by April White
“What is this place?” Rachel asked.
“The oldest synagogue in London,” Archer said, smiling at Ringo, who nodded.
“That’s right. I used to let myself in to practice chandeliers.”
“To practice chandeliers? What does that even mean?” I scoffed.
He grinned. “Ye’ll see.”
Rachel’s eyes were wide and aimed at Ringo. He smiled at her and leapt to the top of a trash container, then pulled himself up the door lintel to the window ledge above it. He pried the bottom of the window open and disappeared inside the building in under thirty seconds. Rachel turned her stare to me.
“He just entered a synagogue like a thief.”
“Yeah. He’s sort of an equal opportunity offender when it comes to private buildings. The first time I met him he broke into Kings College for me. He’ll open the door in a second so we can go in.”
She gasped. “I don’t think I can enter a temple when it is closed.”
“It’s open now.” I pointed to the door Ringo had just flung wide.
Archer held his hand out to Rachel. “Come. Your faith sees this place as schul to learn, and as a place of peace and worship. There are no hours for that.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Rachel allowed Archer to lead her inside. I shot Ringo a grin as I walked past him. “Nice one, Keys.”
He wiggled his fingers at me, then pointed up as I entered the long room. I stopped in my tracks with a gasp that echoed what Rachel had just done, but for a different reason.
Hanging from the tall ceiling were seven huge brass chandeliers, three on each side of the room, plus an even bigger one hanging in the middle. “Are you kidding?” I said to Ringo.
“I’ll show ye,” he said mischievously, but I stopped him before he could jump up the altar.
“No!” I whispered fiercely. “I don’t think she could handle that kind of disrespect. She’s having a hard enough time being in here without the sight of you swinging from the chandeliers.” Then I grinned at him. “But it looks like fun.”
I looked over to find Rachel standing in front of the main altar at the far end of the room. She was staring up at what looked like Hebrew writing on two tablets at the top. Archer had stretched himself out on one of the pews under the biggest chandelier and was looking up at it with such a peaceful expression on his face that I went to join him. I lay down so the tops of our heads touched and our feet pointed in opposite directions. The chandelier looked a little like a kaleidoscope from that angle.
“It was good to bring her here,” Archer said quietly.
I looked past my feet to where Rachel stood, still staring up at the altar, and I saw her shoulders shake.
“She’s crying,” I whispered.
“I’m guess she hasn’t let herself mourn him.”
I knew Archer meant her father, and I dropped my whisper even quieter. “Only about five or ten percent of the people sent to Auschwitz survived.”
“Oh, God.” His tone was horrified, and I rolled over onto my stomach to face him.
“Hitler and the Nazis murdered six million Jews – most of them in camps.” Archer’s shocked expression said it all, and I added the clincher. “In total, over sixty million people died because of this war.”
Archer squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed the heels of his hands over them. “How did we do this to ourselves? How can we have allowed this to happen so soon after the Great War?”
“Have you ever asked yourself, do monsters make war, or does war make monsters?” I said. “It’s a quote from a book about angels and demons, but it fits.”
He was silent, and his eyes went back up to the chandelier above our heads. Ringo passed me and gave me a quiet nod as he went to stand by Rachel’s side. He murmured something to her, and she nodded, and I thought about what makes monsters, and what makes men.
Going Underground
The night was clear and warm when we left the synagogue. Whatever had broken in Rachel as she stood in front of the altar had left exhaustion in its wake.
“I’m goin’ to take Rachel back to Guy’s if it’s alright with ye.” Ringo said to us in a quiet voice. I nodded, then caught her eye and stepped over to where she stood under an unlit streetlamp.
“How are you?” I asked her.
She inhaled softly. “When they took my father, I stayed in the village to keep the garage for him to return to. Now there is no village, and perhaps my father will never come home. It is as though my purpose for living was just torn out of the book, and I don’t know what happens next.”
I searched her startling eyes and saw her strength in them, even under the doubt and pain that clouded them. “It’s your story to write now.”
“Is that what you’ve done? Did you choose the purpose of your life?”
I almost smirked and made a joke about barely being able to choose what t-shirt to wear each day, but I realized it wasn’t true, and saying it wouldn’t do justice to Rachel and what she faced now. “I don’t know how to choose my purpose – that sounds too big and … significant. But I know who I am, and I’ve chosen the things that are important to me. I think the best decisions I make about what to do in my life come when I’m being true to both of those things.”
She blinked, as though my answer had surprised her. “Thank you.”
Ringo came up next to me. “Do ye ‘ave it in ye to run back?” he asked Rachel.
She nodded. “Yes, but only if you show me some new things to try.” She looked at me. “I’m writing a story, you see, and I need to learn who my main character is and what she likes to do.”
I grinned at her and they took off at a sprint. I turned back to find Archer watching me thoughtfully.
“I told him we’d go up to Russell Square to scout Holborn station, and then we’d meet them back at Guy’s Chapel,” he said. “Although the encoded message gave the date of Tom’s mission as June 12th, we’ve both learned that the twelfth begins at midnight tonight.”
