Then 648 Squadron’s Wing Commander Talbot Cromwell came striding out, all ruffled up with importance, his frowning eyebrows like hairy caterpillars having a battle. Phyllis trotted behind him, running like a terrier to keep up.
‘Beaufort-Stuart, what’s the matter with you, are you some kind of collaborator now?’ Cromwell rumbled. ‘Stand back. I want all three of these men under lock and key.’
‘Shall I ring Coastal Command Headquarters and ask for a prisoner transfer?’ Phyllis offered.
‘Pennyworth, don’t you dare.’
Phyllis looked startled. Jamie backed away from Baer and took a shaking, defiant pull on his Woodbine, watching our crabbit commander through narrowed eyes like hot coals.
Talbot Cromwell didn’t want to let those Jerries out of his hands. He had a sack of excuses ready.
‘This is an Intelligence issue uniquely connected to Windyedge,’ he puffed. ‘There’s a designated agent to contact. I’ll conduct the first interview myself.’ He took a keek around him and asked the same question as Chip: ‘Have we a German speaker here?’
Hanging on to Louisa with one arm, old Jane raised her other hand high. She stood straight as a spear, eyes snapping fire and ice, like a very ancient goddess. In her music hall trumpet of a voice, Jane volunteered, ‘I speak a little German.’
Old Cromwell’s hairy caterpillars tried to do backflips.
He growled, ‘Volunteer McEwen, what in blazes are these civilians doing on this aerodrome?’
‘I had to collect the map courier from Stonehaven,’ I said. ‘I gave Mrs Warner and her girl a lift from the library, as a favour to Mrs Campbell; no petrol wasted. But when the planes came in I didn’t take the time to drop off the civilian passengers. Sergeant Fergusson let us through. Sir!’
Cromwell barked at me, ‘Got an answer for everything, haven’t you, McEwen?’ Then he barked at Phyllis and Jamie. ‘Flight Officer Pennyworth – incident report! Flight Lieutenant Beaufort-Stuart! Take your lads for debriefing. And get some clothes on, all of you.’
Cromwell turned to fire on someone else. ‘Lock up those Jerries in the limekilns – I’m told that’s a good, secure prison. The harbour master keeps the keys. Make sure they’ve got camp beds and blankets – oh, and paraffin heaters, it’s a bit damp. Send four lads to keep an eye on ’em – no, make that six, two for each, and make sure they’re armed.’
He paused to catch his breath. Then he lit his own cigarette and had a go at me again. ‘You take the old lady and the girl back to their lodgings. Tell Mrs Campbell what’s going on. See that the Limehouse is closed to the public so we can use the place as a meeting room. Then get back here to collect the rest of us. I’ll question those Jerries myself, and I want Pimms there too.’
Jamie:
I rode to the Limehouse in the Tilly along with Cromwell, Chip, Silver and Phyllis. By the time we got there, the public bar already looked like a medieval courtroom. A fire roared in the hearth, winking orange light off the coins in the black oak beams. The long table was pulled out to the middle of the floor, with three chairs set up on one side of it, facing towards the door. The other furniture was shoved out of the way.
The Old Roundhead walked in as if he owned the place and sat in the middle chair. He spread one of the new maps across the table.
‘Over here, Pennyworth.’
Phyllis sat down obediently and got out her cardboard notebook.
‘Now you, Flying Officer Silvermont. Show me how that Ju-88 came in.’
Silver pointed and scribbled with a china pencil. Chip and I hadn’t been told to do anything, so we stood stiffly at attention in front of the table.
Nancy Campbell had been told to clear off. She wasn’t allowed to hear what was going on. Ellen wouldn’t get a look-in, either. But in a minute Louisa nipped into the room and pressed herself against the wall next to the hall door, waiting for an appropriate gap to get Cromwell’s attention.
A few seconds later, the vestibule filled with the noise of thumping boots and slamming doors, and the three German airmen came trooping in. They’d been allowed to have their hands free, but they were escorted by guards with pistols. Behind the guards and their prisoners came the rest of Pimms Section. I don’t think I’d ever seen my lads so smart and polished, in smoke-blue RAF service dress uniforms, everybody’s face freshly washed and shaved and everybody’s hair slicked down with Brylcreem, even Dougie’s.
