Nebula Awards Showcase 2012

EXCERPT FROM BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR Connie Willis

I fell in love with St. Paul’s and the Blitz when I first went to London over thirty years ago, and I’ve been entranced by them ever since. I wrote several stories about them, but never quite managed to get them out of my system, so I suppose my writing Blackout/All Clear was inevitable.

That era is just so fascinating—the blackout, the gas masks, the kids being sent off to who-knows-where, old men and middle-aged women suddenly finding themselves in uniform and in danger, tube shelters and Ultra and Dunkirk, and, running through it all, the threat of German tanks rolling down Piccadilly! What’s not to like?

And though there were kajillions of novels about World War II, nearly all of them were about the military side of things— hardly any about the shopgirls and maidservants and actors and reporters who were equally essential to winning the war. So I thought I’d write about them.

I didn’t think it would take eight years to do it and that it would be such a long book. Neither did Bantam or my editor Anne Groeli, and I owe them a huge debt of gratitude for sticking with me through a process that ended up taking even longer than the war. Thank you!

And thanks to Robert A. Heinlein, who first introduced me to time travel, and Rumer Godden, who first introduced me to the Blitz! And to the devoted fire watch who saved St. Pauls!

“What do you mean, we’re halfway across the Channel?” Mike shouted, lurching to the stern of the boat. There was no land in sight, nothing but water and darkness on all sides. He groped his way back to the helm and the Commander. “You have to turn back!”

“You said you were a war correspondent, Kansas,” the Commander shouted back at him, his voice muffled by the wind. “Well, here’s your chance to cover the war instead of writing about beach fortifications. The whole bloody British Army’s trapped at Dunkirk, and we’re going to rescue them!”

But you can’t go to Dunkirk, Mike thought, still trying to absorb what had happened. It’s impossible. Dunkirk’s a divergence point. Besides, this wasn’t the way the evacuation had operated. The small craft hadn’t set off on their own. That had been considered far too dangerous. They’d been organized into convoys led by naval destroyers.

“You’ve got to go back to Dover,” he shouted, trying to make himself heard against the sound of the chugging engine and the wet, salt-laden wind. “You’ve got to go back to Dover! The Navy—”

“The Navy?” the Commander snorted. “I wouldn’t trust those paper-pushers to lead me across a mud puddle. When we bring back a boatload of our boys, they’ll see just how seaworthy the Lady Jane is!”

“But you don’t have any charts, and the Channel’s mined—“

“I’ve been piloting this Channel by dead-reckoning since before those young pups from the Small Vessels Pool were born. We won’t let a few mines stop us, will we, Jonathan?”

“Jonathan? You brought Jonathan? He’s fourteen years old!”

Jonathan emerged out of the bow’s darkness half-dragging, half-carrying a huge coil of rope. “Isn’t this exciting?” he said. “We’re going to go rescue the British Expeditionary Force from the Germans. We’re going to be heroes!”

“But you don’t have official clearance,” Mike said, desperately trying to think of some argument that would convince them to turn back. “And you’re not armed—”

“Armed?” the Commander bellowed, taking one hand off the wheel to reach inside his peacoat and pull out an ancient pistol. “Of course we’re armed. We’ve got everything we need.” He waved one hand toward the bow. “Extra rope, extra petrol—”

Mike squinted through the darkness to where he was pointing. He could just make out square metal cans lashed to the gunwales. Oh, Christ. “How much gas—petrol—do you have on board?”

“Twenty five-gallon tins,” Jonathan said eagerly. “We’ve more down in the hold.”

Enough to blow us sky-high if we’re hit by a torpedo.

“Jonathan,” the Commander bellowed, “stow that rope in the stern and go check the bilge pump.”

“Aye, aye, Commander.” Jonathan started for the stern.

Mike went after him. “Jonathan, listen, you’ve got to convince your grandfather to turn back. What he’s doing is—” he was going to say “suicidal,” but settled for, “against Navy regulations. He’ll lose his chance to be recommissioned—”

“Recommissioned?” Jonathan said blankly. “Grandfather was never in the Navy.”

Oh, God, he’d probably never been across the Channel either. “Jonathan!” the Commander called. “I told you to go check the bilge pump. And, Kansas, go below and put your shoes on. And have a drink. You look like death.”

