"Treason? Oh, really! How can I be a traitor when I don"t even know where I am or what I"m doing here?
Where am am I, as a matter of interest? What is the name of this extraordinary place?" I, as a matter of interest? What is the name of this extraordinary place?"
"I cannot tell."
"Well, that makes two of us. So, you won"t help me is that what you"re saying?"
"Sir, if you a.s.sure me you are no traitor perhaps I may accompany you upon some later occasion... But for now I will leave to your prudence what measures you will take...
And to avoid suspicion, I must immediately retire, in as private a manner as I came."
With these words, the stranger swept off his tricorne hat, and made a very civil bow. Then he stepped back and moved behind a tree, out of sight.
The Doctor began to protest: "Hey don"t run away when I"m talking to you there are lots more questions I want to ask. Come back here, my dear chap "
He followed in his footsteps, circling the tree. But there was no-one there. The empty paths stretched out in all directions, but there was no sign of the stranger. He had disappeared into thin air.
The Doctor rubbed his eyes: "A hallucination, perhaps?
Am I dreaming things? Was there anyone here at all? Oh, dear how very tiresome."
There was nothing for it but to continue with his quest.
By now, the Master was becoming more than a little impatient.
The Scottish boy and the Alice in Wonderland girl had been satisfactorily disposed of in their different ways: but what had become of the Doctor?
He drummed his fingers on the desk irritably, and then made another announcement to the minions who obeyed his command.
"We can"t waste any more time do you hear? You"ve let me down badly all of you. The Doctor is still at large, and he must be found. If not by the usual methods then I shall have to try something else... Something a little more subtle."
He rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
"Let me see a real puzzle, this time something worthy of the good Doctor"s brilliant mind... First, we must drive him out of hiding, and then put him on his mettle. We need to employ our most fiendish inquisitors...
The riddlers, the testers, the teasers and tormentors... Get to work, all of you you know what must be done. Go out and play games with him!"
A gleam of excitement lit up the Master"s moist blue eyes. This was going to be a real battle of wits.
The inquisitors set about their task at once: and they tackled it far more cleverly than the regimented soldiery, who could only obey direct commands. This second wave of shock-troops represented a very different power the Intelligence Corps.
As the Master had stated, the Doctor could not be far away; so they began to hunt the area systematically, dividing it up between them, working down each forest path in turn, searching every tree, every secluded corner, every possible hiding place, like beaters flushing out game before a shoot.
As they proceeded to put the Master"s scheme into operation, the Doctor himself blissfully unaware that the hunt was up slogged on through the tree trunks, still looking for Jamie and Zoe.
He was getting weary now. He had been on the move for a, considerable time, and his legs were tired and aching but he would not give up.
The weather was changing too; the bright early sunlight had clouded over, and now a kind of haze shrouded the forest. Wisps of fog hung motionless among the tall trees, and the Doctor shivered a little. He hoped with all his heart that the mist wouldn"t become any thicker: his quest was bad enough without that in thick fog it would be quite impossible.
"Zoe Jamie " he called, as he had been calling at intervals all the morning.
This time he heard a reply, loud and clear, and very close at hand.
"Cooeee!" called a girl"s voice. "Count up to a hundred and we"ll find you!"
A boy"s voice chimed in: "Coming ready or not!"
The Doctor looked around in bewilderment. It didn"t sound quite like Zoe and Jamie, but at least it appeared that help was at hand. He began to do as he was told, counting rapidly aloud: "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven... "
He had only got as far as twenty-three when they found him.
First a little girl stepped out of the mist... She was dressed in a pinafore dress that reached below her knees, and wore a big floppy sunhat. She was followed almost immediately by another girl, a little older, wheeling a doll"s perambulator and then three boys appeared from nowhere: one in a schoolcap and blazer, another in white flannels, who carried a cricket bat, and the third in a tweed Norfolk jacket and knickerbockers. They all looked as if they had stepped out of the pages of a juvenile story by E.
Nesbit or Kenneth Grahame.
The Doctor smiled as he welcomed them: he felt rea.s.sured at once they looked so cosily familiar, and summoned up remembrances of golden summer days and childhoods long ago.
"Well, well!" he exclaimed cheerfully. "This is a pleasant surprise how do you do?"
But the children were not smiling. They stared at him silently, and moved in to surround him.
"We"ve caught you," said the eldest girl, solemnly. "Now you"re "he"... But you can"t run off and hide again, you have to answer our questions first."
The Doctor looked from one accusing gaze to another.
Perhaps they were not quite as harmless as he had first supposed.
"Questions?" he repeated. "What questions?"
The riddles came at him from all sides, delivered at machine-gun speed.
"Why did the chicken cross the road?" "Where was Moses when the light went out?" "How many beans make five?" "How long is a piece of string?"
The Doctor tried to answer as best he could, but they all kept talking at once, and he couldn"t remember half the answers it was all extremely confusing.
"Which is correct the yolk of an egg is is white, or the yolk of an egg are white?" white, or the yolk of an egg are white?"
"Are is " the Doctor stammered, then corrected himself, in the nick of time. "No, no of course not, it"s a catch the yolk of an egg are are yellow!" yellow!"
Still the riddles continued: "Adam and Eve and Pinch-Me went down to the river to bathe; Adam and Eve got drowned so who do you think was saved?"
