He did, and Merope grasped Polly’s free hand and pulled her up over the edge. A bomb exploded somewhere nearby, and Merope flinched and said frightenedly, “How near do you think-?”
“Near. Help me pull Michael out,” Polly said. If we can, she thought. I should have boosted him up. “Take hold of my ankles,” she ordered Merope, lying down flat on the floor and extending her arms down to Michael.
“That won’t work,” Michael shouted up. “I’m too heavy. Listen, you two go on.”
Merope leaped to her feet and ran stocking-footed into the darkness. Polly stared after her, furious. She was obviously frightened, but they couldn’t abandon Michael. “Merope-!”
“You, too,” Michael shouted up to her. “I’ll fix it and meet you downstairs.”
“I’m not going without you.”
“There’s no time to argue,” he said. “You need-” but Merope was back, dragging a chair.
“Sorry,” she said breathlessly. “I had to go all the way to the ladies’ lounge for it. Help me with it.” Together, they lowered the chair down to him, and he stepped awkwardly up onto the seat.
“Wait,” Merope shouted. “My shoes!”
“There isn’t time to-” Polly began, but he’d already stepped off the chair, jammed them in his pockets, and climbed back up.
Merope knelt next to Polly, and they heaved him up and out. “Where’s the nearest stairway?” he asked Merope.
“There,” she said, and they fled across the firelit floor, Michael hobbling behind them.
“I can’t wait to get out of this horrid place and back to Oxford,” Merope said as they ran. “Do you know what the first thing I’m going to do when we get there is?”
If we get there, Polly thought, hurrying them along. The planes were directly above them now. Bombs whistled all around them, and the floor lit up with bright, deafening flashes. They dived into the stairwell and racketed down the stairs.
“I’m going to tell Mr. Dunworthy I am never doing another assignment involving children,” Merope said.
Polly glanced back at Michael. He was keeping up, though he was leaning heavily on the stair railing.
“I thought you’d never find me, Polly,” Merope said. “When I found out you’d gone back, I-”
They reached the ground floor. Polly opened the door, and they plunged along the side of the store through a barrage of flashes and explosions, their hands up to shield their heads, and across the street.
When they came up onto the pavement on the far side, Merope and Michael stopped, panting. “No, we’re still too close,” Polly said, grabbing Merope’s arm and pulling her along the street with Michael limping after, trying to keep away from the windows of the shops and at the same time in the protection of the buildings. They should have stayed on the same side of the street as Padgett’s. The blast would spread out in an arc, and here there were no walls between them and the force of the concussion. And she had no idea how far the blast from the explosion would reach.
“I’m sorry,” Merope gasped after two blocks, “I’ve got to stop a moment.”
Polly nodded and pulled them around the next corner into the shadow of a building to catch their breath. “Thank you,” Merope panted, leaning against the wall.
Michael was bending down, his hands on his knees, breathing hard. “I wish I could… say it was… letting up,” he said, looking up at the sky, “but I think it’s… getting worse.”
“But if we go to a shelter,” Merope objected, “we’ll be trapped there all night. Shouldn’t we go straight to the drop?”
The drop. She’d been so fixed on getting Merope out of Padgett’s, on getting them to safety, she’d forgotten about Michael being the retrieval team. He was here to take her-to take them-back to Oxford, to safety. Home.
“Yes, of course. You’re right,” she said. She turned to Michael. “Let’s go to the drop.”
“Great,” he said. “Where is it?”
“What?”
“Your drop. Where is it? Is it far from here?”
They were both looking at her expectantly. “You’re not the retrieval team, Michael?” Polly said.
“The retrieval team? No.”
I should have known, Polly thought dully. All the clues were there: his injured foot, his not knowing Merope was here, his remark that he’d been searching for her for almost a month.
“Wait, I don’t understand,” Merope said, looking bewilderedly from one to the other. “Neither of you is the retrieval team? But then what are you doing here, Michael?”
“I can’t get to my drop,” he said. “I came to London to find Polly so I could use hers-”
“So did I,” Merope said, “but when I went to Townsend Brothers, they told me you’d gone back, Polly, so I-”
“Look, we can discuss all this in Oxford,” Michael said impatiently. “Right now we need to get to your drop, Polly. How far-?”
“It’s in Kensington,” Polly said, “but we can’t use it either. Why can’t you get to your drop?”
An HE crashed down up the street, spewing glass everywhere. The three of them instinctively put their hands up to shield their faces. “We’ve got to get to a shelter,” Michael said. “Which one’s nearest?”
“Oxford Circus,” Polly said and led them at a trot along the street to the entrance and down the steps. The iron grille had already been pulled across. The guard had to open it for them. “You lot are cutting it close,” he said as they ran in. “You’d best get below straightaway.”
They didn’t need any encouraging. They ran for the turnstiles. “I haven’t any money,” Merope said. “My handbag-”
Polly fumbled in her bag for extra tokens. Another HE thudded nearby, shaking the station.
“Are you certain it’s safe in here?” Merope said, looking nervously up at the ceiling.
“Yes,” Polly said, handing her and Michael tokens. “Oxford Circus wasn’t hit till the end of the Blitz.” She pushed through the turnstile and ran over to the escalators.
“Oh, that’s right,” Merope said, behind her. “I forgot. You know where all the bombs fell.”
Till the first of January, Polly thought, stepping onto the long escalator. Which means we’d better have got to Michael’s drop by then.
What did he mean, he couldn’t get to it? She turned to ask him, but he was several steps above them, limping down to where they were, leaning heavily on the moving rubber rail. “Are you all right?” Merope asked. “You didn’t sprain your ankle chasing me in Padgett’s, did you?”
“No,” Michael said, coming down onto the step with Merope, “I-it was hit by shrapnel. At Dunkirk.”
Dunkirk? Polly felt a twinge of panic. Was that why he couldn’t get to his drop, because it was in Dunkirk? If it was, they wouldn’t be able to reach it till the end of the war, and that was too late. But his drop couldn’t be in Dunkirk. And he couldn’t have been there either.
“What were you doing in Dunkirk?” Merope was asking.
“Shh,” Michael said, pointing below them. They were to the foot of the escalator, which was so jammed with people they had difficulty getting off, and once they did, even more difficulty getting through the crowd. The entire hall was packed solid with people. Everyone on Oxford Street-and Regent Street and New Bond Street-had fled down here when the bombing began, and they all had parcels and shopping bags and wet umbrellas to add to the crush.
The tunnels were just as bad, and Polly knew from experience that the platforms would be even worse. “This is impossible,” Michael said. “We’ve got to find a place where we can talk. What about another tube station? The trains are still running, aren’t they?”