Polly hesitated, caught in an agony of indecision. This was today’s only train, and the bus wouldn’t come till after five. If it was on time.
But someone here might know where Merope went. You know where she went, Polly thought, and you know what they’ll tell you. That all the evacuees went back to London and she left as soon as they were gone. She’s been back in Oxford for weeks. Which means her drop isn’t working anymore, and even if it was, you don’t know where it is and can’t get to it without being shot at, so there’s no point in staying here.
And if you miss that train, there’ll be no way you’ll make it back to London before Tuesday-or Wednesday-and Marjorie can’t cover for you forever. You’ll lose your job, and when the retrieval team comes, they won’t be able to find you.
“We must act-” the vicar said. The whistle, much closer, blew again.
Polly stood up, shot the vicar an apologetic glance, opened the church door, and ran for the train.
Those in the convent are desperate.
War Emergency Hospital-September 1940
MIKE HAD HAD NO IDEA ANYONE WAS SITTING THERE IN the high-backed wicker chair. When the voice said, “I thought you were supposed to keep your weight off that foot, Davis,” it startled him so much he let go of the chair back, came down full on his bad foot, nearly fell, and had to clutch wildly at the potted palm to stay upright.
At the same time, a wild hope surged through him. It’s the retrieval team, he thought. Finally.
The man was wearing the hospital-issue pajamas and maroon bathrobe, but he could have gotten those from Wardrobe. “Patient” would be a perfect disguise for getting into the hospital, and he was the right age for an historian. And he’d waited till they were alone in the sun-room to speak.
“Sorry, old man, I didn’t mean to give you a fright,” he said, leaning over the arm of the chair to smile at Mike.
“You know my name,” Mike said.
“Oh, right, we haven’t been properly introduced, have we?” He extended his hand. “Hugh Tensing. I’m on the third floor.”
And you’re not the retrieval team, Mike thought. Now that he looked closer, he saw Tensing was much too thin, and he had the drawn, strained look of an invalid.
“You’re Mike Davis, the American war correspondent,” Tensing was saying. “You repaired a broken propeller with your bare hands and single handedly rescued the entire BEF, according to Nurse Baker. She can’t stop talking about you.”
“She’s wrong,” Mike said. “The propeller wasn’t broken. It was just fouled, and all I did was pull-”
“Spoken like a true hero,” Tensing said. “Modest, humble even though you were injured in the line of duty-”
“I wasn’t-”
“I see, it’s all a fabrication. You weren’t actually in Dunkirk at all,” Tensing said, smiling. “You were in your newspaper office in London when a typewriter fell on your foot. Sorry, it won’t wash. I know you’re a hero. I’ve seen you take dangerous risks.”
“Dangerous-?”
“Just now. Openly defying your nurse’s orders. And Matron’s wrath. You’re far braver than I am.”
“Yes, well, I’m not brave enough to risk being caught,” Mike said, “and they may be here any minute, so I’d better make my way back to where I’m supposed to be.” He let go of the palm tree and stretched out his hand to grab the windowsill.
“No, wait, don’t go,” Tensing said. “I wasn’t hiding from you just now. I was hiding from my nurse, hoping she’d think someone had taken me back to the ward so I could do the same thing you were doing. As a matter of fact, I was treading exactly the same circuit when your nurse wheeled you in and nearly caught me red-handed. Or is it red-footed?”
Mike glanced down at Tensing’s feet, but there was no cast.
“Back injury,” Tensing said. “For which they have prescribed-”
“Bed rest,” Mike guessed.
“Exactly. ‘You must be patient. Your recovery will take time,’ utterly failing to comprehend that the one thing I don’t have-”
“-is time.”
“Exactly. A man after my own heart.” He grinned. “And because you are, I’ve a proposition for you. I can see you want the same thing I do-to get back in the war.”
You’re wrong, Mike thought. I want to get out of it. Before I do any more damage.
“The last time I was caught trying to hasten my recovery,” Tensing went on, “I was denied sunroom privileges for three weeks, all because I lacked an adequate warning system. I therefore propose a partnership.”
A partnership, Mike thought grimly. I shouldn’t even be talking to you, let alone helping you “hasten your recovery.” What if you get back in the war a month earlier than you would have, thanks to me, and kill somebody you’re not supposed to and change the outcome of the war?
“I propose,” Tensing was saying, “that one of us guard the door while the other walks, and give a warning if someone comes in. It won’t require any effort. They’ll glance in the door and see you reading or-what were you doing just now?”
“Working a crossword puzzle.”
“They’ll see you solving a crossword and assume all’s quiet on the western front and go away again.”
“And if they don’t?”
“Then you’ll call out a warning, and I’ll sink into the nearest chair and give an excellent imitation of a patient napping. And then as soon as they’re gone, we’ll switch places, and I’ll stand guard while you walk, and we’ll both be recovered and out of here in no time. What do you say?”
No, Mike thought, I can’t risk it.
On the other hand, the sooner he got out of this hospital and this century, the better, for him and the century. “All right,” he said, “but how do we arrange to both be here at the same time?”
“Leave that to me. I think half past ten’s best. Earlier than that and Colonel Walton’s likely to be in here reading the Guardian. Shall I make the rounds first, or would you rather?”
“No, you go. I can only manage a few minutes at a time,” Mike said and began hobbling back to his wheelchair. “What should our code be? ‘The dog barks at midnight’? Isn’t that what spies always use?”
Tensing didn’t answer.
Mike looked back, wondering if he’d already walked off to the other side of the room and couldn’t hear him, but he was still sitting in the wicker chair, frowning. “Tensing? I said-”
“Yes. Sorry. I was trying to think of an appropriate code. Just call out one of your crossword clues. Tell me when you reach your chair.”
“I’m there,” Mike said, lowering himself into it. He picked up his crossword, rolled himself over by the door, and then looked over at Tensing beginning his circuit. Tensing didn’t have to hold on to the furniture, but twice he had to stop, his hands tightening into white-knuckled fists.
What if he has internal injuries, Mike worried, and has no business doing this? What if my helping him walk makes his injury worse?
Tensing made two halting trips around the edges of the room and then said, “Your turn,” and took his place at the door while Mike worked his way over to the windows and back.
“How did you come to take up crosswords?” he asked as Mike grabbed for a bookcase. “I thought Americans preferred baseball.”
“They wouldn’t let me have the newspaper otherwise, and I wanted to read the war news,” Mike said, reaching for a chair back. “I’m not really very good at your crosswords.”