Doctor Who: The Awakening Read Online Free PDF Page B

with pleasure at approval from a stranger. ‘It’s my pride and joy,’ he confided.
    ‘Seventeenth century?’
    ‘Yes,’ Wolsey nodded again. ‘And its perfect in every detail.’
    Tegan felt exasperated: chatting about antiques wasn’t going to get them very far. Beginning to think they had entered a lunatic asylum, she glared at the woman who, because she was wearing normal clothes, seemed to Tegan to be the only sane person around here. ‘What is going on?’
    she asked her.
    Jane smiled and shrugged her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry, but I just don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘I think everyone’s gone mad.’
    That made two of them. ‘Look,’ Tegan tried to sound more reasonable than she felt, ‘we don’t want to interfere.
    We’re just here to visit my grandfather.’
    ‘Oh yes, so you said,’ the Sergeant snapped, banging into their conversation as he had barged into their lives.
    ‘And who might he be?’
    ‘His name is Andrew Verney.’
    Just two simple words – a name – but their effect was enormous. A stunned silence foollowed, and the atmosphere became electric. Tegan felt almost physically the shock her words had inflicted upon these villagers. She saw their hasty glances at each other and noticed Joseph Willow look for instructions from the big Roundhead soldier he called Colonel.
    ‘Verney?’ he prodded, but the red-faced man said nothing; he appeared to be embarrassed, and not to know what to say. Tegan felt suddenly apprehensive.
     
    ‘What’s wrong?’ she demanded.
    Jane Hampden was also looking to Ben Wolsey for some explanation, but he remained stolidly silent and eventually she herself turned to Tegan. As gently as she could, she said, ‘He disappeared a few days ago.’
    Tegan’s apprehension became chilling anxiety. ‘Has anything been done to find him?’
    ‘Ben?’ Again Jane turned to Ben Wolsey, and again the former refused to answer, dropping his eyes and turning away.
    ‘Well?’ Tegan shouted.
    It was time for the Doctor to act: he knew the signs and was only too well aware of Tegan’s talent for jumping to conclusions and diving in at the deep end of things. He walked quickly towards her and held up his hands for restraint. ‘Now calm down, Tegan,’ he warned. ‘I’m sure we can sort this out.’
    But Tegan was in the grip of her anxiety and in no mood for more talk. With a frustrated cry of ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ at the prevaricating fools around her, she made a dash for the door and was through it before anyone else even moved.
    The Doctor was the first to react. He called, ‘Now Tegan, come back!’ – but even as the words rang out he knew it was useless, and in the same instant he turned to his other companion and shouted, ‘Turlough! Fetch her, would you? Please?’
    Turlough reacted quickly this time. He was fast on his feet and had hurled himself through the door before Willow’s hand reached the pistol on the table.
    But now Willow snatched it up and pointed the barrel right between the Doctor’s eyes, in case he should have any thought of following his young friends. ‘You!’ he screamed, ‘Stay where you are!’ He was furious with himself for allowing the escape; anger twitched the skin of his cheek, and his finger hovered dangerously over the trigger.
     
    The Doctor looked into the round, ominous tube of the barrel, and raised his hands in surrender.
     
    3

The Body in the Barn
    Tegan ran blindly out of the farmhouse into dazzling sunlight. Propelled by fear for her grandfather’s safety, and bewildered that such events could be happening in a supposedly peaceful English village, she didn’t care where she was going so long as she got away from Willow and the troopers. She could make some firm plans later. So now, clutching her scarlet handbag, she stumbled over the uneven farmyard and raced towards the shelter of some buildings on the other side, hoping to reach them before anyone came out of the house to see which way she had