Blackout

London-15 September 1940

THE NICE THING ABOUT TIME-LAG WAS THAT ONE COULD sleep lying on a cold stone floor with bombs crashing and anti-aircraft guns roaring. Polly even slept through the all clear. When she woke, only Lila and Viv were still there, folding up the blanket they’d sat on, and the sour-faced Mrs. Rickett.

She’s probably staying to make certain I don’t take anything when I leave, Polly thought, picking up her satchel and the “to let” listings, and wondering how early on a Sunday it was acceptable to show up to look at a room. She glanced at her watch. Half past six. Not as early as this. It was too bad she couldn’t stay here and sleep. She still felt drugged, but Mrs. Rickett, her thin arms folded grimly across her chest as she glared at Lila and Viv, was hardly likely to allow that.

They went out, giggling, and Mrs. Rickett started over to Polly. To hurry me along, Polly thought, putting her coat on. “I’ll only be a moment-” she began.

“You said you were looking for a room?” Mrs. Rickett said, pointing at the newspaper in Polly’s hand.

“Yes.”

“I have one,” Mrs. Rickett said. “I run a boardinghouse. I intended to put it in the papers, but if you’re interested it’s at 14 Cardle Street. You can come along with me now and see it if you like. It’s not far.”

And it was one of Mr. Dunworthy’s approved addresses. “Yes,” Polly said, following her out the door and up the steps. “Thank you.” She stopped and stared up at the building they’d come out of, its spire outlined against the dawn sky.

It’s a church, she thought. That explained the clergyman’s presence and the discussion about the altar flowers. The stairs they’d just come up were on the side of the church, and there was a notice board on the wall next to it. “Church of St. George, Kensington,” it read. “The Rev. Floyd Norris, Rector.”

“My single rooms with board are ten and eight,” Mrs. Rickett said, crossing the street. “It’s a nice, cozy room.” Which meant minuscule, and probably appalling.

But it’s only six weeks. Or rather five, with the slippage, Polly thought. And I’ll scarcely ever be in it. I’ll be at the store all day and in the tube shelters at night. “How far is the nearest tube station?” she asked.

“Notting Hill Gate,” Mrs. Rickett said, pointing back the way they’d come. “Three streets over.”

Perfect. Notting Hill Gate wasn’t as deep as Holborn or Bank, but it had never been hit, and it was on the Central Line to Oxford Street. And it was less than a quarter of a mile from Cardle Street. Mr. Dunworthy would be delirious. If the room was habitable.

It was, barely. It was on the third floor, and so “cozy” the bed filled the room and Mrs. Rickett had to squeeze past its foot to get to the wardrobe on the far side. The floor was liver-colored linoleum, the wallpaper was darker still, and even when Mrs. Rickett pulled the blackout curtains back from the single small window, there was scarcely any light. The “facilities” were one flight up, the bathroom two, and hot water was extra.

But it met all of Mr. Dunworthy’s requirements, and she wouldn’t have to spend valuable time looking for a room. She had a feeling Mrs. Rickett would be a dreadful landlady, but having an address would make it easier for the department stores to contact her. “Have you a telephone?” she asked.

“Downstairs in the vestibule, but it’s for local calls only. Five p. If you need to make a trunk call, there’s a pillar box on Lampden Road. And no calls after 9 P.M.”

“I’ll take it,” Polly said, opening her handbag.

Mrs. Rickett held out her hand. “That will be one pound five. Payable in advance.”

“But I thought you said it was ten and eight-”

“This room is a double.”

So much for the legendary wartime spirit of generosity, Polly thought. “You’ve no single rooms available?”

“No.”

And even if you did, you wouldn’t tell me, but it was only for five weeks. She handed her the money.

Mrs. Rickett pocketed it. “No male visitors abovestairs. No smoking or drinking, and no cooking in your room. On weekdays and Saturdays, breakfast is at seven and supper at six. Sunday dinner’s at one o’clock, and there’s a cold collation for supper.” She held out her hand. “I’ll need your ration book.”

Polly handed it to her. “When is breakfast?” she asked, hoping it was soon.

“Your board doesn’t start till tomorrow,” Mrs. Rickett said, and Polly had to resist the impulse to snatch the ration book back and tell her she’d look elsewhere. “Here’s your room key.” Mrs. Rickett handed it to her. “And your latch key.”

