Doctor Who_ Byzantium! - Keith Topping [0]
KEITH TOPPING
Published by BBC Worldwide Ltd
Woodlands, 80 Wood Lane
London W12 OTT
First published 2001
Copyright © Keith Topping 2001
The moral right of the author has been asserted Original series broadcast on the BBC
Format © BBC 1963
Doctor Who and TARDIS are trademarks of the BBC
ISBN 0 563 53836 8
Imaging by Black Sheep, copyright 0 BBC 2001
Printed and bound in Great Britain by Mackays of Chatham Cover printed by Belmont Press Ltd, Northampton
Byzantium!
is dedicated to Shaun Lyon,
because I promised that I would
and
to Jon Miller and. Jim Swallow,
for their valuable advice and friendship.
As it is written in the prophets,
Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.
Mark 1:2
Prologue
Once in a Lifetime
And these signs shall follow them that believe.'
Mark 16:17
London, England: 1973
`... And what is your name then, young man?'
The little boy stopped pretending to be Tony Green (Newcastle United and Scotland) dribbling brilliantly around the static (and imaginary) Chelsea back-four, and looked up at the pretty lady and her bewitching smile. 'Hello,’ he said, without a trace of inhibition. 'I'm John Alydon Ganatus Chesterton.' He held out a delicate child's hand which the woman took and shook, gently. 'And I'm six-and-a-half,' he continued, precociously. 'How do you do?'
`Bet you're only six-and-a-quarter, really?' she asked.
Johnny grinned with a gap-toothed smile.
`Those are unusual names,' the lady noted.
Johnny nodded, half of his attention on the lady's clear sea-green eyes, the other half drawn to the fabulous exhibits around him. 'They were friends of my mommy and daddy,' he replied in a well-rehearsed little speech. 'They live in a place a long way away.'
Barbara appeared from around a nearby corner with an irritated scowl on her face. 'There you are,' she scolded.
'What have I told you about running off like that?'
Johnny looked at his shoes and said nothing.
There was an embarrassed silence before anyone spoke.
'Don't be too hard on him,' said the woman, kindly. 'We were talking.'
Barbara shrugged her shoulders. `He can be a bit of a handful,' she confided and then playfully ruffled Johnny's hair.
'Can't you?' she asked. Her son continued to cling, mutely, to his mother's dress with a contrite look on his face. 'He's at that age where everything's one big adventure. Which is just fine for him, but it's a right pain in the neck for everyone else.'
She paused and looked down at her son. Her stern expression remained until the urchin holding her tightly melted her icy heart to slush.
The woman nodded. 'My youngest is exactly the same,'
she replied. 'She's only three, but you wouldn't believe the kind of things that she can get up to... Well, actually, you probably could.' She held out her black-gloved hand. 'Julia,'
she said brightly.
'Barbara. Chesterton,' replied Barbara. `Pleasure to meet you.'
Julia looked down at the still-silent boy. 'And this little man, I've already met. What do you want to be when you grow up, Johnny?' she asked, kneeling down beside him.
Johnny unwrapped himself from his mother's side and grinned broadly. 'I want to be a top pop star like Julian Blake.
Or Mr Big Hat out of Slade.'
Ì'll buy all of your records,' said Julia, charmed by Johnny's cheeky, ragamuffin smile. `He's so sweet. Can I take him back to Redborough with me?'
Òh, don't encourage him, for goodness sake,' Barbara said, wryly. `He's a dreamer, this one. Last week he wanted to be an astronaut. Next week it'll be something different.'
The miserable and overcast slate-grey November sky, seen through the British Museum windows, was full of drizzle and spit as Barbara and Julia sat on a hard wooden bench in the middle of the vast and virtually deserted hall.
'An Exhibition of Roman and Early Christian Archaeology', noted a sign next to an open-topped case containing fragments of broken Samian pottery and jagged-edged silver and bronze coins.
'One of my specialities when I was