Normal Family Page 11

  “Okay,” I said, “so you stole the diamond, but I don’t see what that’s got to do with the statue, or me ending up on a pillar and getting wrapped up with Bryn.” I paused then grinned mischievously. “Sorry, Neets. When I say wrapped up with Bryn I mean not so much wrapped, as involved with him. No not that either, because that’s what you are in a…er, sort of way.” The hole I was digging just got deeper.

  Neets shot me an angry look. “Shut up, Tersh.”

  “I had to hide the diamond somewhere,” Lewis continued, “and I’d already thought of the perfect place. I decided it had to be in the middle of London, totally inaccessible and where no one would ever think of looking for it.”

  “A statue on top of a hundred-and-fifty foot pillar,” I said. “Very clever.”

  “I went forward in time a few years to when Admiral Lord Nelson’s statue was being made by a Mr. E. H. Baily and broke into his workshop. It was a matter of moments to gouge out one of the statue’s eye sockets, put the Koh-i-noor in the hole and then cover it with a layer of paste. To be doubly sure, I put an eye patch over it soaked in wet cement and it looked as though it was part of the original statue unless you inspected it closely. I was certain Schwartz would never spot it from the ground and all I had to do was make sure that Mr. E. H. Baily and his men were equally unobservant. When the statue was put on top of the column in Trafalgar Square, I knew that this time I’d beaten Schwartz.”

  “That’s what I thought must have happened,” I leaned forward, nodding.

  “That’s impossible. How could you have suspected the diamond was in Nelson’s eye?” Lewis inquired suspiciously. “No one saw me put it in.”

  “Because if you know your history, Nelson never wore an eye-patch in his entire life, or so Marlene told me. So I always thought the fact his statue had one was very strange. But why didn’t everything stop there?”

  “Because I knew Schwartz wouldn’t stop trying to steal the diamond,” said Lewis. “Remember, I’d replaced the real diamond with the replica and as far as Schwartz was concerned it was still the original. I had to get the Tower of London authorities to move the Koh-i-noor to a safer place; somewhere that even Schwartz would give up and go home empty-handed. I couldn’t just go up and tell people to put the jewels in much stronger cabinets, behind bars in a better protected tower. Let’s face it, they knew me as an ordinary Beefeater.”

  “So what did you do?” Unita asked Lewis as she looked at Bryn.

  “I went back to the Tower disguised as an old woman and by stretching my arm between the bars protecting the diamond brooch, I nearly managed to get it out of the display before I was stopped. In those days the bars in front of the jewels were thick, but wide apart. They were a deterrent, but of little practical use.”

  “Weren’t you arrested?”

  “No. I was considered mad, given a strong cup of tea and sent packing with a warning. It taught them a lesson though and within a couple of days the whole collection was moved to another much more secure tower and placed behind bars so narrow even a child’s hand couldn’t get through. The Koh-i-noor diamond, or rather its replica, was safe and Schwartz finally gave up, though as you know he keeps a display cabinet free in his cellar to remind him of his one failure.”

  “Do you think he suspected you had something to do with the fact they moved the jewel collection?” I asked, already knowing the answer from Schwartz’s own mouth.

  “Almost certainly,” said Lewis. “It would be too much of a coincidence and Schwartz doesn’t believe in coincidences.”

  “Nor do we at the Agency,” I said with feeling. “Which brings me to my next question, how did I get dragged into all this with Bryn? I reckon your son played around with the Time Portal in your cellar and the thing went haywire.”

  “Something like that,” said Lewis. “I’d left the Portal controls focused on Nelson’s Column so I could see that the statue was put into place by using the visual device and then check on it occasionally.”

  “That’ll be Marlene’s PortalVision,” I said proudly.

  “As far as I can tell, Bryn went into the Portal room against all my warnings and switched it on. Then like all inquisitive boys, he fiddled with the control knobs and probably put it onto full power just to see what would happen.”

