Connie Willis - All Clear

The girl shut the cupboard and turned, and Eileen realized with a shock that it was Binnie. Oh, my, she’s nearly grown up, Eileen thought, and then saw the stunned look on Binnie’s face.

She’d seen that look before—on Mike’s face when she told him Polly had already been here, on Polly’s face when the warden told them Mike was dead.

Binnie thinks something dreadful’s happened, Eileen thought, and hurried down the corridor to reassure her. “It’s not bad news. The war’s over. Aren’t you excited?”

“Yes,” Binnie said, but she didn’t sound excited.

She’d been very moody lately. Don’t be difficult tonight, Eileen thought. I haven’t time for this. “Where’s your brother?” she asked.

Alf came tearing down the corridor, shirttail out, socks down, tie askew, followed by the headmistress.

“The war’s over, ain’t it?” he said, skidding to a stop inches from Eileen. “I knew it was going to be today. When’d you hear? We been listenin’ to the wireless in class all day”—he glanced guiltily at the headmistress, but she was still beaming—“but they haven’t said anything at all!”

“Come along,” Eileen said. “We need to go. Alf, where’s your coat?”

“Oh, I forgot it! It’s in my classroom. I’ll fetch it.” He tore off down the corridor.

“Don’t tell—” Eileen said, but she wasn’t quick enough. There was a loud whoop from the end of the corridor, followed by the sound of cheering and doors banging open. The headmistress scurried off to deal with it.

Alf came tearing back with his coat clutched to his chest. “Alf,” Eileen said reprovingly.

“It was just on the wireless!” he shouted. “The war’s over! Come on, let’s go. They’re gonna turn on the lights in Piccadilly Circus.”

He caught sight of Binnie’s face, and his grin faded. “You’re lettin’ us go, ain’t you, Mum?” he said to Eileen. “Everybody’ll be there. The King and Queen and Churchill.”

And Polly, Eileen thought.

“The whole city’s goin’. The war’s over!” He appealed to Binnie. “Tell Eileen we must go!”

“Are we going?” Binnie asked.

“Yes, of course,” Eileen said, wondering if Binnie had somehow picked up on her anxiety. “We must be there. Come along, Alf, Binnie.”

Alf shot through the door, but Binnie still stood there, looking resentful.

“Binnie?” Eileen said, taking her arm, and when she still didn’t move, “I’m sorry, I forgot you wanted to be called Roxie.” She’d insisted on the name ever since seeing Ginger Rogers play an unrepentant murderess in Roxie Hart. Which wasn’t surprising.

Binnie wrested free of her grasp. “I don’t care a jot what you call me,” she said and flounced out of the school.

Alf was waiting for them at the bottom of the steps, but Binnie marched past him and started up the street toward the tube station. “We’re not going by tube,” Eileen said. “I’ve got Colonel Abrams’s car.”

“Can I drive?” Alf said, clambering into the front.

Binnie stood there, looking at the car. “Don’t you have to take this back to headquarters?”

“They won’t miss it,” Eileen said. “Get in.”

Binnie did, slamming the door.

“And I’m not certain I could get it there. The crowds were already starting to gather in front of the palace when I drove past,” she lied.

“Is that where we’re goin’ Mum?” Alf asked. “To Buckingham Palace?”

“No, we must go home first so I can change out of my uniform,” Eileen said.

“Good. I need to fetch my Union Jack.”

“Good. I need to fetch my Union Jack.”

“I think you should take the car back,” Binnie said from the backseat. “If you get in trouble, you might lose your job.”

“She can’t lose ’er job, ’cause she won’t ’ave a job,” Alf said jubilantly. “And you ain’t got a job drivin’ ambulances no more neither, Binnie. The war’s over. I think we should go to Piccadilly Circus and then Buckingham Palace.” He leaned out the window, waving. “The war’s over! Hurrah!”

Her lie about the crowds turned out to be the truth. People clogged the streets, shouting and waving flags. It took forever to reach Bloomsbury.

I’ll never be able to get the car to Trafalgar Square through this, Eileen thought, parking outside the house.

“I still think you should take it back to headquarters,” Binnie said.

“There isn’t time,” Eileen said, and ran upstairs to change out of her uniform. She put on a summer frock and her green coat and then rang up Mrs. Owens and told her the good news.

“We only just heard,” Mrs. Owens said. “Theodore’s mother just telephoned,” and Eileen could hear Theodore in the background saying, “I don’t want the war to be over!”

Of course not, Eileen thought.

Binnie came out wearing her white dress. Alf was carrying the parrot in its cage. “Can Mrs. Bascombe go with us?” he asked.

“Of course not, you noddlehead,” Binnie said.

“She’s really glad about us winning. She ’ated the war.”

“No, she can’t go with us,” Eileen said and sent Alf back to his room.

When he came out, he had his Union Jack and a box of matches, three Roman candles, and a long string of squibs. “Where did you get those?” Eileen demanded.

“I been savin’ ’em up for the victory celebration,” he said, which wasn’t an answer, but it was already half past six, and they still had to get to Trafalgar Square.

“You can take the squibs and one Roman candle,” she said, trying to ignore Binnie’s look of disapproval. “And no setting them off when there are people nearby.

Come along.”

She hurried them out the door and down to Russell Square—another ordeal. The streets and the station were jammed, and they had to wait through several trains for one there was room enough to squeeze onto.

It was eight by the time they reached Leicester Square. “Off,” she ordered Alf and Binnie.

“Why’re we gettin’ off ’ere?” Alf asked. “We ain’t to Piccadilly Circus yet.”

“We’re not going to Piccadilly Circus,” Eileen said, leading them through the crowd to the Northern Line platform. “We’re going to Trafalgar Square.” She herded them onto the train, which, fortunately, was too crammed to permit further conversation.

The station at Trafalgar Square was even worse, a wall-to-wall mass of shouting, jostling people and noisemakers and paper streamers. “You could nick lots of stuff

’ere,” Alf said.

“No one is nicking anything,” Eileen said, grabbing his and Binnie’s arms and propelling them up the escalator and the stairs and out onto the street.

There were people everywhere—cheering and singing and waving Union Jacks. Church bells were ringing wildly. A BEF soldier was moving through the crowd kissing every woman he saw, and none of the women—including two elderly ladies in flowered hats and white gloves—seemed to mind at all.

A double-decker bus with a hand-lettered banner reading, “Hitler Missed the Bus!” crept past, honking its horn nonstop and parting the crowds in front of it, and Eileen and the children were able to cross the street before the mob closed in again.

But the moment they reached the other side, they were engulfed. “We shoulda gone to Piccadilly Circus instead,” Alf said.

“We’re going to Trafalgar Square,” Eileen said firmly. “We’ll be fine. We just need to keep together.”

“Keep together,” Binnie echoed coldly. She had that sullen look again.

What is the matter with her? Eileen wondered, grabbing her by the arm and Alf by the sleeve and pushing them determinedly through the crowd to the square.

It was filled to bursting with sailors, soldiers, Wrens, waitresses still wearing their aprons, all waving Union Jacks. They had climbed up onto the base of the monument and the sandbagged sentry points, and one American Marine was trying to shin up the monument itself, while a policeman below him shouted at him to get down.