“Thank you,” Polly said, trying to inch to the door, but she had a few more rules to deliver. “No children and no pets. I require a fortnight’s notice of departure. I hope you’re not frightened of the bombs like my last boarder.”

“No,” Polly said. Just so time-lagged I can hardly stand.

“Your blackout curtains must be pulled by five o’clock, so if you won’t be back from work by then, do them before you leave in the morning. You’ll have to pay any fines for blackout infractions,” she said and finally left.

Polly sank down on the bed. She needed to go find the drop so she’d know where it was from here and from the church, then find the tube station and go to Oxford Street to see what time the stores opened tomorrow. But she was so tired. The time-lag was even worse than last time. Then, a good night’s sleep had been all she needed to adjust. But even though she’d slept nearly eight hours last night in the shelter, she felt as exhausted as if she hadn’t had any sleep at all.

And she wasn’t likely to get much in the coming days. She couldn’t count on being able to sleep through the bombing every night. The contemps had all complained about being sleep-deprived during the Blitz.

It would be smart to catch up on sleep while I can, she thought, though she actually had no choice. She was almost too drowsy to climb into bed. She kicked her shoes off, took off her jacket and skirt so they wouldn’t get wrinkled, crawled into the creaking-springed bed, and fell instantly asleep.

She woke half an hour later and then lay there. And lay there. After what seemed like hours and was actually twenty minutes, she got up, cursing the unpredictable effects of time-lag, dressed, and went out. There was no one in the corridor and no sound from any of the rooms.

No one else seems to be having difficulty sleeping, she thought resentfully, but when she went downstairs she could hear voices from the direction of the dining room, and was suddenly starving.

Of course you’re starving, she thought, letting herself out. You haven’t eaten in a hundred and twenty years. There’d been a teashop on Lampden Road. Perhaps it was open. She walked back to St. George’s, counting streets and noting landmarks for future reference. And planning what she’d have to eat for breakfast. Bacon and eggs, she decided. It might be the last time she had the chance. Bacon was rationed, eggs were already in short supply, and she had a feeling Mrs. Rickett’s table would be spartan.

She reached the church. A woman carrying a prayer book was standing outside the front door. “I beg your pardon,” Polly said, “can you direct me to Lampden Road?”

“Lampden Road? You’re on it.”

“Oh,” Polly said, “thank you,” and walked rapidly up the road as if she knew where she were going. The woman was looking after her, her prayer book clutched to her bosom.

I hope she hasn’t read one of those “Report Anyone Behaving Suspiciously” posters, Polly thought.

The woman was right. This was definitely Lampden Road. Polly recognized its distinctive curve from the night before. The church must be nearer to the drop than she’d thought. She crossed a side street and saw the chemist’s on the next corner, and, beyond it, the teashop, which unfortunately wasn’t open. On up the street were the newsagent’s and the greengrocer’s she’d seen last night with the baskets of cabbages outside and “T. Tubbins, Greengrocer,” above the door.

Which meant the drop was only a few yards away in the next alley, even though she thought she’d come much farther in the dark. The warden must have taken her some roundabout way. She turned toward the alley, wondering if she should go through right now and give the lab her address and report on the slippage. Badri had specifically asked her to note how much there was. She wondered if he’d been half-expecting something like this. Four and a half days’ slippage had to be due to a divergence point, and the beginning of the Blitz had been rife with them. That was why she’d arranged to come through on the tenth rather than the seventh.

But if she reported in now, she’d need to go through again after she was hired on at a department store, and she didn’t want to give Mr. Dunworthy additional opportunities to cancel her assignment.

I’ll go tomorrow, after I’ve been hired on, she thought, and checked the alley to make certain it was the right one. It was-she could see the barrels and the chalked Union Jack and “London kan take it” on the wall-and then walked back to Lampden Road to look for an open restaurant.

There was nothing to the north but houses. She walked back down past St. George’s to the curve of the road, but there was nothing that way either except a shut-up confectioner’s, a tailor’s, and an ARP post with sandbags stacked on either side of the door.

I should have offered to pay extra to have my board begin today, she thought, and walked down to Notting Hill Gate Station, hoping the shelter canteens in the Underground stations had been set up by now and were open, but the only sign of food in the entire station was a currant bun being consumed by a small boy on the Central Line platform.

