The Time Wasters

By Graham Read

Discover that history can really be fun as you join two young explorers on their journey along the Time Corridor and learn a little about the real Tudor England. On the way you will meet King Henry VIII and all his wives, and you will sail over the Spanish Armada in a hot air balloon. You may even discover how those malicious sprites, the Time Wasters, have changed the course of history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Graham Read
• Release date: May 31, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311142306

Book preview

The Time Wasters

A story intended for ages 9 - 14

By Graham Read

This little book is dedicated to my own little time wasters:

Naomi, Bethany, Phoebe, Lydia, Annabelle and Aeryn;

and to any other early readers who are interested in life in Tudor times.

Published By Graham Read at Smashwords

Copyright 2013 Graham Read

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Contents

Chapter 1 - The Small Green Door

Chapter 2 - Chronos

Chapter 3 - Two Princes and a Princess

Chapter 4 - King Henry the Eighth

Chapter 5 - Princess Mary

Chapter 6 - The Field of Cloth of Gold

Chapter 7 - Anne Boleyn

Chapter 8 - The King Wants a Son

Chapter 9 - A Wedding Feast

Chapter 10 - Princess Elizabeth

Chapter 11 - Where Did All the Monks Go?

Chapter 12 - Anne of Cleves

Chapter 13 - Kathryn Howard

Chapter 14 - Sad News

Chapter 15 - Catherine Parr

Chapter 16 - The Mary Rose

Chapter 17 - Home Again (But not for long)

Chapter 18 - Barnaby Fitzpatrick

Chapter 19 - Spanish Treasure

Chapter 20 - Lady Jane Grey

Chapter 21 - The Tower of London

Chapter 22 - Queen Mary

Chapter 23 - Old Barnaby

Chapter 24 - Queen Gladys

Chapter 25 - The Hunt for Barnaby FitzPatrick

Chapter 26 - One of the Best Parties Ever Held

Chapter 27 - Lost in Time

Chapter 28 - Beth Comes to the Rescue

Chapter 29 - Barnaby’s Study (for the third time)

Chapter 30 - The Spanish Armada

Addendum

About the author

Other books by this author

Chapter 1

The Small Green Door

It was the sort of day when nothing exciting happened. All the cats were too sleepy to chase the birds, the birds were too lazy to search for worms, and the worms were too tired to come out of their holes. Naomi and Bethany were sitting in their bedroom – and they were both cross.

‘Why do they have to give us homework’ asked Beth angrily. ‘Don’t we get enough to do at school?’

Naomi nodded in agreement, but she was too engrossed in playing a computer game to give a proper reply. Her school bag lay unopened at the bottom of her bed – and there it would stay until Mummy or Daddy forced her to explore its murky depths for the ordeals it held in store. In particular, she had no interest whatever in her book about rotten old Tudor England and its rotten old kings and queens.

‘Oh bother!’ snorted Beth. ‘Now my stupid pencil has broken,’ and she threw it down on the desk, and knocked her box of tissues onto the floor.

She climbed under her desk to search for it, and then, in the dark region near the corner of the room, she made an amazing discovery. Half hidden behind the long window curtain there was a small green door.

‘Come and look at this Naomi,’ she shouted to her older sister from beneath the desk.

‘It’s amazing – there is a small door down here. I wonder where it leads.’

Naomi put her computer game on pause, and reluctantly joined her sister under the desk.

‘If this is another one of your silly tricks I shall be extremely angry,’ she said petulantly.

But then she saw that it was no trick. There really was a small green door, complete with a brass handle and the number 2013 written in small gold letters at the top.

‘What can it mean?’ asked Beth in a whisper, ‘I’m sure that it wasn’t here before.’

‘It’s very strange, and a bit worrying,’ said Naomi.

‘There is nothing but the garden on the other side of that wall, and we are up on the top floor of the house.’

‘Well I am going to look inside,’ said Beth. She crawled towards the little door, and, before Naomi could stop her, she had opened it and crept right through so that she completely disappeared

‘What will my idiot sister do next?’ muttered Naomi to herself, but there was nothing to be done but to crawl under the desk and to see where Beth had gone. She peeped through the small doorway, but it was too dark on the other side to see anything.

‘Come out of there at once,’ she called, but there was no reply.

‘I’m just going to have to rescue her – again!’

Naomi climbed out from under the desk, and then, stopping only to pick up her torch and to put a few items that are essential to explorers into her school bag, she made her way back to the little door.