That’s because we’re going to die, Mike thought, trying to think of some argument that would convince him to turn the boat around and head back to Saltram-on-Sea. But there wasn’t one. Nothing short of knocking him out with the butt of that pistol and taking the wheel would work, and then what? He knew even less than the Commander did about piloting a boat, and there weren’t any charts on board, even if he could decipher them, which he doubted.

“Get yourself some dinner,” the Commander ordered. “We’ve a long night’s work ahead of us.”

They had no idea what they were getting into. Over sixty of the small craft that had gone over to Dunkirk had been sunk and their crews injured or killed. Mike started down the ladder. “There’s some of that pilchard stew left,” the Commander called down after him.

I don’t need to eat, Mike thought, descending into the hold, which now had a full foot of water in it. I need to think. How could they be going to Dunkirk? It was impossible. The laws of time travel didn’t allow historians anywhere near divergence points. Unless Dunkirk isn’t a divergence point, he thought, wading over to the bunk to retrieve his shoes and socks.

They were in the farthest corner. Mike clambered up onto the bunk to get them and then sat there with a shoe in his hand, staring blindly at it, considering the possibility. Dunkirk had been a major turning point in the war. If the soldiers had been captured by the Germans, the invasion of England, and its surrender, would have been inevitable. But it wasn’t a single discrete event, like Lincoln’s assassination or the sinking of the Titanic, where a historian making a grab for John Wilkes Booth’s pistol or shouting “Iceberg ahead!” could alter the entire course of events. He couldn’t keep the entire British Expeditionary Force from being rescued, no matter what he did. There were too many boats, too many people involved, spread over too great an area. Even if a historian wanted to alter the outcome of the evacuation, he couldn’t.

But he could alter individual events. Dunkirk had been full of narrow escapes and near misses. A five-minute delay in landing could put a boat underneath a bomb from a Stuka or turn a near-miss into a direct hit, and a five-degree change in steering could mean the difference between it being grounded or making it out of the harbor.

Anything I do could get the Lady Jane sunk, Mike thought, horrified. Which means I don’t dare do anything. I’ve got to stay down here till we’re safely out of Dunkirk. Maybe he could feign seasickness, or cowardice.

But even his mere presence here could alter events. At a divergence point, history balanced on a knife-edge, and his merely being on board could be enough to tilt the balance. Most of the small craft who’d come back from Dunkirk had been packed to capacity. His presence might mean there wasn’t room for a soldier who’d otherwise have been saved—a soldier who would have gone on to do something critical at Tobruk or Normandy or the Battle of the Bulge.

But if his presence at Dunkirk would have altered events and caused a paradox, then the net would never have let him through. It would have refused to open, the way it had in Dover and Ramsgate and all those other places Badri had tried. The fact that it had let him through at Saltram-on-Sea meant that he hadn’t done anything at Dunkirk to alter events, or that whatever he’d done hadn’t affected the course of history.

Or that he hadn’t made it to Dunkirk. Which meant the Lady Jane had hit a mine or been sunk by a German U-boat—or the rising water in her hold—before she ever got there. She wouldn’t be the only boat that had happened to.

I knew I should have memorized that asterisked list of small craft, he thought. And I should have remembered that slippage isn’t the only way the continuum has of keeping historians from altering the course of history.

There was a sudden pounding of footsteps overhead and Jonathan poked his head down the hatch. “Grandfather sent me to fetch you,” he said breathlessly.

“Get the bloody hell up here!” the Commander shouted over Jonathan’s voice.

They’ve spotted the U-boat, Mike thought, grabbing his shoes and wading over to the ladder. He clambered up it. Jonathan was leaning over the hatch, looking excited. “Grandfather needs you to navigate,” he said.

“I thought he didn’t have any charts,” Mike said.

“He doesn’t,” Jonathan said. “He—”

“Now!” the Commander roared.

“We’re here,” Jonathan said. “He needs us to guide him through the harbor.”

“What do you mean, we’re here?” Mike said, hauling himself up the ladder and onto the deck. “We can’t be—”

But they were. The harbor lay in front of them, lit by a pinkish-orange glow that illuminated two destroyers and dozens of small boats. And behind it, on fire and half-obscured by towering plumes of black smoke, was Dunkirk.

Cess opened the door of the office and leaned in. “Worthing!” he called, and when he didn’t answer, “Ernest! Stop playing reporter and come with me. I need you on a job.”

Ernest kept typing. “Can’t,” he said through the pencil between his teeth. “I’ve got five newspaper articles and ten pages of transmissions to write.”