  “Chaos,” I said knowingly. “That’s what happens when you get an idiot messing with things he doesn’t understand.” Neets was about to protest, then thought better of it. Bryn sat silent. “As a result we had Nelson’s statue, Bryn and me, cluttering the Temporal Detective Agency office plus had we known it, the Koh-i-noor diamond. As a bonus, of course, I also picked up my favorite copper Inspector Smollett.” I stood up and slapped Lewis on the back. “Come on, you’re a man of action, or at least used to be. I’ve seen round your house as an undercover maid, admittedly only for a day, but I’d like to see it as it is now with furniture and people in it. Take me on a guided tour while Neets and Bryn do the washing up.” My cousin gave a yelp of protest. “Remember, Neets, you’re the maid and I’m the teacher. You can’t expect a teacher to do the washing up!”

  “You’re absolutely right, Tertia,” said Lewis as he walked out of the kitchen. “No tours and you can do the drying.”

  The dishes done, Neets and Bryn went for a stroll in the dunes, while Lewis and I stood on the Port Eynon cliff and looked at the calm waters gently slopping against the rocks far below. Oystercatchers skimmed over the waters and the seagulls wheeled high above, shrieking annoyance at their nests being disturbed by humans. It was an idyllic day and the sun shone high above as clouds gathered menacingly on the horizon.

  “Lovely view,” I said breaking the awkward silence. “If you shield your eyes you can see right over to Devon.”

  “You can at the moment,” said Lewis, “but tonight will be a different matter. The low clouds will be as thick as fog and so inky black you won’t see beyond your own nose. The wind will tear at your clothes and it’ll feel as though the skin on your face is being peeled away layer by layer. The coming rain will make it difficult to breathe and you’ll think you’re drowning.” He paused and smiled. “Not a good night for walking the dogs.”

  “But a good night for wrecking ships?”

  “One of the best,” said Lewis, “one of the very best. Let’s walk.”

  For the rest of the afternoon we made our way along the cliff path as the sun slowly moved towards the horizon. As we looked down into each bay, Lewis told me its history and whether Schwartz and his gang had ever used it as a wrecking point. Occasionally Lewis pointed out wooden spars, smashed planks of wood and pieces of wreckage that may have been washed overboard from some distant ship, but were more likely to be the work of Schwartz. In one rocky bay I spotted the remains of a china doll. Its clothes were torn and one leg was missing, but I couldn’t help wondering whether the owner had dropped it by accident or had become another victim of the wreckers. Weird thoughts for a fourteen-year-old, but over the past 24 hours I’d mentally aged rather a lot.

  As the sun slid behind the cloud-filled horizon, turning the water into molten copper, Lewis stopped and stared out to sea as though searching for something. I put a hand on his and he turned, with a sad smile.

  “I’m sorry,” he said quietly, “every time I come here I look for my Marie. I have this feeling she’s out there somewhere waiting for me to find her, but I don’t know where to start looking.” He sighed deeply. “Come on, let’s get back home. It’ll be dark in a couple of hours and we’ve a busy night ahead of us.”

  As Lewis started to walk towards Port Eynon, I didn’t make any move to go with him and suspected from the look on his face he knew the reason. “There’s something I have to do, or tonight will be a disaster,” I said. “Schwartz needs to see me at his place sometime today working or doing whatever, otherwise he’ll know we’ve double-crossed him and he’ll change his wrecking plans. He has to think Neets and I have joined him for keeps, or at least that I have.”

  “What
about Unita? Won’t he think it strange she’s not with you?”

  I’d rather hoped for him to say something like you brave girl. So young and yet the bravest person I know. Nope. Straight onto Neets instead. Still, I thought, that’s a future father-in-law for you! Unfazed, I continued. “Not really. In fact it might even look better if I tell him Neets ran back to you and Bryn, but I was true to my promise and stayed with him.” I gave him a quick wave and started to trot towards Schwartz’s lair.

  “You brave girl. So young and yet the bravest person I know.” Lewis shouted the words so they echoed round the cliffs and I knew I’d definitely arrived as a detective. I also knew in my heart that by morning the Temporal Detective Agency would have solved everything to do with appearing statues, disappearing diamonds and thieves living in the wrong century. I felt good.

