by Daisy Styles
Maudie froze as the implications of what the men were discussing, and Edward’s obvious involvement at some level, sank in.
‘Mother of God!’ she thought.
Trembling, she waited until the men stubbed out their cigarettes and went on their way. As soon as it was safe, she shot out of her hiding place. ‘I’ve got to tell Kit what I’ve just heard!’ she gasped under her breath.
When she heard the sound of an approaching vehicle, she whirled around to see who the driver was and gasped in relief when she saw it was Peter.
‘Jump in!’ he called.
Breathless, she asked, ‘Can I borrow the Land Rover? It’s urgent, I need to get to the airbase.’
Peter looked surprised. ‘I’ve got to get this lot to the lake house for lunch.’ He nodded to the passengers in the back. ‘But you can have it after I’ve dropped them off.’
Flushed and panting, Maudie jumped into the passenger seat. ‘Thanks,’ she muttered.
Sitting tensely beside Peter, she willed him to drive faster. All she wanted was to get to Kit, but she couldn’t kick everybody out of the vehicle without causing alarm.
When they reached the lake house Maudie’s heart sank: Edward was there, drinking heavily with his loud-mouthed chums. As she moved into the driver’s seat, which Peter had vacated, Edward bellowed, ‘Where do you think you’re going, girl?’
Before Maudie could answer he yanked her out of the cab and steered her into the lake house.
‘Serve our lunch, girl! That’s your job, isn’t it?’
Maudie threw his hand off her. ‘If you touch me one more time, you’ll be sorry,’ she threatened.
Edward’s piggy little eyes brightened with desire. ‘Mmmm, I recall you like a fight, a bit of rough,’ he whispered lasciviously into her ear.
Disgusted, Maudie turned away, just as Bella stormed up.
‘Leave her alone, Edward!’ she commanded.
‘Quite the little proletariat these days aren’t we, Lady Annabelle?’ he retorted, in a loud, mocking voice. ‘You’ve spent too much time below stairs, mixing with guttersnipes. In fact,’ he said, as he gave a loud sniff, ‘you’re beginning to smell like them.’
‘You unutterable bastard!’ Bella seethed.
Before a fight broke out, Ava loudly announced, ‘Lunch is served!’
Though Maudie’s instincts were to run out of the lake house and drive straight to the airbase, she knew such action would make Edward suspicious. The best thing she could do was serve lunch quickly, then the shooting party would be on their way. Luckily, they were all starving, so they demolished what was on their plate, along with a crate of fine red wine. Maudie gave drunken Edward a very wide berth but as she cleared away the casserole pot, he reached out and stroked her bottom. Incandescent with anger, she gasped and whirled around to face him.
‘Nice arse!’ he leered.
‘How dare you?’ she cried, and ‘accidentally’ dropped the half-empty pot on to his lap.
As the remains of the cold casserole dripped down Edward’s tweed trousers, he jumped to his feet.
Raising a hand as if to strike Maudie, he yelled, ‘Bloody stupid bitch!’
Completely unafraid, Bella stood between her brother and her friend. Edward’s hand hovered in the air, then dropped. Grabbing his shotgun, he threw it over his shoulder and stormed out of the lake house.
‘I’ll see your servant friend fired!’ he yelled over his shoulder to his sister, who angrily yelled back: ‘Try it!’
As soon as Edward and his chums had driven off, Peter winked at Maudie. ‘Take the Land Rover,’ he said. ‘The rest of us can make our way on foot.’
Ava and Bella were astonished when Maudie drove off without any explanation.
‘Where’s she going?’ Ava asked Peter, who shook his head.
‘I’ve no idea,’ he replied. ‘But she said it was urgent.’
Maudie drove like a bat out of hell. Screeching into the airfield, she pulled up sharply, switched off the ignition then sprinted to Kit’s office, where she found him leaning back in his chair, smoking a Craven A with his feet up on the cluttered desk. Seeing her face, Kit instantly jumped up.
‘Darling!’ he said, taking hold of her shaking hands. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘There’s something strange going on, Kit!’ she blurted out.
