“Maybe, but it’s not how sick I look that matters—it’s how sick I really am,” I said, handing Mr. Marley my schoolbag. Seeing that I was so weak and feeble, he was welcome to carry it this time. “And I do think that, under these circumstances, the visit to the ball can be postponed.”
“Impossible!” cried Mr. Marley, only to clap his hand to his mouth next moment and look around in alarm in case he’d been heard. “Do you know how much time and trouble has gone into those preparations?” he went on in a whisper as we made for the headquarters of the Lodge. I was trailing along in such a limp way that we made only slow progress. “It wasn’t easy to get your school principal to let that amateur dramatics society use the art room in the cellar for their rehearsal. Today! And Count Saint-Germain expressly said that—”
Mr. Marley was getting on my nerves. (Amateur dramatics society? Mr. Gilles, the principal? I didn’t understand any of this.) “Listen, I’m sick! Sick! I took three aspirins, but they didn’t help. In fact it’s getting worse and worse. I’m running a high temperature as well. And I’m short of breath.” To emphasize what I said, I clung to the rail of the flight of steps leading up to the house and did some heavy breathing.
“Tomorrow! You can be sick tomorrow,” bleated Mr. Marley. “Mr. George! Tell her she can’t be sick until tomorrow, or the whole timetable will be ruined!”
“Aren’t you feeling well, Gwyneth?” Mr. George, who had appeared in the doorway, considerately put an arm around me and led me into the house. This was better.
I nodded as if I were suffering. “I probably caught Charlotte’s flu bug.” Ha, ha! Exactly! We both had the same imaginary flu. Might as well go the whole hog. “My head is splitting.”
“Oh, dear, it’s really very unfortunate just now,” said Mr. George.
“That’s what I’ve been trying to get her to understand,” said Mr. Marley, trotting busily along after us. For a change, his face wasn’t red as a lobster but white with red spots, as if it couldn’t make up its mind which was the right color for this situation. “Surely Dr. White can give her an injection of something, can’t he? She only has to get through a few hours.”
“Yes, that’s a possibility,” said Mr. George.
Shaken, I gave him a sidelong glance. I’d have expected a little more sympathy and support from Mr. George. I was beginning to feel genuinely sick, but with fear. I somehow had a feeling that if the Guardians realized I was simply pretending, they wouldn’t handle me with kid gloves. But it was too late now. There was no going back.
Instead of making for Madame Rossini’s studio, where I was supposed to be getting dressed in my eighteenth-century clothes, Mr. George took me to the Dragon Hall, and Mr. Marley followed us, still carrying my bag and talking to himself indignantly.
Dr. White, Falk de Villiers, Mr. Whitman, and a man I didn’t know (maybe the minister of health?) were sitting around the table. When Mr. George gently pushed me into the room, they all turned their heads to the doorway and stared. I was feeling more and more uncomfortable.
“She says she’s sick!” exclaimed Mr. Marley, as he marched into the room after us.
Falk de Villiers stood up. “Close the door first, please, Marley. Now, let’s start again. Who’s sick?”
“She is!” Mr. Marley pointed his forefinger accusingly in my direction, and I only just resisted the temptation to roll my eyes.
Mr. George let go of me, sat down with a groan on an empty chair, and mopped the sweat off his bald patch with his handkerchief. “That’s right. Gwyneth isn’t feeling well.”
“I’m really sorry,” I said, taking care to look down and to my right. I’d read, somewhere, that people always look up and to their left when they’re telling lies. “But I don’t feel up to going to that ball today. I can hardly keep on my feet, and it’s getting worse all the time.” I emphasized my point by leaning on the back of Mr. George’s chair for support.
Only now did I notice that Gideon was present, too, and my heart missed a couple of beats.
It was so unfair that the mere sight of him was enough to upset me, while he stood casually by the window, hands deep in the pockets of his jeans, just smiling at me. Well, okay, it wasn’t an outright, broad, beaming smile, only a tiny lift of the corners of his mouth, but his eyes were smiling at the same time, and for some reason, I had a lump in my throat again.
I quickly looked in another direction, and saw little Robert, Dr. White’s son who had drowned in a swimming pool when he was seven, over by the fireplace. The little ghost boy had been shy at first, but by now he trusted me. He gave me a big wave, but I could only nod briefly to him.
“What kind of sudden, unexpected sickness do you have, if I may ask?” Mr. Whitman looked at me with mockery in his eyes. “You were sound as a bell in school just now.” He folded his arms before obviously thinking better of it and changing his tactics. At this point, he switched to his soft, nice-guy voice, gentle and sympathetic. “If you are by any chance nervous about the ball, Gwyneth, we can understand that. Maybe Dr. White can give you something to help with your stage fright.”
Falk nodded. “We really can’t put off today’s appointment,” he said.
Now Mr. George was stabbing me in the back as well. “Mr. Whitman is right, and a little stage fright is perfectly normal. Anyone would feel nervous in your place. So there’s no need to be ashamed of it.”
