All Clear

Saltram-on-Sea—December 1940

“DAPHNE’S MARRIED?” MIKE SAID, PUSHING HIMSELF AWAY from the pub’s counter.

“Aye,” her father said, placidly toweling a glass dry. “To one of the lads what was putting in the beach defenses.”

I obviously didn’t need to worry about accidentally breaking her heart and keeping her from marrying anybody else, Mike thought ruefully.

“Beach defenses,” the pipe-smoking fisherman he’d talked to on the quay snorted. “Didn’t know much about defenses, if you ask me. Couldn’t defend himself against your Daphne, could he now?” He nudged Mike. “Looks like you couldn’t either, eh, lad?”

There was general laughter, under cover of which Mike asked, “Can you tell me where I can find her?”

Daphne’s father frowned. “I don’t know as that’s a good idea, lad. She’s Mrs. Rob Butcher, and there’s naught you can do about it.”

“I don’t want to,” Mike said.

Her father scowled.

“I mean, I don’t want to make trouble. I just need to talk to her about something. She wrote me a letter—about some men who were asking for me—and I need to ask her if she knows where I can get in touch with them. Or maybe you can help me. Daphne said they came in—”

Her father shook his head. “I know nothing about any men, and as for Daphne, she’s in Manchester with her husband.”

Manchester? That was more than two hundred miles from Saltram. It would take him at least two days to get there by train. If he could even get on one. They’d be jammed with soldiers going home on leave for Christmas.

“I don’t suppose you have a phone number where she can be reached?” Mike asked. “Or an address?”

“You’re not thinkin’ of goin’ there to make mischief, are you?”

“No, I just want to write to her,” Mike lied, hoping the address wouldn’t be a post office box.

It wasn’t. It was an address on King Street. “Though I had a letter from her yesterday saying their lodgings were very unsatisfactory,” Daphne’s father told him, “and they were hopin’ to find somethin’ better.”

Let’s hope they didn’t, Mike thought, writing the address down.

“If anyone comes in asking for me, tell them I can be reached here,” he said, giving him Mrs. Leary’s address and telephone number. He congratulated him on his daughter’s marriage, then set out for Manchester.

It didn’t take two days. It took nearly four of fully booked trains, delayed departures, missed connections, and compartments crammed full not only of soldiers but of civilians with packages, plum puddings, and, on one leg of the journey, an enormous unplucked Christmas goose. Apparently no one in England was obeying the government order posted in every station to “avoid unnecessary travel.”

He didn’t reach Manchester till late afternoon on December twenty-second—by which time Daphne and her new husband had found “something better.” He limped all the way to King Street, only to be sent back across town to Whitworth. And then the landlady, who looked exactly like Mrs. Rickett, wasn’t sure Daphne was in.

“I’ll go and see,” she said, and left him standing at the door.

Please let her be in, he thought, leaning against the doorjamb to take the weight off his aching foot.

She was. She came halfway down the stairs and stopped, just like she had that first day in Saltram-on-Sea. “Why, Mike,” she said, her eyes widening, “I never expected to see you in Manchester. Whatever are you doing here?”

“I came to find you, to ask you—”

“But didn’t Dad tell you? Oh, dear, this is dreadful! I didn’t mean for you to find out like this! You’re a lovely boy, and now you’ve come all this way, but the thing is, I was married last week.”

“I know. Your father told me,” he said, trying to get the right mixture of heartbreak and resignation into his voice. “I really came about your letter.”

“My letter?” she said, bewildered. “But I didn’t … I thought about writing and telling you about Rob, but I didn’t know where you were or what you were doing, and I thought if you were off covering the war, it would be unkind—”

“No, the letter you wrote me about the men who came in asking about me,” he said, pulling it out of his coat. “There was a mix-up with the mail, and I just got it.”

“Oh,” she said, sounding vaguely disappointed.

“I went to Saltram-on-Sea to talk to you about it, and your father told me you’d gone to Manchester and that you’d got married. Congratulations to both of you.

Your husband’s a very lucky man.”