After Maudie had recounted what she’d seen and heard in the woods, Kit’s blue eyes widened in alarm. ‘Are you sure?’
She nodded grimly. ‘I saw them twice,’ she confirmed. ‘I’m absolutely sure ‒ but why would Walsingham be involved with two such shifty-looking characters?’
‘Because he’s a bloody shifty character himself!’ Kit said as he slammed his fist angrily on his desk. ‘He’d better stay well away from here, or I’ll have him behind bars!’
Agitated beyond words, Maudie cried out and pointed to the window ‘Kit! Those men could be snooping around the base already!’
‘Calm down, darling. Interfering nosey parkers are quickly picked out.’
Maudie shook her head. ‘Believe me, they won’t be easy to spot – they’re both wearing RAF uniforms.’
Kit took hold of her hand, saying, ‘Come with me, we’ll need a description.’
As they hurried over to the officers’ mess, Kit asked tensely, ‘Did you have any trouble with Walsingham at the shoot lunch?’
When she admitted what had happened, Kit’s face tightened in fury. She squeezed his hand and she gave a wicked smile. ‘But I got my own back, I poured the remains of the casserole into his lap!’
Kit gazed at her with a mixture of shock and pride. ‘Really?’
‘I only regret it wasn’t boiling hot. I’d like to have set fire to his posh Crown Jewels!’
Kit ground his teeth in fury, ‘One day, I’ll beat the living daylights out of Walsingham, I swear to God I will!’
In the officers’ mess, Maudie described the rogue airmen to the officers, who listened intently as they smoked their cigarettes or puffed on their pipes.
‘Average height, average build, short hair, both wearing RAF uniforms. Sorry, I know it’s not much to go on,’ she finished apologetically.
‘It’s the unit leader’s primary responsibility to know every man in his squad. If there’re any oddballs, we’ll track them down,’ Kit assured her, then, turning, he gave rapid instructions to his men. ‘Organize search parties to scour the grounds, hangars, bomb stores, Nissen huts, communications centre, control tower – everywhere. Right, men – scramble!’
Kit would not entertain the idea of Maudie driving back to the hall alone and in the dark. ‘Raf will drive you home in the Land Rover,’ he said firmly.
‘You need all your men here,’ she reminded him.
Kit took her in his arms and kissed her briefly but passionately. ‘And you need protecting, my darling spy girl,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Take a torch and check out the woods on your way back – the men just might be holing up there till morning.’
‘What about Edward?’ she asked. ‘Shouldn’t somebody be tailing him?’
Kit nodded. ‘I’ll get Raf to shadow him. Now, off you go, Maudie. I’ll feel happier once I know you’re back with your friends.’
Secretly grateful that she was being escorted home, Maudie shone Kit’s torch into the woods and bushes as they drove by, but saw nothing other than a startled fox and a barn owl that floated out of the forest as silent as a ghost.
‘Good news about Soviets,’ Raf said, as he drove, with no headlights, in the pitch dark.
‘I’ve not had time to hear much news today,’ Maudie said with a wry smile.
‘Soviets on offensive against bloody Hun in Stalingrad,’ Raf explained. ‘Bloody freeze there but they fight, they tough, the Red Army.’
When they reached the hall, Raf opened the car door for Maudie, then got back into the passenger seat.
‘I keep eyes peeled for bloody bastard Edward!’ he told Maudie, settling as he pulled his leather flying jacket
closely around him.
‘I’m sure your wife will be out with a brew for you soon,’ Maudie said, with a smile.
A few minutes later, as the girls gathered around the warm Aga, Maudie told her story.
‘I’m so sorry, Bella,’ she said, when she had to reveal the embarrassing truth to friend. ‘It looks like your brother’s up to no good.’
‘Nothing that Edward does can shock me,’ Bella replied with a heavy sigh. ‘He’s always been ruthlessly out for himself.’ Turning to the Brig, whose brow was furrowed with concern, she added, ‘We should search his room as soon as we can – we must find out exactly what Edward’s up to.’
26. Cracking the Code
It was decided that Ruby would be the one to search Lord Edward’s rooms. ‘We can’t have Maudie going in there, he might jump on her again,’ she said.