Surely there’ll be a canteen open in Oxford Circus, she thought. It’s a much larger station, but there wasn’t, and Oxford Street was deserted. Polly walked down the long shopping street, looking at the shut shops and department stores: Peter Robinson, Townsend Brothers, massive Selfridges. They looked like palaces rather than stores with their stately gray stone facades and pillars.

And indestructible. Except for the small printed cards in several stores’ windows announcing “safe and comfortable shelter accommodations,” and the yellow-green gas-detecting paint patches on the red pillar postboxes, there was no sign here that there was a war on. Bourne and Hollingsworth was advertising “The Latest in Ladies’ Hats for Autumn,” and Mary Marsh “Modish Dancing Frocks,” and Cook’s window was still calling itself “The Place to Make Your Travel Arrangements.”

To where? Polly wondered. Obviously not Paris, which Hitler had just occupied, along with the rest of Europe. John Lewis and Company was having a sale on fur coats. Not for long, Polly thought, stopping in front of the huge square store, trying to memorize the building and the displays in its wide-fronted windows. By Wednesday morning, it would all be reduced to a charred ruin.

She walked past it toward Marble Arch, noting the stores’ posted opening times and looking for “Shop Assistant Wanted” cards in the windows, but the only one she saw was at Padgett’s, which was on Mr. Dunworthy’s forbidden list even though it wouldn’t be hit till October twenty-fifth, three days after the end of her mission.

She also looked for somewhere to eat, but every restaurant she saw had a Closed Sundays sign, and there was no one to ask. She finally spotted a teenaged boy and girl standing outside Parson’s, but as she started over to them, Polly saw they were poring over a map, which meant they weren’t from here either. “We could go to the Tower of London,” the girl said, pointing at the map, “and see the ravens.”

The boy, who didn’t look any older than Colin, shook his head. “They’re using it for a prison, like in the old days, only now it’s German spies, not royalty.”

“Will they cut their heads off?” the girl asked. “Like they did Anne Boleyn?”

“No, now they hang them.”

“Oh,” she said, disappointed. “I did so want to see them.”

The ravens or the cut-off heads? Polly wondered.

“They’re good luck, you know,” the girl said. “So long as there are ravens at the Tower, England can never fall.”

Which is why, when they’re all killed by blast next month, the government will secretly dispose of the bodies and substitute new ones.

“It’s so unfair!” The girl pouted. “And on our honeymoon!”

Honeymoon? Polly was glad Colin wasn’t here to hear that. It would give him ideas.

The boy pored over the map for several moments and then said, “We could go to Westminster Abbey.”

They’re here sightseeing, Polly thought, amazed. In the middle of the Blitz.

“Or we could go to Madame Tussaud’s Waxworks,” the boy was saying, “and see Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII’s other wives.”

No, you can’t. Madame Tussaud’s was bombed on the eleventh, Polly thought, and then, I should go sightseeing. She couldn’t look for a job till tomorrow, and she couldn’t observe life in the shelters till tonight. And once she began working, she’d have almost no time to travel about London. This might be her only opportunity.

And there might be a restaurant open near Westminster Abbey or Buckingham Palace. I can see where the bomb hit the north end of the palace and nearly killed the King and Queen, she thought, walking back to the tube station. Or perhaps she should go see something that wouldn’t survive the Blitz, like the Guildhall or one of the Christopher Wren churches that would be destroyed on the twenty-ninth of December.

Or I could go see St. Paul’s, she thought suddenly. Mr. Dunworthy adored St. Paul’s. He was always talking about it, and perhaps if she told him she’d been to see it and all the things he’d raved about-Nelson’s tomb and the Whispering Gallery and Holman Hunt’s The Light of the World-and told him how beautiful she thought they were, she might be able to talk him into letting her stay an extra week. Or at least prevent him from canceling her assignment.

No, wait, Mr. Dunworthy had said an unexploded bomb had buried itself under St. Paul’s in September. But that had been early on the twelfth, which was this past Thursday, and he’d said it had taken them three days to dig it out, so it would have been removed on the fourteenth-yesterday. So the cathedral would be open again.

She started toward the Central Line and then changed her mind and took the Bakerloo to Piccadilly Circus instead. She could catch a bus from there and see some of London on the way. And there might be a restaurant in Piccadilly Circus.

There were more people in Piccadilly Circus than there had been on Oxford Street-soldiers, and elderly men hawking newspapers next to sandwich boards reading Latest War News-but there was nothing open here either. The statue of Eros in the center of the Circus had been boarded up. The Guinness clock and the giant signs advertising Bovril and Wrigley’s Chewing Gum were still there, though not in their full electric glory. Their lightbulbs had been taken out when the blackout began.

