“But—”
“We’re window dressing,” Prism said impatiently. “The newspaper stories you’ll write will say that the hospital has only a few patients at present, but that its capacity is six hundred, and that it’s one of five new hospitals which will open in the area over the next four months.”
“Which plays nicely into the scenario that the invasion’s scheduled for mid-July,” Ernest said. “So the Queen will be seen visiting the wards?”
“Ward,” Prism said. “They were only able to mock up one for the ribbon cutting. The hospital in Dover couldn’t spare the beds for more than that, and Lady Mofford wasn’t keen on having her entire house turned into a hospital just for one afternoon’s photographs.”
“Afternoon?” Ernest said. “I thought you said this would only take a couple of hours.”
“It will. There’ll be a speech welcoming the Queen, a visit to the ward, and then tea. The Queen’s to arrive at one.”
“One o’clock this afternoon?” Cess cried. “That’s hours from now. And Worthing and I haven’t even had breakfast. Why did we need to leave now?”
“I told you,” Prism said imperturbably. “The Queen will be there. One can’t keep royalty waiting. And we need to help set up.”
“But I’m starving!” Cess said.
“And I must be in Croydon by four o’clock, or my articles won’t make this week’s edition.”
“Then they’ll have to go in next week’s.”
“That’s what you said last week,” Ernest said. “At this rate, they won’t go in till after the invasion, and a bloody lot of good they’ll do then.”
“Very well,” Prism said. “When we get there I’ll ring up Lady Bracknell and have Algernon take them to Croydon for you.”
Which would completely defeat the purpose. “They’re not done yet,” he said. “I’d intended to finish writing them up last night, and instead I ended up playing matador.”
“With a tank as his cape,” Cess said, and launched into an account of their adventures with the bull and his charging of the tank, which Prism and Moncrieff both found highly amusing.
“Today won’t be nearly so dangerous,” Moncrieff said. “And don’t worry, we’ll have you back to the castle in plenty of time.”
At which point, I will no doubt be sent to blow up more tanks.
“Speaking of dangers,” Prism said, “you need to read this.” He handed a sheet of paper back to Ernest over the seat. “It’s a memo from Lady Bracknell.”
“Warning us,” Cess said, “about”—he lowered his voice to a sinister whisper—“spies in our midst.”
Ernest snatched the paper from Prism. “Spies?”
“Yes,” Cess said. “It says we’re to look out for suspicious behavior, particularly for people who seem unfamiliar with local customs. And we’re not to discuss our mission with anyone, no matter how harmless and trustworthy they seem, because they might be German spies. That bull this morning, for instance.”
“It’s not a joking matter,” Prism said. “If there’s a security breach, it could endanger the entire invasion.”
“I know,” Cess said. “But whom exactly does Bracknell think we’d talk to? The only people we ever see are irate farmers, except for Ernest here—”
“And the only people I talk to are irate editors who want to know why my articles are always late,” Ernest said. He needed to get this conversation off the topic of spies. “And I doubt very much that they’ll believe I missed their deadline because I was having tea with the Queen. How are we supposed to address her, by the way?
Your Majesty? Your Highness?”
“There! You see that?” Cess said, pointing an accusing finger at him. “Unfamiliarity with local customs. Definitely suspicious behavior. And he behaved very oddly around that bull. Are you a spy, Worthing?” he said, and when Ernest didn’t answer, “Well, are you?”
We shall fight in the offices … and in the hospitals.
—WINSTON CHURCHILL,
1940
London—27 October 1940
THE MOMENT POLLY RETURNED FROM SEEING MARJORIE, Eileen said, “Mr. Fetters rang up while you were gone. He said they’d found three bodies in Padgett’s.” Which meant Polly hadn’t had to go to the hospital after all.
She wished she hadn’t. She’d gone there to prove the number of dead wasn’t a discrepancy so that Mike could stop worrying that he’d altered events, only to find that she’d altered them.
Don’t be ridiculous, she thought. Historians can’t do that. And there were dozens of reasons why Mr. Dunworthy could have got the time of the St. Paul’s UXB’s removal wrong. The newspaper could have moved the time up to throw the Germans off. During the V-1 and V-2 attacks, they’d printed false accounts of where the rockets fell to trick the Germans into shortening their range. They might have done something like that with the UXB, to convince the Nazis the bomb was easier to defuse than it had been. Or they could simply have got the time wrong, like the nurses at Padgett’s had got the number wrong.
You thought the number of fatalities was a discrepancy, she reassured herself, and it turned out it wasn’t. And look at your last assignment. For a few weeks there, you were convinced you’d altered events, but you hadn’t. Everything worked out exactly the same as it would have if you hadn’t been there.
And this will, too. The doctors say Marjorie’s going to make a full recovery, and it isn’t as if she married her
