The Accidental Time Traveller Read Online Free PDF Page A

I smelt burning. Maybe Crow had been here and set the den on fire? Maybe he had killed Agatha? I upped the pace, slipping on the snow. I could see a wisp of smoke curling into the air. I squirmed through the gap in the hedge and when I came out the other side breathed a sigh of relief. Pisa was still leaning. In the middle of the garden a little bonfire was burning. And from somewhere nearby I could hear Agatha laughing, but I couldn’t see her. I dashed towards the bonfire. “Agatha?” I called out. “Where are you?”
    “Hello. I am making angels,” she called. I swung round to see Agatha lying in the snow whipping her arms up and down. She laughed again then jumped up and ran to me. “Oh Saul! Is it not a marvel?” She pointed down to the shape she’d made in the snow. It was.
    “Nice one,” I said. “You’ve made yourself some company.”
    She laughed again and brushed the snow off, then flopped down on the fallen log. That log, I knew for a fact, used to be over near the fence. I stared at Agatha in amazement. She must have dragged it. “Come and warm yourself by the fire,” she said, patting the log for me to sit down. She was sitting on Mrs Singh’s big coat. She pulled it from under her and draped it over her shoulders. “Ah! Warm as toast,” she murmured.
    I gazed about, seeing the garden all afresh. The scene was like a Christmas card, with the white snow and the glowing red flames and behind it the evergreentree. “Well, I’m back,” I said, “and I brought you some survival stuff.” I swung my rucksack down in front of me, but I couldn’t help gaping at her crackling log fire. The sticks were all arranged in spires exactly like the way it shows you to make fire in
The Dangerous Book for Boys
.
    She smiled at me. “I am glad indeed to see yea, Saul. I missed yea.” That was the first time anyone said that to me.
    I whistled and looked into the crackling fire. “Cool fire, by the way,” I said. “How did you do it?”
    “It isna cool I hope. ‘Tis hot.”
    I laughed. “I mean – it’s good. I’m impressed.”
    “I have had a great deal of practice,” she answered, deftly slinging a twig into the flames. “I was obliged to use one of your coloured books to catch the spark from the stones. I am sorry, Saul.”
    “No probs,” I said, amazed. Agatha Black had actually started the fire without matches. In my mind I started my prize-winning essay.
    In 1812 girls made fires. They rubbed stones together to catch sparks
.
    I grinned, imagining the head teacher calling out my name at the special prize ceremony. “Saul Martin – first prize!”
    “It is actually not difficult,” Agatha said, cutting in on my daydream.
    “Sure,” I muttered, as if I started fires by rubbing stones together all the time. It felt warm on my face. I half-expected to see a skinned rabbit roasting on a spit, but could tell by Agatha’s clothes and voice thatshe wasn’t like an orphan or beggar, like you see in films. She seemed more of a lady and ladies probably didn’t go around skinning rabbits. But, posh or not, Agatha could make fire, which was more than me, Will or Robbie could. We’d had our gang a whole year and never once made a fire. Loads of pretend ones. Loads of pretend everything. But never real.
    The church bells rang out for two o’clock. “Two after noon,” announced Agatha.
    “On the dot,” I added, handing her an apple. She sniffed it and turned it around, examining it. “It’s Golden Delicious,” I told her. “From New Zealand, I think, or maybe France.”
    Agatha arched her eyebrows and sucked in her cheeks. Probably she’d never heard of New Zealand, or France. She took ages biting into it. “I have to be home at three,” I warned her as she chewed, knowing how she liked to have a handle on time. I watched her polish off the whole apple, even the core. She still looked hungry, so I fished out the marshmallows. “Confectionary,” I announced, feeling really pleased