Mr. Churchill's Secretary (7 page)

Under the hot cerulean sky, the girls surveyed the garden,
tied pinafores around their waists, and picked up their shovels. They’d marked off the area to dig; now they just had to do it.

Chuck groaned. “Of course it
had
to rain this morning. Makes the dirt even heavier.”

“All right, ladies,” Paige declared, scanning the directions with the same take-charge attitude she’d used for party planning. “We’ve marked off the proper dimensions. Let’s start digging!”

Clarabelle and Annabelle exchanged a look and then started giggling. Although they weren’t that much younger than Maggie, Paige, and Chuck, with their pixielike physiques and tendency to laugh, they seemed like children sometimes.

Paige was not amused.
“What?”

Annabelle, the slightly taller, firstborn twin, often spoke for the two of them. “It’s just that … you sound just like one of our schoolmistresses.”

Clarabelle began. “Miss—”

“—Poulter!” Annabelle finished. “Isn’t she just a dead ringer for Miss Poulter?”

Paige narrowed her eyes.

“Oh, Miss Poulter was really quite nice—” said Annabelle, sensing Paige’s annoyance.

“—and
very
pretty. And smart. Like Jo March in
Jo’s Boys
—” Clarabelle chimed in.

“—or Anne Shirley in
Anne of Avonlea—
”

“—and not at
all
like Miss Minchin in
A Little Princess—
”

Chuck glared. “The fucking Nazis are going to drop fucking bombs on us, and all you two twits can talk about is fucking
books
?” She grabbed hold of a shovel, stalked off, and began digging with a vengeance.

“She’s still annoyed about the dish situation,” Maggie explained. “Maybe … if you two could wash up a little more often?”

The twins exchanged exasperated glances. Then Annabelle whispered, “She’s just so—”

“—bossy,” Clarabelle said.

“And
loud
!” both twins said simultaneously, setting off a fresh explosion of giggles.

“And her
language
sometimes,” Annabelle said.

Maggie’s lip twitched; Chuck was indeed bossy, loud, and prone to using profanity. Still, she had her reasons. “Just do your dishes,” she said gently. “And I’m sure everything will be fine.”

They turned back to digging. After months of the “bore war,” the threat of bombs wasn’t just hypothetical anymore. Overhead, Hurricanes and Spitfires roared by in V-shaped formations of three, on their way to France, most likely. German Messerschmitts and Heinkels could be on their way to London any day. Some of the port cities had already been bombed. It was just a matter of time for London.

Shovels in hand, they all ripped up the sod, rolled it back, and then began digging in earnest. The earth smelled damp, rich, and loamy, warmed in the sun. A hundred years and a gallon of sweat later, the five had barely scratched the surface. The back of Maggie’s blouse was soaking wet, and beads of sweat stung her eyes.

They rested on the back steps leading up to the kitchen, gulping glasses of cool water as the sun’s rays slanted and deepened. As Chuck lit a cigarette and pushed back a brown curl, Paige ventured, “You know, I’m sure if we called the boys, they would—”

“No!”
Maggie exclaimed. Then, in a more reasonable tone of voice, “We can do it ourselves,” she said, rubbing her sore forearms. A blood blister on her forefinger was starting to ooze. “Eventually.”

The twins sighed. “We don’t really need an Anderson, do we? We could always just go down to the basement.…”

“And be crushed if the house collapses?” Maggie asked. “Or burned to a crisp if a bomb sets it on fire?”

The twins looked at the house and shared a chagrined expression, realizing Maggie’s logic.

“I don’t know how you can stand it, Chuck,” Annabelle said, leaning back and swatting at a buzzing fly. “With Nigel enlisted in the RAF now.” She looked at Chuck sideways. “Any idea where he’s going to be sent? And when?”

Chuck took a long drag on her cigarette; her hands were shaking. “No, no idea,” she said. “Could be anywhere …” Her voice broke. “He’s training now. Probably up north, in Scotland maybe. I know he can’t say anything, but—”

Clarabelle patted Chuck on the shoulder. “It’ll be fine, Chuck. You’ll see. Everything will be all right.”

Maggie, Paige, and Chuck, and then even Annabelle, looked at Clarabelle, then at the pieces of the Anderson shelter, then back to Clarabelle. “I mean,
Nigel
will be fine. More than fine. A hero, in fact.”

Chuck blinked hard. “Bloody hell,” she said finally, wiping her eyes with her sleeve.

“Right, then. Back to work, ladies.” Maggie stood up, brushing dirt and leaves off the seat of her trousers. “And do you know what I think our shelter needs? A nice big bottle of gin.”

Across the Atlantic Ocean, in one of Wellesley College’s faculty apartments, Edith Hope couldn’t sleep. It was her age, she told herself; it was hot flashes and night sweats and needing to use the toilet every few hours.

She looked up at the bedroom ceiling, shadows from the maple tree branches outside the window dancing in the silvery light from a waning moon.

Not to mention the fact that her niece was in a country about to be invaded by Germany.

She turned over and flipped the down pillow to the cool side but still couldn’t get comfortable. She threw off the gray-silk duvet, the one her hair was beginning to match.
Guilty conscience, Edith?
she thought.
Maybe. Probably
.

Edith’s last argument with Margaret still rang in her ears and haunted her dreams. She hadn’t wanted to send her to London. But when her mother, Margaret’s grandmother, died, there wasn’t any other option. Edith wouldn’t—couldn’t—go back to London, to that place where time compressed and old hurts would feel just as raw as they had twenty-some-odd years ago. And she was still, after all this time, determined to keep her word.

