“Eileen!” Polly called, and hurried across the wet square, the pigeons scattering before her, flying up to perch on the lions at the base of the monument.
Eileen saw her and raised her hand in recognition, but she didn’t wave. Or smile. Polly glanced at her watch. It wasn’t that late, and the concert had obviously just let out. And Eileen was always so cheerful and optimistic. Some of Polly’s anxiety these last few weeks must have infected her.
Perhaps I shouldn’t say anything about St. Paul’s, she thought. It will only make things worse.
But Polly had to know. And there was no one else to ask. She ran up the steps and over to Eileen. “I need to ask you something,” she said urgently. “Was St. Paul’s
—?”
But Eileen cut her off. “The retrieval team didn’t come to the concert,” she said. “Did you find them?”
“No, there was no one at St. Paul’s.”
“No one?” Eileen said, and there was an edge to her voice. Was she angry at her for insisting she go to the concert? If she was, it couldn’t be helped. There were more important matters at hand.
“No historians at all?” Eileen persisted.
“No, and I was there from nine o’clock on. Eileen, do you know if St. Paul’s was hit by any HEs during the Blitz?”
She looked surprised. “Hit by HEs?”
“Yes. Not incendiaries, high-explosive bombs. Did Mr. Dunworthy say anything about its being hit?”
“Yes,” Eileen said. “But you—”
“Did he say when and which part of the cathedral?”
“I don’t know all the dates. A UXB landed under the—”
“I know about the UXB. And the twenty-ninth.”
“And the altar was hit on October tenth.”
Thank God, Polly thought. It was supposed to have been hit.
Eileen was frowning. “If you were at St. Paul’s this morning, then you saw the damage, didn’t you?”
Oh, no. In her anxiety about the bombing, she’d totally forgotten Eileen knew nothing about her and Mike’s fears that they’d altered events. “Yes, I mean, I did see it,” she stammered, “but I didn’t know … Mr. Dunworthy had told me all about the UXB and the incendiaries, but not about the altar, and when I saw it, I—”
“Thought it might have happened this morning?”
This morning? What did that mean? But at least Eileen hadn’t guessed the real reason she’d asked all these questions. “No, last night,” Polly said. “And there was so much damage, it looked like the entire thing could collapse any minute, and even though I knew St. Paul’s had survived, I thought … I mean, I wasn’t thinking. It was such a shock, seeing it. I hadn’t realized St. Paul’s had ever been hit by an HE.”
“Two,” Eileen said.
Two? Mr. Humphreys had said one.
“The other one was in the transept,” Eileen said. “I don’t know when.”
“The north transept?” Polly asked, thinking irrelevantly of the memorial to Captain Faulknor. Mr. Humphreys would be so upset if that was destroyed.
“I don’t know which transept. Mr. Bartholomew didn’t say.”
Mr. Bartholomew? Who was Mr. Bartholomew? Had someone here at the concert told her about the bombing of the altar? If so, then it could still be a discrepancy.
“Mr. Bartholomew?” Polly asked.
“Yes, John Bartholomew. He gave a lecture about it when I was a first-year.”
Oh, thank goodness, it was someone from Oxford. “He’s a professor at Balliol?”
“No, an historian. He gave a lecture about his experiences on the St. Paul’s fire watch during the Blitz.”
“He’s here?” Polly grabbed Eileen’s arms. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“No, he’s not here now. He was here years ago.”
“In the Blitz. In 1940,” Polly said, and when Eileen nodded, “It doesn’t matter when he was here Oxford time. This is time travel. If he was here in 1940, he’s still here now.”
“Oh!” Eileen clapped her hand to her mouth. “I didn’t even think of that! Is that why you—?”
“How could you not think of it?” Polly burst out. “Mike asked us to try to think of any past historians who might be here,” she said, but even as she said it, she thought, That was that day he came to Townsend Brothers, before he left for Beachy Head, and Eileen wasn’t there. And immediately after that, all their attention had turned to Bletchley Park.
“Mike never said a word to me about past historians,” Eileen said defensively. “How—?”
“It doesn’t matter. Now that we know he’s here—”
“But he’s not. He was injured when the bomb fell on the altar and went back to Oxford.”
“How long after the bombing?”
