All Clear (100 page)

“What’s the best place to hide?” Colin whispered. “The choir?”

“No,” she said. “There’s no way out.” She grabbed his hand, and they darted across the nave and down the south aisle. They could hide in the Chapel of St. Michael and St. George, behind the prayer stalls—

Colin grabbed her around the waist and thrust her behind a pillar. “Shh,” he whispered against her ear. “I hear footsteps.”

She listened. “I don’t—” she began, and then did hear them. Footsteps from inside the main stairway. And a flash from a pocket torch.

They ducked farther behind the pillar and pressed against it, listening. The sound of footsteps came out onto the floor, into the north transept, and then there was another flash of light.

He’s looking at the wreckage
, Polly thought.

More footsteps and a wide sweep of light as he shone the torch slowly around the transept.

“How much longer till the drop opens again?” Polly whispered to Colin.

“Twelve or thirteen minutes.” It wouldn’t open if the firewatcher was still there, of course, but they were running out of time. When the all clear went, the men would come down from the roofs, and from then on there’d be men in the Crypt and going off duty. She remembered the firewatchers on the morning after the twenty-ninth walking out through the nave, standing on the steps talking. And Mr. Dunworthy had said they made morning rounds, checking for incendiaries and damage.

Now the firewatcher was shining the torch up at the ceiling to see if something had fallen.

Leave
, Polly said silently, but it was forever before the torch finally switched off and the footsteps went back upstairs.

They faded away, but Colin still didn’t move. He went on standing there, pressing her against the stone, his arm still around her, waiting. She could feel his breath against her cheek, feel his heart beating.

“I think he’s gone,” he whispered finally, his mouth against her hair. “More’s the pity.” And she felt her heart lift.

But how could even love repay him for the years, the youth he’d sacrificed for her?

“I wish we could stand here forever,” he said, pulling away from her, “but we’d better—” There was a flicker of light. “He’s back.” Colin pushed her behind the pillar. And a moment later he said, “That’s not a torch. It’s the shimmer. The drop’s already opening again.”

“No, it isn’t,” Polly said. “It’s from outside. A flare, I think.” But it must have been an incendiary because a yellow-orange light began to fill the aisle.

She hadn’t realized they were in the bay that held
The Light of the World
. As the light grew, as golden as the light inside the lantern, she could see the painting more clearly than she ever had. And Mr. Humphreys was right. There was something new to see every time you looked at it.

She had been wrong in thinking Christ had been called up against his will to fight in a war. He didn’t look—in spite of the crown of thorns—like someone making a sacrifice. Or even like someone determined to “do his bit.” He looked instead like Marjorie had looked telling Polly she’d joined the Nursing Service, like Mr. Humphreys had looked filling buckets with water and sand to save St. Paul’s, like Miss Laburnum had looked that day she came to Townsend Brothers with the coats. He looked like Captain Faulknor must have looked, lashing the ships together. Like Ernest Shackleton, setting out in that tiny boat across icy seas. Like Colin helping Mr. Dunworthy across the wreckage.

He looked … contented. As if he was where he wanted to be, doing what he wanted to do.

Like Eileen had looked, telling Polly she’d decided to stay. Like Mike must have looked in Kent, composing engagement announcements and letters to the editor.
Like I must have looked there in the rubble with Sir Godfrey, my hand pressed against his heart
. Exalted. Happy.

To do something for someone or something you loved—England or Shakespeare or a dog or the Hodbins or history—wasn’t a sacrifice at all. Even if it cost you your freedom, your life, your youth.

She turned to look at Colin. He was looking uncertainly at her, and his soot-smudged face was as open to her as hers had been to Sir Godfrey. “Colin, I—” she said, and stopped, amazed.

She hadn’t seen him clearly either. She’d been so intent on finding in his face echoes of the seventeen-year-old boy she’d known, so entranced by his resemblance to Stephen Lang, that she hadn’t seen what was so obviously there. Though Eileen clearly had.

No wonder Eileen had said, “You know I didn’t go back.” And no wonder Colin had looked at her after she’d said, “Colin knows I stayed, don’t you?” for that long, silent moment before he’d said, “Yes, I know.”

How could Polly not have seen the resemblance before? It was right there. No wonder, at the last, that Eileen had hugged Polly and said, “It’s all right. I’ll always be with you.” No wonder she’d called Colin “my dear boy.”

Oh, my dear friend
, Polly thought, and the light in Christ’s face seemed to deepen, to grow more bright—

“The shimmer’s starting,” Colin said gently. “We need to go.”

Polly nodded and turned back to
The Light of the World
for one last look. She kissed her fingers and pressed them gently against the picture, and then she and Colin ran hand in hand up the aisle and across the nave.

Colin helped her over the barricade, and they clambered onto the wreckage, and across the precarious timbers, holding on to Faulknor, on to Honour and each other, picking their way over broken masonry and plaster, and climbing down again to the stained-glass-strewn floor.

“Careful,” Colin said, and she nodded and followed him into the shimmer.

“Where do we need to stand?” she asked.

“Here.” He reached for her hand, and a sound cut suddenly across the silence. He looked up alertly.

“It’s all right,” she said. “It’s the all clear.”

He shook his head. “ ‘It is the lark,’ ” he said, and her breath caught.

“ ‘The herald of the morn,’ ” she said.

The shimmer began to brighten, to flare. She took his hand and stepped into the midst of the light with him.

“Almost there,” he said.

She nodded. “ ‘Behold, I stand at the door and knock,’ ” she said, and the drop opened.

I want to say thank you to all the people who helped me and stood by me with
Blackout
and
All Clear
as one book morphed into two and I went slowly mad under the strain: my incredibly patient editor, Anne Groell, and my long-suffering agent, Ralph Vicinanza; my even longer-suffering secretary, Laura Lewis; my daughter and chief confidante, Cordelia; my family and friends; every librarian within a hundred-mile radius; and the baristas at Margie’s, Starbucks, and the UNC student union who gave me tea—well, chai—and sympathy on a daily basis. Thank you all for putting up with me, standing by me, and not giving up on me or the book.

But most especially, I want to thank the marvelous group of ladies who were at the Imperial War Museum the day I was there doing research on the Blitz—women who, it turned out, had all been rescue workers and ambulance drivers and air-raid wardens during the Blitz, and who told me story after story that proved invaluable to the book and to my understanding of the bravery, determination, and humor of the British people as they faced down Hitler. And I want to thank my
wonderful
husband, who found them, sat them down, bought them tea and cakes, and then came to find me so I could interview them. Best husband ever!

BY CONNIE WILLIS

Lincoln’s Dreams
Doomsday Book
Impossible Things
Uncharted Territory
Remake
Bellwether
Fire Watch
To Say Nothing of the Dog
Miracle and Other Christmas Stories
Passage
Blackout
All Clear

C
ONNIE
W
ILLIS
has received six Nebula Awards and ten Hugo awards for science fiction, and her novel
Passage
was nominated for both. Her other works include
Doomsday Book, Lincoln’s Dreams, Bellwether, Impossible Things, Remake, Uncharted Territory, To Say Nothing of the Dog, Fire Watch, Miracle and Other Chrisimas Stories
, and
Blackout
. Connie Willis lives in Colorado with her family.