“No,” I said. “No, I haven’t, but we read The Children’s Homer in school.” I stood up. “I have to help Jane get ready for bed.”

“Isn’t she in bed already?” Miss Lind tilted her head to look up at me with her crooked smile.

“Yes, but—I have to turn out the fire. And the standing lamp. You’re all right now, aren’t you? You did that perfectly.”

Beneath the powder and lipstick her face nagged at me, familiar—until all I could think was that she reminded me a bit of Felix Baer himself. With his bruised eyes and swollen nose I couldn’t tell what he really looked like, either.

Miss Lind stood up now too, in a swish of gray and black silk. She snatched my hand and squeezed it as if we’d known each other for years.

“I won’t keep you,” she said. “But I don’t know if I shall get you to myself again. I can’t ask you about Odysseus when anyone’s listening.”

I stood still, my hand in hers.

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said carefully. “I thought you were here to help Wing Commander Cromwell while he’s questioning the Germans.”

“Let’s not play this stupid game,” she said. “I know you’ve heard the name Odysseus because I’ve been briefed about everything that’s happened here. I know he’s one of the Germans locked up in those awful pits below the hill; he’s Felix Baer, the pilot. He’s supposed to talk to me. They’re all supposed to talk to me; I’m standing in for their British contact. I even have a code name from The Odyssey, which Eberhard Moritz made up himself just in case this happened, so they can identify me and trust me.”

It took every ounce of strength in my body not to pull my hand away. My skin crawled with suspicion, as if I’d bathed in syrup and woken up covered with ants. I said quietly, “What do you need me for, then?”

“My code name is Calypso.” Miss Lind let go of my hand. “Do you remember who Calypso is, from your Children’s Homer? She’s a goddess who lures Odysseus to her lonely island by singing to him. Then she won’t let him leave for seven years.” She hugged the gray silk around her. “Calypso is also a type of music in the West Indies. Perhaps you know that.”

“Yes, in Trinidad,” I said.

“Where are you from?” she asked me. “Jamaica, isn’t that right? An island in the Caribbean Sea, like Trinidad. Even the British tried to ban calypso music, and I’m sure most Germans don’t bother to distinguish where it comes from, if they’ve even heard of it. Just another type of forbidden music from a West Indian island full of British subjects of the Crown.”