Free Doctor Who BBCN10 - The Nightmare of Black Island by Doctor Who

things, not that much had changed over the last fifty years or so. The harbour was just the same, the seafront dominated by the imposing Victorian facade of the pub, the street leading up the hill still lined with the same cluster of small shop fronts, only the signage in the windows and the price tags visible on stalls giving the age of the photographs away. There were shots of the lighthouse in the bay, the paintwork clean and fresh, the lighthouse keepers posing proudly on the rocks at its base. There was even a photo of the rectory, its gardens neatly kept and the shrubbery that now grew wild trimmed and orderly.
    As the Doctor looked through the photographs he realised that a lot of them featured Bronwyn as a young woman. She had been attractive in her youth, with long auburn hair cascading over her shoulders and a smile on her face in every picture.
    One photograph showed her standing outside the beach house, a young man at her shoulder, a baby in her arms. The house was tidy and whitewashed, a line full of clean clothes hanging alongside it.
    Another showed the three of them on the beach, only this time the 56

    baby had grown into a small boy in shorts, his knees covered in sand, a bucket and spade being waved enthusiastically at the photographer.
    The Doctor put the photographs down and stared around the room.
    Nearly all of the photos on the walls or in frames on the top of cupboards featured the boy. He must have been five or six years old at a guess.
    Hauling himself out of the sagging sofa, the Doctor slipped on his glasses. A jumble of photographs of the boy in a smart school uniform sat propped up against a vase on one of the groaning shelves. He picked them up, peering at them one by one. The boy had the same bright eyes and slightly crooked smile as his mother.
    ‘Where are you now, I wonder?’ he murmured.
    Plucking one of them from the pile, the Doctor slipped it into his jacket pocket.
    At that moment Bronwyn bustled back into the room. She was now wearing a huge battered oilskin and had a canvas bag slung over her shoulder. The Doctor hurriedly tried to put the rest of the photographs back in their place, fumbling and dropping several on to the floor.
    Flashing her a guilty grin, he gathered them up.
    ‘Sorry. Butterfingers.’
    Bronwyn snatched the photographs from him, putting them back in their place. The Doctor watched as her fingers ran gently over the pictures.
    ‘Good-looking boy.’
    A flicker of a smile started to cross her face, taking years off her.
    ‘Yes. . . ’
    The smile vanished as suddenly as it had arrived and she shot the Doctor a suspicious glance.
    ‘We’d better get a move on if we’re going to catch the tide,’ she said.
    ‘Absolutely. Don’t want to keep those seals waiting.’
    Bronwyn bustled out of the room, muttering to herself. The Doctor took off his spectacles and fingered the photograph in his pocket.
    Something dark had happened in Bronwyn’s past, of that he had no doubt. Something to do with her son. It could not have been a coincidence that Rose had seen a child in her dream. It could also not 57

    have been a coincidence that there was history between Bronwyn and Nathaniel Morton. The problem was that he was still no closer to finding out what.
    He tapped his teeth thoughtfully with the arm of his glasses.
    ‘Jimmy,’ he murmured.
    58

    Thereyouare!’ Alipointedproudlyatalowpileofruinedbrickwork that emerged from under a sprawling holly bush.
    She and the others had led Rose through the wood until they came to the high, imposing wall that bordered the back of the rectory grounds. Then they had followed the wall until they reached what had once been outbuildings serving the main house. Here the kids had scrambled enthusiastically underneath the foliage.
    Rose pushed her way forward through the tangle of branches to where Billy Palmer and Baz Morgan were clearing leaves from a sheet of rotten plywood. The ruined building had obviously been a coal house or