“You can do them later,” Cess said. “The tanks are here. We need to blow them up.”

Ernest removed the pencil from between his teeth and said, “I thought the tanks were Gwendolyn’s job.”

“He’s in Hawkhurst. Dental appointment.”

“Which takes priority over tanks? I can see the history books now. ‘World War II was lost due to a toothache.’”

“It’s not a toothache, it’s a cracked filling,” Cess said. “And it’ll do you good to get a bit of fresh air.” Cess yanked the sheet of paper out of the typewriter. “You can write your fairy tales later.”

“No, I can’t,” Ernest said, making an unsuccessful grab for the paper. “If I don’t get these stories in by tomorrow morning, they won’t be in Tuesday’s edition, and Lady Bracknell will have my head.”

Cess held it out of reach. ‘“The Steeple Cross Women’s Institute held a tea Friday afternoon,”‘ he read aloud, “‘to welcome the officers of the 21^st Airborne to the village.’ Definitely more important than blowing up tanks. Front page stuff, Worthing. This’ll be in the times, I presume?”

“The Sudbury Weekly Shopper,” he said, making another grab for it, this time successful. “And it’s due at nine tomorrow morning along with four others which I haven’t finished yet. And, thanks to you, I already missed last week’s deadline. Take Moncrieff with you.”

“He’s down with a bad cold.”

“Which he no doubt caught while blowing up tanks in the pouring rain. Not exactly my idea of fun,” Ernest said, rolling a new sheet of paper into the typewriter.

“It’s not raining,” Cess said. “There’s only a light fog, and it’s supposed to clear by morning. Perfect flying weather. That’s why we’ve got to blow them up tonight. It’ll only take an hour or two. You’ll be back in more than enough time to finish your articles and get them over to Sudbury.”

Ernest didn’t believe that any more than he believed it wasn’t raining. It had rained all spring. “There must be someone else in this castle who can do it. What about Lady Bracknell? He’d be perfect for the job. He’s full of hot air.”

“He’s in London, meeting with the higher-ups, and everyone else is over at Camp Omaha. Come on, Worthing, do you want to tell your children you sat at a typewriter all through the war or that you blew up tanks?”

“What makes you think we’ll ever be allowed to tell anyone anything, Cess?”

“I suppose that’s true. But surely by the time we have grandchildren, some of it will have been declassified. That is, if we win the war, which we won’t if you don’t help. I can’t manage both the tanks and the cutter on my own.” “Oh, all right,” Ernest said, pulling the story out of the typewriter and putting it in a file folder on top of several others. “Give me five minutes to lock up.”

“Lock up? Do you honestly think Goebbels is going to break in and steal your tea party story while we’re gone?”

“I’m only following regulations,” Ernest said, swiveling his chair to face the metal filing cabinet. He opened the second drawer down, filed the folder, then fished a ring of keys out of his pocket and locked the cabinet. ‘“All written materials of Fortitude South and the Special Means unit shall be considered ‘top top secret’ and handled accordingly.’ And speaking of regulations, if I’m going to be in some bloody cow pasture all night, I need a decent pair of boots. ‘All officers are to be issued appropriate gear for missions.’”

Cess handed him an umbrella. “Here.”

“I thought you said fog, not rain.”

“Light fog. Clearing towards morning. And wear an army uniform, in case someone shows up in the middle of the operation. You have two minutes. I want to be there before dark.” He went out.

Ernest waited, listening, till he heard the outside door slam, then swiftly unlocked the file drawer, pulled out the folder, removed several of the pages, replaced the file, and relocked the drawer. He slid the pages he’d removed into a manila envelope, sealed it, and stuck it under a stack of forms in the bottom drawer of the desk. Then he took a key from around his neck, locked the drawer, hung the key around his neck again under his shirt, picked up the umbrella, put on his uniform and his boots, and went outside. Into an all-enveloping dark grayness. If this was what Cess considered a light fog, he shuddered to think what a heavy one was. He couldn’t see the tanks or the lorry. He couldn’t even see the gravel driveway at his feet.

But he could hear an engine. He felt his way toward it, his hands out in front of him till they connected with the side of the Landrover. “What took you so long?” Cess asked, leaning out of the fog to open its door. “Get in.”

Ernest climbed in. “I thought you said the tanks were here.”

“They are,” Cess said, roaring off into blackness. “We’ve got to go pick them up in Tenterden and then take them down to Icklesham.”