Polly went a short way down Shaftesbury and Haymarket, looking for an open cafй, then came back to the Circus and found a bus to St. Paul’s. She climbed aboard and up the narrow spiral staircase to the open upper deck so she could have a good view. She was the only one up there, and as soon as the bus started off, she could see why. It was freezing. She dug her gloves out of her pockets and pulled her coat closer about her, debating whether to go back down. But up ahead she could see Trafalgar Square, so she stayed where she was.

The broad plaza was nearly empty, and the fountains were shut off. Five years from now it would be crammed to bursting with cheering crowds celebrating the end of the war, but today even the pigeons had abandoned it. The base of Nelson’s monument was swathed in a Buy National War Bonds banner, and someone had stuck a Union Jack behind one of the bronze lions’ ears. She looked at its paws, trying to see if they’d fallen victim to shrapnel, but that apparently hadn’t happened yet. Then she craned her neck up to look at Nelson, high atop his pillar, his tricorn hat in his hand.

Hitler had planned to take the memorial-lions and all-to Berlin after the invasion and have it set up in front of the Reichstag. He’d also planned to have himself crowned emperor of Europe in Westminster Abbey-he’d written it all down in his secret invasion plans-and then begin systematically eliminating everyone who got in his way, including all of the intelligentsia. And, of course, the Jews. Virginia Woolf had been on the “elimination” list, and so had Laurence Olivier and C. P. Snow. And T. S. Eliot. And Hitler had come incredibly close to carrying his plans out.

The bus drove past the National Gallery and started down the broad Strand. There were many more signs of the war here-sandbags and shelter notices and a large water tank outside the Savoy for fighting fires. She didn’t see any damage. That will change tonight, she thought. By this time tomorrow nearly every shop window they were passing would have been shattered, and there’d be an enormous crater in the spot the bus was driving over. It was a good thing she’d come today.

The bus turned onto Fleet Street. And ahead, for a brief moment, was St. Paul’s. Mr. Dunworthy had spoken of its pewter-colored dome, standing high on Ludgate Hill above the city, but she could only catch intermittent glimpses of it between and above the newspaper offices lining Fleet Street. They’d all be hit several weeks from now, so badly that only one newspaper would manage to get out an edition the next morning. Polly smiled, thinking of its headline: “Bomb Injured in Fall on Fleet Street.”

St. Bride’s was just ahead. Polly leaned forward to look at its wedding-cake steeple, with its decorated tiers and arched windows. On the twenty-ninth of December, those windows would be alight with fire. So would most of the buildings they were passing now. This entire part of London’s old City had burnt that night in what history would call the Second Great Fire of London, including the Guildhall, and eight Wren churches.

But not St. Paul’s, she thought, even though the reporters watching from here that night had thought it was doomed. The American reporter Edward R. Murrow had even begun his radio broadcast, “Tonight, as I speak to you now, St. Paul’s Cathedral is burning to the ground.” But it hadn’t. It had survived the Blitz, and the war.

But not the twenty-first century, Polly thought. Not the terrorist years. Nothing they were driving past had survived a terrorist with a martyr complex and a pinpoint bomb under his arm. She looked up at the dome again, which she could see looming ahead.

We’re nearly there, she thought, but moments later the bus turned sharply to the right away from it. She leaned over the side to look down at the street. It was blocked off with sawhorses and notices reading This Area Off-Limits.

There must be bomb damage ahead. The bus drove down two streets and turned east again, but that way was blocked, too, with a rope and a hand-lettered notice reading Danger, and when the bus stopped, a black-helmeted policeman came over to confer with the driver, after which he pulled the bus over to the curb, and passengers began to disembark. Was it a raid? She hadn’t heard anything, but Colin had warned her that engine sounds sometimes drowned the sirens out, and everyone seemed to be getting off. Polly ran down the winding steps. “Is it a raid?” she asked the driver.

He shook his head, and the policeman said, “Unexploded bomb. This entire area’s cordoned off. Where were you going, miss?”

“St. Paul’s.”

“You can’t go there. That’s where the UXB is. It fell in the road next to the clock tower and burrowed into the foundations. It’s under the cathedral.”

