They managed a staggering eighty percent correct at remote viewing, and each managed the movement of two-pound weights across a table for a distance of seven inches.
Carol was the more sensitive receiver, while Robert was better at sending, and in the movement of objects.
However, over the next few months, as the enzyme was attacked by the body’s natural immune system, they each returned to their norm.
In that time, however, they had married and were expecting their first child.
The General election took place, and Winston Churchill swept back into power. He was an old man now and no longer the warlord that he had been. In an impoverished post-war Britain, with all the problems of a struggling economy and the cold war, the results from the project were not a spectacular success. It seemed that neither the Russians nor the Americans were having any more luck than the British.
Financial constraints and a lack of motivation meant that the project was terminated and the team disbanded, all the members were sworn to secrecy under the official Secrets Act.
Dr and Mrs Robert Masters returned to the Berkshire countryside, as Robert took up his job as a GP in Pangbourne. Their son, Andrew James was born on the 5th March 1952, and all seemed well for the Masters family. All was, until that fateful day in 1954 when on holiday in Greece, a truck collided with their car, killing the couple outright.
Little Andrew, being looked after by his maternal grandparents, awoke from his rest, certain that something terrible had happened to his parents.
Andrew was now an orphan.
CHAPTER ONE
Rhona Nash was tired. She had never anticipated having to look after a young child again. She had had two of her own children, Mark and Caroline. Unfortunately, Mark had died before his third birthday and they had never had any more. Her daughter had been such a blessing, so when little Andrew had come along everyone had been so delighted.
Now, three years after the tragic accident, the little five-year old lad was making her feel every one of her sixty years of age. Fortunately, he was one of the most placid and agreeable little boys she had ever come across. However, she knew that the tiredness was due in part to his amazing thirst for knowledge.
He had initially attended the local nursery school in Wallingford, run by a gentle lady who had been widowed in the war. Her late husband had been a naval doctor on board HMS Hood when it had been sunk.
Eight children of local families attended the small school in her home. They ranged from four to seven, and prepared them for proper school. Most would go on to private schools, but Andrew’s grandparents did not have the money for such a venture.
Andrew seemed oblivious to his surrounding and played quietly by himself. He wasn’t dreadfully active in his play, preferring to solve puzzles, read books, or undertake creative activities, such as drawing or painting. He was a slight, delicately featured boy, with golden hair, big sad eyes and a permanently solemn expression.
Rhona had been worried about him, from the moment they received that dreadful news from an embarrassed police constable, who delivered his message whilst turning his hat round and round in his hands.
Andrew had understood, and seemed to display little or no surprise at the message. He was upset and hardly spoke for weeks, but Rhona was convinced that, somehow, he had known in advance.
He had come down from his rest, tears streaming down his face. Rhona has assumed he had experienced a bad dream. No matter how hard she had tried to comfort the distressed little boy, who kept repeating the names, Mama and Dada.
Three hours later, the local Police Constable knocked on the door, and he disclosed the enormity of what had happened. It had taken Rhona several days to realise that her daughter was never coming back, and she had cuddled her grandson, the only link she had left with her beloved daughter.
Now he was five, she had come to terms with the situation, and he appeared to have done likewise. Her husband, Geoffrey, had taken their loss badly, having become even more withdrawn and surly. No matter how miserable he became, the mere presence of his little grandson would break him out of his self-imposed grump, and bring a sad smile to his face.
Andrew rarely spoke, but simply took his grandfather’s hand, and looked at him with those enormous amber eyes of his. Inexplicably, he was the only person who knew exactly how to cheer up the melancholy elderly man. Geoffrey had seen action in the trenches in the first War, and despite the length of time that had elapsed; the experience had had a profound effect on him. The loss of his daughter was enough to put him back several years.
The pair would spend hours together, and Rhona was amazed that they never seemed to speak at all. Indeed, it was almost as if they didn’t need words, having developed an unspoken language to communicate. However, Rhona was in no doubt, if it wasn’t for the little boy, Geoffrey would have given up ages ago.
Andrew was very bright, which was hardly surprising as his parents had both been exceptionally intelligent. His schoolwork was way ahead of that expected of a five year old, but he refused to socialise properly with the other children.
He progressed to the local primary school, and for the first time in his life was exposed to the rough and ready world of ‘ordinary’ children.
The school was a small one, with only eighty children, and the classes were quite small. Jenny Hutchins was the teacher of Andrew’s class, and as soon as she saw him, she felt that he was different.
Jenny knew the pain the little chap suffered, as she had lost her own parents during or soon after the war. Her father had died in a Japanese POW camp, and her mother died when she had been sixteen and at school in Singapore. Andrew’s large eyes seemed to look at the world through a veil of suffering and loneliness, and her heart went out to him. The war had seriously interfered with her own childhood, as she had been born in 1934. She had been only five when the Japanese started expanding across the Far East, and she and her mother had fled to Australia. Their home had been in Singapore, which they found completely wrecked when they returned in 1946, when she had been twelve. She had been at school when her mother had died, and had remained living with a very good friend and her family in Singapore before returning to England when she was nineteen to attend Oxford University.
She could never have guessed how different Andrew really was.
The first incident happened in the playground.
It was late September 1958, but a sunny day, and the children were running and playing in the sun. Andrew was sitting on the ground watching a wood louse as it curled up into a ball when he placed it gently in the palm of his hand. A pretty little girl in a red dress called Natasha was sitting next to him, watching with interest. Unusually, Andrew told Natasha about the small creature, and Jenny was surprised at the level of understanding the small chap already had.
Another child, a small red-haired boy called Roger, came along and smacked Andrew’s hand, sending the wood louse in a parabolic arc into the grass several feet away.
Before Jenny could remonstrate with Roger, the miscreant made good his escape, laughing.
Andrew said nothing, but he simply stood up, watching as Roger ran for the corner.
Jenny looked on in amazement as a concrete bicycle rest slid out four or five feet from beside the wall and into Roger’s path. The boy tripped and fell headlong onto the tarmac surface.