"The Doctor began: "Pinch-Me, obviously, but "
Instantly they fell upon him, squealing gleefully and pinching him all over, with cruel, pointed fingers.
"Ouch stop don"t do that !" The Doctor protested.
"I"ve had quite enough riddles, thank you now it"s time for me to ask you some questions. First and foremost, what are your names, and where have you "
But they weren"t even listening. The boy with the cricket bat raised it like a weapon and suddenly it was no longer a wooden bat, but a wickedly sharp sword of polished steel, and the swordpoint was at the Doctor"s throat.
"What can you make of a sword?" the boy demanded.
The Doctor gulped, trying to make sense of this nightmare examination.
"What? I don"t understand " he gasped.
The other children joined in the attack: "What can you make of it?"
"Rearrange it think!"
"This is your last chance!"
The youngest girl spelled it out for him: "S-W-O-R-D rearrange!"
The Doctor thought desperately: it was clearly some kind of brainteaser a rearrangement of letters an anagram :.. If you rearranged the word SWORD you could make it spell " Words Words!" he exclaimed triumphantly, feeling the blade below his chin.
The children cheered and clapped their hands: the boy threw the sword high into the air, and when it came down again, it had turned into a dictionary, which landed slap in the Doctor"s outstretched hands... A book of words, of course: that"s what it had all been about rhymes and riddles and word play...
The eldest girl said politely: "You have given the correct answer... You may well be suitable... I do hope so, for your sake."
Then she stopped and listened: somewhere a bell was clanging.
"Hurry up," said the cricketing boy. "That means they"re closing the park gates... Time to go home time for tea."
"b.u.t.tered toast and plum cake for tea today!" shouted the boy in knickerbockers. "Come on, I"ll race you!"
And they all ran off, shouting and laughing: their voices dying away into the distance, as the fog swallowed them up.
For it was getting thicker all the time. The Doctor began to walk once more, pondering what he had just heard.
"You may well be suitable"... Suitable? But for what?
The light was fading fast, and he had to put his hands out before him, to avoid b.u.mping into the trees. Surely it couldn"t be night-time already?
Straining his eyes, he peered through the gloom: was that one of the children, waiting for him just ahead? He pressed on, and his heart leaped as he recognised the familiar silhouette of a boy in a kilt...
" Jamie Jamie!" he cried joyfully. "There you are at last!"
By now it was so dark, he could hardly distinguish any details of Jamie"s appearance, but he continued eagerly: "I"m so glad to see you, my lad. Not that I can see you very clearly: do you suppose there"s going to be a storm? What do you think?"
Oddly, Jamie made no reply. The Doctor turned to him, questioningly: "Why don"t you say something? What"s wrong, Jamie?"
As he spoke, there was a crash of thunder, followed almost instantly by a startling flash of lightning.
For a brief moment, the forest was lit up brilliantly, and the Doctor could see every detail. He felt a chill of sheer horror, which gripped his heart like an icy hand.
Now he knew why Jamie was dumb. He could not speak, or see, for he had no features at all. Where eyes, nose and mouth should have been, was a smooth blank oval...
Jamie had no face.
4.
Dangerous Games It was one of the most terrifying moments the Doctor had ever known.
Here was his young friend safe and sound in every particular, but a hideous trick had been played on him.
What fiendish intelligence could have devised such a punishment and why?
The Doctor"s mind raced; he had to stay calm, and try to find some way to put things right... To turn this zombie-like figure into Jamie once again.
At least the storm clouds appeared to be lifting; the sky was growing lighter. A thin ray of watery sun filtered through the forest glade, and illuminated a strange object which had been hidden in the shadows until now. The Doctor stared at it: it appeared to be an old-fashioned school blackboard, propped up on an easel... But there were no chalked inscriptions upon it.
Instead, he found himself gazing at a.s.sorted sc.r.a.ps of old photographs some in colour, some black-and-white details cut out of various pictures... Each of them contained a section of a face some eyes here, a nose there, a selection of mouths, chins, cheekbones...
"So that"s it," the Doctor muttered to himself. "Another test, obviously. I have to select the correct features and put them together to make up Jamie"s face! Very well so be it.
He set to work as quickly as possible: "Eyes let me see, what colour are Jamie"s eyes? Hazel, I think a brownish-green... And that"s definitely the lad"s cheeky nose I"d recognise it anywhere!"
He soon collected a handful of photographic sc.r.a.ps, shuffling them into position on the blackboard in an attempt to recreate Jamie"s familiar image. But then he got distracted at a crucial moment.
The misty clouds continued to roll back, and sunlight touched first one and then another area of the forest that until now had been shrouded in darkness. And in each area a strange artifact stood revealed a bizarre collection of items.
The Doctor stared at them... An old-fashioned steel safe, with a wheel-shaped combination lock... A gigantic cut-out of an upraised hand, with a letter scrawled upon its palm...
And most unlikely of all a traditional wishing well, with a thatched roof, and a wooden bucket.
The Doctor examined each of these extraordinary objects with great care: he tried the door of the safe, but it remained obstinately locked. He peered into the well, hoping to discover the truth, for wasn"t truth to be found at the bottom of a well, according to the ancient legend?
But all he saw was the reflection of his own puzzled face staring back at him, far below.
"Of course this is a wishing well... " The Doctor racked his brains. "I wish I wish oh, dear me, I wish I believed in wishing wells... "