No, it’s not. It’s already been removed, but she could scarcely tell them that.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to go there another time, miss,” the policeman said, and the driver added, “This bus can take you back to Piccadilly Circus, or you can take the tube from Blackfriars. It’s just down there.” He pointed down the hill to where she could see an Underground station.

“Thank you. That’s what I’ll do,” Polly said and walked in the direction he’d pointed down to the first side street, then glanced back to see if they were watching. They weren’t. She ducked down the side street and walked quickly to the next street and back up the hill, looking for a way through the barricade. She wasn’t worried about being seen, except by the policemen. This area was all offices and warehouses. It would be deserted on a Sunday. That was how the fire on the twenty-ninth had got out of control. That had been a Sunday, too, and there’d been no one there to put out the incendiaries.

There was a policeman standing guard at the end of this street as well, so she cut over to the next one, which led into a maze of narrow lanes. It was easy to see why this had burned. The warehouses were mere feet apart. Flames could easily jump from building to building, from street to street. She couldn’t see the cathedral’s dome or west towers, but the lane she was on led uphill, and through the obscuring white paint on the curb, she could make out “Amen Corner.” She must be getting near it.

She was. Here was Paternoster Row. She started along it, keeping close to the buildings so she could duck into a doorway if necessary, and there was the front of St. Paul’s, with its wide steps and broad pillared porch.

But Mr. Dunworthy had been wrong about how long it had taken to remove the UXB, because a lorry and two fire pumpers stood in the courtyard, and just past the end of the steps was a huge hole surrounded by heaps of yellow clay littered with shovels, winches, pickaxes, planks. Two men in clay-covered coveralls were inching ropes down into the hole, two held fire hoses at the ready, and several more, some in clerical collars, watched in strained attention. The bomb was obviously still down there, and from the looks on the bomb squad’s faces, liable to go off at any moment.

But it hadn’t. They’d successfully got it out and taken it to Hackney Marshes to be detonated. Which meant it was perfectly safe to be here and go inside whether they had the bomb out or not. If she could only get past them without being seen.

She looked over at the cathedral doors at the top of the wide steps. They appeared too heavy to open quickly-and silently-even if they weren’t locked.

A man’s voice shouted, “I can’t-where’s that damned-?” and cut off abruptly, followed by a hollow, heart-stopping thud.

Oh, God, they’ve dropped it, Polly thought, and then, Mr. Dunworthy was wrong about how long it took to get it out. What if he was wrong about the bomb going off as well?

But if the bomb had gone off, the cathedral would have collapsed. There’d have been no valiant effort to save it on the night of December twenty-ninth, no morale-lifting photograph of it standing defiant above the flames and smoke, the symbol of England’s determination and refusal to surrender. And the Blitz-and the war-would have gone very differently.

All those thoughts had gone through her head in the fraction of a second it had taken her to look over at the hole and realize the thud hadn’t come from there. The men were still lowering the ropes inch by inch, still watching. She looked back at the porch. A man in a long black cassock and a tin helmet appeared from behind one of the pillars and hurried across the porch toward the hole, carrying a crowbar.

There’s another door there, behind that pillar. Its opening was what I heard, she thought, and as soon as the clergyman reached the end of the porch and started down the side steps, she crept out of the doorway to look, keeping a sharp eye on the group of men. But no one looked up, not even when the clergyman handed the crowbar to one of the firemen.

Yes, there was the door, smaller than the central doors and obviously not locked, but there might still be someone inside, and if they caught her, what could she say, that she somehow hadn’t noticed the barricades and the pumpers and the firemen? If she got arrested… But she was so close. She started cautiously across the courtyard.

“Stop!” someone shouted, and Polly froze, but they weren’t looking at her. They were staring intently down at the hole. The men had ceased to lower the ropes, and a fireman was down on one knee, his hands cupped around his mouth, shouting down into the hole. “Try it to the left.”

It’s stuck, Polly thought, and sprinted across the courtyard, up the broad steps and across the porch, and yanked on the door. It was so heavy she thought for a moment it was locked after all, but then it gave, and she was through it and easing the door silently shut behind her.

She was in a dark, narrow vestibule. She stood there for a moment, listening, but the only sound was the audible hush of a large building. She tiptoed out of the vestibule into the side aisle and looked out into the nave. A wooden admissions desk stood there, but no one was manning it, and there was no one in the north aisle.

Polly stepped out into the nave. And gasped.

