“But I thought—you said he was down at the Old Bailey.”

“He is. Oh, you thought because I said he’d been detained that he was the defendant.” She laughed. “Oh, dear, I must tell Alf that. No, he’s had an important case on this week, and the jury stayed out longer than expected.”

“He’s a barrister?” Colin said, astonished.

“No,” she said, and laughed again. “He’s a judge.”

All shall be well, and

All manner of thing shall be well.

—T. S. ELIOT, FOUR QUARTETS

London—7 May 1945

AT THREE, EILEEN PICKED UP COLONEL ABRAMS FROM THE Savoy in the staff car. “To the War Office, Lieutenant,” he said.

“Yes, sir,” she said. She pulled out of the drive onto the Strand and then jammed on the brakes as a man ran straight in front of the car and across the road, shouting, “It’s here!”

“It’s not a V-2, is it?” Colonel Abrams, who was newly arrived from the States, said, peering anxiously out the window.

“No,” she said. It’s the end of the war.

And as soon as she’d delivered him to the War Office and he’d gone inside, she drove straight to Alf and Binnie’s school.

“I’ve come for Alf and Binnie,” she told the headmistress. “I need to take them home with me at once.”

“Have you heard something, then?” the headmistress asked.

And what should she answer? The surrender wouldn’t be officially announced till tomorrow, even though it had been signed at three this morning. And the newsagents’ signboards she’d seen on the way had said only, Surrender Soon?

“I haven’t heard anything official,” she said, “but everyone’s been saying they expect the announcement at any moment.”

The headmistress beamed. “I’ll fetch them,” she said, and bustled off down the corridor.

She was gone for what seemed like forever. They’d better not have chosen today to play truant, Eileen thought anxiously.

She leaned out the door to look down the corridor, and caught a glimpse of a teenaged girl at the end of it, taking her coat out of the cupboard. The girl was tall and graceful, with shining blonde hair. What a pretty girl, Eileen thought.

The girl shut the cupboard and turned, and Eileen realized with a shock that it was Binnie. Oh, my, she’s nearly grown up, Eileen thought, and then saw the stunned look on Binnie’s face.

She’d seen that look before—on Mike’s face when she told him Polly had already been here, on Polly’s face when the warden told them Mike was dead.

Binnie thinks something dreadful’s happened, Eileen thought, and hurried down the corridor to reassure her. “It’s not bad news. The war’s over. Aren’t you excited?”

“Yes,” Binnie said, but she didn’t sound excited.

She’d been very moody lately. Don’t be difficult tonight, Eileen thought. I haven’t time for this. “Where’s your brother?” she asked.

Alf came tearing down the corridor, shirttail out, socks down, tie askew, followed by the headmistress.

“The war’s over, ain’t it?” he said, skidding to a stop inches from Eileen. “I knew it was going to be today. When’d you hear? We been listenin’ to the wireless in class all day”—he glanced guiltily at the headmistress, but she was still beaming—“but they haven’t said anything at all!”