“Oh, but I’m the lucky one,” she said, blushing. “Rob’s wonderful, so kind and brave. He’s working on repairing the docks just now, but he’s put in for combat duty. He’s determined to do his bit for England. I said, ‘You are doing your bit. You’re seeing to it England doesn’t starve, aren’t you? It may not look as grandly heroic as shooting Germans or sinking U-boats, but—’ ”

And if he didn’t cut her off, he’d be here all night. “If I could just ask you a couple of questions.”

“Oh, of course. Where are my manners, keeping you standing in the door like that? Come through to the parlor. Would you like some tea?”

He’d love some tea—he hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast—and he’d love to take the weight off his foot, but he didn’t want to do anything to encourage her to talk longer than she already was. “No, thanks, I have a train to catch. You said these two men came into the pub asking for me.”

Daphne nodded. “Twice. The first time they asked everyone in the pub if they knew a war correspondent named Mike Davis, and Mr. Tompkins said I did, and they asked me if I knew how they could get in touch with you.”

“And did you tell them?”

“No. I remembered what you said about letting you know straightaway if anyone came round asking for you. That’s why I wrote to you instead of giving them your address.”

Mike groaned inwardly. “Did they say why they were trying to get in touch with me?”

“No, they said it was something to do with the war, and that it was very important that they contact you, but they didn’t say what it was.”

“Did they tell you their names?”

“Yes. Mr. Watson and Mr.…” She frowned and bit her lip. “I can’t remember, it began with an H, like Hawes or …”

“Mr. Holmes?”

“Yes, that was it. Mr. Watson and Mr. Holmes.”

That cinched it. It was the retrieval team.

“They knew all about you having been at Dunkirk and in hospital,” Daphne said. “They said one of the nurses told them you might have gone to Saltram-on-Sea.”

Which meant they’d traced him as far as Orpington, but they obviously hadn’t talked to Sister Carmody or she’d have told them he was in London. “What did they look like?” he asked. “Were they in uniform?”

“No. Civilian clothes. Very posh, and very posh accents, and they were both terribly handsome”—she cocked her head flirtatiously—“though not so handsome as you, speaking quite impartially. I’m a married woman, you know.”

Yes, I know.

“You said they came in twice,” he said, trying to get her back to the subject at hand. “The same day?”

“No, they came in on, let me see, when was it? The first Saturday in December, I think.”

When he was in Oxford, trying to find out whether Gerald Phipps had been there.

“And then they came in again the next night, and that was when Rob got jealous and told me to stop flirting with them, and I said, ‘I wasn’t flirting, and even if I was, you’ve got no call to tell me not to, Rob Butcher. I’m not your wife,’ and he said, ‘I wish you were,’ and the next thing you know he’s been to Dover and got a special license so the vicar could marry us straightaway. Dad wanted us to wait, but Rob said no, who knew what might happen tomorrow or how much time we might have together, and then he found out he was being sent here, and—”

“When the men came the second time,” Mike finally managed to get in, “what did they say?”

“They said if I did hear from you, to contact them immediately, and they wrote down their address for me. I meant to send it on to you, but then in the excitement of the wedding and all, I forgot. Oh, it was a lovely wedding. Rob looked terribly handsome in his uniform, and the church was all decorated with holly and—”

“Do you remember the address?”

“No.”

Of course not.

“But I’ve got it. I put it”—she frowned in consternation—“now, where did I put it?”

Please don’t say you stuck it behind the bar, and now I’ll have to trudge all the way back across the country to Saltram-on-Sea for it, Mike thought.

“I put it … oh, I know,” she said. “I put it in my vanity case so I wouldn’t go off without it. It’s upstairs. Hang on.” She started up and then turned to look at him over the railing. “You’re not in any trouble, are you?”

Not anymore, he thought.

“I mean, the authorities aren’t after you or anything?” she asked, concerned.

“No. I think I know who the men were. They’re a couple of guys who were on the boat with me coming back from Dunkirk. Reporters.”

“Oh, I wish I’d known they’d been at Dunkirk. I could have asked them about the Commander and Jonathan. They might know what happened to them.”

