Nineteen

Emily did at least arrange some food for Arnie. In fact, she went back and sat with him, which made me smile to myself. That left us to make sure Lady Louise was suitable sorted out. That bit was easy, we seemed to have a small army of helpers to assist. Instead of food on plates, they produced empty plates then proceeded to fill them from larger bowls and stuff. This was what Mum would have called ‘Silver Service’, although there was no actual silver in sight.

Conversation paused while we ate - or at least conversation with Louise did.

“What’ll we do if we have to eat with Louise and her family tonight?” ‘asked’ Holly.

“You mean in terms of not looking like this?” ‘said’ Lisa, adding a picture of the three us in our Angels suits.

“Don’t see a problem,” I ‘said’. “We can just fetch some more togs from home.”

“Good point,” ‘said’ Holly. “I suppose we can fetch makeup and stuff as well?”

“Hm,” I ‘said’. “Might be a slight problem there, two problems actually.”

“The nature of these minor and insignificant problems?” ‘asked’ Lisa.

“Well, number one is a certain lack in the makeup department - I don’t usually bother much,” I ‘said’.

“And number two?”

“Err - I’m not sure I can remember where it all is.”

“Ah, what you mean is that the top of your dressing table is such a mess ...” Lisa ‘added’ a picture of a dressing table loaded with half empty pots and jars and stuff, all higgledy-piggledy everywhere.

“My dressing table does not look like that,” I ‘said’, frostily. Then I spoiled it by ‘laughing’. I couldn’t laugh out loud, I had a mouth full of rather nice roast beef.

Things were about to get worse anyway. Between courses, Louise dropped a bombshell.

“We’re going to have a formal dinner tonight. I’d like you to join us, all three of you. What I need to know is, can you make some nice dresses appear? Like you did for the coats at Lille, where are they, by the way?”

Lisa dealt with that, telling Louise we’d simply sent them back home again, while I ‘spoke’ to Holly. “What d’you think Holly? Lisa and I’ll be ok, we have a couple of nice dresses, you’ve seen Lisa’s - sort of. What about you?”

Holly surprised both of us. “Don’t you worry about little old me. I can hold my end up no problem. Look.” And she sent a picture of herself in a beautiful pale blue full length dress with a halter neck.

“Holly Merrick. Where have you been hiding that?” ‘asked’ Lisa.

“It’s a prezzy from Mum and Dad, ready for my eighteenth birthday bash. Was supposed to be a surprise. You can’t know the relief I felt when you showed me that you two had posh frocks as well.”

Lisa wasted no time assuring Louise that a formal dinner would be no problem. “We even know which spoon to use for the soup.”

That made Louise laugh. “I was taught that very early on. Still comes as a surprise that other people don’t necessarily know.”

All that did was serve to remind me about the large gulf between us ‘normal’ people and Lady Louise in terms of knowledge and experience. She obviously had quite different priorities to the three of us.

Back at our end of carriage seven we discovered Arnie and Emily sitting side by side with the remains of the meal Emily had taken back for the two of them on the table. They seemed to be deep in conversation. It would be nice to think they were becoming attracted to each other. I couldn’t help thinking of the problems they’d face if that were so, Emily having to follow Lady Louise around as she followed her parents, and of Arnie being sent here, there, and everywhere to do his job.

But that was their problem. The train was slowing down to stop at Avignon, we needed to be alert in case there were more of the ETA people waiting there for us.

“Watch out for the bridge,” said Lisa. “Should be on our left.”

“Bridge?” said Holly.

“You know, ‘Sur Le Pont d’Avignon’ and all that?”

“Oh. Yeah. Now I remember.”

Lady Louise joined in our laughter. The TGV station at Avignon is just south of the bridge across the river Rhône. Like quite a lot of French train stations, it was just a long platform with car parks on either side. Not much there at all, to say it services one of the most advanced railways in the world. Not only was there not much station, there was not much to occupy the three of us, no threats we could detect. We relaxed again as the train left Avignon and picked up speed again towards its next stop at Aix-en-Provence. Lisa decided to parade more of her acquired knowledge.