They lined up alongside me and Chip in front of Cromwell, with Pimms at one end and the German prisoners at the other. Harry Morrow’s head nearly brushed the low ceiling.
The Germans hadn’t scrubbed up as well as us, even the two who hadn’t taken a beating. They didn’t have pressed uniforms to change into; they were wearing the flight suits they’d arrived in. I longed to get a good look at Baer, and turned my head ever so slightly to try to study him. His broken nose was taped with sticking plaster, while the rest of his swollen face was beginning to turn purple.
This was my informer – our conspirator.
Baer glanced around, too, and his eyes settled on the gramophone. Then he gazed at Louisa for exactly the same length of time.
Then he looked away. His battered face was absolutely blank.
They didn’t let on that they recognised each other.
A thunderous, ringing silence seemed to fall, like the still moment when an aircraft’s engine shuts down. Cromwell looked around impatiently.
‘Where’s the old girl?’ he asked.
Louisa:
Jane took a long time in the bathroom and didn’t want help. Waiting in our room, I heard the Tilly labouring up and down the hill as Ellen brought people over from the airfield. I opened one of the south-east windows, trying to eavesdrop. Doors slammed, and there was a hubbub of men’s excited – maybe angry – voices. But they were muffled by the corner of the house and I couldn’t understand a word.
I went to check on Jane. She’d been bolted in the bathroom for at least half an hour.
She opened the door when I knocked.
That old woman had transformed herself into a film star. I’m not sure what part she was playing – judge? Ambassador, perhaps? No – ambassador’s wife? She’d changed into a long, tight-fitting black knit dress with a high neck and ruffles at the wrist and down the front. It was stylish and modern, though it couldn’t be new. Her short silver bob was pulled back with glinting jet combs.
‘Oh, Jane, you are stunning!’ I exclaimed. ‘No wonder people can’t tell how old you are!’
Jane smiled modestly and turned around. ‘Zip me up, please, darling. I simply cannot reach my own back any more.’
I zipped.
‘Now then, these ridiculous sticks. How I detest them! It will take me forever to get down the stairs and I know the young men are here already. Run ahead and tell them I am on my way.’
Off I went back down, like a courier racing between army units.
The awful commander was busy looking at a map with David Silvermont when I came in, and I didn’t like to interrupt. I stood against the wall waiting for a gap. Then I was glad I did, because it gave me a moment to set my face and not smile or frown or anything when Felix Baer looked me straight in the eye.
Did he know? Did he know it was me who’d figured out his codes, who was using them?
Almost instantly he turned away. I swallowed. Wing Commander Cromwell glanced up.
‘Well, girl! Is the old woman ready yet?’
‘She’s coming down now,’ I said. How was I supposed to address him? I didn’t have any idea. I added, ‘Sir. The stair takes her a while. She ought to have a comfortable place to sit.’
‘Indeed. Kerr, Yorke, get moving,’ Cromwell snapped, looking back down.
The wireless operators scrambled to rearrange the furniture, pulling Jane’s chair up to the table next to Cromwell. By the time they finished, Jane had arrived. I hovered at her elbow as she came in, wondering if Cromwell would kick me out when she was seated. Her sticks tapped agains
t the stone floor, and for a moment the only sounds were that tapping and the crackle and hiss of burning peat.
Jane reached her chair and I took the sticks. She braced herself against the armrests and made her terrifying backwards plunge into the seat. Jamie and Silver and even one of the German airmen threw themselves forward in alarm to try to support her.
Jane looked up and smiled.
‘I am perfectly all right.’
‘Pimms Section, attention,’ ordered Wing Commander Cromwell, and they all leaped into their stiff line-up in front of the table.
I laid Jane’s sticks on the floor and purposefully planted myself behind her chair, holding my breath. Jane reached for my hand, anchoring me. ‘I need Louisa here, please,’ she said. She raised her arm a little, and our hands stayed firmly clasped over her frail shoulder.
Cromwell looked at Jane, frowning. He looked up at me.
‘You were here in November, weren’t you, Miss Adair?’ he asked. ‘One of the hostages?’