“I’ll ask them when I see them,” Mike lied. “You were going to go get the address?”

“Oh, yes,” she said, and pattered up the stairs, turning as she ran to give Mike one of those over-the-shoulder smiles that had no doubt snared her new husband. “I’ll only be a moment.”

She was as good as her word, reappearing almost immediately with a sheet of lined paper torn from a notebook like the one he carried. “Here it is,” she said, handing it to him.

He looked down at the address. It was in Edgebourne, Kent. That must be where their drop was.

“It’s near Hawkhurst,” Daphne said.

Hawkhurst. Well, he wouldn’t have to go all the way back to Saltram-on-Sea, but almost. He’d have to make that whole long, uncomfortable trip back in a packed train.

At least it wasn’t on the coast, so he wouldn’t have to deal with guards and checkpoints. But he was afraid it wasn’t big enough to have a railroad station. But it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. He felt all the near panic of the last six months melt away. The retrieval team was here, and they were going home.

“Thank you,” he said, and kissed Daphne impulsively on the cheek. “You’re wonderful.”

“Now, then,” she said, blushing, “you mustn’t do that sort of thing, you know. I’m a married woman. Rob—”

“Is a very lucky guy.” And so am I. You have just saved my life. All our lives. “Listen,” he said. “Be careful. When the sirens go, don’t be a hero. Get yourself to the shelter. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“Oh, dear, I did break your heart, didn’t I?” She smiled sympathetically at him. “You mustn’t worry. You’ll meet someone, and you’ll be just as happy as Rob and I are. You’ll see, it will all work out for the best. Rob says—”

The sirens went, and Mike used them as an excuse to leave. “Remember what I said,” he told her. “You get to that shelter.” And he limped off before she could tell him what Rob had said and what her wedding dress had looked like and how he’d find a nice girl.

I already have a nice girl, he thought. Two of them.

Who he needed to call and tell the good news to as soon as he got to the station. He hadn’t wanted to call them before for fear he wouldn’t be able to find Daphne or for fear she wouldn’t have the retrieval team’s address, but now they needed to quit their jobs and get ready to go. And he needed to ask Polly if Manchester had been bombed on the twenty-second and how badly.

In spite of the sirens having gone nearly fifteen minutes ago, he still didn’t hear any planes. Manchester must have a longer warning period than London, since they In spite of the sirens having gone nearly fifteen minutes ago, he still didn’t hear any planes. Manchester must have a longer warning period than London, since they were farther north and west. He didn’t hear any guns either, and the only searchlights were out toward the docks. But they gave off enough light to see his way by.

He hobbled on toward the train station, cursing his limp. Which I won’t have in a few more days, he thought. I’ll have a brand-new foot, and Polly won’t have to worry about still being here on her deadline, and Eileen won’t ever have to suffer through another raid.

A man hurried past him, carrying a spray of holly.

We’ll be home for Christmas, Mike thought. He pushed through the station door and headed for the line of red phone booths along the far wall to call Polly and Eileen. Would it be better for him to go back to London and get them, and the three of them go to Edgebourne together, or should he have them meet him there? That would be faster, and it would mean Eileen and Polly were safely out of London sooner. But if something went wrong and they got separated …

Maybe he’d better go get them. That way they’d all be together and—

What am I talking about? he thought. All I have to do is get to Edgebourne and tell them where Polly and Eileen are, and they can have another team go get them.

Tonight if they want. Or the night I left for Saltram-on-Sea. This was time travel. Eileen and Polly were probably already in Oxford. In which case all he needed to do was get back to Kent and tell the retrieval team where they were the day he’d left.

He looked up at the departures board. There was an express leaving for Reading in six minutes. He limped over to the ticket counter. “One way to Reading on the 6:05,” he said.

The ticket agent shook his head.

“Or on the next train east I can get a space on.”

“No departures during a raid,” the agent said, and pointed up at the high ceiling, where a sudden buzz of planes was becoming a dull roar. “You’re not going anywhere tonight, mate. I’d find a shelter if I were you.”

Happy Blitzmas!

—CHRISTMAS CARD,

1940