<Li> Merope Ward is a red - headed young Oxford historian (in 2060) making her first trip back in time to Warwickshire as a servant, Eileen O'Reilly, in a country house in 1939 to observe children evacuated from London . Her name Ward suggests her sympathy for the orphaned wards of the war - time . After Merope cannot return to 2060 Oxford via her drop in Warwickshire, she travels to London to seek help from her friend Polly . Unable ever to find a viable drop, she chooses to remain in England and to adopt and raise Alf and Binnie Hodbin . It is implied at the end of All Clear that she will marry Vicar Goode and will become an ancestor of Colin Templer . </Li> <Li> Alf and Binnie Hodbin (Binnie is an 11 - year - old girl; Alf is her younger brother) are very troublesome young urchins evacuated from London to Warwickshire in 1939 . Despite causing difficulties for Eileen (Merope), she nurses them after both catch measles (and saves Binnie's life when her measles turns into pneumonia). After a measles quarantine is lifted, Eileen delivers them both back to their mother in London in September 1940 . Binnie, it turns out, has never been given a first name; "Binnie" is merely a nickname derived from her last name, Hodbin . When she fears dying and having no given name on her tombstone, Eileen tells her she can choose any name she likes . Binnie searches film magazines for a glamorous actress name . At one point, she chooses "Spitfire"; later she opts for Dolores, Rapunzel, Vera, and others . Finally she takes Eileen's name as her own, too . </Li> <Li> James Dunworthy, a Fellow (professor) of History in charge of time travel from Oxford in 2060 . (Dunworthy was a pivotal character in "Fire Watch", Doomsday Book and To Say Nothing of the Dog .) His students think that he is overprotective . When he comes to believe that he alone is responsible for altering the "real" historical facts, he succumbs to despair . Polly finds him in St Paul's Cathedral in All Clear; in every story in which Dunworthy occurs, it is emphasized that he cares chiefly for the Cathedral, for his students, and for the importance of history . </Li> <Li> Lady Caroline Denewell - lives at Denewell Manor in Warwickshire where Eileen first serves and where the Hodbin children are evacuated; later she becomes the Major, Polly / Mary Kent's commanding officer at the FANY station in Dulwich . </Li>

In blackout what was the nickname that the captain of the mary jane gave to mike