Tenterden was not “here.” It was fifteen miles in the opposite direction from Icklesham and, in this fog, it would be well after dark before they even got to Tenterden. This’ll take all night, he thought. I’ll never make that deadline. But halfway to Brede, the fog lifted and when they reached Tenterden, everything was, amazingly, loaded and ready to go. Ernest, following Cess and the lorry in the Landrover, began to feel some hope that it wouldn’t take too long to get unloaded and set up, and they might actually be done blowing up the tanks by midnight. Whereupon the fog closed in again, causing Cess to miss the turn for Icklesham twice and the lane once. It was nearly midnight before they located the right pasture.

Ernest parked the Landrover in amongst some bushes and got out to open the gate. He promptly stepped in mud up to his ankles and then, after he’d extricated himself, in a large cowpat. He squelched over to the lorry, looking around for cows, even though, in this foggy darkness he wouldn’t see one till he’d collided with it. “I thought there weren’t supposed to be any cows in this pasture,” he said to Cess.

“There were before, but the farmer moved them into the next one over,” Cess said, leaning out the window. “That’s why we picked this pasture. That, and the large copse of trees over there.” He pointed vaguely out into the murk. “The tanks will be hidden out of sight under the trees.”

“I thought the whole idea was to let the Germans see them.”

“To let them see some of them,” Cess corrected. “There are a dozen in this battalion.”

“We’ve got to blow up a dozen tanks?”

“No, only two. The Army didn’t park them far enough under the trees. Their rear ends can still be seen poking out from under the branches. I think it’ll be easiest if I back across the field. Help me turn around.”

“Are you certain that’s a good idea?” Ernest said. “It’s awfully muddy.”

“That’ll make the tracks more visible. You needn’t worry. This lorry’s got good tyres. I won’t get her stuck.”

He didn’t. Ernest did, driving the lorry back to the gate after they’d unloaded the two tanks. It took them the next two hours to get out of the mudhole, in the process of which Ernest lost his footing and fell flat, and they made a hideous rutted mess out of the center of the field.

“Goering’s boys will never believe tank treads did that,” Ernest said, shining a shielded torch on the churned-up mud.

“You’re right,” Cess said. “We’ll have to put a tank over it to hide it, and—I know!—we’ll make it look as though it got stuck in the mud.”

“Tanks don’t get stuck in the mud.”

“They would in this mud,” Cess said. “We’ll only blow up three quadrants and leave the other one flat, so it’ll look like it’s listing.”

“Do you honestly think they’ll be able to see that from fifteen thousand feet?”

“No idea,” Cess said, “but if we stand here arguing, we won’t be done by morning, and the Germans will see what we’re up to. Here, lend me a hand. We’ll unload the tank and then drive the lorry back to the lane. That way we won’t have to drag it.”

Ernest helped him unload the heavy rubber pallet. Cess connected the pump and began inflating the tank. “Are you certain it’s facing the right way?” Ernest asked. “It should be facing the copse.”

“Oh, right,” Cess said, shielding his torch with his hand and shining it on it. “No, it’s the wrong way round. Here, help me shift it.”

They pushed and shoved and dragged the heavy mass around till it faced the other way. “Now let’s hope it isn’t upside down,” Cess said. “They should put a ‘this end up’ on them, though I suppose that might make the Germans suspicious.” He began to pump. “Oh, good, there’s a tread.”

The front end of a tank began to emerge out of the flat folds of gray-green rubber, looking remarkably tank-like. Ernest watched for a moment, then fetched the phonograph, the small wooden table it sat on, and its speaker. He set them up, got the record from the lorry, placed it on the turntable, and lowered the needle. The sound of tanks rolling thunderously toward him filled the pasture, making it impossible to hear anything Cess said.

On the other hand, he thought as he wrestled the tank-tread cutter off the back of the lorry, he no longer had to switch on his torch. He could find his way simply by following the sound. Unless there were in fact cows in this pasture—which, judging by the number of fresh cowpats he was stepping in, there definitely could be.

Cess had told him on the way to Tenterden that the cutter was perfectly simple to operate. All one had to do was push it, like a lawnmower, but it was at least five times as heavy as the lawnmower at the castle. It required bearing down with one’s whole weight on the handle to make it go even a few inches, it refused to budge at all in grass taller than two inches, and it tended to veer off at an angle. Ernest had to go back to the lorry, fetch a rake, smooth over what he’d done, then redo it several times before he had a more-or-less straight tread mark from the gate to the mired tank.

