“Do you know these children?” the matron demanded.

“They’re my foster children,” Eileen said, coming in. “I told them to stay in the waiting room while I visited Polly. They’ve been very worried over their aunt,” she explained.

Alf nodded. “We was scared she was dead.”

“We was orphaned before, you see,” Binnie said, sniffling.

Alf patted his sister kindly. “We ain’t got nobody to take care of us ’cept Aunt Eileen and Aunt Polly.”

“I’m sorry if they attempted to come up to the ward to see me,” Polly said. “They meant well—”

“Attempted to come up to the ward?” the matron said. “They’ve turned this entire hospital upside down. They’ve been racketing through the corridors, terrorizing patients, wreaking—”

“We was only trying to catch Alf’s snake,” Binnie said, “ ’afore it frightened anyone.”

“Snake?” the matron said. “You two let a snake loose in hospital?”

“Course not,” Binnie said, her eyes wide and innocent. “ ’E got away on ’is own, didn’t ’e?”

“But don’t worry, we caught ’im,” Alf said, pulling a snake out of his pocket and dangling it in front of the matron.

The matron blanched. “I want these two children—and their reptile—out of this hospital immediately.”

“Yes, Matron,” Eileen said, and hustled the children out.

“I’m afraid they’ll only come back,” Polly said. “They’re very much attached to me.” And within a quarter of an hour she was pronounced fully recovered, discharged, and allowed to telephone someone—but not Eileen—to bring her her clothes and handbag.

Polly rang up Hattie and spent the time till Hattie got there from the Alhambra thinking of everything that had happened, trying to fit it into the puzzle.

Because she’d driven Stephen, Paige Fairchild had gone with her to Croydon and had stopped the car to confront Polly. If she hadn’t, they wouldn’t have been there when the V-1 hit, they wouldn’t have found the man with the severed foot. Had she saved his life, too?

I hope so, Polly thought, remembering how he’d clutched her hand, how he’d told her he was sorry.

Just as I told Sir Godfrey I was sorry for getting him killed. But the man at Croydon hadn’t got either of them killed. It was just the opposite. If Paige hadn’t been bringing the medical kit, she’d have been in the ambulance when the V-2 hit and been killed. So why had he said he was sorry—?

“Oh, thank goodness you’re all right!” Hattie said, bursting into the ward. “I was so afraid—I kept telling the incident officer Reggie’d seen you run into the Phoenix, but it took me an age to convince him.” She handed Polly her clothes. “Tabbitt says you’re not to come in tonight or tomorrow night.”

Good, Polly thought. That will give me time to go to St. Bart’s. But when she arrived home, Eileen wouldn’t hear of it. “You’re going to bed,” she said. “You’ve only just got out of hospital, I’ll go. What is it you want me to find out?”