I was astonished. I thought he had no idea who I was.
I’d known he was pig-headed and stuck on following rules, but I’d mistakenly also thought he was stupid. I realised now I might be jumping to conclusions, just like everybody did about me.
‘Yes, sir,’ I said politely.
‘All right, I’ll allow it. Make a note, Flight Officer Pennyworth; the girl can take an oath of secrecy along with the rest.’
I was in.
He moved on as if he’d never noticed me in the first place.
‘Find out why they’re here,’ he said to Jane, and waved his hand at the German prisoners.
Jane leaned forward. She spoke German hesitatingly, as if she were choosing her words with care. She was good at pretending to be English speaking German. An old actress! She tilted her head, favouring her left ear, and waited for a response.
Felix Baer and one of the other Germans both spoke at the same time, and in a minute they were shouting at each other. Baer backed down first – he threw his hands up in frustration and waved the other man ahead.
‘Eberhard Moritz,’ the airman introduced himself, laying one hand on his heart. He stepped forward and held the hand towards Jane. When she took it, he bowed his head and gave her hand a formal kiss. Then he stepped back and answered her.
I listened and listened, trying to understand anything. But I couldn’t – not one word. It made me wild with frustration, even when Jane relayed his message. I hated being so ignorant.
‘This man, this Eberhard Moritz, says he and his companions want to defect.’
‘Defect!’ echoed Cromwell in amazement.
Jane nodded. ‘He said they want to renounce Germany. Their connection to British Intelligence has been discovered and the Gestapo secret police are hunting for them – this flight was a perilous chance, and they had no choice but to take it. They dropped their life rafts in the North Sea to make it look as though they’d crashed on their way here! Moritz is their gunner, but he also leads their resistance cell. He apologises for his companion’s behaviour – that’s Felix Baer, the pilot.’ She nodded towards him. ‘Moritz says that Baer tried to shoot their navigator, Dietrich Althammer, just before they landed, and Moritz had to wrestle the gun away from him.’
Jane paused, frowning. ‘They haven’t stopped arguing about Althammer,’ she added. ‘That’s what you heard before Moritz spoke to me. They disagree as to whether he can be trusted.’
‘Go on,’ Wing Commander Cromwell said quietly.
‘Moritz asks for amnesty for all three of them. But Baer says that Althammer is a double agent and is here on some dubious mission of his own. They went back and forth, you heard – arguing. Moritz accused Baer of carelessness on an earlier mission, and Baer denied it.’ Jane added smugly, ‘They used stronger language, of course!’
Cromwell growled, ‘Ask Althammer for his side of the story.’
Jane turned to the third German and murmured, ‘Dietrich Althammer?’
He bowed his head to her. When he saw how she tilted her left ear in his direction, he leaned closer so she could hear him. It reminded me of the way Jamie talked to her, patient and interested, as if the German navigator were used to speaking to old women. I suppose even Luftwaffe airmen must sometimes have grannies who are hard of hearing.
‘Althammer says that Baer’s distrust is egotistic nonsense,’ Jane said finally. ‘He thinks it is a war of protocol – Baer, the pilot, should naturally be the commanding officer of their aircrew. But in their resistance cell, Moritz, the lowly gunner, is the designated leader. So they argue over matters of authority.’
‘Matters of authority!’ Wing Commander Cromwell gave a grunt of disgust.
It sounded a lot like Jamie’s struggle with Cromwell, and I knew the commander would be puzzled – should he believe the German flight crew’s commanding officer or the resistance cell’s designated leader? Directly across from me, Jamie was lined up standing at attention at the end of the row beside Silver, and our eyes met. I thought they were both struggling not to laugh. I had to look away so they wouldn’t infect me with it.
Wing Commander Cromwell rumbled, ‘If they can’t agree on their story we can’t get sense out of any one of them.’ Without warning he told the guard at the door, ‘Call Mrs Campbell back out here. We all want tea.’
Nan crept through and let herself behind the bar, where she put the kettle on to boil and tiptoed about rattling teacups. Jane and Eberhard Moritz started talking to each other again while Phyllis scribbled frantically in her cardboard notebook, trying to record everything properly.
