‘HAVE YOU SEEN THIS GIRL?’ she read. ‘Kylie Duncan, nineteen. Long dark hair and green eyes. Last seen wearing blue jeans and a red T-shirt.’ She looked up at the Doctor, puzzled.

‘Have you seen this girl?’ he echoed. ‘Last seen wearing a long white nightie.’

Amy’s mouth fell open as she stared at the photo on the poster. ‘That’s her! That’s the girl we’ve just seen vanish!’

‘People are worried,’ said the Doctor. ‘Worried enough to report her missing. I expect Kylie Duncan’s mum is crying herself to sleep every night. She doesn’t know she’ll never see her little girl again. No one from this time will ever see her again.’

He jumped up and began to walk around the edge of the square. There were posters every few metres. ‘Molly Crane. Brittany Hughes. Amber Reynolds. Lauren Peters,’ he read as he ripped them all down. ‘Each of these girls has a mum waiting at home. None of those mums will ever see their daughters again.’ Amy had rarely heard him sound so angry. ‘Sammy Star doesn’t bring his assistants back from the past. He doesn’t have to. There are hundreds of girls out here, friendless and helpless. They come to London looking for a new start. Of course they’ll jump at the chance to get into showbiz!’

‘Oh no,’ whispered Amy. ‘You mean... it’s a new girl every night? Every show someone else gets sent back in time? But it’s sold out for months and months!’

‘Then the theatre will have to give everyone their money back,’ said the Doctor grimly. ‘Tonight was Sammy Star’s last show. His last show ever.’

Chapter Four

RORY HELPED WALK Mrs Collins and Mrs Hooper back to their minibus. He had an arm round Mrs Collins and could feel her shaking. Miss Leake was leading Mrs Hooper.

Miss Leake was in charge of Golden Years Home for the Elderly. She told Rory this, and a lot of other things that didn’t interest him, as they walked to the car park. She also kept being cheerful at the old ladies. ‘Now, don’t let’s be sillies!’ she said. ‘It was just a silly old magic trick, nothing to be scared of. Fancy being scared of ghosties and ghoulies at your age, Mrs Collins and Mrs Hooper!’

‘Monster...’ muttered Mrs Hooper.

‘It wasn’t a real monster, it was just a young lad. Like this lad here!’ Miss Leake said, waving a hand at Rory. ‘You’re not scared of him, now, are you?’

Rory thought that Sammy Star must be at least fifteen years older than him. He didn’t mention it, though. It was hard to get a word in edgeways when Miss Leake was talking.

‘Lost,’ said Mrs Collins. ‘So lost.’

‘You’re not lost, Mrs Collins! We’re in London – LONDON,’ said Miss Leake loudly. ‘Now you just need to get on the bus and we’ll take you home. I said, we’ll take you BACK HOME. Back to lovely Golden Years for a cup of cocoa then beddy-byes.’

Miss Leake unlocked the minibus and Rory helped the two ladies up the steps. ‘Now I’m going to ask this young man to be very kind,’ said Miss Leake to her charges. ‘I’m going to ask him to stay here with you while I go back for the others. I hope they’ve not got up to mischief while I’ve been gone!’

She turned to Rory and gave him a would-be winning smile. ‘Now, you don’t mind waiting, do you? I won’t be long. I can’t leave my girls alone, though!’

Rory nodded. ‘That’s fine.’

‘There, do you hear that? He says it’s fine. It’s FINE. You don’t have to worry, because he’s a nurse,’ Miss Leake said, with a little giggle in her voice. ‘Oh, they love a male nurse, do my old dears! Maybe you should be the one to worry!’

Rory forced a smile onto his face. ‘I’m sure we’ll be OK.’

Miss Leake went off, still giggling a little to herself. Rory shut the door of the minibus, and sat down on a seat. Mrs Collins and Mrs Hooper were in the seat behind, and he swivelled round to talk to them. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked.