Mr. Dunworthy had said St. Paul’s was unique, and she’d seen vids and photographs, but they hadn’t begun to convey how beautiful it was. Or how vast. She’d expected a narrow-aisled Gothic church, but this was wide and airy. The nave stretched away in a series of rounded arches supported by massive rectangular pillars, revealing vista after vista-dome, choir, chancel, altar-all of them lit with a rich, warm golden light that streamed from curved golden ceilings, from the golden-railed galleries, the gilt mosaics, the gold-tinged stone itself, turning the air itself golden.

“It’s beautiful,” Polly murmured, and felt for the first time what its destruction really meant. How could he? she thought. Even if he was a terrorist? He’d walked into the cathedral one September morning in 2015 and killed half a million people. And destroyed this.

But it had only been there to destroy because the bomb underneath it at this very moment hadn’t gone off, and because Hitler and his air force had failed to blow St. Paul’s up or burn it down.

Though they certainly tried, she thought, walking up the nave, her footsteps echoing in the vast open space. They’d dropped hundreds of incendiaries on its roofs, to say nothing of the V-1s and V-2s Hitler would send at it in 1944 and ’45.

But St. Paul’s was ready for them. Tubs of water stood next to every pillar, and pickaxes and pails of sand were propped against the walls at intervals, next to coils of rope. On the night of the twenty-ninth, when dozens of incendiaries would fall on the roofs and the water mains would fail, they-and the volunteers wielding them-would be all that stood between the cathedral and destruction.

Polly heard a door shut somewhere far away and ducked into the south aisle behind one of the rectangular pillars, but no other sound followed, and after a cautious minute she emerged. If she wanted to see all the things Mr. Dunworthy had spoken of, she’d best hurry. She might get tossed out at any moment.

She wasn’t certain where the Whispering Gallery or Lord Nelson’s tomb were. The tomb was presumably down in the Crypt, but she didn’t know how to get to it. He’d said The Light of the World was the first thing he’d seen the first time he’d been in St. Paul’s, which meant it should be here in one of the side aisles. If it was still here. There were pale squares on the walls where paintings had obviously hung.

No, here it was, in a bay midway up the south aisle, looking just as Mr. Dunworthy had described it. Christ, wearing a white robe and a crown of thorns, stood in the middle of a forest in a deep blue twilight, holding a lantern and waiting impatiently outside a wooden door, his hand raised to knock on it.

It’s Mr. Dunworthy, Polly thought, wanting to know why I haven’t checked in yet. No wonder he likes it so much.

She wasn’t particularly impressed. The painting was smaller than she’d expected and stiffly old-fashioned, and now that she looked at it again, Christ looked less impatient than unconvinced anyone was going to answer his knock. Which was probably the case, considering the door obviously hadn’t been opened in years. Ivy had twined up over it, and weeds choked the threshold.

“I’d give it up if I were you,” Polly murmured.

“I beg your pardon, miss?” a voice said at her elbow, and she jumped a foot. It was an elderly man in a black suit with a waistcoat. “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said, “but I saw you looking at the painting, and-I hadn’t realized they’d opened the church again.”

She was tempted to say yes, that the bomb squad or the man in the cassock had given her permission to come in, but if he decided to check… “Oh, was it closed before?” she said instead.

“Oh, my, yes. Since Thursday. We’ve had an unexploded bomb under the west end. They only just now got it out. It was a near thing there for a bit. The gas main caught fire and was burning straight for the bomb. If it had reached it, it would have blown up the lot of us, and St. Paul’s. I’ve never been happier in my life than to see that monstrous thing driven away. I’m surprised Dean Matthews decided to reopen the church, though. It was my understanding it was to have remained closed till they’d rechecked the gas main. Who-?”

“I’m so glad they did decide to open it, then,” Polly said hastily. “A friend of mine told me I must see St. Paul’s when I came to London, particularly The Light of the World. It’s beautiful.”

“It’s only a copy, I’m afraid. The original was sent to Wales with the cathedral’s other treasures, but we decided it simply wasn’t St. Paul’s without it. It had hung here all through the last war, and we felt it was vital it be here through this one, particularly with the blackout and the lights gone out in Europe and Hitler spreading his nasty brand of darkness over the world. This reminds us that one light, at the least, will never go out.”

He looked at it critically. “I fear it’s not a very good copy. It’s smaller than the original, and the colors aren’t as vivid. Still, it’s better than nothing. See how the light seems to be fading, and how the artist has made Christ’s face exhibit so many emotions at the same time: patience and sorrow and hope.”