Cess was still working on the right front quadrant. “Sprang a leak,” he shouted over the rumble of tanks. “Lucky I brought my bicycle patch kit along. Don’t come any nearer! That cutter’s sharp.”

Ernest nodded and hoisted it over in front of where the tank’s other tread would be and started back toward the gate. “How many of these do you want?” he shouted to Cess.

“At least a dozen pair,” Cess shouted, “and some of them need to overlap. I think the fog’s beginning to lift.”

The fog was not beginning to lift. When he switched on his torch so he could return the needle to the beginning of the record, the phonograph was shrouded in mist. And even if it should lift, they wouldn’t be able to tell in this blackness. He looked at his watch. Two o’clock, and they still hadn’t inflated a tank. They were going to be stuck here forever.

Cess finally completed the mired tank and slogged across the field to the copse to do the other two, Ernest following with the cutter, making tread-tracks to indicate where the tanks had driven in under the trees.

Halfway there, the sound of tanks shut off. Damn, he’d forgotten to move the needle. He had to go all the way back across the pasture, start the record again, and he’d no sooner reached the cutter again than the fog did indeed lift. “I told you,” Cess said happily, and it immediately began to rain.

“The phonograph!” Cess cried, and Ernest had to fetch the umbrella and prop it over the phonograph, tying it to the tank’s rubber gun with rope.

The shower lasted till just before dawn, magnifying the mud and making the grass so slippery that Ernest fell down two more times, once racing to move the phonograph needle, which had stuck and was repeating the same three seconds of tank rumbling over and over, and the second time helping Cess repair yet another puncture. “But think of the war story you’ll have to tell your grandchildren!” Cess said as he wiped the mud off.

“I doubt whether I’ll ever have grandchildren,” Ernest said, spitting out mud. “I am beginning to doubt whether I’ll even survive this night.”

“Nonsense, the sun’ll be up any moment, and we’re nearly done here.” Cess leaned down so he could see the treadmarks, which Ernest had to admit looked very realistic. “Make two more tracks, and I’ll finish off this last tank. We’ll be home in time for breakfast.”

And in time for me to finish the articles and run them over to Sudbury by nine, he thought, aligning the tracker with the other treadmarks and pushing them down hard. Which would be good. He didn’t like the idea of those other articles sitting there for another week, even in a locked drawer. Now that he could partially see where he was going and didn’t need to stop and check his path with the torch every few feet, it should only take him twenty minutes to do the treads and load the lorry, and another three-quarters of an hour back to the castle. They should be there by seven at the latest, which should work.

But he’d only gone a few yards before Cess loomed out of the fog and tapped him on the shoulder. “The fog’s beginning to lift,” he said. “We’d best get out of here. I’ll finish off the tanks and you start on stowing the equipment.”

Cess was right; the fog was beginning to thin. Ernest could make out the vague shapes of trees, ghostly in the gray dawn, and across the field a fence and three black-and-white cows placidly chewing grass—luckily, on the far side of it.

Ernest folded up the tarp, untied the umbrella, carried them and the pump to the lorry, and came back for the cutter. He picked it up, decided there was no way he could carry it all the way across the field, set it down, pulled the cord to start it, and pushed it back, making one last track from just in front of the tank’s left tread to the edge of the field, and lugged it, limping, from there to the lorry. By the time he’d hoisted it up into the back, the fog was beginning to break up, tearing apart into long streamers which drifted like veils across the pasture, revealing the long line of treadmarks leading to the copse and the rear end of one imperfectly hidden tank peeking out from the leaves, with the other behind it. Even knowing how it had been done, it looked real, and he wasn’t fifteen thousand feet up. From that height, the deception would be perfect. Unless, of course, there was a phonograph standing in the middle of the pasture.

He started back for it, able to actually see where he was going for several yards at a time, but as he reached the tank, the fog closed in again, thicker than ever, cutting off everything—even the tank next to him. He shut the phonograph and fastened the clasps, then folded up the table. “Cess!” he called in what he thought was his general direction. “How are you coming along?” and the fog abruptly parted, like theatre curtains sweeping open, and he could see the copse of trees and the entire pasture.

And the bull. It stood halfway across the pasture, a huge shaggy brown creature with beady little eyes and enormous horns. It was looking at the tank.