  Of course, if it all went wrong I’d be dead.

  Chapter Nine

  Recruits, the Crabart and Mrs. Jones’s Trap

  “Where’ve you been, girl?” I noticed that Schwartz wasn’t using my name anymore, though I suspected the wrecker never trusted anyone for more than an hour or two, including himself. “I know where you’ve been, so don’t lie to me.”

  I paled and thought of the Leap of Faith. When I walked into the courtyard Schwartz had been standing outside the entrance to his house watching the distant storm intensify as it threatened to sweep in from the sea. I knew he was also keeping track of who walked in and out of the courtyard gate and why. I bunched my fists and got ready to fight as best I could or if necessary run like crazy.

  “You’ve been moping around,” Schwartz said before I could answer, “because your little friend turned chicken and ran. She did, didn’t she?” I nodded, a bit annoyed that my well-crafted story was reduced to a single nod. “I thought so. Well don’t!” The man’s voice rose to a growl. “Remember that I use you and not the other way round.”

  For one awful moment I thought Schwartz must have had me followed.

  “Sorry, sir,” I said looking downcast, “I was looking forward to tonight so after I took Neets, I mean Unita, part of the way back to Port Eynon I finished in the stables then snuck out and walked to Rhossili to look at the Crabart.”

  “And what did you see, girl?”

  “Dead calm it was. The sea was right out and like a millpond. All the rocks on the causeway looked shiny with their seaweed and not a bit dangerous.”

  Schwartz nodded as he scanned the heavy storm clouds building up. “That’s how I like people to think of my little bit of coastline, then they get careless. But tonight, now the storm’s rising, there’ll be murder, mayhem and profit for us all.” Schwartz could be very persuasive. “You’ll be part of it, girl, and you’ll play your part well, or you’ll take the Leap.”

  “Yes, sir.” I decided I’d said enough and shut up.

  “Come inside, Tertia.” Schwartz was becoming friendly again, at least for him, and my heart sank, because I liked him more as a villainous thug. I followed him into what would normally have been the sitting room, except it had no chairs and was full of miscellaneous plunder. Schwartz rubbed the glass of the main window and looked out. The storm clouds were racing in from the sea and within the hour would bring stinging rain in the howling wind when darkness had fallen. “Look out there, Tertia. The waves will be viciously unforgiving when they crash onto the coastline and in a couple of hours the Crabart causeway will be ready to smash any ship I entice there.” The smile on his face at the destruction he was going to cause was sickening. Then his face clouded and seething anger replaced the smile. “Tonight will make up for all the trouble caused by Gawain both in Camelot and since I arrived in Port Eynon. Bryn’s mother scorned me to marry him and the man has ruined too many of my profitable ventures. Now he’ll pay.” He turned from the window and stared at me. “Now to cap it all, you and that other interfering brat have turned up again from Camelot. Tonight I’ll eliminate Gawain at long last and show his boy Bryn the Leap of Faith from the top down to the very watery bottom. And if you and Unita have betrayed me you’ll leap with him. This is going to be a very good night.”

  “You can trust me, sir.” I was so good I almost believed it myself.

  “Then get ready and meet me at the stables. We ride in one hour.”

  I walked off and tried to imagine what was going on in Schwartz’s mind. I figured he’d be half inclined to change the wrecking site for tonight, just in case I spread the word, or if Neets was doing it right now. But then he would also reason that if I’d double-crossed him, Gawain would be too intelligent to fall for being misled about the Crabart and would think it had to be the next bay, which was Mewslade. In which case the obvious thing to do was to set up his wrecking operation on the Crabart, safe in the knowledge that his old enemy would be elsewhere.

  The old double-think.

  I walked through the courtyard archway and no one paid me any attention as I started to run towards Port Eynon. I’d done what I’d intended and Schwartz seemed satisfied that I was on his side and would join his plan of wrecking at the Crabart. Now it was up to Gawain and his people to finish the job.

