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16

ALICE HAD NEVER HAD FOUR PEOPLE IN HER SITTING ROOM BEFORE. She had far too much furniture, and it was all designed for greater, grander rooms. The three men standing there, blinking in the harsh light, seemed to fill every inch. This was the first time she had been able to see Edward properly. He had not changed in the slightest from the gangling, fresh-faced boy he had been three years ago. Except that now his expression was murderous.

"Do sit down, please!" she said. "And I'll make some tea."

They were all beat, as if they had mud smeared under their eyes. The two youngsters were blue chinned, old Mr. Jones's beard was frazzled. His thin hair lay all awry over his bald crown, while his fingers kept touching the bridge of his nose, feeling for lost specs. She probably looked a hag herself. She ought to be exhausted, yet she seemed to be floating in unreality, a bubble on a sea of illusion.

"So the old bastard did steal it all?" Edward said.

"Don't speak ill . . . You do know he died?"

"Glad to hear it. And for all eternity, he will wonder why he's in hell!"

"Edward! Go and wash out your mouth."

Still glowering, he removed the greatcoat and spread it on the sofa, bloodstains out. He gestured for Julian to sit there, while he flopped into a chair, apparently unaware that his pajamas were blood spattered also. Mr. Jones sank into the other with a long sigh, like a collapsing balloon. Alice took the kettle from the counter and headed for the bathroom to fill it, stepping over feet.

She heard Julian say, "Your late lamented uncle Roland, I presume?"

Edward growled something she did not catch; probably just as well. She returned to put the kettle on the gas ring, then stepped over all the feet again and went into the bedroom. D'Arcy's photograph was safely hidden in the drawer. She had only one other thing to remember him by, the bottle-green velvet dressing gown he had kept at her flat in Chelsea. Many of her favorite memories of him involved that gown—sitting on his lap, watching him take it off, or taking it off for him, or stepping inside it with him and feeling its soft touch on her back as he closed it around them both, body against body . . . . Every day I do not hear is one day closer to the end of the war.

D'Arcy would not mind her lending his dressing gown to Cousin Edward. Young Cousin Edward had been a little too friendly in the car. He should have grown out of his romantic illusions by now.

She went back into the sitting room and dropped the gown on him. "Here. You can make yourself a little more respectable."

Then she went to the cupboard and began taking out cups and saucers, not watching what was happening behind her back. Edward must have risen and donned the gown and sat down again, because she heard the chair squeak. Presumably three grown men knew a man's garment when they saw one. The silence was pregnant. Extremely pregnant.

She turned enough to see Julian. If that was an owlish look in his eye, then it was an owl trying very hard not to hoot.

"We must take a gander at your leg," she said. "It may need a doctor."

He blinked solemnly. "Then it won't get one. It's only a gash. A scar there won't ruin my looks."

Scar! She spun around to look at Edward. His eyes had never been bluer, but she did not read in them what she had expected—reproach, self-reproach, humiliation, anger, all of them? No, Edward was amused, and suddenly it was her face that was burning. He had seen through her little ploy. However he looked on the outside, there was an older, more experienced Edward inside there.

Ignoring the embarrassment she had brought on herself, she touched his forehead. He jerked his head away.

"You had stitches!" she said.

He smiled sardonically. "Now you believe me?"

"I believed you before." But that physical evidence made her feel creepy. He had no scar at all, which was impossible.

"The sawbones have some new techniques," Julian said. "They're using them on the—" He yawned. "Scuse me! On the wounded. They say they can put a chap back together so the scars don't show."

"They couldn't three years ago. Get those bags off, old man," Edward said without taking his mocking gaze away from Alice. We're all men of the world here. "Want to take a look at your leg."

Julian yawned again. "In a minute. Alice, how safe are we here? How about the neighbors?"

She turned back to the kettle, feeling it. "The old lady across the hall is as nosey as they come but deaf as a pole. The two couples at the end are away all day. You may be noticed when you go to the loo, though."

"Do it in squads and march in step?" He grinned wanly. "Or do you have a bucket we can use?"

"Good idea," she said. Julian had a foxy streak, an echo of his boyhood mischief.

She sat down on the end of the sofa, and all her bones seemed to creak. The bubble had burst. She felt old. She wished the watched pot would boil. She did not want tea, she wanted a mattress. "Two of you can share the bed. If we—"

"Tommyrot!" Julian said. "I can sleep in two feet of mud with shells falling all around. Nagian warriors lie on the ground, so I'm told."

"'Sright." Edward yawned also. "That's why they sleepwalk so much."

Well, well! Big boy now.

"I'll remember to lock my door."

Jones, too, was having trouble keeping his eyes open. "And I made out very well on the settee last night, or whenever it was. Feels like a week ago."

