Johnny O'Brien - Day of the Assassins

Inchquin now looked at them more gravely, “This war will happen despite the antics of my old colleague, Christie, and Pendelshape…”

The professor spoke up bravely, “Counsellor Inchquin, I think I speak for the boys here as well as myself. We have no wish to become embroiled in something we do not understand. We have become involved in this simply by chance. We are innocent victims. All we wish, is to return to our lives.”

“Do you really think there is such a thing as ‘chance’ Professor?” Inchquin snapped. “History is determined. There is a required course of events and we meddle with them at our peril. Although you protest to be innocent bystanders, I am afraid that you are involved whether you like it or not. We must therefore consider very carefully what we do next. I think the Rector explained the VIGIL Imperative and the delicate role we in VIGIL must play in terms of preventing and controlling interventions that are made in history. And this is not helped by fools like your father, Jack,” he added bitterly.

The professor tried to stay calm, “Counsellor Inchquin, we have no desire to interfere with your plans…”

Of course, Jack knew what the professor really thought, and that this was a lie.

Inchquin shrugged, “Sometimes, desperate times call for desperate measures. We are dealing with matters of utmost importance and now we must take executive action…”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s just as the Rector explained to you. While we have you we can protect you from your father. You are the only hold that we have over him. I’m afraid that you will be incarcerated here until we can get a time signal to send you back home where you will need to be protected at all times from him. Until we can get you home we must limit your contact with the outside world, but…” he added with a little more warmth, “we will try and make your stay as comfortable as possible.”

“You’re going to lock us up again?” Jack said.

“It is for your protection.”

“What about the war?” the professor said, his voice rising in agitation. He immediately wished he hadn’t.

Inchquin looked at the professor, “What about it? When Princip pulls the trigger in Sarajevo on Sunday, four days from now, then the cogs of history will grind inexorably forward and we will have our war. I will stay here to ensure the diplomatic process is smoothly executed. And you will stay here, Jack, to ensure that neither your father, nor Pendelshape for that matter, do anything stupid. If they do I fear your father may find himself without an heir.”

Inchquin’s words hung ominously in the air. There was no emotion, no histrionics. There didn’t need to be. He held all the cards.

“Ah. One thing I nearly forgot. Your time phone, Angus,” Inchquin held out a hand, “If you please.”

Angus reluctantly removed the precious device from his pocket and slid it over the table. Inchquin eyed the time phone in his hand.

“Thank you,” he nodded. “I must say, very impressive of your father, Jack, to recreate all this. And he was certainly taking a risk by giving this to you, Angus. He must have known it might fall into our hands. But that’s just like him. Brilliant — but impetuous. A risk taker. He hasn’t changed. But now, finally, I have a time phone that is linked to his Taurus. We can use it to give him a little surprise.” He flipped open the time phone and peered at the display, “As I thought. No signal. But there will be at some point, and then we’ll be able to locate your father and his Taurus and get rid of this whole annoying problem once and for all.”

Inchquin got to his feet. The meeting was over. He clapped his hands and the guards re-entered the room to usher them back towards the Great Gallery and into the bowels of the palace to begin their imprisonment. Inchquin stopped by the door to acknowledge their departure. The professor and Angus were escorted away by the guards and a third guard was about to take Jack when Inchquin unexpectedly touched him on the shoulder, causing him to wait for a moment.

“Jack, one last thing. How is your mother?”

In the circumstances, Jack felt this to be the strangest of questions and did not really know what to say, “She’s fine. I hope.”

Inchquin smiled. It was an odd smile — there may have even been a hint of warmth there, warmth that had been absent from the earlier conversation. But it also hid a tinge of embarrassment, perhaps guilt. He said quietly, “That’s good, Jack, that’s good. She has been loyal to us and she and I, well, since Geneva and through all this turmoil, we have become good… friends.” He paused and grimaced slightly. “This is not easy. Not easy for any of us. But I want you to know that we are doing the right thing. We are not monsters. I just hope your father sees sense. I really do… Jack… I really do.”

The words lingered briefly in the air. But Jack had little time to consider their meaning before he was marched off with the others. As they made their way from the Great Gallery a small group crossed from room to room ahead of them. Their escorts suddenly halted and gestured for Jack, Angus and the professor to follow suit. In unison, they dropped their heads in a bow. In the centre of the group ahead was an old man. He was dressed a bit like Inchquin; he had the same double-breasted jacket with brass buttons, high-braided collar and gold-braided cuffs. An insignia of some high office dropped from his neck and a number of impressive medals hung from his left collar. He was balding but had a fine white moustache and white mutton-chop side burns. Although the man was old, he was tall and had the straight back of a horseman. He carried himself with an air of superiority. Suddenly Jack realised that he was gazing upon the emperor himself — Franz Joseph.

As the entourage crossed their path, the emperor glanced round and, for a split second, Jack caught his sharp blue eyes. Through those eyes, he was suddenly looking into a different era. An era where God gave power to the few, who in turn took on the responsibility of ruling. He realised that, although he and the emperor were both human, they were a whole world apart. And in a way, this pending war would be the very thing that made Jack so different to him. It was going to be the great watershed between the ‘old’ and the ‘new’. The emperor turned his head away again. He had not even registered the rather odd presence of Jack and his friends, chaperoned by Inchquin and his helpers. He was not to know that in only four days’ time his own nephew would be assassinated in Sarajevo, triggering a chain of events that would lead to the end of his mighty empire.

Jack, Angus and the professor were led back into the depths of the palace. The building was endless. You could have fitted a hundred Cairnfields inside this place, and still have room for the garden.

At last they were deposited in rooms close to the servant’s quarters at the rear of the palace, on the ground floor. There was a small bedroom, with two bunk beds, and a larger living room furnished simply with a table and four wooden chairs. There were no windows, only a couple of metal grilled skylights. Two guards had been stationed outside the door. This was to be their home, until… well, until they were told otherwise. Jack took the chance to wash in the small bathroom that adjoined the bedroom. A strange array of early twentieth-century bathroom accoutrements had been supplied and although he was unsure what a number of them were for, he did identify some soap, which took an age to lather.

He peered into the mirror. Somebody stared back — but it didn’t look much like him. His eyes seemed to have turned a dullish grey and his blonde hair was greasy. He rubbed his eyes tiredly, as if tuning an old TV set, trying to improve the image before him. He remembered what Inchquin had said about his mum… they had become good friends. It hadn’t really registered at the time, but now the remarks combined uneasily with his mum’s guarded attitude towards his father and her unwillingness to trust Jack with what she had known all along. He frowned; was there something else his mum hadn’t told him? Jack felt a sudden stab of despair. He sat on the edge of the bath. Here he was stuck nearly a hundred years in the past, with no obvious way home. He was a pawn in a battle in which he was unsure which side was right and which side was wrong. It was a battle that had torn his own family apart. It meant he had to grow up without a dad and with a mum who felt she couldn’t tell him the truth. Jack put his head in his hands. But he didn’t cry — he just bit his lip.