They nodded slowly. The tears had stopped falling now, but both old ladies still looked sad. They had a haunted look, Rory thought, as if they were thinking of a past tragedy.

They all sat in silence for a while. The two women were holding hands tightly, clinging to each other for comfort.

‘What was it, Mrs Collins?’ Rory asked softly after a while. ‘What’s the matter? What scared you?’

‘Kylie,’ she said.

Rory just gazed at her in surprise. It seemed a very odd thing to be scared of.

‘Kylie,’ she repeated. ‘My name. Call me Kylie. Not Mrs Collins.’

‘Amber,’ said Mrs Hooper. ‘I’m Amber. I’m not mad.’

‘Of course you’re not,’ said Rory. ‘Who says you are?’

‘We have to be careful,’ said Mrs Hooper. She didn’t seem to be talking to Rory, her eyes were looking far away. ‘We mustn’t tell the truth. They’ll think we’re mad.’

‘We’ll get locked up if we tell the truth,’ added Mrs Collins.

‘Is something bad going on?’ Rory asked, worried now. ‘Is something bad going on at the Golden Years home?’

To his relief, Mrs Hooper shook her head. ‘Not there,’ she said. ‘A long time ago. A very long time ago.’

Mrs Collins nodded fiercely. ‘A very long time ago,’ she agreed. ‘Today. A very long time ago today.’

Rory had thought he was getting somewhere, but that answer made no sense at all.

‘It was VE Day,’ said Mrs Hooper. ‘Victory in Europe. I didn’t know what that meant, then. We didn’t do it at school.’

‘They asked me why I was in my nightie,’ said Mrs Collins. ‘Why I was walking around in a daze.’

Mrs Hooper almost smiled. ‘I was dazed too. They said there was a girl like me, a girl who was confused. They wondered if we knew each other. That’s how we met. We’ve stuck together ever since.’ She squeezed her friend’s hand.

‘They said it must have been a bomb,’ said Mrs Collins. ‘A bomb must have come down and hurt our heads. That’s why we didn’t know what had happened.’

Mrs Hooper nodded. ‘They said they’d thought the last Doodlebug had fallen months ago. People were upset to think there’d been more bombs. They said it would be the last one, though. There was peace in Europe at last. We knew it wasn’t a bomb, but we didn’t know what had really happened. So we went along with it.’ She paused. ‘We knew there must have been other girls, but we didn’t look for them. It’s not the sort of thing you can ask people.’

‘They made us join their party,’ said Mrs Collins. ‘It was the biggest party I’d ever seen. Right there in Trafalgar Square. They were all so happy. We danced and danced and danced. We were so scared and so lost, but we danced.’

‘I danced with a soldier,’ said Mrs Hooper. ‘His name was Albert. It was a summer’s day like this when we got married...’ Tears began to fall from her eyes again, and she began to sing. ‘It may be an hour, it may be a week...’

Mrs Collins lifted her voice and joined in. ‘It may be fifty years...’

Rory felt tears pricking at his eyes too. The two old ladies were so sad, yet so dignified.

The moment was broken. The door to the minibus clunked open, and Miss Leake began helping elderly people up the steps. ‘Everything all right?’ she called to Rory, but didn’t wait for an answer. ‘I’m sure you’ve been fine, even with that cheeky pair! Mrs Collins and Mrs Hooper are so naughty sometimes. They do play such jokes. Why, the other day they tried to tell me they were born in 1993! 1893 more like, I said, didn’t I, Mrs Hooper? But you will have your little joke.’ She didn’t seem to care or even notice that Mrs Hooper ignored her.

When the old people were seated, Rory got up and walked down the bus to the door. ‘Bye then,’ he said to Miss Leake.

‘Goodbye, and thank you so much,’ she replied, sitting herself down in the driver’s seat. ‘Oh! By the way! You know those friends you were with? That nice red-haired girl and the young man in the plastic bowler hat?’ Rory nodded. ‘Well, they got thrown out of the theatre! Awful, isn’t it? So I wouldn’t go back there looking for them if I were you.’