Connie Willis - All Clear

“They didn’t know they were going into a war,” Bob said impatiently. “Did they, Calvin?”

No, he thought. They didn’t know they were going into a war.

We didn’t know where we were going, so we just scribbled little notes and flung them out at stations as we passed.

—SERGEANT MAJOR MARTIN MCLANE,

RECALLING HIS ARRIVAL HOME

FROM DUNKIRK

Dover—April 1944

“KANSAS!” COMMANDER HAROLD BAWLED IN ERNEST’S EAR, hugging him and pounding him on the back. “I can’t believe it’s you!” And for the space of perhaps thirty seconds, Ernest wondered if he could convince him he was mistaken—if his two-day stubble and Cornish accent might create just enough doubt that he could look bewildered and say, “I’m sorry, I’m afraid you’ve confused me with someone else.”

But it was too late. The Commander had already seen the look on his face when he’d realized this was the Lady Jane. And now what the hell was he going to do?

If the Commander told Lady Bracknell …

He suddenly remembered Bracknell saying, “Algernon specifically requested you for this delivery.” Tensing already knows I know the Commander, he thought.

That’s why he sent me. But how had he known that? And what was the Commander—

“What are you doing here, Kansas?” Commander Harold was saying.

“What am I doing here? What are you doing here? I thought the Lady Jane had been sunk at Dunkirk—”

“Sunk?” he bellowed, outraged. “The Lady Jane?”

Jesus, the sailor up on deck will hear him, he thought. “Shouldn’t we—” he cautioned, pointing at the hatch.

“You’re right, lad,” the Commander said, and waded over to the hatch, reached up, and pulled the trapdoor shut. “You should know nothing can sink the Lady Jane, not even a Nazi U-boat.”

“But then what happened? Where’s Jonathan?” he said, almost afraid to ask. “Did he make it back?”

“Make it back?” the Commander bellowed, surprised. “Why, you saw him up there on deck not five minutes ago.” He tipped the hatch open and shouted,

“Jonathan! Get down here!”

“Aye, aye, Captain Doolittle,” a man’s voice said, and the sailor came down the ladder, still carrying the wrench and saying reprovingly, “Grandfather, you’re not supposed to call me Jonathan. My name’s Alfred—” He stopped when he saw Ernest, looking uneasily at him. His hand tightened on the wrench.

This can’t possibly be Jonathan, Ernest thought, staring at the tall, broad-shouldered sailor. He’s a grown man.

“Sorry, Captain Doolittle,” Jonathan said. “I didn’t know you had company.”

“Stop that Captain Doolittle nonsense,” the Commander said. “Can’t you see who this is? It’s Mike Davis!”

He may not even remember me, Ernest thought. It’s been four years.

“You know,” the Commander prompted. “Kansas!”

“Oh, my goodness!” Jonathan exclaimed, shifting the wrench to his other fist so he could shake hands. “Mr. Davis!” He was beaming. “This is wonderful!”

“Wonderful” was the word, all right. They were alive. His unfouling the propeller hadn’t got them killed. Especially Jonathan—the Commander had known what he was getting into when he took off for Dunkirk, but Jonathan hadn’t. He’d been just a kid.

Though he wasn’t any longer. “I can’t believe it!” he was saying, pumping Ernest’s hand vigorously. “I’m so glad you’re here. I never thanked you for saving our lives. Without you, we’d be at the bottom of Dunkirk harbor. And you nearly got killed yourself, trying to—” He stopped short and looked down at the water Ernest was standing in. “I mean, your foot and everything. I thought they were going to have to cut it off.”

So did I, he thought.

“We’d never have made it without you,” Jonathan said. “I should have recognized you, but you look so different!”

“I look different? Look at you! You’re all grown up!”

“Having German torpedo boats on your tail ages you rather quickly. But what are you doing here?”

“That’s the same question I’ve been asking your grandfather. I’d heard you didn’t make it back to Dover after your second trip to Dunkirk.”

“We didn’t,” the Commander said. “We were commandeered.”

“They needed us to go to Ostende to take off an intelligence officer they couldn’t afford to let the Germans get hold of,” Jonathan explained. “So they offloaded our passengers onto the Grayhoe, and we went to Belgium instead.”

“And when we got him back to Ramsgate, they asked us if we’d do a few other jobs for Intelligence, like—”

“Grandfather,” Jonathan said warningly. “That’s classified. I’m not certain we’re allowed to—”

“Bah! We can tell him. Can’t we, Kansas?”

“Not Kansas,” he said. “These days it’s Ernest Worthing.”

“What’d I tell you, Jonathan? And I’ll wager he’s got even more secrets than we do, haven’t you, Kansas?”

“Yes,” he said. Most of which I can’t tell even you.

“All right, we told you what we’ve been up to since Dunkirk,” the Commander said. “Now you tell us what you’ve been doing these last four years.”

I’ve been trying to get two of my fellow historians out of this century and back home, he thought. I’ve been writing letters to the editor and personal ads and funeral notices with coded messages in them to people who haven’t been born yet. And I’ve been trying to find Denys Atherton, who is somewhere in the staging area for the invasion, so he can tell Oxford where Polly and Eileen are and pull them out before Polly’s deadline, which passed four months ago.

“I’ve been delivering parcels,” he said, and when the Commander frowned, he smiled and said, “I’m Seaman Higgins. Captain Pickering said as how you were hiring on a crew.”

“I knew it,” the Commander said jubilantly. “I told Jonathan that Tensing’d put you to work.”

“You’re not supposed to call Colonel Tensing that,” Jonathan said. “You’re supposed to call him Algernon.”

“That’s only when there might be German spies about.” The Commander turned to Ernest. “All these made-up names—Captain Doolittle, First Mate Alfred—a lot

“That’s only when there might be German spies about.” The Commander turned to Ernest. “All these made-up names—Captain Doolittle, First Mate Alfred—a lot of nonsense. Wanted me to be Capitaine Myriel,” he said, pronouncing it “Cap-ee-tayne Meeryell.” “And what the hell good will that do? If the jerries catch us, they’ll know in two minutes we’re not Frenchies. Instead of worrying over names, I told ’em, you should be seeing to it we don’t get caught.” He turned to Jonathan. “And Kansas here knows his name’s Tensing. He was in hospital with him. Weren’t you, Kansas?”

“Yes,” he said, trying to make sense of all this. He’d assumed they’d met Tensing in connection with the assignments they’d done for British Intelligence and that they’d mentioned him to Tensing, but if they’d known him while he was in hospital …

“How did you meet him?” he asked.

“He was the officer we had to fetch at Ostende,” the Commander said.

“He was badly injured,” Jonathan said. “He’d been shot in the spine.”

“And you told him about me when you were bringing him back?”

“He wasn’t in any shape to be told anything,” the Commander said. “Unconscious the whole way.”

“We didn’t think he was going to make it,” Jonathan said.

“And then eight months later up he pops, nearly as good as new and looking for you. Said he’d been in hospital with you and somebody’d told him we’d brought you back from Dunkirk. Said he’d seen you in some town near Oxford and then lost you again and did we know where you were and what could we tell him about you. Mainly, could you be trusted?”