“And you won’t be on your own,” added Falk. “Gideon will be with you the whole time.”
I didn’t mean to do it, but I glanced quickly at Gideon and looked away again just as quickly when his eyes seemed to fasten on mine.
“Before you know it,” Falk went on, “you’ll be back again, and it will all be over.”
“And just think of that lovely dress,” said the man I took to be the minister of health, trying to tempt me. Hello? Did he think I was a ten-year-old still playing with Barbie dolls?
The others murmured their agreement, and they all smiled at me encouragingly, except for Dr. White, whose eyebrows were drawn together in his usual frown. His hostile expression would have terrified anyone. Little Robert put his head apologetically on one side.
“My throat hurts, I have a headache, and my joints all ache,” I said as firmly as I could. “I don’t think that’s how stage fright feels. My cousin stayed at home with flu today, and now I’ve caught her bug. It’s as simple as that!”
“Someone ought to explain to her again that this is an event of historical importance,” squeaked Mr. Marley in the background, but Mr. Whitman interrupted him.
“Gwyneth, do you remember our conversation this morning?” he asked, and his tone of voice became, if anything, a tad slimier.
Which one did he mean? Surely he wasn’t seriously describing his grousing about the trouble with my schoolwork as a conversation? Yes, he obviously was.
“It may be because of our training, but I feel fairly sure that in your place, Charlotte would have been aware of her duty. She would never rate her own physical state above her mission in our cause.”
Well, it wasn’t my fault if they’d gone and trained the wrong girl, was it? I clung even harder to the back of the chair. “Honestly, if Charlotte felt as sick as I do, she wouldn’t be able to go to that ball either.”
Mr. Whitman looked as if he was about to lose his temper any moment now. “I don’t think you understand what I’m talking about.”
“This is getting us nowhere!” That was Dr. White, speaking in his usual brusque way. “We’re only losing valuable time. If the girl really is sick, we can hardly talk her back into good health. And if she’s only pretending—” He pushed his chair back, got to his feet, and came around the table toward me so quickly that little Robert found it hard to keep up with him. “Mouth open!”
This was really going too far! I stared at him indignantly, but he had taken my head in both hands, and his fingers ran down from my ears to my throat. Then he put a hand on my forehead. My heart sank.
“Hm,” he said, and now his expression was even darker, if possible. “Swollen lymph nodes, high temperature—this really doesn’t look good. Open your mouth, please, Gwyneth.”
Astonished, I did as he said. Swollen lymph nodes? High temperature? Was I genuinely sick with sheer fright now?
“Just as I thought.” Dr. White had taken a wooden spatula out of his breast pocket and pressed my tongue down with it. “Pharynx inflamed, tonsils swollen … no wonder you have a sore throat. It must hurt like hell when you swallow.”
“You poor thing,” said Robert sympathetically. “Now I expect you’ll have to take horrible cough syrup.” He made a face.
“Are you cold?” his father asked me.
I nodded uncertainly. Why on earth was he doing this? Why was he helping me? Dr. White, of all people, who always acted as if I’d take the first opportunity I got of running off with the chronograph?
“I thought so. Your temperature will go on rising for a while.” Dr. White turned to the others. “Seems like a viral infection.”
The Guardians present looked upset. I forced myself not to look at Gideon, although I’d have loved to see his face.
“Can you give her anything for it, Jake?” asked Falk de Villiers.
“Something to lower her temperature, that’s all. But there’s no way she can be fit for the ball this evening in a hurry. She ought to be in bed.” Dr. White looked grimly at me. “If she’s lucky, it’ll be the one-day infection that’s going around at present. But it could well take several days for her to—”
“All the same, surely we could—” Mr. Whitman began.
“No, we couldn’t,” Dr. White rudely interrupted him. I was doing my best not to stare at him as if he were the seventh wonder of the world. “Apart from the fact that Gideon can hardly push her to the ball in a wheelchair, it would be irresponsible and an offense against the Golden Rules to send her into the eighteenth century with an acute viral infection.”
“That’s true,” said the unknown man whom I took for the minister of health. “We don’t know how the immune system of people in the late eighteenth century would react to a modern virus. It could have devastating effects.”
“As with the Maya Indians in the past,” murmured Mr. George.
Falk sighed deeply. “Well, the decision seems to have been made for us. Gideon and Gwyneth won’t go to the ball this evening. Maybe we can bring Operation Opal forward instead. Marley, would you please let the others know about our change of plan?”
“Yes, sir.” Mr. Marley made for the door, visibly upset. The glance he cast me was full of reproach. I couldn’t have cared less. The main thing was that I’d put off the visit to the ball. I still couldn’t grasp my luck.
Now I did risk a cautious look at Gideon. Unlike the others, he didn’t seem to be bothered by the postponement of our excursion, because he was smiling at me. Did he guess that I was faking my infection? Or was he just glad to be spared the nuisance of dressing in those clothes today? One way or another, I resisted the temptation to smile back and let my eyes go to Dr. White, who was standing there talking to the minister of health.