“It’s not called Aix as in ‘aches’, it’s Aix as in ‘axe’. Don’t ask why. Typically French.”

The station at Aix-en-Provence is at least under cover. Nothing to worry us here either. Next stop, Marseille. The approach to Marseille is through a dirty great big tunnel. Not nearly as long as the Channel Tunnel, of course, but every bit as boring. As was the stop at the station.

After Marseille, the railway turns east and follows the coast, more or less, to Toulon. The train continues on to Nice and stuff, but we were getting off at Toulon. Lisa had questions.“Arnie? How d’we get from Toulon to where we’re going?”

“Should be a car waiting for us. Where we’re going is actually La Seyne-sur-Mer. Lady Louise and her parents are guests of people here in France. English people, but they make their home here. They have quite a big place, on the headland overlooking the harbour. They should have sent some more boys as well.”

By now, the train was slowing. I had another question. “How are we going to get all the stuff from here to the cars? All your boys are back at Lyon with Jim.”

“Hm. Hadn’t thought of that. We’ll have to dump it on the platform and then hand-carry it to the car.”

“No we won’t,” said Holly. “One of us goes to see where and what at the car, then we link up and just teleport all the stuff.”

“Ok, sounds like a plan.” Lisa engaged organising mode. “Holly, you need to stay with Louise, I’ll stay here too. Jody, you and Arnie go and sort out the car. Then we strengthen the link, and all the stuff travels on its own.”

We still had to off-load all the baggage, or the train would have scarpered with our stuff still aboard. Lisa, Holly, Louise and Emily stayed to watch it while Arnie and I went in search of our wheels.

Arnie insisted on taking the bag of assorted weaponry with us, understandable really, even though Holly had told him there were no threats she could ‘see’.

Outside, we found two great big black cars. Arnie approached the front one. Two men got out, dressed in almost the same sort of black suit Arnie himself was wearing. What was this? Some kind of international uniform? There was a rapid exchange of French. Might as well have been Greek or Serbo-Croat as far as I was concerned. Then Arnie said, “Here’ll do.”

“Ready to send stuff?” I ‘asked’.

“Yep. Give us an idea. Ah. Right. Link up Angels.”

The three of us became one girl, that one girl was actually capable of moving the whole pile of luggage all at once. There to here in one go.

“Blimey. Didn’t think we’d manage that,” ‘said’ Holly.

“Me neither,” said Lisa. “Shows just how much we’re improving day by day.”

By the time Lisa and the others appeared, we had all the stuff packed away in the two cars. The front car was easily big enough to take all of us, although one of the Frenchmen had to ride in the second car. Arnie claimed the thus vacated front seat.

The drive took about twenty minutes. Although we didn’t expect any trouble, we kept a shield in place the whole way. The area around Toulon is mostly for commercial shipping. Around La Seyne, however, it’s marinas and yacht harbours. Very posh.

The house we were going to was on a hill. I say house, it was a ruddy mansion. You could have fit my house into it umpteen times.

Lisa looked down at her Angels suit. “I’m glad we can make something more - appropriate - appear.”

Louise put her hand on Lisa’s arm. “Don’t worry so. Mummy and Daddy won’t, so neither should you.”

Lisa smiled. “We’ll make the effort later on. We have plans.”

The cars pulled up to the front door. It had taken several minutes to get through the electric gates and travel down the huge drive, I think the M1 is longer and wider - but I’m not at all sure. Arnie didn’t get to come in with us, but he’d be ok. As far as I could tell he was bossing the French chaps around unmercifully. No more time to think about that, we were about to be introduced to Louise’s mum and dad. Louise herself did the introductions, remembering all our second names and everything. She was really quite impressive.

Louise couldn’t compete with Lisa in Director mode. Holly and I stood just behind her. When you can speak mind to mind, co-ordinated curtsies are no problem.

“We are very pleased to meet you. It has been a pleasure to protect your daughter.”

“Yes. We hear your protection was actually necessary. You have our thanks.” Then the member of the Royal Family went away and a concerned father took his place. “Enough of that. Tell us what happened? I heard there was a lot of gunfire.”