“Hey! You there!” a voice called from the fence. “What do you think you’re doing in my pasture?” And Ernest turned instinctively to look at the farmer standing there. So did the bull. “Get those bloody tanks out of my pasture!” the farmer shouted, angrily jabbing the air with his finger.

The bull watched him, fascinated, for a moment, then swung his head back around. To look directly at Ernest.

By midnight only Polly and the elderly, aristocratic gentleman who always gave her his Times were awake. He had draped his coat over his shoulders and was reading. Everyone else had nodded off, though only Lila and Viv and Mrs. Brightford’s little girls had lain down, Bess and Trot with their heads in their mother’s lap. The others sat drowsing on the bench or the floor, leaning back against the wall. Miss Hibbard had let go of her knitting, and her head had fallen forward onto her chest. The rector and Miss Laburnum were both snoring.

Polly was surprised. One of the things the contemps had complained about was lack of sleep due to the raids, and by midway through the Blitz many Londoners had abandoned the shelters and gone back to their own beds, more desperate for a good night’s sleep than they were frightened of the bombs. But this group didn’t seem bothered by the uncomfortable sleeping conditions or the noise, even though the raid was picking up in intensity again. The anti-aircraft gun in Kensington Gardens started up, and another wave of planes growled overhead.

She wondered if this was the wave of bombers which would hit John Lewis. No, they sounded nearer—Mayfair? It and Bloomsbury had both been hit as well as central London, and after they’d finished with Oxford Street, they’d hit Regent Street and the BBC studios. She’d better try to sleep while she could. She would need to start off early tomorrow morning, though she wondered if the department stores would even be open.

London businesses had prided themselves on remaining open throughout the Blitz, and Padgett’s and John Lewis had both managed to reopen after a few weeks. But what about the day after the bombing? Would the stores which hadn’t been damaged be open, or would the whole street be off-limits, like the area around St. Paul’s? And for how long? If I haven’t got a job by tomorrow night—

Of course they’ll be open, she thought. Think of all those window signs the Blitz was famous for: “Hitler can smash our windows, but he can’t match our prices,” and “It’s bomb marché in Oxford Street this week.” And that photograph of a woman reaching through a broken display window to feel the fabric of a frock. It might even be a good day to apply for a position. It would show the raids didn’t frighten her, and if some of the shopgirls weren’t able to make it into work because of bombed bus routes, the stores might hire her to fill in.

But she’d also have to compete with all those suddenly unemployed John Lewis shopgirls, and they’d be more likely to be taken on than she would, out of sympathy. Perhaps I should tell them I worked there, she thought.

She folded her coat into a pillow and lay down, but she couldn’t sleep. The droning planes were too loud. They sounded like monstrous, buzzing wasps, and they were growing louder—and nearer—by the moment. Polly sat up. The noise had wakened the rector, too. He’d sat up and was looking nervously at the ceiling. There was a whoosh, and then a huge explosion. Mr. Dorming jerked upright. “What the bloody hell—?” he said, and then, “Sorry, rector.”

“Quite understandable given the circumstances,” the rector said. “They seem to have begun again.” Which was an understatement even for a con-temp. The gun in Battersea Park was going full blast, and he had to shout to make himself heard. “I do hope those girls are all right. The ones who were trying to find Gloucester Terrace.”

The gun in Kensington Gardens started in again, and Irene sat up, rubbing her eyes. “Shh, go back to sleep,” Mrs. Brightford murmured, looking over at Mr. Dorming, who was staring at the door. The raid seemed to be just outside it, whumps and bangs and long, shuddering booms, that woke up Nelson and Mr. Simms and the rest of the women. Mrs. Rickett looked annoyed, but everyone else looked wary and then worried.

“Perhaps we shouldn’t have allowed the girls go,” Miss Laburnum said.

Trot crawled into her mother’s lap. “Shh,” Mrs. Brightford said, patting her. “It’s all right.” No, it’s not, Polly thought, watching their faces. They had the same look they’d had when the knocking began. If the raid didn’t let up soon . . .

Every anti-aircraft gun in London was firing—a chorus of deafening thump-thump-thumps, punctuated by the thud and crash of bombs. The din grew louder and louder. Everyone’s eyes strayed to the ceiling, as if expecting it to crash in at any moment. There was a screech, like tearing metal, and then an ear-splitting boom. Miss Hibbard jumped and dropped her knitting, and Bess began to cry.

