that his social skills need work. But what a good job he noticed your mis . . . that mistake. From where I was standing, it looked quite bad. Obviously, I’m no expert, but it looks to me as if that whole section is about to implode. And you hadn’t noticed. Well done, Matthew, but we really should let them get on with their repairs. You can finish your lesson another day. Map Master. Captain Ellis. Good afternoon.’

  I nodded at the pair of them and got him out of the room before anyone could pull themselves together enough to stop us. I don’t know which of us was shaking most. This whole mother business isn’t easy, you know.

  I took him back to my room. If anyone wanted him – and they very probably would because he’d just committed a major sin – they would have to come through me first.

  Channelling Dr Stone, I made him a cup of cocoa and we sat down. He huddled at one end of the sofa. Until I saw it reappear, I hadn’t realised how much he’d lost his old, suspicious, watchful, careful expression, from when there was no kindness in his world and no one was to be trusted. Not even for a second. Adults were people who exploded into violence at a second’s notice. In that moment, I kicked everything into touch. My plan, the Time Police, Clive Ronan, everything. It could all disappear up its own rear end as far as I was concerned. If things got nasty for him here I’d take him back to St Mary’s, and Leon and I would rethink everything.

  I looked down at him. At the hollows in his temples where the blue veins showed through his skin. At his thin, bony hands. My heart ach
ed for him. He was so vulnerable. He probably always would be.

  He finished his cocoa but it hadn’t done him as much good as I had hoped. He hadn’t said a word the whole time, just huddling into the corner of the sofa and trying to make himself as small as possible.

  I had a brilliant idea, leaned over, and pulled one of his jigsaws from the drawer. Once, when everyone thought Leon was dead, we’d sat every night, not saying very much but doing something simple together. I wanted to give him something safe and familiar to do. To give him a chance to get himself back together again.

  The picture showed the Tower of London and part of Tower Bridge, both of which were just downriver from us. Or possibly upriver. I was never really sure.

  I refilled his mug, he shook the pieces out of the box and we sat quietly, as we used to do, looking for the corners and the sky. Neither of us spoke, but slowly, the colour returned to his cheeks. He stopped turning pieces over at random and began to concentrate.

  Until someone knocked at the door.

  He jumped a mile and turned anxious eyes to me.

  I winked and said, ‘Seriously? How long have you known me?’ and the door opened to reveal Captain Ellis.

  ‘Hey, Max,’ he said lightly. ‘Matthew here?’

  I nodded.

  There was a pause. ‘May I come in?’

  ‘Well, that rather depends.’

  He held up his hands. One of which contained a pizza box. ‘I bear a gift.’

  ‘Pizza? On a school night?’

  ‘I think Commander Hay is rather worried there might be no more school days.’

  ‘I haven’t yet taken that off the table.’

  ‘Perhaps I could come in and talk for a moment?’

  ‘Again, that rather depends.’

  ‘I haven’t come to cause trouble, Max, so climb down off your high horse and give your kid a lesson in how to handle conflict gracefully.’

  ‘Hey, I’m not an ear-boxing Map Master.’

  ‘And neither is she. It wouldn’t have come to that. But he broke the rules.’

  ‘And highlighted a problem you had no idea existed.’

  ‘That’s what I’ve come to talk about. With pizza.’

  He flourished the box again.

  ‘If you shout at him, I will kill you where you stand.’

  ‘Duly noted.’

  I sighed. ‘Come in.’

  I stood well back, arms folded, radiating protective maternal hostility, but I have to say he handled Matthew beautifully. He sat beside him at the table, unhurriedly turning over various pieces of the puzzle, not saying anything. The minutes ticked by. He gave no sign of being hurried, or hostile, or critical. All I could hear was the occasional murmur of, ‘I think that might be a bit of tree.’ Or, ‘There’s a piece of the bridge that goes with that bit.’ Gradually, the emotional temperature began to drop.

  I opened the pizza, and because I’m a godless heathen, ­Matthew’s the son of a godless heathen, and Ellis is in the Time Police, we didn’t bother with plates; we rolled it up and scarfed it straight from the box. It tastes better that way. When we’d nearly finished, I made Ellis some brown water, and Matthew had a glass of milk.

  It was Matthew himself who brought the subject up. ‘Are they very cross?’

  ‘They were,’ said Ellis, using his thumbnail to scrape cheese off the inside of the box, ‘but now they think you’ve done a Good Thing.’ He grinned. ‘It’s safe to go back.’

  Matthew shook his head. He still looked pale.

  ‘I’ll go with you if you like,’ I said. ‘And then you can show her where her Map was wrong and I can show her what will happen if she ever frightens you like that again.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ellis, thoughtfully. ‘I’m pretty sure everyone was hoping that we’d call all that water under the bridge and just move on. Better for everyone.’

  He winked at Matthew. ‘Adults don’t like to be reminded they’ve made a mistake. On the other hand, young Matthew, you know the rules. You don’t touch the Map.’

  He nodded. ‘But it was wrong.’

  ‘True, but next time, just point, there’s a good lad. Saves a lot of emotional wear and tear on your mentor.’

