She stopped, flustered, and looked down at Mike’s foot.
“It would have been more dangerous,” Mike said, “if I’d gone to Dover like I was supposed to. Eileen’s right, Polly. The assignments could have been switched for lots of reasons. And the fact that they didn’t cancel yours is a good sign Oxford doesn’t think you’re in danger.”
“And her seeing me at VE-Day might be a good sign, too. I could have gone there after we got back to Oxford. Because Mr. Dunworthy felt badly about our having been trapped. He knows I’ve always wanted to go to VE- Day.”
You may get your wish, Mike thought grimly.
He looked at Polly, who hadn’t said anything. Her expression was guarded, wary, as if there was still something she hadn’t told them, and he thought about her saying, “You asked me if I’d been to Bletchley Park.” Could she still be lying to them and carefully answering exactly what they asked and nothing else?
“Is the V-1 assignment your only one to World War Two?” he asked, and Eileen looked, horrified, at him and then Polly.
“Is it?” he pressed her. “Or did you go to Pearl Harbor? Or the end of the Blitz?” he asked, remembering she’d known all about those attacks, too.
“No,” she said, and looked like she was telling the truth. But then, he’d thought she was telling the truth before.
“You weren’t here in World War Two on any other assignment besides this one and the V-1s and V-2s?”
“No.”
Thank God, he thought, but the V-1s assignment was bad enough. Denys Atherton wouldn’t be here till March of 1944, which was cutting it awfully close.
If he’d come through. And to get to him, they had to survive the next three years and the rest of the Blitz, and in another few weeks they wouldn’t know when or where the bombs were going to be. And if the increase in slippage was bad enough for Dunworthy to have switched drops that were years apart, there might not be anything they could do till well after Polly …
But they didn’t know the increase was that big. And even if it was, the increase might only be on a few drops. And there might be some other reason Phipps hadn’t come. Bletchley Park was still a divergence point, and, for all they knew, so were these months of the Blitz. And the soldiers at Dunkirk had thought they were licked, and look how that had turned out.
“Don’t worry, Polly,” he said. “We’ll get you out of here. We’ve got three years to figure out something. And there’s still Denys Atherton.”
“And Historian X,” Eileen said. “The historian who’s here till the eighteenth.”
He’d hoped they’d forgotten about that. “Afraid not,” he said.
“Why not?” Eileen said.
“Because Historian X was Gerald,” Polly said. “Wasn’t it, Mike?”
“Yes.”
“Are you certain?” Eileen asked.
“Yes.” He told them about the date on the letter. “And there was a train ticket to Oxford for December eighteenth, and his departure letter was postmarked the sixteenth.”
“Oh, dear,” Eileen said.
“But we still have the drop in St. John’s Wood,” Mike said. “And on my way here, I saw that hoardings have gone up on the site in front of your drop, Polly.”
“So if the drop wouldn’t open because people could see into it,” Eileen said eagerly, “it may begin working again.”
“Exactly,” Mike said. He stood up. “What say we get out of here and give the Luftwaffe a clear shot at this atrocity?” he suggested, looking around at the Albert Memorial statuary. “I’ll take you two to lunch and we’ll plan our strategy for finding the drop. Eileen, did you hear from Lady Caroline?”
“Yes, but not from the officer at the manor.”
“Write them again, and write your vicar and see what you can find out about the riflery range. Maybe they’ve moved it. And I’ll write my barmaid and see if they’ve taken the beach defenses down. You said the invasion had been called off, didn’t you, Polly?”
“Yes, but that doesn’t mean they’ll take the defenses down.”
“You don’t know that,” Eileen said. “Or maybe Mike’s barmaid’s written to say the retrieval team’s been there, and all our problems will be solved.”
“Eileen’s right. We’ll stop by Mrs. Leary’s on our way to lunch and pick up my mail. Come on,” he said, pulling Polly and then Eileen to their feet and walking
“Eileen’s right. We’ll stop by Mrs. Leary’s on our way to lunch and pick up my mail. Come on,” he said, pulling Polly and then Eileen to their feet and walking them back to Mrs. Leary’s.
When they arrived, Eileen said, “While you’re collecting your letters, I’ll go see if we’ve had any.”
“It’s Sunday,” Polly said. “There’s no post on Sunday.”
“But the retrieval team may have rung up,” she said, and hurried off toward Mrs. Rickett’s.
Mike watched her till she rounded the corner and then turned to Polly.
“You said you saw Eileen on VE-Day. Was she the only person you saw?”