I grimaced at the reminder of my horrible mistake in Victorian London on the night Mary Kelly was murdered by Jack the Ripper. It was not one I’d ever repeat. “It would be nice to actually be able to make a plan, instead of just reacting to everything,” I said.
We jogged through the streets of Old London, and had to move away from the London Wall down toward the river because of building damage and debris. The neighborhood around Saint Paul’s Cathedral had been destroyed by bombs and fire, but the dome still rose up from the ashes like a shining beacon in the moonlight.
“Are the bombs that hard to direct to targets?” I whispered to Archer when we stopped to stare at the Cathedral. “I mean, you must be able to see that dome from miles away.”
“That’s exactly why they’ve left it standing. It’s a navigational tool now, especially with so much of the city unrecognizable.”
We saw no one out on the roads until we passed St. Bride’s Church, but it wasn’t a surprise that Fleet Street was bustling with life. Slivers of light shone through blackout curtains, and messengers darted between buildings as they ran errands for the papers that delivered each day’s war news. They barely seemed to notice us as we sprinted toward the Strand, intending to cut up toward the British Museum after we’d passed the Royal Courts of Justice.
The bit of activity on Fleet Street made me happy. It was a small thing, to see people scurrying about at night, but significant in this city that had been so besieged from the air since the Blitz of 1940. I didn’t know a lot about the Blitz, but running through London four years later was a major education in the damage the German bombs had done.
The silence as we passed the Bush House seemed almost absolute. Our feet pounded a soft staccato on the pavement, and Archer’s pace was perfectly matched to mine. I was just about to take his hand and pull him into a doorway for a surprise kiss when an air raid siren sounded its wail above us.
I barely bit back a shriek of surprise when Archer grabbed my hand and swung me off the curb to dart a
cross the Strand. “There’s a shelter at Aldwych Station,” he said with grim determination. I remembered his story about having been caught in a wave of people going underground during the Blitz, and I yanked his hand sharply to make him stop.
“Wait! When did you eat last? The buck in France?”
“I’m fine, Saira. We need to get off the street.”
The drone of airplane engines was faint, and I looked around us at the buildings. “There are no landmarks here. We can hide on the surface.” People had already begun streaming out of flats and houses, heading toward the Underground station. They looked grim-faced and exhausted, and most were carrying blankets and pillows. I suddenly didn’t want to be stuck underground with so many grumpy people.
Archer spun me around to face him. “Saira, you can’t hide from a bomb, because it’s not looking for you. The only part of hide and seek it knows is ready or not, here I come.” He wasn’t angry, just determined, and one small part of me wanted to dig in my heels and resist on principle.
But then the drone of the bomber engines carried a new sound under them. It was sort of like a mechanical bumble bee, with an engine that surged rhythmically.
Until it didn’t.
My brain automatically began counting. In the movies, the V-1 rockets went silent for a count of twelve before they exploded. Except … this wasn’t a movie.
“Ahhh!” I grabbed Archer’s hand and pulled him after me. “Run!”
We wove through the people moving like lemmings to the Underground entrance, dodging the kids who decided running with us looked fun. No one else seemed to understand the imminence of the danger, and we had just made it to the top of the stairs when the unconscious count in my brain hit twelve.
BOOM!
“What was that?!” Archer shouted.
“A V-1 rocket,” I shouted back over the screams of panicked people as they ran for the station. “Haven’t you heard one before?”
“No!”
I didn’t know how far away the explosion was – a couple of blocks, maybe – but I felt it in my teeth and bones and eardrums. A tidal wave of people running for the station entrance threatened to sweep us away with it. The stairs were completely jammed, and I leapt to the stair rail to ride it down. Archer was right behind me, and we made it down the multi-level stairs before the next bomb hit.
Underground, the explosions were like a great, angry giant thumping his club on the ground as he demanded the blood of Englishmen. Both platforms at Aldwych were filling rapidly.
“Is Central the only line that runs here?” I asked Archer.
“Yes. It’s a dead end from Holborn, so it’s an easy air raid shelter. They stopped running trains to Aldwych during the Blitz.”
“So the track should be dead, right?” I had heard enough horror stories of people being pushed onto live rails that I stared dubiously off the platform.
Archer searched into the blackness of the tunnel for a long moment, then quickly took my hand and pulled me toward the northern end. “You’re a genius.”
“I am? I mean, yes, thank you, I know.” I grinned at him. “What did I say?”
“Holborn is about two hundred and fifty yards away. We can get there underground.”
“Yep, I’m a genius. Especially since I have this.” I whipped my little Maglite out of my pocket, and Archer hid it from view as he took it from my hand.
“Undeniably genius.”
Archer gave me a quick kiss on the lips. I was a little giddy from the adrenaline of running from bombs, and I kissed him back with enthusiasm. An older woman standing behind him smiled cheerily through her exhaustion.
