For Molly was a time traveler and a time stopper. She was also a world-class hypnotist. The odd thing about Molly, though, was that though she had all these amazing skills, she had never found that she had any talent for schoolwork. So, that afternoon, she’d stared out of the window, dreading the new tutor who was coming.
“I’m a bit worried about this teacher,” she confided. “Bet she hates me. All teachers hate me.” She sighed. “Always. Mind you,” she added more quietly, wiping the misted-up windowpane with the sleeve of her sweater, “I usually hate them.”
“Oh, she’ll be fine,” said Rocky, raising himself from his slump. “She won’t be anything like the teachers we used to have, Molly. Lucy and Primo chose her. Even Forest says she sounds cool.” Forest was the aging hippie who Molly and Rocky had met in Los Angeles, who also now lived in the big house that was Briersville Park.
“Talking of teachers,” said Micky, folding his newspaper into a huge paper dart, “will you teach me how to hypnotize again, Molly? I’m sure I’ll pick it up quickly, since I used to be so good at it.”
Molly nodded. “Of course. Whenever you want.” A week or so before, Molly and Micky had been a few hundred years in the future, where Micky had been put on a mind machine. It had sucked all his knowledge of how to hypnotize out of his head. “Or,” Molly suggested, “there’s the book in the library downstairs. You could use that. That’s how I learned to start with. It’s called Hypnotism: An Ancient Art Explained. Are you still getting nightmares about the mind machine?”
“Not really.” Micky threw the newspaper dart into the fire, where it burst into flames.
“My head really hurts,” said Rocky. He pulled a blanket off the sofa and lay down on the carpet in front of the fire, beside Petula. Petula dropped the stone that she had been sucking and snuggled up to him.
Molly shut her eyes. “Hypnotism: An Ancient Art Explained.” The title of the old book swam around her head. That book had changed her life. And ever since she’d found it, she’d been traveling. Traveling all over the world and through time.
“You gotta calm down, Molly,” Forest had said. “Gotta, like, get into the groove of yer own time.” That was when Lucy and Primo had hidden her special chain with the time-travel crystals on it. “Just so you won’t be tempted,” Lucy had said. “You really should stay in this time for a bit, Molly,” she had recommended. “And try not to use the hypnotism. Live like an ordinary girl. It’ll be good for you.” She had given Molly a new chain with four animals on it—a black pug, a silver elephant, and two blackbirds. “You can wear your pets instead. They’re sweet, aren’t they?”
Molly had felt happy to start with, like a bird glad to be back home safe in its nest. But then something started to happen. Molly found herself longing for excitement and wanting to spread her wings again. You see, all her life she’d been cooped up in an orphanage. She loved the freedom of adventure. And so, quite soon, life started to feel a bit boring. She wanted to see more of the world. She wanted more unpredictability. But her parents and Forest had insisted that a normal time was needed. This was why a teacher had been hired.
Primo, Lucy, and Forest said that Molly, Micky, Rocky, and Ojas couldn’t carry on as though life was one big holiday. They needed to have routine, working and playing. Lucy had promised that the tutor who was coming was very nice, but Molly was dreading lessons. As far as she knew, lessons were when you watched the clock, or got picked on by a teacher, or where you got punished for not knowing the right answer. Micky and Rocky were both natural students, good at learning, and easily able to work. Ojas was keen as mustard. He’d never been to school ever. “You don’t know how lucky you are, Molly,” he had told her. “Where I come from, some children can’t even read. Don’t you want to get more and more clever? Don’t you want to know things?” Molly did, but she didn’t want a teacher having anything to do with it. All the teachers she’d ever known had been small-minded and mean. “I’d rather teach myself and learn straight from the world,” she’d said.
Molly was a straight talker, but there was one thing that she had kept secret from everyone at Briersville Park. She sat on the secret like a chicken on an uncomfortable egg.
On her trip to the future, Molly had discovered that she had developed a new skill. But it wasn’t a skill that she could ever tell her friends and family about. For Molly’s newest skill was mind reading.
Imagine if your friends could read your mind! You might start to avoid seeing them, for you might worry that they’d see something in your mind that you didn’t want them to see. Even though Molly had decided not to use her newfound powers on her family and friends, she knew that, if they knew what she could do, they might start to mistrust her. They might assume that she was probing into their heads to see their thoughts. And so Molly had decided to keep sitting on her spiky egg of a secret.
Of course this didn’t stop Molly from looking into other people’s minds. Maybe Molly would have a little look into the tutor’s head when she arrived and see what she was really like.
To the left of the attic-room window, Molly saw white lights twinkling far away at the gate lodge. A car began to make its way along the dark drive.
With Lucy and Primo stuck in a traffic jam, Molly, Micky, and Rocky found themselves being hosts, looking after their guest, their new tutor, Miss Hunroe.
It all began a little strangely for Miss Hunroe. For Todson, the new butler (who preferred to be called plain Todson), had forgotton to put Cornelius Logan away in his stall for the night. Cornelius was Molly’s uncle. He too had hypnotic powers, but he had used his hypnotism for bad ends. Molly had been forced to hypnotize him into thinking he was a lamb and then lock that hypnotism in, so that he wouldn’t revert to his bad ways. Cornelius was harmless as a lamb and spent the afternoons with the llamas in the front field, eating grass and running about. Todson looked after him, bringing him his meals and in the evenings putting him to bed. But tonight Cornelius hadn’t been put away.
Bristling with excitement, Cornelius came trotting into the sitting room where Rocky, Molly, and Micky were giving Miss Hunroe a cup of tea.
Before anyone could do anything about it, Cornelius was kicking his legs. He knocked over a table, upset a vase of flowers, and leaped excitedly onto a sofa. Then he ran around and around the chair where Miss Hunroe was sitting, finally lying down at her feet like a pet.
“Er, sorry about him,” Molly said. “He’s my, um, uncle. He’s not quite right in the head. He was in a special home,” she lied, “but we brought him back to live here. Don’t worry, he won’t hurt you.”
“He seems to like you a lot,” said Rocky, wiping his nose.
“Oh, don’t worry,” Miss Hunroe replied. “He’s sweet!”
And so Cornelius sat at Miss Hunroe’s feet until she went upstairs to change for dinner.
The round-tabled dining room was being used that night. Todson had brought out all the Georgian silver and polished it. Every place had two knives, three forks, and two spoons, with a bird-shaped name card–holder perched next to each person’s water glass. Two tall, eight-armed candelabras stood proudly between the shiny pepper mills and the salt and mustard pots. The candles were lit, and a stack of wood burned in the grand fireplace so that the room danced with orange light and the faces in the old gilt-framed portraits on the walls flickered and moved as if coming to life.
“Well, isn’t this lovely!” exclaimed Miss Hunroe as Todson helped her into her chair. “And something smells delicious.”
“That’s a relief,” said Todson, grunting. “New cook.”