“The bombardment does seem rather more severe this evening,” the rector said.

Rather more severe. It sounded like the planes—and the anti-aircraft guns—were fighting it out in the sanctuary upstairs. Kensington wasn’t hit, she told herself.

“Perhaps we should sing,” the rector shouted over the cacophony.

“That’s an excellent idea,” Mrs. Wyvern said, and launched into, “God save our noble king.” Miss Laburnum and then Mr. Simms joined in, but they could scarcely be heard above the roar and scream outside, and the rector made no attempt to go on to the second verse. One by one, everyone stopped singing and stared anxiously up at the ceiling.

An HE exploded so close the beams of the shelter shook, followed immediately by another even closer, drowning out the sound of the guns, but not the planes droning endlessly, maddeningly overhead. “Why isn’t it letting up?” Viv asked, and Polly could hear the panic in her voice.

“I don’t like it!” Trot wailed, clapping her small hands over her ears. “It’s loud!”

“Indeed,” the elderly gentleman said from his corner. “‘The isle is full of noises,”‘ and Polly looked over at him in surprise. His voice had changed completely from the quiet, well-bred voice of a gentleman to a deep, commanding tone which made even the little girls stop crying and look at him.

He shut his book and laid it on the floor beside him. ‘“With strange and several noises,”‘ he said, getting to his feet, ‘“of roaring . . .’” He shrugged his coat from his shoulders, as if throwing off a cloak to reveal himself as a magician, a king. “‘With shrieking, howling, and more diversity of sounds, all horrible, we were awaked.’”

He strode suddenly to the center of the cellar. “‘To the dread rattling thunder have I given fire,”‘ he shouted, seeming to Polly to have grown to twice his size. “‘The strong-bas’d promontory have I made shake!”‘ His resonant voice reached every corner of the cellar. “‘Sometime I’d divide and burn in many places,”‘ he said, pointing dramatically at the ceiling, the floor, the door in turn as he spoke, “‘on the topmast, the yards, and bowsprit would I flame—‘” He flung both arms out, “‘Then meet and join.’”

Above, a bomb crashed, close enough to rattle the tea urn and the teacups, but no one glanced over at them. They were all watching him, their fear gone, and even though the terrifying racket hadn’t diminished, and his words, rather than attempting to distract them from the noise, were drawing attention to it, describing it, the din was no longer frightening. It had become mere stage effects, clashing cymbals and sheets of rattled tin, providing a dramatic background to his voice. “‘A plague upon this howling!”‘ he cried, “They are louder than the weather or our office,’” and went straight into Prospero’s epilogue and from there into Lear’s mad scene, and finally Henry V, while his audience listened, entranced.

At some point the cacophony outside had diminished, fading till there was nothing but the muffled poom-poom-poom of an anti-aircraft gun off to the northeast, but no one in the room had noticed. Which was, of course, the point. Polly gazed at him in admiration.

“‘This story shall the good man teach his son, from this day to the ending of the world,”‘ he said, his voice ringing through the cellar, ‘“but we in it shall be remembered—we few, we happy few, we band of brothers.’” His voice died away on the last words, like a bell echoing into silence. “‘The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve,”‘ he whispered. “‘Sweet friends, to bed,”‘ and bowed his head, his hand on his heart.

There was a moment of entranced silence, followed by Miss Hibbard’s, “Oh, my!” and general applause. Trot clapped wildly, and even Mr. Dorming joined in. The gentleman bowed deeply, retrieved his coat from the floor and returned to his corner and his book. Mrs. Brightford gathered her girls to her, and Nelson and Lila and Viv composed themselves to sleep, one after the other, like children who’d been told a bedtime story. Polly went over to sit next to Miss Laburnum and the rector. “Who is he?” she whispered.

“You mean you don’t know?” Miss Laburnum said,

Polly hoped he wasn’t so famous that her failing to recognize him would be suspicious. “He’s Godfrey Kingsman,” the rector explained, “the Shakespearean actor.”

“England’s greatest actor,” Miss Laburnum said.

Mrs. Rickett sniffed. “If he’s such a great actor, what’s he doing sitting in this shelter? Why isn’t he on stage?”

“You know perfectly well the theatres are closed because of the raids,” Miss Laburnum said heatedly. “Until the government reopens them—”

“All I know is, I don’t let rooms to actors,” Mrs. Rickett said. “They can’t be relied on to pay their rent.”

