“You seem to know them quite…intimately,” Durgin insisted.
Roth crossed his legs and leaned back in his chair. “Well, it’s not my fault the girls don’t close their blinds, now, is it?”
Mark leaned in. “It’s not as if they’re expecting someone across the way to have a bloody telescope!”
“If you ask me, if they left their curtains open, they wanted to be seen.” Roth shrugged. “Probably enjoyed it.”
“Where did you take them?” Durgin pressed. “When you met with these girls—where did you go?”
“I never met these girls—I never even spoke to them!” He tugged at his tie. “I know it might not look like it with everything you’ve seen in my room—but everything I do is, er, solo.”
“Where were you on the nights of March twentieth, twenty-seventh, and twenty-ninth?”
There was a pause as Roth searched his memory. “I was at the studio,” he managed. “I was on the air, live! I daresay you won’t find a more airtight alibi than that.”
“You could have recorded your voice and snuck out while it was playing.”
“Gentlemen, I have a team of sound engineers, writers, and producers, as well as scores of adoring fans. Believe me, if I’d left the studio, it would have been noted!”
Durgin turned to Mark. “Confirm his story with the appropriate people at the BBC.” He turned back to Roth. “We’re releasing you,” he told him, standing. “For now. Don’t leave London.”
—
The two men met Maggie back in the observation room.
“Well, so much for that,” she said, disappointed. “Just because he’s a Peeping Tom with distinctive taste in literature doesn’t make him our murderer.”
“Do you want to go with me to the BBC?” Mark asked. “Verify his alibi?”
“I told you yesterday,” she chided, giving them both a mysterious smile. “This afternoon I have an appointment—tea with the Queen. But first I need to change.”
—
“And how’s your day going, young sir?” Maggie asked Griffin. From his bassinet fashioned from a dresser drawer lined with blankets on the kitchen table, the baby waved his chubby fists and drooled. “Ga!” he called.
“Yes, my sweet—‘ga,’?” Maggie answered, bending to kiss his head.
K rubbed his face against her ankles, and she reached down to pet him.
Chuck was heating up leftover Woolton pie. “Do you want some?”
“I’d love a piece,” Maggie replied. “Skipped breakfast.”
“From what I’m hearing,” Chuck said, taking out silverware, plates, and napkins, “the explosion was absolutely preventable.” Maggie noticed her hands were trembling. “The police found evidence someone was tapping the building’s gas main—stealing it. Whoever did it used a hose attached to the gas line, to siphon it off.” She set two places, keeping everything out of Griffin’s reach. “Thank goodness most people were at work, but two mothers and three small children died. I only knew them by sight, but—” She faltered, unable to continue.
Oh, poor Chuck…Maggie got up and put her arms around her. “Shhhh…Now, why don’t you sit down and rest—and I’ll serve up that pie.”
Dazed, Chuck obeyed, sitting at the table and reaching out to hold on to Griffin’s bouncing foot. “We’re lucky this little man didn’t want to take his nap. And I was so angry, Maggie! You should have heard all I was saying as I packed him up in his pram. I was tired and just wanted a lie-down myself. The last thing I wanted to do was go to the park.” She looked down at her gurgling baby in awe. “But he saved both of our lives.”
“Thank goodness,” Maggie said, using pot holders to take the pie out of the oven. “Will there be any funerals? Memorial services?”
“Yes,” Chuck said. “Of course we’re going.” She rubbed at her eyes. “But I don’t want to dwell on it. Tell me about you—what’s going on in your life?”
“Oh, work,” Maggie said, dishing up the pie, steam rising in curls. “Just paperwork, you know—answering the telephones and filing—boring things like that.” She brought two plates over to the table.
“Any news on your sister?”
“Half sister. And not yet. But I am going somewhere rather exciting today.”
“And where’s that?”
“Buckingham Palace.” Maggie grinned. “To take tea with the Queen.”
Chuck dropped her fork. “Blimey O’Riley!” she exclaimed. “And here you are, keeping it so quiet. You could be a spy, you know! One of those Mata Hari secret agent types.”
“Oh”—Maggie took a bite of pie, nearly burning her tongue—“don’t be silly!”
“Well, Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ!” Chuck exclaimed, pressing her napkin to her mouth, her eyes aglow.
Maggie was glad to see her friend distracted.
“And now let’s talk about the truly important things in life.” Chuck took another forkful of pie and blew on it to cool it. “What are you going to wear?”
—
Maggie tried on dress after dress, as Chuck, Griffin, and K looked on.
Everything she owned was old, worn, and shabby. Most of her clothes were patched, some had holes from moths, while others had been made over using collars and cuffs from other outfits. “I could always wear my ATS uniform.” Maggie pulled out her brown Auxiliary Territorial Service regalia.
Chuck crinkled her nose. “Er, no,” she said. “No offense, but the Wrens have the best outfits. The ATS uniforms…”
Maggie sighed. “I know. They’re not really flattering, are they? I love those black stockings the Wrens get to wear. We get only the loathed lisle.”
“Why didn’t you buy any clothes when you were in America?”
“I was busy with things like toothbrushes and soap. And silk stockings. And chocolate. I did buy a dress, but alas, it’s a gown. I wore it to the New Year’s ball.”
“And books.”
“And books,” she admitted.
“You know,” Chuck said, “I don’t know how you’ll feel about this, but there are other clothes here. I hope you don’t mind, but I was having a poke around and found Paige’s old things. I know you two used to share clothes. They’re in her old room—well, Elise’s new room, I suppose.”
Maggie left her room for Elise’s, with memories of her late friend and former flatmate, Paige, swirling about her, despite the new paint and construction. She walked to the closet of the yellow bedroom and opened the doors. There were all of Paige’s clothes from the long-ago days before the war. They smelled faintly of mildew and a haunting touch of her Joy perfume. Maggie ran her hand over the pebbly bouclé fabric of a Chanel jacket. Paige always did have wonderful taste. And plenty of money.
Maggie pulled out a Schiaparelli suit. While the skirt was plain black silk, the jacket was black with a bright pink collar, embroidered with silk butterflies and demoiselles. In an instant, she made her decision. The suit was too beautiful not to wear.
“Do you think it’s all right—to wear her old clothes?”
“?‘There’s a war on, you know.’?” Chuck hugged her. “Carpe diem, my friend,” she said. “Take it from me—carpe the fucking diem.”
—
At the gates of Buckingham Palace, Maggie could see bomb damage to the Neoclassical fa?ade. She smiled as she remembered David’s critique of the palace’s architecture—Excruciatingly dull indeed—like a huge provincial Edwardian bank with the interior of a pretentious railway hotel.
Looking closer, Maggie could see some of the broken windows had been boarded up. The ornate black iron fencing had been removed to make tanks and planes. And there were the huge craters in front of the main gates; workmen in coveralls were filling them in with wheelbarrows full of tar. Like the rest of London, the Palace had seen better days.