And resignation, Polly thought. “What is it a door to?” she asked. “One can’t tell from the painting.”

He beamed at her as if she were a bright pupil. “Exactly. And you’ll note the door has no latch. It can only be opened from the inside. Like the door of the heart. That’s what is so wonderful about the painting. One sees something different in it each time one looks at it. We like to call it our ‘sermon in a frame,’ although the frame’s been taken to Wales as well. A lovely gilded wooden thing, with the Scripture which the painting depicts on it.”

“‘Behold I stand at the door and knock,’” Polly quoted.

He nodded, beaming even more. “‘If any man hear my voice and open the door I will come in to him.’ The artist’s tomb is in the Crypt.”

With Lord Nelson’s. “I’d love to see it,” Polly said.

“I’m afraid the Crypt is closed to visitors, but I can show you round the rest of the church, if you’ve the time.”

And if Dean Matthews doesn’t come in and announce the church is still closed and demand to know what I’m doing here, she thought. “I’d love to see it, if it’s no trouble, Mr.-?”

“Humphreys. It would be no trouble at all. As verger, I often conduct tours.” He led her back down the aisle and over to the central doors where, presumably, he began those tours. “This is the Great West Door. It’s opened only on ceremonial occasions. On other days we use the smaller doors on either side,” he said, and she saw there was another door in the south aisle, the twin of the one she’d come through. “The pilasters are of Portland stone,” he continued, patting one of the rectangular pillars. “The floor where we are standing-”

Is where the Fire Watch stone will be, Polly thought, the memorial dedicated to the memory of St. Paul’s fire watch, the volunteers “who by the grace of God saved this church.” And the only thing left after the pinpoint bomb.

“-is made of Carrara marble in a black-and-white checkerboard pattern,” Mr. Humphreys said. “From here one can see the full length of the cathedral. It’s built in the shape of the cross. To your right-” He walked over to the south aisle to a makeshift wooden partition just this side of the vestibule, “is the Geometrical Staircase, designed by Christopher Wren. As you can see, it’s currently boarded up, though a final decision on what to do hasn’t been made.”

“What to do?”

“Yes, you see, the staircase offers the best access to the roofs on this end of the church, but at the same time it’s extremely fragile. And irreplaceable. But if an incendiary were to fall on the library roof or the towers… It’s difficult to know what to do. Over here-” he walked up the south aisle to an iron grille, “is the Chapel of the Order of St. Michael and St. George with its wooden prayer stalls. The banners which ordinarily hang above them have unfortunately been removed for safekeeping.”

The seventeenth-century cherubs had been, too, and the nave’s chandeliers and most of the monuments in the south aisle. “Some of them were too heavy to move, so we’ve put sandbags round them,” Mr. Humphreys said, leading her past a stairway with a chain across it and a notice: To the Whispering Gallery. Closed to Visitors.

And so much for the Whispering Gallery, Polly thought as the verger led her into the wide central crossing beneath the dome, where there was another chained staircase.

“This is the transept,” he said. “It forms the crosspiece of the cathedral.” He led her into it to show her the monument to Lord Nelson, or rather, the stack of sandbags hiding it, and several other piles of sandbags concealing statues of Captain Robert Scott, Admiral Howe, and the artist J. M. W. Turner. “The south transept is chiefly interesting for the carved oak doorcase by Grinling Gibbons, which unfortunately-”

“Has been removed for safekeeping,” Polly murmured, following him from the transept into the choir and the apse, where he pointed out the organ (removed for safekeeping), the shrouded statue of John Donne (in a shroud of sandbags in the Crypt), the High Altar, and the stained-glass windows.

“We’ve been very lucky so far,” Mr. Humphreys said, pointing up at them. “They’re too large to board up, but we haven’t lost a single window.”

You will, Polly thought. By the end of the war they’d all have been smashed. The last one had been taken out by a V-2 that had crashed nearby.

Mr. Humphreys led her back down the other side of the choir, pointing out the buckets of water and stirrup pumps lined against the wall. “Our greatest worry is fire. The underlying structure’s of wood, and if one of the roofs were to catch fire, the lead would run down into the cracks between the stones, and they’d burst as they did when the first St. Paul’s burned. It was utterly destroyed during the Great Fire of London, when this entire part of the city burned.”