It was hard not to fidget. Jamie’s rigid Pimms Section crews stood lined up like statues. Put your shoulders back, Lula, Mummy always told me as I stood up to play the flute. Make your daddy proud. If Pimms could do it, so could I.
‘Moritz says none of them will speak in confidence here,’ Jane relayed finally. ‘He objects to a civilian translator – that’s me, you know – and requests a translator aligned with the services, and also reminds us that according to the Geneva Convention of 1929, he and his companions are not required to tell you anything more than their name and rank.’
I thought that all sounded quite stuffed up, even if it was true. I looked over at Felix Baer. His face was turned away as if he couldn’t stand to watch. He was seething with fury.
Eberhard Moritz added something else, less stiffly.
‘He’s just apologising for being rude about me doing the translation,’ Jane explained. ‘He credits my German as being very good.’
Baer tried once more. Pale beneath the bruises, he faced Cromwell directly. He reined in his anger, but I was sure he was desperate to make himself understood.
Jane was cool as she translated.
‘He insists that Althammer is lying. He says that he and Moritz have risked their lives to deliver concealed information which, they hope, will be of mutual benefit to Britain and Germany. Baer believes Althammer is trying to prevent them from delivering it.’
Jamie:
Nancy’s clattering fell silent; she froze in the act of holding up her teapot. Cromwell sat with his mouth open and his fists clenched on the table in stark bafflement, waiting for an answer.
I stared at the floor. I didn’t dare catch Louisa’s eye again.
Moritz and Baer uttered another duelling fugue of frustration and defiance.
I was torn over which of them to believe. I thought I knew what it was like to be Felix Baer, struggling with an unruly flight crew, utterly unable to sacrifice himself to authority because of his own experience and knowledge. But I also sympathised with Eberhard Moritz, trying to command someone who was uncooperative and had his own plans.
Is that how Cromwell felt about me? The same way I felt about my lads?
Mrs Warner repeated in English, ‘Moritz says this place is informal and insecure. Baer says he won’t share War Office information with anyone but his contact. A man called – Mr Nestor?’
‘“Nestor!”’
exclaimed Wing Commander Cromwell.
My classical education wasn’t going to waste after all. I knew who Nestor was: Odysseus’s faithful adviser in The Odyssey.
Cromwell worked it out too.
‘“Nestor” indeed,’ Cromwell repeated. Then he sighed. ‘Our man with Intelligence, Robert Ethan, is in Abyssinia. What damnably poor timing. It will be at least a week before he can get here – if we can reach him.’
He paused to think. Phyllis looked as if she were holding her breath.
‘Pennyworth, make a call to Coastal Command Headquarters to send us a translator. One of their German-speaking wireless operators.’
‘Yes, sir. Now, sir? On the Limehouse telephone? It’s a public line, sir.’
‘Ask for a Y girl. Mention Nestor and Odysseus. They’ll know what to do.’
Phyllis scurried off to the hall telephone.
Chip took two long steps forward and confronted Felix Baer. They glared at each other coldly. ‘I’ll take over if you want,’ Chip said assuredly. ‘I’ll make him talk.’
He was going to get me another reprimand if he didn’t settle down. I clamped a hand hard on his shoulder and pitched my voice low.
‘Back off, Tex.’
‘C’mon, it won’t take long.’
Then I got insurrection from the Polish and Welsh contingent as well.
‘If the Yankee breaks a few more filthy Nazi noses, no one will cry,’ Ignacy said. ‘Or let Taff at them. He is good at throwing punches.’
Derfel nodded enthusiastically.
‘Your U-boat score is thanks to these so-called Nazis,’ I reminded them.
‘Back in line, all of you,’ barked Cromwell. ‘You’re a disgrace to enlisted men.’
Everybody snapped to attention again.
Cromwell spoke directly to the prisoners, cold and formal.
‘This base is not equipped for a tribunal. As military men you will appreciate we have made hasty accommodation here, but I will postpone our discussion until an appropriate translator is summoned. I will not release you to a higher command until I have been ordered to do so by the contact you yourselves have named.’
The Enigma Game Page 21