And yet.

And yet it had been hard on Margaret. Edith sighed. Margaret hadn’t understood. And why should she? She was young and had her life in front of her.

“I’m a college graduate now,” Margaret had snapped any number of times before she’d left. “Don’t you think it’s time to start treating me as an adult?”

An adult?
When Edith looked at her she still saw a newborn, small and mewing like a kitten. She saw an inquisitive toddler, a precocious child, and a determined teenage girl. But a grown woman? Edith tried not to let her lips twitch into a smile. “I’m well aware of your age, Margaret. And if you want me to treat you like a grown-up, you will need to behave like one.… I’m sorry, but there it is.”

And that was the end of the discussion.

Until, of course, Margaret started to make noise about staying in London—poppycock and nonsense about truly living in London, not merely getting a job long enough to sell the house and then returning to Boston, where she belonged.
What’s that girl thinking?
In response, Edith had sent off the letter, revised and rewritten so many times, she knew it by heart.

Wellesley, Massachusetts

There was the war, there was the threat of imminent invasion.

There was also the chance, however slight, that Margaret would find out the truth about her father.

And that was what worried Edith the most.

A
T
N
O
. 10, Maggie had seen Mr. Churchill only in passing, always in a hurry, his endless Romeo y Julieta cigars leaving a pungent trail of smoke behind him wherever he went, faithfully shadowed by his private detective, Mr. Walter Thompson. But it was obvious when he was in—the office crackled with electricity and there was a sense of urgency in the air.

Mrs. Tinsley had come down with a bad case of flu. Despite her exclamations that she should stay and work, she was being sent home by Miss Stewart.

“Really, Miss Stewart,” she managed to croak, “I’m quite capable of—”

Notwithstanding her air of genteel diffidence, Miss Stewart wasn’t having any of it. “Mrs. Tinsley, you’re not well. You must go home and rest, so you may return as quickly as possible at full strength.”

“London may be attacked at any moment, and—”

“Mrs. Tinsley, I must appeal to your common sense.” Miss Stewart pulled out her trump card. “What if the P.M. became ill?”

Mrs. Tinsley paused to consider. Then she sneezed into her starched cambric handkerchief. “Oh, very well. But it’s only for one evening.” She stood up and put on her hat, stabbing it with long pearl-tipped pins. “I assure
you,” she declared as she made her way out the door, “I shall return tomorrow, first thing.”

As the sound of Mrs. Tinsley’s footsteps echoed down the hallway, Miss Stewart gave a gentle sigh and folded her tiny, plump hands. “Miss Hope?”

Maggie was typing a letter to one of the constituents. “Yes, Miss Stewart?”

“I think it’s high time you worked with Mr. Churchill. Would you mind stepping in tonight?”

“Of course not, ma’am,” Maggie replied. As nervous as she was, she wanted to get started.

“Very well, then, dear. Go into his study and wait. He’ll be coming in from dinner and will be here shortly.”

Maggie did as she was told and found herself in the Prime Minister’s study. It was large, with dark wood paneling, a red Persian carpet, and several oil paintings of the seaside in ornate gilt frames, with
W. Churchill
signed in thick script.

Her heart was beating so loudly she was sure everyone in the building could hear it. With sweaty palms, she rolled the paper into the typewriter. She arranged and rearranged her fountain pens and thick, stubby pencils. She looked up at the black hands of the clock a half-dozen times. She waited. And waited.

And waited some more.

Nelson, Mr. Churchill’s cat, came into the room and jumped on a cushioned window seat, sitting down and tucking his paws and tail under him.

Maggie looked out the window at the dying light. It was a glorious June evening—bright and warm in the waning sunshine, growing chilly in the shadows. She could hear the low chimes of Big Ben and then the lighter bells of the Horse Guards Parade strike the hour.

The fine weather was a blessing, because beneath the thin veneer of civility and pleasantries, England was a
nation bracing for the worst. Underneath their polite façades, people were anxious, uneasy, depressed, fatalistic. Children were being evacuated to the countryside. Plans were proposed to relocate the royal family to Canada. The contents of the Tate and the national museum had been put into storage. Dogs were being put down. People were warned about fifth columnists, spies living among them. A blackout was in effect night after night.

The men, more than a million, who were too old, too young, or too infirm to serve in the military, joined the Home Guard. There were no guns for them, so they armed themselves with hunting rifles, swords, billy clubs, golf clubs, and pickaxes. Those without carried broom handles or pepper—to throw in the face of the enemy. It would be easy to laugh, Maggie thought, if it weren’t so desperate. And so very brave.

Maggie watched the country’s preparations for invasion with a mixture of terror, disbelief, and admiration. She remembered how, just a few years ago, occasionally the newspaper would have an article or two about Hitler and his growing power, or how then Minister of Parliament Winston Churchill made speeches about the growing Nazi threat in the House of Commons—only to be ignored.

Just a year ago, when Neville Chamberlain was Prime Minister, promising peace and offering appeasement, Winston Churchill had been one of the few voices warning against the growing threat of Nazi Germany. In speeches and articles, he’d said that Britain couldn’t turn a blind eye to Hitler’s invasion of Poland the way she had with Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia. England must honor her treaty to back the Poles or else face disgrace. And England must rearm to defend herself or else risk enslavement by the Nazis.