Mr.Churchill's Secretary(23)

SEVEN





THE P.M. OFTEN worked so late into the night that overnight shifts were required.

Bunking down in the Dock, the underground dormitory housing of the War Rooms set aside for junior staff working late, was one of Maggie’s least favorite parts of her job. Lying on the hard, narrow cot, she covered herself with the rough, brown army blanket and looked at the little alarm clock she’d brought from home. It was nearly five in the morning, only two hours until she had to get up and start the whole routine over again. Listening to the dull roar of the subbasement’s air-conditioning, she turned out her flashlight and tried to will her body into sleep. But she was still too keyed up after her marathon day. Her thoughts were racing.

She remembered about the classified paperwork she’d seen, the civilian casualties predicted, the hundreds of thousands of cardboard coffins the government had on standby that no one except the highest-ranking officials knew about. What would happen if the Germans invaded—would there be hand-to-hand combat in the streets? Would there be a secret police set up with tribunals and hangings? Would the prettier Englishwomen become the concubines of the conquerors, trading in their self-respect for better rations and safety?

She thought about the P.M.’s conversation with Frain. Would the war be lost because of a spy who’d managed to infiltrate some government office and obtain that one crucial piece of information that would change the course of history?

Maggie thought about numbers. Numbers weren’t evil. Numbers, points, curves, fractions—they all existed independent of human thought and action.

She missed math. She loved the order, the cool logic, the joy of solving its inevitable steps. Now the numbers she saw were of the dead and wounded, of planes, ships, and U-boats downed. The black numbers against the white paper, once the source of so much pleasure for her, were now like tiny insects, signifying death. Sometimes she dreamed of numbers at night—dark, swarming digits flying with iridescent ebony wings. They’d swarm around her, nesting in her hair, crawling up her nose, into her eyes. She’d wake up in a cold, metallic sweat with the bedclothes in a pile at her feet.

The idea that this kind of violence and horror existed shook Maggie to her core. It was one thing to study war—it was another to live it. What have I been thinking of my whole life? Columns of equations had always made sense—that was what Maggie had always loved about them. Now that it was abundantly clear that there was no order, she felt empty. Cheated. Robbed.

The latest reports she’d read had turned her stomach. After invading a particular French town, Nazis had ordered the Jewish men to line up in front of their wives and children, then made them strip down and shave their private parts. A delousing program, or so it was called—really an exercise in power and humiliation. And they submitted. Because the alternative was being shipped off to one of the camps or being shot in the streets.

Learning all the sick and twisted details of the war, Maggie was starting to hate, hate with a ferocity she never knew she had within her. Could I kill a Nazi? she thought. Before, she would have said no. Or maybe—but only if she was in a kill-or-be-killed situation. But now she felt she could do it easily, with a song in her heart if it meant getting even. She could even picture drawing it out, adding to the suffering until they begged for it to stop, before she caught herself. What’s happening to me? Am I turning into a monster? One of them?

Earlier that evening, David had taken her out to dinner, one of the government-sponsored British restaurants redolent with the odors of fried onions and oily fish. After the waiter brought their plates to the table, Maggie asked him what he thought. She was desperate for someone to pull her back to civilization. David seemed to be the best prospect.

“The nature of evil?” He’d laughed as he tucked into his corned beef hash. “Now, that’s a festive topic of conversation!”

“I’m serious, David. You must have thought about it.” Maggie played with her cutlery as her dry and tasteless bangers and mash became cold. She knew she needed some kind of rational perspective.

“My grandparents were German Jews and left for England in the late 1880s. But I have relatives who got out as late as ’thirty-seven—and they could only escape to somewhere like Shanghai. That’s where they are now.”

Maggie had no idea. “David. I’m so sorry—”

A muscle in his jaw twitched. “At least they’re out of there and relatively safe.”

She tried to imagine Aunt Edith, stripped of her life’s work, wearing an armband with a pink triangle, confined to a ghetto. It was too much to envision. She reached over and took David’s hand. “I’m glad they’re safe. And I’m sorry it happened.”