Dooms Day Book

“Here we are, then,” she said, holding a door open for them. The medics filed through. “There’s tea on the trolley, and a WC just through there.”

“When will I be able to see Badri Chaudhuri?” Dunworthy asked, holding the door so she couldn’t shut it.

“Dr. Ahrens will be with you directly,” she said and shut the door in spite of him.

The female medic had already slouched down in a chair, her hands in her pockets. The man was over by the tea trolley, plugging in the electric kettle. Neither of them had asked the registrar any questions on the way down the corridor, so perhaps this was routine, though Dunworthy couldn’t imagine why they would want to see Badri. Or why they had all been brought here.

This waiting room was in an entirely different wing from the casualties ward. It had the same spine-destroying chairs of the waiting room in Casualties, the same tables with inspirational pamphlets fanned out on them, the same foil garland draped over the tea trolley and secured with bunches of plastene holly. There were no windows, though, not even in the door. It was self– contained and private, the sort of room where people waited for bad news.

Dunworthy sat down, suddenly tired. Bad news. An infection of some sort. BP 96, pulse l20, temp 39.5. The only other tech in Oxford off in Wales and the bursar out doing her Christmas shopping. And Kivrin somewhere in 1320, days or even weeks from where she was supposed to be. Or months.

The male medic poured milk and sugar into a cup and stirred it, waiting for the electric kettle to heat. The woman appeared to have gone to sleep.

Dunworthy stared at her, thinking about the slippage. Badri had said the preliminary calculations indicated minimal slippage, but they were only preliminary. Badri had told him he thought two weeks’ slippage was likely, and that made sense.

The farther back the historian was sent, the greater the average slippage. Twentieth-Century drops usually had only a few minutes, Eighteenth-Century a few hours. Magdalen, which was still running unmanneds to the Renaissance, was getting slippage of from three to six days.

But those were only averages. The slippage varied from person to person, and it was impossible to predict for any given drop. Nineteenth Century had had one off by forty-eight days, and in uninhabited areas there was often no slippage at all.

And often the amount seemed arbitrary, whimsical. When they’d run the first slippage checks for Twentieth Century back in the twenties, he’d stood in Balliol’s empty quad and been sent through to two a.m. on the fourteenth of September, 1956, with only three minutes’ slippage. But when they sent him through again at 2:08, there had been nearly two hours’, and he’d come through nearly on top of an undergraduate sneaking in after a night out.

Kivrin might be six months from where she was supposed to be, with no idea of when the rendezvous was. And Badri had come running to the pub to tell him to pull her out.

Mary came in, still wearing her coat. Dunworthy stood up. “Is it Badri?” he asked, afraid of the answer.

“He’s in the casualties ward,” she said. “We need his NHS number, and we can’t find his records in Balliol’s file.”

Her gray hair was mussed again, but otherwise she seemed as businesslike as she was when she discussed Dunworthy’s students with him. “He’s not a member of the college,” he said, feeling relieved. “Techs are assigned to the individual colleges, but they’re officially employed by the University.”

“Then his records would be in the Registrar’s Office. Good. Do you know if he’s travelled outside England in the past month?”

“He did an on-site for Nineteenth Century in Hungary two weeks ago. He’s been in England since then.”

“Has he had any relations visit him from Pakistan?”

“He hasn’t any. He’s third generation. Have you found out what he’s got?”

She wasn’t listening. “Where are Gilchrist and Montoya?” she said.

“You told Gilchrist to meet us here, but he hadn’t come in yet when I was brought in here.”

“And Montoya?”

“She left as soon as the drop was completed,” Dunworthy said.

“Have you any idea where she might have gone?”

No more than you have, Dunworthy thought. You watched her leave, too. “I assume she went back to Witney to her dig. She spends the majority of her time there.”

“Her dig?” Mary said, as if she’d never heard of it.

What is it? he thought. What’s wrong? “In Witney,” he said. “The National Trust farm. She’s excavating a mediaeval village.”

“Witney?” she said, looking unhappy. “She’ll have to come in immediately.”

“Shall I try to ring her up?” Dunworthy said, but Mary had already gone over to the medic standing by the tea trolley.

“I need you to fetch someone in from Witney,” she said to him. He put down his cup and saucer and shrugged on his jacket. “From the National Trust site. Lupe Montoya.” She went out the door with him.