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?”

“What do you mean? There were thousands of people in Trafalgar Square that night—”

“Was I one of them?” If she had seen him, it would be proof they hadn’t got out, that they’d still been there when Polly’s deadline passed.

“No,” Polly said. “I didn’t see you.”

“Did you see something else, something that made you think she was there because we didn’t get out?”

“No, nothing except that our drops won’t open and Mr. Dunworthy was worried about a slippage increase and was changing assignments to chronological—”

“But he didn’t change yours. And the fact that you didn’t see me there with Eileen means she’s right. She was there on a later assignment. Otherwise, I’d have been there with her. How did she look? Excited? Sad?”

“Not sad,” Polly said, frowning as if trying to remember. “Optimistic,” she said finally.

He looked hard at her, trying to decide if she was still keeping something from him. “You’re sure it was Eileen? That it wasn’t just somebody who looked like her?”

“No, I’m certain it was her.”

“Then why, when I left for Bletchley Park, were you so worried about Marjorie?”

“Because I did change what happened. And a nurse is in a position to save who knows how many lives—”

“But whatever she does, we know it can’t lose the war. You may have gone to VE-Day before all this other stuff happened, but Eileen didn’t. She hasn’t gone yet. She went after I saved Hardy and after Marjorie was dug out of the rubble.”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Polly said.

“Well, it’s true. Either we didn’t alter events or there was no lasting harm done,” Mike said. “I wish you’d told me all this before I left for Bletchley Park. I got worried after that encounter with Turing.”

“Turing? Alan Turing?” Polly cried. “What encounter?”

“He nearly ran me down with his bicycle,” Mike said. “He swerved at the last minute, and crashed into a lamppost. He wasn’t hurt, and neither was his bike, but when I found out it was him, it scared me to death. But thank God it didn’t do any damage. I’ll be right back.”

He ran inside to ask Mrs. Leary if he’d received anything while he was gone and then came back out. “No letter and no messages,” he said. “Where’s Eileen? Isn’t she back?”

“No, she must have got caught by Miss Laburnum. She’s doing the costumes for the play. We’d best go rescue her.” But as they came round the corner they saw Eileen running toward them, waving a letter.