Lisa grinned as she answered for all three of us. “There were rather a lot of bullets whizzing about the countryside.”

Louise was bobbing up and down excitedly. “But none of them in with us. Holly makes them all vanish. Jody was brilliant. She shot at them with a machine gun!”

“Doesn’t matter where the bullets came from, they still got teleported to the outside of the train,” said Lisa. “All the byplay and noise gave enough time for Arnie and Jim to recover. They had handcuffs.”

“But who were they?”

“Ah. You don’t know yet? They were from ETA. I’m sure Arnie and Jim will be doing official reports quite soon. They’ll probably have more details than we have.”

“Lisa? How did ETA know who, what, and where?” I ‘said’.

“Good point,” ‘said’ Lisa, then she went on in a normal voice, “One thing that concerns us is how ETA knew about your daughter’s travel arrangements. What’s also interesting is how the Ministry knew they needed our services in the first place. We can’t answer either of those questions, but perhaps you should be asking the people who might know for their opinions.”

“Good point. I’ll be talking to Mr. Nichols - Arnie - later. I’ll see what he can find out. What, my dear?”

“Daddy, can Arnie stay here for a few days? He did get beaten up.”

“Oh, I’d think that can be arranged.” He turned to us, “Will you three be ok going home on your own?”

“Yes,” said Lisa. “We plan to go home under our own power, if you see what I mean. You have been told about the other stuff we can do?”

“I’m told you can levitate.”

Lisa grinned. “We usually call it flying. This is levitating.” She let herself lift about six inches into the air. She shrugged. “What else can you call going from one place to another through the air at high speed, but flying.”

“How fast can you go,” asked Louise.

“We’re not actually sure”, said Holly. “We think our top speed is a little under a thousand miles an hour. That’s about MACH 1.5, one and a half times the speed of sound.”

Louise’s eyes grew big and round as saucers. “Oh, wow. No wonder you don’t want to go on the train.” Then she had another thought. “Daddy? I’ve told the Angels they’re to join us for dinner.”

Interesting. Not a question. Lady Louise was already sufficiently sure of herself to be certain that her dad would simply agree with her.

“Yes. Girls? Will you join us for dinner ...”

Lisa knew exactly what the pause was for at the end of that sentence. “We’ll be pleased to join you,” then she looked down at herself. “We can do ever so much better than this as well. We just need a room to get changed?”

“Ah, that is not a problem. Chris’ house has lots and lots of those. You’ll meet Chris later. Now, it’s getting late. We should get ready for dinner. Will an hour be enough time?

“Yes sir. More than enough. May we be shown to our room?” asked Lisa.

There was no obvious signal given, but a chap in a white shirt with a bowtie appeared. Some quick words in French, far too quick for me anyway, and he vanished, to reappear almost at once with Emily behind him. Emily gathered up Louise and they left to do whatever was required. Bowtie approached us.

“M’mselles? If you would be kind enough to follow me?” His English was excellent - with an accent to send shivers down your back - if you’re a girl at any rate!

He led us back into the huge hall at the front of the house, pointing out the direction to the dining room as we went. Then up the stairs and along a couple of corridors to a row of doors.

“This will be your room. We have been unable to find any luggage obviously belonging to you. Will you be ok?”

Lisa turned on Sweet Smile Number Seven. “It will not be a problem. Thank you so much for your help.”

Bowtie nodded and withdrew, leaving us to explore the room. It had two huge beds in it and an ensuite bathroom.

“Oh yes. This’ll do nicely,” said Lisa. “Right. We have an hour. Not enough time for complicated hair. Brush it ‘til it shines and it’ll have to do. First job, ring home, don’t forget the plus four four bit. Red alert for the kitchens tomorrow, and remember to mention that stuff will be whizzing about. Anybody sitting on our beds may get covered in stuff.”

A little concentration saw my mobile phone sitting in my hand instead of sitting on the little table in the hall where it usually lived. I rang home and got Mum.

“Hi Mum. Me.”