And will again three months from now, Polly thought. She wondered if Mr. Humphreys was part of the fire watch. He looked too old, but then again, the Blitz had been a war of old men and shopgirls and middle-aged women.

“But we shan’t let that happen again,” he said, answering her question. “We’ve formed a band of volunteers to keep watch for incendiaries on the roofs. I’m on duty tonight.”

“Then I shouldn’t keep you,” Polly said. “I should go.”

“No, no, not till I’ve shown you my favorite monument,” Mr. Humphreys said, dragging her into the north transept. He made her look at the Corinthian columns and the oak doors of the north porch. “And this is the monument to Captain Robert Faulknor,” he said, pointing proudly at another pile of sandbags. “His ship was badly damaged. She’d lost most of her rigging and couldn’t fire, and the La Pique was coming athwart her. Captain Faulknor courageously grabbed her bowsprit and lashed the two ships together and used the La Pique’s guns to fire on the other French ships. His brave action won the battle. Unfortunately he never knew what he’d accomplished. He was shot through the heart the moment after he’d bound the two together.” He shook his head sadly. “A true hero.”

I’ll need to tell Michael Davies about him, Polly thought, and wondered where he was now. He was to have left just after she did, which meant he was in Dover, observing the evacuation efforts. But here in this time, that had happened three months ago, and his next assignment, Pearl Harbor, which he’d leave for as soon as he returned from Dover, wouldn’t happen here for more than a year.

“It’s such a pity you can’t see the monument,” Mr. Humphreys said. “Wait, I’ve just thought of something,” he said, and led her back down the nave. The cathedral had lost its golden glow and looked gray and chilly, and the side aisles were already in shadow. Polly stole a glance at her watch. It was after four. She hadn’t realized how late it was.

Mr. Humphreys was taking her to the admissions desk. It had a number of pamphlets on it, colored prints of the The Light of the World for sale for sixpence apiece, a box marked Donations to the Minesweepers Fund, and a wooden rack filled with picture postcards. “I think we may have a photograph of Captain Faulknor’s monument,” he said, searching through postcards of the Whispering Gallery, the organ, and a three-tiered Victorian monstrosity that had to be the Wellington Monument. “Oh, dear, we don’t seem to have one of it. What a pity! You must come back and see it when the war’s over.”

The side door clanged, and a sharp-faced young man came in, wearing a dark blue coverall and carrying a tin helmet and a gas mask. “So they got the bomb out all right, did they, Mr. Humphreys?” he asked the verger.

He nodded. “You’re a bit early, Langby. You don’t come on duty till half past six.”

“I want to take a look at the chancel roof pump. It’s been giving a bit of trouble. Have you the key to the vestry?”

“Yes,” Mr. Humphreys said. “I’ll be there in a moment.”

“I’m keeping you from your duties,” Polly said. “Thank you for showing me the cathedral.”

“Oh, but you mustn’t go yet. There’s one last thing you must see,” he said, leading her over to the south aisle.

No doubt another pile of sandbags, Polly thought, following him, but it wasn’t. He’d led her back to The Light of the World, the painting now only dimly visible in the gloom.

Mr. Humphreys said reverently, “Do you see how, now that the light’s fading, the lantern seems to glow?”

It did. A warm orange-gold light spread from it, lighting Christ’s robe, the door, the weeds that had grown up around it.

“Do you know what Dean Matthews said when he saw that glow? He said, ‘He’d better not let the ARP warden catch him with that lantern.’” Mr. Humphreys chuckled. “A fine sense of humor, the dean has. It’s a great help in times like these.”

The door clanged open again and another member of the fire watch came in and walked swiftly up the nave. “Humphreys!” Langby called from the transept.

“I’m afraid I must be going,” Mr. Humphreys said. “If you’d care to stay and look round a bit more…”

“No, I should be getting home.”

He nodded. “Best not to be out after dark if one can help it,” he said and hurried toward Langby.

He was right. It was a long way to Kensington, and she had to find somewhere open where she could get supper before she went back. There was no way she could make it through another night without having eaten. And the raids tonight began at 6:54. She needed to go.

But she stayed a few minutes longer, looking at the painting. Christ’s face, in the dimming light, no longer looked bored, but afraid, and the woods surrounding him not only dark but threatening.

Best not to be out after dark if one can help it, Polly thought, and then, looking at the locked door, I wonder if that’s the door to an air-raid shelter.