Free Homing by Elswyth Thane Page A

hanging out there with an American just out of Warsaw—some sort of Unofficial guy, just a Tourist, Johnny explained in his code voice which capitalized the vital word ever so slightly—one of those professional globetrotters on Holiday, as you might say.
    This American said the Poles would fight like hell, he bet, and even then he gave them about a month, without help. They were too charming, and too confident, and too old-world, and too bloody ill-equipped. And by the way, said Johnny, ask Virginia if she remembered anything about October 1918.
    Virginia would naturally remember several things about October 1918, but she had gone to bed for once, and Johnny had not told them what sort of thing she was supposed to remember.Something about the American in the Adlon bar, apparently. Not much to go on. They speculated on it briefly, with yawns, and went off to lie down a while, if not to sleep, before the new day caught up with them.
5
    “Of course I remember October 1918,” said Virginia at breakfast when they put it to her. “They went right on getting killed. What else do you want to know?”
    “We sort of wondered if you recalled any Americans,” Jeff said mildly.
    “Quite a few. Why?”
    “We don’t know why,” Bracken admitted. “Johnny was trying to get something across last night on the phone. He’s met up with an American tourist type—he says—who is in and out of Warsaw, and then he said to ask you.”
    “Intelligence man,” said Virginia, not batting an eye, pouring out more tea.
    “Probably,” Bracken conceded with respect.
    “What’s his name?”
    “No names,” said Bracken.
    “I see,” said Virginia.
    And then, though her eyes were on her teacup and she did nothing so obvious as catch her breath or change colour, Bracken could have sworn that she thought of something. He waited, while a silence spread.
    “Well, it’s not much to go on, is it,” said Virginia, her eyes still lowered, and they agreed it wasn’t and went on waiting. “There were dozens of them,” she remarked, and lifted her cup. “Most of them I wouldn’t know now from a hole in the wall. Why? Is it important?”
    “Hard to tell. It could be,” Bracken said cautiously.
    “He’ll get himself killed, no matter who he is, mucking about in Warsaw, once the fun starts,” said Virginia.
    “The American Embassy has taken a villa outside Warsaw as a refuge in case of air raids,” Bracken said. “No flies on Biddle.”
    “Well, so they have here, at Epsom or somewhere,” she agreed. “And will the German bombers know Biddle’s Embassy villa outside Warsaw from anybody else’s villa when the time comes—or will they care?”
    “Remains to be seen,” said Bracken, handing his cup for moretea. He perceived that there would be nothing more forthcoming now, and when Virginia remarked that believe it or not the annual cricket party at Farthingale village was tomorrow and she had to be seen there as usual, he allowed Johnny’s mysterious American to sink into temporary oblivion.
    “You’d think they’d call the cricket off this year,” Sylvia remarked.
    “What, and let Hitler have the satisfaction?” Virginia demanded . “They begin to plan these August festivals in January. This one has already sustained the march into Prague and the death of Albania. We aren’t going to miscarry now!”
    “But surely everybody’s called up,” said Sylvia.
    “Regulars and reservists, yes. But there are still enough old crocks and schoolboys to make a team, and the village expects it. They could never do it without Mab and me, though, so we’ll be off right after lunch, if we can have the car.”
    “Certainly, take the car. But there’s no real rush yet,” Bracken said.
    The morning papers lay beside him, folded so that only one headline was visible. Hitler’s Midnight Conference, it said. Next to that there was a column about all Warsaw digging trenches, even expensively dressed women swinging picks and shovels in