We dodged people who were beginning to settle down in hopes of getting an hour or two of sleep, and finally made it to the far end of the platform. A very quick look around revealed no obvious watchers, so I blocked Archer’s body with mine as he dropped to the tracks, then surreptitiously knelt as if I was tying my boots. I took his outstretched hand and leaned forward to slip down next to him. “Nicely done,” he whispered as we crouched low and hugged the platform wall.
A moment later we were inside the tunnel, with the dim light of the platform fading behind us. I held Archer’s hand tightly and used my night vision until the light was completely gone.
“Torch, please,” I whispered into the blackness.
A moment later, the Maglite clicked. I stifled a scream as a headless ghost rose up in front of us, its arm raised in a warning. We both froze in place, until I realized the ghost was naked … and not a ghost.
“It’s a statue,” I breathed, relief pouring out of my whispered voice.
“It’s not just any statue. It’s one of the Elgin Marbles.” Archer shone the Maglite around the headless naked guy, and I realized he was made of marble, and he was hanging out with a headless centaur.
“From the British Museum?” I had just been to the Duveen Gallery a few weeks before and had been following the controversy about whether Britain should return the marbles to Greece.
Archer snorted derisively. “Duveen was an idiot, and Elgin was a thief.”
“So, apparently, you have an opinion about whether or not to give them back?”
We had continued walking, though more slowly now as the light from the torch played over the surfaces of friezes and sculptures that had once graced the Parthenon in Athens.
“I have opinions about art dealers and preservation techniques,” he said as we approached one of the wall friezes filled with horses and their riders. Archer shone the light at the carvings and pointed to clear grooves in the finish. “Lord Duveen did this a few years ago. Pentelic marble patinas to a honey color, but he thought the marble should be white, and he directed the use of scrapers and a chisel against the stone.”
I held out my fingers and touched the two-thousand-year-old sculpture, feeling the ridges and grooves that should have been worn soft with age. “I didn’t notice when I saw them in the gallery. But you’re right.”
“The museum must have moved them here after the Blitz,” he whispered as we continued making our way down the tracks. The tunnel was full of the marble slabs, but the most striking pieces were the statues. The head of Selene’s horse glared down at me from the top of another piece, and I wanted to blow it a kiss.
“I wonder what else they have stored down here?” I said as we resumed walking.
Archer froze and stared at the marbles. “Or if this has anything to do with the Werwolf mission with an entrance from Holborn?”
I peered down the tunnel in front of us, but it fell off into blackness. “You think it’s a simple case of theft?”
“The Germans are looting the rest of Europe. Stealing Britain’s greatest art treasures right out from under their noses would be utterly demoralizing.” We had begun walking again and whispered as we picked our way past the marbles that still lined the tunnel.
It did make a certain amount of sense, except for one glaring thing. “But why would Tom steal art from his own country?”
Archer was silent for a long moment as we walked. “I don’t know Tom. But I do know that if this is indeed theft, there has to be an inside man. These are priceless treasures, and there was no guard posted. Anyone could do what we just did and walk away with a beautiful horse head for their fireplace mantle. Except no one in England knows they’re here. No one but the people who moved them and the people who arranged to have them moved.”
“Which means museum employees?” I asked. I picked my way carefully over the uneven ground next to the tracks.
Archer sighed. “It only takes one disgruntled or greedy person with the right knowledge.”
“But it still doesn’t explain Tom.” And Tom was the whole reason we had come to this time and place.
Archer clicked off the small Maglite, and I was about to protest until I realized I could still see the dim outline of his shape next to me. I looked ahead of us and realized we were approaching another station.
“Holborn,” Archer whispered directly in
my ear. He stopped and crossed the track, pulling me with him. The marbles were tucked safely into the black tunnel behind us and weren’t visible at all in the dimmest of light that leaked from the platform ahead of us. I could feel Archer step over the tracks, and I followed, nearly blind, but with that extra spatial-awareness sense the darkness brings.
“Why are we on this side?” I asked in a whisper.
“We’re on the branch line from Aldwych. If there’s a way to cross over to the through line platform, I’d like to find it rather than use the passenger tunnels.” I tried to picture what he was talking about in my mind. Aldwych station was a branch line that was closed in my own time. Before it closed, trains originating from Aldwych only went through Holborn station on their way back out to the main Picadilly line – but the track we were on started at Holborn station and was therefore a dead end.
“Tell me about the rocket that went silent before it exploded,” Archer whispered as we walked.
“I’m pretty sure it was a V-1 rocket. They also called it a buzzbee. In old war movies they always went silent for a count of twelve before they exploded.”
Archer was silent for a moment, then he said, “I’d heard the Germans were building something new. That must be it.”
I stumbled over something that I wasn’t expecting and hissed out to Archer. “Wait. Shine the light here.” I back-stepped and felt it again with my foot. An electrical junction with a line running straight at the wall. I reached out to the wall just as Archer clicked the Maglite on and hid the beam with his palm.
Through the red light glowing from his skin I could just make out the edges of a metal door. “Block the light with your body if you can, but I need to see.”
