Doctor Who_ Camera Obscura - Lloyd Rose [86]
As if from far away, life and expression seeped back into Chiltern’s face. Entranced but alert, he looked at the Doctor, who smiled in relief and greeting. ‘You’re here. Good. Thank you.’ He stood upright. ‘He’s still in there,’ he said happily.
‘Very nice, I’m sure,’ said Sabbath. ‘Now if he only knows something useful.’
‘Dr Chiltern, will you answer a question for me?’
‘Yes.’
‘Aside from the residences in London and on Dartmoor, did Sebastian or any other member of your family have any other home? Any place to go to in order to hide, or rest?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Try hard to remember. Please.’
Chiltern was quiet for a minute. ‘There were... moors,’ he said finally. ‘The piles of stone... The house... The house was cold...’
‘Yes. But was there any other place?’
Another silence. Then: ‘I don’t know.’
‘Are you certain?’
‘I don’t know.’
The Doctor grimaced and turned away.
‘It can’t be Yorkshire or any other moor,’ Sabbath pointed out. ‘They have no tors.’
‘No. He’s thinking of here.’ The Doctor looked sombre. ‘Only of here,’ he repeated under his breath.
As they returned downstairs, Sabbath said casually, ‘Why don’t we take a walk?’
The Doctor nodded. ‘All right.’
They went down into the town orchard and along beside the shallow, amber-coloured river. The sun was bright without being too hot, and the sky a soft blue with only a few wisps of cloud. Butterflies flitted among the fruit trees. The Doctor kept holding up a finger for one to land on and then examining it.
‘Red Admiral,’ he observed as a particularly handsome pair of wings fluttered away.
Sabbath was uninterested in lepidoptery. ‘Can she really see the future?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘Then it doesn’t look very promising.’
‘Her reaction could have been to some vision having only to do with her.’
‘That was a very interesting conversation you had.’
‘In what way?’
‘In the way she claimed you were responsible for her present condition.’ The Doctor strolled on without answering, his eyes following the butterflies. ‘Well?’
‘I’m sorry. Was I supposed to say something?’
‘Don’t be coy with me, Doctor,’ Sabbath rumbled.
‘I wouldn’t dream of it. What do you want to know? Why I had such an effect on her? I have no idea.’
‘None?’
‘None at all.’
‘I find that difficult to countenance.’
‘Really? I can spin you all sorts of plausible-sounding nonsense theories if you like. Such as, I am some kind of temporal strange attractor.’
‘Is that true?’
‘How should I know?’ said the Doctor impatiently. ‘It’s not something you can test in a lab. Am I a time-sensitive? Yes. Do I biologically incorporate certain temporal elements? Yes. Does that sometimes appear to cause odd things to happen? Yes. Do I know what any of it means? No.’
‘You are being disingenuous, Doctor. Have you honestly taken no notice of the way in which coincidence trails you like a shadow?’
The Doctor shrugged. ‘Anecdotal evidence. You can’t draw any conclusions from it.’
‘No?’
‘You’ve got that tone in your voice again. That sly, “the Doctor is an intrinsically disruptive force who must have Something Done About Him” tone.’
‘You claim such righteousness in your protection of time. Are you afraid to face the possibility that you might be one of its greatest threats?’
The Doctor snorted in amusement. ‘Are you willing to face the possibility that your thesis might be a trifle self-serving?’
‘In the sense that it supports my argument, certainly.’
‘Which argument is that again? I know we discussed it in Spain, but I was a bit woozy –’
‘Doubtless from all the popping around in time you do. You’re as dangerous as that fool Chiltern meddling with his toy time machine.’
The Doctor stopped, stung. ‘That’s a ridiculous accusation.’
‘Is it?’
‘Overblown and, if I may say so, a tad hysterical. I am hardly shredding time.’
‘No, but you’re fracturing it. Showing up here, showing up there