“Hello Jody. Not a problem is there?”

“No Mum. Don’t panic. We’ve repelled all the boarders, the baddies are in custody somewhere in France and we’re getting ready for a formal dinner.”

“Oh. Sounds nice. What’re you going to do? Make your long frock come to you?”

“Something like that, yes. There’ll be stuff flying about. Don’t leave anything on my bed, that’ll be ground zero for anything I send back. Err, we’ll be home quite early tomorrow. We’ve decided to fly back. Take a couple of hours or less. Be all day if we take the train.”

“I see. Need the kitchen running full blast I suppose?”

“Yes please Mum.”

“No problem. You enjoy yourself tonight.”

“I will Mum. Got to go. Love to you and Dad.”

And Mum was gone. As I watched, Lisa and Holly put their phones down at almost the same time. Lisa issued orders. “Right Angels. Into the shower. Do we each know where our hairdryers are at home?”

“I’ve got one in my bag,” I said.

“Not much good for all three of us. I know where mine is. Holly?”

“In my hand is where mine is.” And it was. While Lisa had been speaking, Holly’d ‘fetched’ hers from her bedroom at home.

Despite there being only the one shower, we were ready in short order. Wrapped in towels, we took turns drying and brushing hair. Holly’d been really clever and ‘fetched’ shampoo and conditioner. Lisa and I hadn’t thought of that. Holly shared. She’s a star.

With suitable underwear ‘told’ to be here with us, last thing was the dresses themselves. We gave each other a hand with zips and fastenings and stuff.

“Blimey Holly. You look marvellous,” Lisa said.

“Why, thank you. One tries.”

General Lisa reviewed the troops. “We should be really pleased and proud of ourselves. Ready to meet royalty?”

“Yep. Lead on Macduff.”

Holly looked perplexed for a moment, then, “Ah. Shakespeare. You doing Macbeth in English Lit?”

“Holly? Did you know that or have you just discovered you know it?”

“Dunnow. It’s true though, isn’t it?”

“Mm. Interesting.”

“English Lit later. A grand entrance now. Ok?”

Holly and I both said “Yes Lisa,” more or less together. That made us giggle slightly. Lisa looked at us and shook her head - then spoiled it by giggling with us.

Each using one hand to lift the hem of our dresses slightly, the three of us made our way down the stairs. From there to the dining room was just down a short corridor. Most of the others were already there, including a couple we didn’t know.

Louise’s dad jumped up as we came into the room, as did the other man who had to be Chris, the owner of the house.

“You said you were making an effort, but I didn’t expect this.”

Louise looked smug. “See, Daddy? I told you it’d be all right.”

“Yes you did. And next time I’ll believe you.” He turned to us. “Girls, you look wonderful. Thank you for being here tonight.”

Lisa did a deep curtsy, really quite impressive in her long frock. Holly and I did the same, the slightest of delays while Lisa told us what she wanted us to do apparently went completely unnoticed.

“We are honoured that you invited us. Thank you.”

“Hm. Thank you. My daughter invited you though, not me.”

Lisa turned to Lady Louise. There was a repeat of the curtsy. “You have our thanks, M’lady.”

Lady Louise jumped to her feet and ran to Lisa. She grabbed Lisa’s hand in hers and hauled her to her feet. “It is I who must thank you.” Then she turned to her father. “Daddy? If they call me M’lady again, can you throw them out?” Then she giggled.

That set the tone for the rest of the evening. We were properly introduced to Chris and Angela, his wife. Louise’s dad and Chris had been at uni together. Everybody wanted to know how we did what we did and were disappointed when we couldn’t tell them.

“There’s a whole Institute full of people working hard to find out just that,” grinned Lisa. “We just get on with it.”

“Well, we’re glad you do ‘just get on with it’,” said Louise’s mum.

Courses came and went. We managed to always use the correct fork and what have you. All three of us refused the wine which circulated freely. Luckily, they’d been expecting Louise, whose favourite tipple was coke. She shared with us, so that was ok. It was about three courses in that the brown stuff hit the windmill.