The whole arrangement began to rock and sway from side to side, like a pot with the lid too tight. I bent towards it, the strange green light and the whirr of the sonic screwdriver merging into a strange phantasmagoria. Something was cooking.

Then, of a sudden – bang!

The door of the machine flew open and the Doctor leapt out!

He was fully restored and fully dressed, looking just as he usually did – his great mass of dead straight hair falling forward into boot-button eyes that shone with mischief.

‘Missed me?’

‘Doctor!’ I cried, thrilled to bits.

‘Jenny,’ he replied. ‘Oh, Jennyennyjenny! Just when you think your favourite lock-picking Victorian chambermaid will never turn up! Jenny!!’ And he took me in his arms, bent me low like we was dancing and kissed me!

Now, I’m a respectable gal – most of the time – and even though I was very pleased to see my pal restored to life there’s a time and a place. ’Sides, I prefer to be asked.

So I clocked him one, right on the kisser.

He rubbed his jaw and grinned again. ‘You’ve no idea how good that feels! Right! Mrs Gillyflower! We’ve got to stop her! And then there’s Clara. Poor Clara. Where’s Clara?’

‘Clara?’

But he didn’t hang around. The Doctor never did. He was off, throwing open the door to the main chamber and disappearing into the steam.

I dashed after him. ‘Doctor, wait!’

‘Can’t,’ he called over his shoulder. ‘Clara. Got to find.’

‘What happened to you? How long have you been like that?’

‘Days. Weeks. Dunno. Long story.’

He suddenly pulled up suddenly and I ran into him. He looked down at me and beamed.

‘I’ll keep it short!’

Chapter the Seventh

‘Diary of a Madman’

I’ve tried keeping one of these things before. Many times. Or I will. That’s the trouble with time travel. It can get confusing. And the pages are never really big enough and it still always seems to have ‘Grouse shooting begins’ or ‘Bank Holiday in Ireland’ rather awkwardly placed on the page so you have to write really small to cram everything in. Which is probably the Universe’s way of telling me I should get out more – or at least not get my diaries from WH Smith’s.

Yes, diaries! Confusing! And that’s before you’ve even factored in the Blinovitch Limitation Effect. Which I rarely do, to be honest. Have you read Blinovitch? No? No one has, really. It’s quite a dull book. He bangs on far more about his rough upbringing in the Urals and his dreadful father than about the contradictions of temporal mechanics. On the plus side, it does contain a really smashing recipe for dumplings. His father’s recipe in fact. Which is maybe one of the reasons Blinovitch decided against going back in time to kill him. Anyway, I digress. Which is another thing I do.