  As I made my way back through the village to Bryn’s house, I turned off down a muddy side street just after the tavern and opened the large wooden door to the school. I looked into my classroom and was told they were writing an essay on where they would like to go if there was such a thing as time travel. Amazingly they were doing it quietly and unsupervised. The Tertia effect! Miss Jones was in the other room doing a math lesson and after a whispered conversation with me and a lot of nodding by her, she clapped her hands for attention while I went back into my classroom and told the kids to quickly join the others next door.

  Miss Jones looked at the packed classroom with obvious pride and smiled at the eager faces arranged before her. Those children who didn’t have seats were perched on desks and those who did sat on chairs craning round to see what was going on. We wanted to talk to them all without repeating ourselves, and saying things twice is something all teachers hate doing. Besides we wanted a unanimous vote at the end of what was going to be a short speech. Miss Jones coughed for silence.

  “Children, this week a new teacher started with us and I believe she has proved fairly popular. Am I right?” Nobody wanted to be the first to respond, but slowly there was a rising murmur of agreement. “Good. I know that Miss Tertia has told you some wonderful stories in her history and geography lessons, but I suspect you’re too grown up to believe everything she said.” Another slow murmur of agreement. “However, I have reason to believe there’s more to our new teacher than meets the eye. For a start it would seem she’s a detective.” Another murmur this time of surprise went round the room and there was also the odd What’s a ’tectif? “What’s more she’s on a case right now and if I’m not mistaken, and I very rarely am, she’s encountering problems and needs help. My question to all of you is… do we help Miss Tertia? Yes or no? Hands up.”

  It took less than two seconds for every hand to be raised.

  “It may be dangerous and it’ll be very dark.”

  All hands shot up again.

  “And it’ll be tonight.”

  It looked to me as though most kids had two hands raised this time. “That’s my school,” Miss Jones said to me proudly and as I left she started to outline to the children what they were going to do.

  Back at the Lewis mansion I talked at length to Mrs. Jones. “The master and his men are just getting ready to go, my dear,” she said from her armchair by the fire. “Do you want to go with them?”

  I told her what I intended to do and about my recent visit to her sister at the school. For a rather large person Mrs. Jones could move quickly, but I was even faster as I grabbed the last sandwich left over from lunch.

  “Do you think they’re in real danger and will they need our help do you think?” I looked thoughtful and nodded through a mouthful of beef and mustard. “I figured as much.”

  Blodwyn Jones pu
t two fingers in her mouth, gave the most penetrating whistle I’d ever heard and within a minute the kitchen was full of older people. The only person missing was David, but then someone was going to have to look after the house. She stood in the middle of the floor with her arms folded, looking like a vast lighthouse, and stared at her scullery maids, parlor maids, kitchen wenches and general servants with a smile. She was on to a winner.

  “Boys and girls,” she used the term loosely, “the Master needs our help and I for one am not about to refuse him. Show me your weapons.”

  A variety of lethally-edged ladles, sharpened mops, spiked dusters and wickedly tipped brushes were waved, or in some cases raised with difficulty. Blodwyn Jones laughed as she so often did. “Excellent. Then get the horse and cart hitched up because tonight we go to fight for the Lewis family.”

  Lewis had chosen horses for all of us. Bryn had the same chestnut mare that nuzzled against his cheek when he whispered in its ear and they looked as though they understood each other perfectly. Neets had been given a piebald pony that trotted up to her like an old friend.

  “Used to be Bryn’s,” explained Lewis, “before he got too big for her. Now she’ll only let someone Bryn trusts ride her. It seems he trusts you, Unita.” He smiled that charismatic smile of his and Neets blushed in reply. Poor cow.

  I looked at my donkey again and was about to protest when Lewis put a hand on my shoulder. “Pedro isn’t just a donkey, Tertia,” he said gently. “He’s the most surefooted animal on the entire Gower coast. He knows every inch of the headland and will look after you with more care than any boyfriend. He may be a donkey, but he saved my life many times. Tonight he belongs to you and I will ride another mount.”