  ‘So,’ I said, joining them at the table and casually turning over a few more pieces of puzzle, keeping things low-key, ‘what was the outcome?’

  ‘The outcome is that we have a problem. No, nothing you did,’ he added hastily, as Matthew got wild-eyed again. ‘The problem is with the 16th century.’

  ‘What?’ I said jokingly. ‘All of it?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said seriously. ‘Most of it. And it’s spreading. Very slowly, but it’s serious.’

  I shot Matthew a glance. He was to all intents and purposes engrossed in his puzzle but I could practically feel the breeze from his anxiously flapping ears. ‘So, what’s this problem then?’

  Ellis drained his mug and set it down. ‘Well, I need to put this in terms St Mary’s can understand . . . It’s a bit like a bluebell wood, isn’t it?’

  I blinked. ‘Is it?’

  ‘Yes. Actually, that’s rather good, because it’s exactly like a bluebell wood.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘Time.’

  I resisted the temptation to roll my eyes. We’d been ticking along nicely and now here he was banging on about Time. You’d think Time would be the same as History, wouldn’t you? I think I’d mentioned this once and the shocked silence had warned me never to make that comparison again.

  I said, carefully, ‘Time is a bluebell wood?’

  ‘Well, no, obviously not, but yes. You understand I’m keeping it simple for you.’

  Now I did roll my eyes. ‘Go on then. Explain to me how Time is like a bluebell wood.’

  ‘OK – stop me when I get too technical. Think of the 16th century as a bluebell wood. Very pretty. Very popular. Very interesting. There’s a lot going on and everyone wants to visit.’

  He paused, presumably to give me time to catch up.

  ‘Anyway – as we know – a lot happened in the 16th century. And not just in England, but in Scotland, France, Europe, and America as well. Things were happening everywhere. New countries. New religions. Larger than life personalities all over the place. When time travel was available to the public, the 16th century was where everyone wanted to be. What everyone wanted to see.’

  I nodded. He was right. The entire 16th century was an inter­national dance of diplomacy, religion and death. The century when everything changed.

  He’d stopped again. I wasn’t sure if he’d finished or was waiting for me to catch up, so I nodded encouragingly. It wasn’t so very different from dealing with Matthew. The younger Matthew, I mean.

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘16th century. Bluebell wood. Got it. What’s the problem?’

  ‘Well, imagine you’re strolling through the 16th century . . .’

  ‘The bluebell wood . . .’

  ‘Exactly. You’re strolling through the bluebell wood, enjoying the birdsong, the sunshine, the lovely colours . . .’

  I said impatiently, ‘It’s the 16th century – you mean the religious intolerance, the torture, the paranoia, the violence . . .’

  ‘If you like, yes. But now, you look behind you and there’s another group of people following on. And another, bigger group behind them. And another even bigger group behind them. And so on. And slowly, the nice little path that you’ve been following gets wider and deeper and more and more churned up as more and more people use it. So, what happens?’

  I opened my mouth but I wasn’t quick enough. He was well into his stride now.

  ‘People step off the path – that’s what happens. They make a new one. One that avoids the muddy bits. And then that one becomes the path. But, of course, in only a very short time, that one becomes un­-usable as well, so people
make yet another path. Or they just wander off into the wood on their own, trampling the bluebells, damaging the trees, frightening the birds and, before you know what’s happened, the entire bluebell wood has been destroyed. Everything has disappeared into the mud and all that’s left are a few dying flowers.’

  ‘So,’ I said slowly. ‘You’re saying the 16th century has been trampled into the mud.’

  ‘Pretty much, yes.’

  ‘Collapsed under the weight of sightseers.’

  ‘Exactly. I don’t know if you’ve heard the expression, “The act of observing changes that which is being observed.”’

  ‘Once or twice,’ I said. ‘It’s a favourite of Dr Bairstow’s.’

  ‘And he’s perfectly correct.’

  ‘He always is,’ I said, gloomily. ‘So . . . how do you fix it?’

  He added another piece of bridge, not looking at me. ‘Well, I suppose you could say – we put down decking.’

  I began to wonder if the Time Police weren’t more similar to St Mary’s than anyone had suspected. ‘Decking?’

  ‘Yes, decking.’

  ‘The Decking of Time.’

  ‘Exactly, Max. Well done. I never thought you’d grasp things so quickly. We make another path with decking and then the bluebells can begin to grow again.’

  I thought about this for a while and then said meaningfully, ‘But they’re not the same bluebells.’

  He sighed. ‘Yes, for your own peace of mind, you might not want to dwell too long on that.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Look, you’re not going to be happy, so let’s just give the next bit a miss, shall we?’

  ‘Let’s not.’

  ‘OK. We . . . rebuild . . . the bluebell wood.’

  I shot to my feet. Bits of jigsaw went everywhere. ‘You what? And don’t wrap it up in pretty stories about bluebell woods and birdsong. You change History?’

  ‘We rebuild Time.’

  ‘You can’t do that.’

  ‘We’ve already done it.’

  ‘What? When?’

  ‘Well, not lots of times, but once or twice.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’