Miss Laburnum went very red. “Sir Godfrey—”

“He’s been knighted then?” Polly asked hastily.

“By King Edward,” Miss Laburnum said. “I can’t imagine that you’ve never heard of him, Miss Sebastian. His Lear is renowned! I saw him in Hamlet when I was a girl, and he was simply marvelous!”

He’s rather marvelous now, Polly thought.

“He’s appeared before all the crowned heads of Europe,” Miss Laburnum said. “And to think he honored us with a performance tonight.”

Mrs. Rickett sniffed again, and Miss Laburnum was only stopped from saying something regrettable by the all clear. The sleepers sat up and yawned, and everyone began to gather their belongings. Sir Godfrey marked his place in his book, shut it, and stood up. Miss Laburnum and Miss Hibbard scurried over to him to tell him how wonderful he’d been. “It was so inspiring,” Miss Laburnum said, “especially the speech from Hamlet.”

Polly suppressed a smile. Sir Godfrey thanked the two ladies solemnly, his voice quiet and refined again. Watching him putting on his coat and picking up his umbrella, it was hard to believe he’d just given that mesmerizing performance.

Lila and Viv folded their blankets and gathered up their magazines, Mr. Dorming picked up his thermos, Mrs. Brightford picked up Trot, and they all converged on the door. The rector pulled the bolt back and opened it, and as he did, Polly caught an echo of the tense, frightened look they’d had before Sir Godfrey intervened, this time for what they might find when they went through that door and up those steps: their houses gone, London in ruins. Or German tanks driving down Lampden Road.

The rector stepped back from the opened door to let them through, but no one moved, not even Nelson, who’d been cooped up since before midnight.

‘“Hie you, make haste!”‘ Sir Godfrey’s clarion voice rang out, “‘See this dispatch’d with all the haste thou canst,”‘ and Nelson shot through the door.

Everyone laughed.

“Nelson, come back!” Mr. Simms shouted and ran after him. He called down from the top of the steps, “No damage I can see,” and the rest of them trooped up the steps and looked around at the street, peaceful in the dim, gray predawn light. The buildings were all intact, though there was a smoky pall in the air, and a sharp smell of cordite and burning wood.

“Lambeth got it last night,” Mr. Dorming said, pointing at plumes of black smoke off to the southeast.

“And Piccadilly Circus, looks like,” Mr. Simms said, coming back with Nelson and pointing at what was actually Oxford Street and the smoke from John Lewis. Mr. Dorming was wrong, too. Shoreditch and Whitechapel had taken the brunt of the first round of raids, not Lambeth, but from the look of the smoke, nowhere in the East End was safe.

“I don’t understand,” Lila said, looking around at the tranquil scene. “It sounded like it was bang on top of us.”

“What will it sound like if it is on top of us, I wonder?” Viv asked.

“I’ve heard one hears a very loud, very high-pitched scream,” Mr. Simms began, but Mr. Dorming was shaking his head.

“You won’t hear it,” he said, “You’ll never know what hit you,” and stomped away.

“Cheerful,” Viv said, looking after him.

Lila was still looking toward the smoke of Oxford Street. “I suppose the Underground won’t be running,” she said glumly, “and it’ll take us ages to get to work.”

“And when we get there,” Viv said, “the windows will have been blown out again. We’ll have to spend all day sweeping up.”

‘“What’s this, varlets?”‘ Sir Godfrey roared. “‘Do I hear talk of terror and defeat? Stiffen the sinews! Summon up the blood!”‘

Lila and Viv giggled.

Sir Godfrey drew his umbrella like a sword. “‘Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more!”‘ he shouted, raising it high, “We fight for England!”‘

“Oh, I do love Richard the Third!” Miss Laburnum said.

Sir Godfrey gripped the umbrella handle violently, and for a moment Polly thought he was going to run Miss Laburnum through, but instead he hooked it over his arm. ‘“And if we no more meet till we meet in heaven,”‘ he said, “‘then joyfully, my noble lords and my kind kinsmen, warriors all, adieu!”‘ and strode off, umbrella in hand, as if going into battle.

Which he is, Polly thought, watching him. Which they all are.

“How marvellous!” Miss Laburnum said. “Do you think if we asked him, he’d do another play tomorrow? The Tempest, perhaps, or Henry the Fifth?’

Connie Willis has won seven Nebulas, more than any other writer, and was the first author to win the Nebula in all four categories.