"We'd better draw up some plans, though," Edward said sadly. "A couple of hours' shut-eye until the shops open won't hurt, but we can't stay here longer."

"Why not?" Alice had been wondering about that, and had decided that they had left no trail. "There's nothing to connect the car to us." She had dropped the lockup key down a drain in Bermondsey.

"No. It's Stringer. If he was telling the truth, we're all right, of course. If he was just protecting the Old School Tie, you see. But if he was trying to trap me and calls in the law . . . He knows who I am."

Now it was Jones who hid a yawn. "I tracked you down in one afternoon, Miss Prescott. The police should be faster."

Edward nodded and rubbed his eyes. "And if Stringer is on the side of the Blighters, then I've put you all in mortal danger."

The kettle began singing a warning.

"The who?" Alice said.

"The Blighters." He glanced around bleakly, as if expecting to see doubt in the weary faces. "They're the Chamber's allies in this world. They contrived the massacre at Nyagatha. They're a damned sight more dangerous than the law, although they can warp the law to their own ends if they want to. They have powers you can't imagine. They killed Bagpipe."

Alice caught Ginger's eye, and his expression frightened her. He believed. Timothy Blodgley, she recalled, had been nailed to a draining board with a butcher knife. In a locked room.

"How could they know you were in Staffles in the first place?" she demanded. "And if they're so clever, why not kill you on the spot? Why ever let you reach England alive?"

He shrugged.

"Well?" she demanded. "You can't just issue cataclysmic warnings and then not explain them!"

"The man who tricked me into landing in Flanders expected me to die," Edward said. "But he knows I'm extremely hard to kill, because of the prophecy. So it would make sense for him to have put a mark on me, like a ring on a pigeon. Then the Chamber passes word:

"Dear Messrs. Blighters,

"The indicated subject has just returned to your manor. If he is alive, would you please stop him breathing at your earliest convenience. If you will do same, you will oblige,

"Your humble servants, etc.

"The car broke down exactly where the bombs were going to fall! Or vice versa. I really oughtn't involve you lot anymore, but I'm frightened that the Blighters may decide to take you off as witnesses or even just for spite. In that case, my luck may help shield you also."

Ginger said, "Good Lord!"

"They're not infallible," Julian said sleepily. "The bombs missed. You are heading back to Nextdoor, aren't you? To pass a message, you said."

"No."

Alice rose and stepped over Edward's feet to reach the kettle. She poured some water into the pot to warm it. She wondered why Smedley was so eager to cross over to this other world of Edward's. Running around with spears did not sound like his cup of tea, especially since he would have to throw with his left hand and carry the shield on his stump. Did he seriously believe that magic could give him back his hand?

After a moment, Julian said, "Why not? Why aren't you going back?"

"Lordie!" Edward said. "You should know! Because I came back here to fight in the war I'm supposed to fight in, that's why! How much identification will I need to enlist?"

"If you can breathe you're in," Jones growled.

It would not be that easy, Alice thought. And how long could he stay in? Her indestructible cousin was trailing a remarkable history behind him now. Too many people knew of him and knew him by sight. The thought of another loved one at the Front was a horror, and yet that confession made her feel guilty and unpatriotic. He would have to enlist under a false name, so she could no more be listed as his next of kin than she could be D'Arcy's. She would have two names to look for in the casualty lists.

"What about this prophecy?" she asked. "Did you kill the Zath character?"

"No. And I never will."

She made the tea and covered the pot with the cozy. "So that's all? You walk out of here at daylight and enlist?" The night's efforts seemed strangely futile if all they had achieved was to deliver another living body to the abattoir.

"There's one thing I must do first," Edward said through a yawn. "And that's get word to Head Office about the traitor back in Olympus. I hope they can tell me if the Blighters are still after me."

"I thought only people could cross over?" Julian said. "Letters won't? So how do you get word back to the Service?"

"I've got three leads. Yes, one of them might require a trip back, but if I do have to go, it won't be for long. They all require heading down to the West Country. You going back to Fallow, Ginger?"

"I must. First thing."

"Then I'll come with you. Soon as I have something to wear. Can you think of anywhere I can lay low for a couple of days?"

Jones fingered the bridge of his nose and jerked his hand away angrily. "I do have one idea. If we can't trust Stringer, then the school itself's too obvious."

Edward nodded, yawning again. "Smedley?"

They all looked at Julian.

"I'll tag along," he said quietly.

"Tea, anyone?" Alice said, but it turned out nobody wanted tea. Probably, like her, they wanted only to close their eyes and disappear. "Well, if you men are sure you'll be all right in here . . . "

Today was Thursday. She would likely be sacked if she missed a second day's work, but she knew she could not just walk out of this affair now.

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Framed