Alfie nodded and stepped into the kitchen, putting the water on the range to boil. He looked in the tea caddy: it was a quarter full, so he put a spoonful in the teapot, filled it with the hot water, and left it to stew for a few minutes while he took some bread and cheese from the larder. When the tea was brewed, he put everything on a tray and brought it into the parlor. Georgie was standing by the fireplace, holding a portrait of the three of them—himself, Margie, and Alfie—taken only a few weeks before the war began.
“Nice-looking family,” said Georgie as if he didn’t recognize any of them.
“Dad, that’s us,” said Alfie, handing the tea across. “Here, drink this. You’ll feel better, I promise.”
Georgie nodded and sat down with the cup, taking a careful sip. “You forgot the sugar,” he said. “Never mind, we’re probably out. Think on, if we were back in London, my Margie would never forget the sugar.”
Alfie stared at him. “Dad, this is—”
There was a rat-a-tat-tat on the front door, and Alfie jumped. Only one person ever knocked on the door like that. “Stay in here,” he said, turning to his father. “Don’t move, all right?”
“Yes, sir!” said Georgie, saluting as he sat back in the chair.
Alfie stepped outside into the hallway and opened the front door only a little, looking out into the street but keeping his right foot positioned so no one could just walk in.
“All right, Alfie?”
“All right, Old Bill,” he said, smiling at his next-door neighbor, who was peering over his shoulder into the corridor. Behind him, Alfie could see Mr. Asquith standing in the middle of the road with Henry Lyons sitting on the bench-seat behind, the milk float filled with empty churns. He was doing everything he could to get the horse to trot on, but Mr. Asquith was staring intently at number twelve and would not move under any circumstances.
“Everything all right in there?” asked Old Bill.
“Yes. Mum’s at work, though, if you were looking for her.”
“No, it’s not that,” he said. “Alfie, I might be going mad, but I was coming into my front room a few minutes ago and glanced outside, and I could have sworn that I saw a familiar face passing by my window.”
Alfie swallowed and hoped that his expression wouldn’t give him away. He tried to look as if he didn’t understand.
“A familiar face?” he asked. “Whose?”
“You all alone in there, Alfie?” asked Old Bill.
“Come on, old chap!” cried Henry Lyons at the top of his voice.
“I told you: Mum’s at work.”
Old Bill scratched his beard and seemed uncertain whether or not he should ask more questions. “I thought I saw … well, look, I know this sounds crazy, but I thought I saw your dad walking down Damley Road. Large as life and twice as ugly.” He turned around and stared at Mr. Asquith. “What the flamin’ ’ell is wrong with that horse?”
“My dad?” asked Alfie, laughing out loud, and even to him it sounded fake.
“Yes, your dad. You know—tall bloke. Went away to the war. Your dad, Alfie.”
“My dad’s on a secret mission,” said Alfie.
“Then my eyes must have been playing tricks on me.”
“I suppose so.”
“I must have been dreaming.”
“There’s no one else here.”
“Can I come in, Alfie?” asked Old Bill.
“I’ve got to go to school.”
Old Bill glanced at his watch. “At this time?” he said.
“I mean the shops. I told Mum I’d get something in for our tea.”
There was a long pause, and they stared at each other, man and boy, waiting for the other to crack. Finally, with a great neighing sound, Mr. Asquith lunged forward down the street, clip-clopping along, turning his head back once or twice to look at Alfie reproachfully.
“Right you are,” said Old Bill finally, sighing deeply. “Well, I suppose I’ll see you later on. Good-bye, Alfie.”
“Good-bye, Old Bill.”
He closed the door and stood with his back to it for a moment, shaking his head. That had been close. When he went back into the parlor, Georgie’s cup was lying on the floor, the tea seeping into the carpet at his feet. He looked up at Alfie like a little child who has been discovered doing something he shouldn’t.
“I dropped it,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter,” said Alfie. “It’ll dry out.”
“No, I better clean it up,” he said, reaching for one of the cushions from the sofa and moving to press it down on the damp spot.
“No, don’t do that,” said Alfie, grabbing the cushion away from him. His mum would go mad if he got tea on that. “It doesn’t matter. Just leave it.”
“Yes, sir, Sarge,” said Georgie, sitting back again.
“I’m not a sarge!” cried Alfie in frustration. “I’m Alfie!”
“Of course you are, son,” said Georgie with a shrug. “I know my own son, don’t I?”
Alfie glanced over at the clock on the sideboard. It was the middle of the afternoon now, and he realized that he had never really thought about what he would do once he’d brought his father home again; he had just wanted to get him out of that terrible hospital, with its blood and its stench and the constant groaning of damaged men in the air. But now he realized that maybe being cooped up inside this small house wasn’t the best thing for Georgie right now, and an idea struck him. He ran up to his bedroom, opened his wardrobe, took the shoeshine box from its storage place, and came back downstairs. “We’re going out,” he said, looking at his father.
“Out? Where to? I was just getting comfortable.”
“I have to go to work.”
Georgie frowned. “Work? The dairy won’t be open now. Not for us anyway.”
“I don’t work at the dairy,” said Alfie. “I work at King’s Cross.”
“Train driver, are you? They’re a posh old lot, them train drivers.”
“I’m a shoeshine boy,” said Alfie in frustration.
“Well, that’s a good honest way to make a living.” His dad gazed around and suddenly looked as if he didn’t recognize where he was. “I need to get out of here,” he said in a tone of sudden terror.
“Good, because that’s what we’re doing. Come on.”
They left the house, and this time Alfie walked Georgie the long way around, ushering his father ahead of him so they wouldn’t pass Old Bill Hemperton’s front window. At the end of the street he turned around for a moment and saw Joe Patience standing in his doorway smoking a cigarette and watching him. How long had he been standing there? Had he seen Georgie? Their eyes met for a moment, but Joe gave nothing away, just continued to smoke, and Alfie turned the corner, where his father was waiting for him, staring up at the sky.
“It’s a big world, isn’t it?” said Georgie. “Do you think they all hate each other on other planets too?”
* * *
“This is my spot,” said Alfie when he reached his usual place at King’s Cross, equidistant between the platforms, the ticket counter, and the tea shop. “And that’s the chair I let the customers sit in. Do you want to sit on it?”