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grinning. ‘I’m terribly sorry if I’ve put you out at all.’
    â€˜Don’t mention it,’ Guy heard himself saying. Pure reflex.
    â€˜Nonsense,’ said de Nesle. ‘If you hadn’t been kind enough to give me that lift - oh yes, let’s see if my call came through.’ He pressed a knob on the box attached to his telephone, and then continued; ‘No, not yet, what a nuisance. If you hadn’t been kind enough to give me that lift, you wouldn’t have been put to all this trouble. Actually,’ de Nesle said, in a confidential whisper, ‘I think you’d have crashed in the sea, because you were almost out of fuel. Can you swim?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Oh well,’ de Nesle said, ‘I needn’t feel quite so bad about it after all. Still, it was a bit of a liberty when all’s said and done, particularly since your friend was, well, dead. A bit tasteless in the circumstances. Still, needs must, as they say.’
    â€˜Er,’ said Guy.
    â€˜The main thing now,’ said de Nesle, ‘is to get you back where you want to be. Now I’m not sure I’m supposed to do that - they get awfully cross Upstairs when I go interfering with things that aren’t really any of my concern - but if you can’t help someone out of a jam, what’s the point of any of it, that’s what I always say. Where would you like to go?’
    Guy took a deep breath. ‘Would London be out of the question?’ he said.
    â€˜By no means,’ de Nesle replied. ‘Anywhere in particular in London, or can I just drop you off at Trafalgar Square?’
    â€˜Yes,’ said Guy. ‘I mean, Trafalgar Square will do fine.’
    â€˜Splendid. Now then, when?’
    â€˜Sorry?’
    â€˜When would you like me to drop you off?’
    Guy frowned slightly. ‘Well, now, if that’s no ...’
    De Nesle raised an eyebrow and pointed to the wall calendar. ‘Are you sure?’ he said.
    Guy looked at the calendar. It was one of those mechanical perpetual-calendar things, and the little wheels with numbers on them to represent date, month and year were spinning like the tumblers of a fruit machine, turning so fast you couldn’t read them.
    â€˜Now,’ said de Nesle brightly, ‘doesn’t mean a lot here. We’re in the Chastel des Temps Jadis, you see. Time here is very much what you make of it.’
    A very silly thought made itself known in Guy’s mind, declaring to all who would listen that it might not be all that silly after all, if only it could get a fair hearing.
    â€˜Are you trying to tell me,’ he said slowly, ‘that this is a sort of, well, time machine?’
    De Nesle grinned. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘the strict answer to your question is No, but you’re on the right lines. Now be honest; you’d really rather I didn’t explain, right?’
    Guy nodded.
    â€˜Good man.’ De Nesle nodded approvingly. ‘By now, I suppose you meant 6th July 1943?’
    â€˜Well, if that’s all right ...’
    â€˜Nothing simpler.’ De Nesle stood up and pressed some keys on his typewriter keyboard. The green lights on the screen flashed and then went out. A moment later they read 6/7/43; # 8765A7.
    De Nesle walked over to the door which, a few minutes earlier, had led to the diplomatic reception and pushed it open.
    â€˜Follow me,’ he said.
    Just then, the other door opened and a girl walked in. She put a cup of what looked like coffee down on the desk, picked up the two brandy glasses, smiled brightly at Guy, and walked out again.
    â€˜Er,’ said Guy, ‘just a moment.’
    Â 
    When Julian XXIII was installed as the hundred and ninth Anti-Pope, his unsuccessful rivals raised a number of objections, not least of which were the undisputed facts that he had previously been the Pope of Rome, and that he was now dead.
    For his part, Julian treated these