She shone her torch into the gloom, but Beth was nowhere to be seen. Inside there was a long corridor with dark stone walls, and a low arched ceiling, like the inside of an ancient church. It seemed to stretch both ways into the darkness, and far beyond the light from her small torch.

‘Beth, where are you?’ she shouted, and she was beginning to get quite worried.

‘I’m right here,’ said Beth, from right behind her, which made her jump so much that her head nearly hit the roof.

‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,’ said Naomi crossly, ‘I am scared enough without you making it worse. Let’s get out of here – it’s really creepy.’

‘Don’t be such a wimp,’ said Beth. ‘Let’s explore a bit.’ Then she grabbed the torch and set off down the corridor. Naomi had no intention of being left in the dark, so she was forced to follow on behind.

The corridor was about as wide as a small room, and every so often there were pillars on either side supporting a small archway surrounding another little green door, just like the one in the wall of their bedroom. Each one had some gold lettering in a strange language at the top and a number written underneath. The first they met had the number 2012, and the next 2011.

‘They must be the numbers of peoples’ houses, and the writing must be their names I suppose,’ said Naomi.

But before Beth could reply they heard a noise in the distance. It was coming from behind them, and it sounded very much like a police siren or a fire engine racing to a fire. The sound grew louder and louder, and the girls looked round anxiously for somewhere to hide – but there was nowhere to go, and when they tried the nearest little door it seemed to be locked.

There was no way out. They were shaking with fright but they had to face up to the approaching noise – but then from the darkness behind them they saw the most amazing sight.

Chapter 2

Chronos

A little old man appeared out of the gloom, furiously pedalling a tiny bicycle. He had a long beard and thick spectacles, and on his head he wore a large floppy that came down well over his ears. If that wasn’t strange enough, a large red feather sprouted from his hatband, an enormous alarm clock hung from a chain around his neck, and, to cap it all, the back wheel of his bike had stabilisers.

He leapt from his bicycle and pointed a finger at the two frightened girls.

‘Stay exactly where you are – this finger is loaded and I’m not afraid to use it,’ he exclaimed dramatically.

The effect was somewhat spoiled when he took a step forwards and tripped over his long overcoat. His hand shot upwards – in more senses than one – and a blast of lightning sparked from his outstretched finger to the roof of the corridor. There was a loud bang, then sparks and a cloud of white dust rained down from the ceiling. There was a short pause, then the little man rose from the floor covered in a thin layer of chalky powder, and began to cough and splutter, and then to brush himself down.

‘Are you alright?’ asked Naomi anxiously.

She was not quite so frightened now that she could see that the little man was no taller than a large garden gnome, although the explosion from his loaded finger had been a bit scary.

‘I’m just fine,’ said the little man with a grin, but then he put on his fierce face again and added,

‘Thank you for asking, but I’ll stand for no nonsense from a pair of Time Wasters like you.’

‘I don’t know why you call us that,’ said Beth. ‘We are just visitors here.’

‘Wherever here is,’ she added.

‘I think that you know very well that you are in my time,’ said the little man, ‘and I want to know when you have come from?’

‘Don’t you mean WHERE have we come from?’ asked Naomi. ‘And why is it YOUR time?’

‘I am the official Time Keeper for this part of time, and I say what I mean – when I say when I mean when, when, when?’ said the little man.

‘Tell me who you are, and make it quick, I have an urgent problem to deal with.’

The girls explained how they had found the little door, and how they had just come in to explore, and that seemed to put the little man in a better mood.

Then he told them that his name was Chronos and that it was his job to keep all the time in his corridor in good repair. It seemed that he had a constant battle with some evil sprites that did all sorts of damage to his section of time, just for the fun of it. He had never actually seen any of them, which was why he had mistaken Naomi and Beth for two of the little pests.

‘So when do you actually come from?’ asked Chronos.

‘We live in 2013,’ said Naomi.

‘When Wendy the Second is queen.’

‘That can’t be right,’ said the little man.

‘Good King Renaldo is on the throne around that time.’

Then he threw up his arms in horror.

‘Oh my goodness – they have really done it this time – that’s why the alarm went off – the Time Wasters have made a big change to history.

I must get there at once – before it all sets like concrete.

You will have to come with me – I don’t have time to take you home now – that will have to wait.’

Chronos dipped into a pocket of his long overcoat and pulled out what appeared to be a portable telephone. He keyed in the number 1501 and then pressed a red button.

‘There is no time to go by bicycle,’ he said.

‘Hold on tight – we are off by flooromat.’

Immediately the floor began to shake and the corridor in front of them began to glow with a dim light from somewhere in the ceiling. At first the floor moved forward slowly, then, with a low grinding