London—December 1940

MIKE STILL WASN’T BACK BY CHRISTMAS EVE.

“Do you think he’ll come tonight?” Eileen asked Polly as they rode down the escalator to Piccadilly Station to perform A Christmas Carol.

The man behind them said, laughing, “Ain’t you a bit old to believe in Father Christmas, dearie?”

“You fool, she wasn’t talkin’ about Father Christmas,” his companion said. “She was talkin’ about ’Itler.” He nodded at Eileen. “I’ll give you six-to-one odds ’e’ll come tonight. It’d be just like ’im to try to ruin our Christmas, the little bastard.”

They had obviously both had more than a little Christmas cheer.

“That’s no way to talk in the presence of ladies, you bleedin’ sod,” the first man said belligerently, and Polly hoped they wouldn’t come to blows there on the escalator.

But the other man tipped his cap and said, “Beggin’ your pardon, misses. I shouldn’t ’ave called ’Itler a little bastard. ’E’s the biggest bastard what ever lived. And I’ll wager five bob ’e’s up to something. A nasty Christmas surprise. You watch. Them sirens’ll go any minute now.”

They wouldn’t, but it was obvious he wasn’t the only one who thought that. There were more people in the station than there had been in the last two weeks, all with their bedrolls and picnic baskets. The woman just below them on the escalator had a Harrods carrier bag full of Christmas presents, and two toddlers had each brought a long brown stocking with them.

The two men weren’t the only ones who’d been drinking. There were periodic outbursts of too-loud laughter and unsteady choruses of “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen” on the platforms. And during their performance, when Sir Godfrey as Scrooge launched into his “Bah, humbug!” speech, someone shouted from the audience, “What you need is a spot of rum, you auld sod!”

The troupe gave two performances, the first in the main hall and the second on a stage built out over the tracks on the westbound Piccadilly Line platform after the trains had stopped. Even with the stage, the platform was still too small to accommodate the crowd. “Do you see that crutch by the fireplace, tenderly preserved?” Sir Godfrey muttered to Polly. “That’s Tiny Tim’s. He was pushed onto the track by his adoring public and run over by a train.”

“But at least he wasn’t doing panto when he died,” Polly whispered back.

“Or, God forbid, Peter Pan,” Sir Godfrey said, and made his entrance.

Scrooge bahhed, humbugged, saw the ghost of Marley (Mr. Simms), traveled to the past and back to the future, learned the error of his ways, made amends, and prevented Tiny Tim from dying, in front of a large and enthusiastic crowd, which Polly and Eileen both scanned for Mike.

But he didn’t come. He wasn’t waiting for them outside Notting Hill Gate or at Mrs. Leary’s either. And all that was waiting for them at their boardinghouse was the news that Mrs. Rickett had taken the Christmas goose and plum pudding—purchased with her boarders’ ration points—with her when she went to her sister’s and left them turnip soup for their Christmas dinner.