‘You’ll have to tell me what I’m searching for, though,’ Ruby said practically.
‘Anything suspicious,’ the Brig replied. ‘But what we’re really looking for is a radio transmitter which, if he does have one, he’ll certainly have hidden.’
‘And what does one of these radio thingummies look like?’ Ruby enquired.
‘Basically, it’s a small radio built into an ordinary-looking suitcase,’ Bella elaborated.
Ruby’s dark eyes grew round with awe. ‘Ooooh! Like one of them radio sets that you see in scary spy films!’ she exclaimed.
‘You’ve got it, Ruby!’ the Brig chuckled. ‘A spy radio set.’
‘You must only search his room when it’s safe, Ruby,’ Bella warned.
‘We mustn’t arouse suspicion,’ the Brig added. ‘The last thing we want is Edward to know we’re on to him.’
With the new code girls already installed, domestic life below stairs was getting back to normal, apart from one startling piece of news.
‘Timms isn’t coming back!’ Bella informed her friends one morning.
Ava, Ruby and Maudie gaped open-mouthed at her.
‘You’re kidding!’ cried Ava.
Bella shook her head. ‘Mummy’s just received a letter from her. Listen to this!’ she said, smothering a giggle. ‘Timms is getting married! She met a retired vicar when she was staying with her relatives in Norwich over Christmas.’
‘Well, good luck to the poor vicar,’ Ruby chuckled. ‘He’s got the housekeeper from hell!’
As Ruby waited for a good time to search Edward’s rooms, Raf remained on guard outdoors.
‘Edward will rumble you if he catches you in your RAF uniform,’ Bella told Raf, who crinkled his brow as he asked, ‘What is “rumbles”?’
Bella laughed as she apologized.
‘Sorry, Raf. You need to be in disguise ‒ you need to get rid of the uniform.’
When Ruby saw her husband dressed in an old and grubby boiler suit that Bella had borrowed from Peter, she screamed with laughter. ‘Oh, my God! You look like Worzel Gummidge!’
To complete his rustic image, Raf donned a battered tweed cap.
‘Nobody rumbles Rafal Boskow now,’ he joked.
‘I’m your wife, and I wouldn’t recognize you,’ Ruby giggled, as she stood on her tiptoes to kiss Raf’s cheek. Growing serious, she sat Raf down at the kitchen table. ‘Now, listen, lovie, we’ve wasted too much precious time hanging around waiting for Walsingham. We’ve got to seize the moment,’ she said, bunching her small fist. ‘The sooner I can get into his bedroom, the better. Understand?’
‘I understands you, Rubee,’ Raf answered, uncurling her fist and kissing her soft, pink palm. ‘I give you nods when all is clear, OK?’
Ruby had her opportunity the very next day.
‘He leave now, in car!’ Raf cried, rushing into the kitchen. ‘Go, quick!’
Ruby grabbed a mop and duster from the cleaning cupboard and crept up the back stairs. She opened Edward’s door, stepped inside and immediately shot the bolt. Hurrying to the chest of drawers, she searched each drawer in turn but found nothing odd or unusual. Then she tried to search the desk, which was locked.
‘Damn!’ she muttered, as her eyes scanned the room. They landed on the large mahogany wardrobe which almost ran the length of one wall. She riffled through the rails of coats and suits, then spotted Edward’s expensive leather-bound suitcases stacked beside the hanging rails.
‘Oh, God,’ she whispered, as she nervously removed the smallest case, which was on top of the pile, and flicked open the brass clips. ‘Nothing,’ she murmured, then laid it aside and opened the next.
It was when she came to the fourth case that she found exactly what Bella had described: a radio set neatly built into an ordinary-looking suitcase. As Ruby gazed in amazement at the transmitter, with its panel of bewildering controls and switches, she heard a tinkling sound at the window. With her heart pounding, she jumped to her feet and ran to the window, where she saw an agitated Raf waving to her from below.
‘Edward back!’ he called up to her.
‘Jesus Christ!’ she gasped.
Breaking into a hot sweat, Ruby neatly returned all the cases, including the crucial one, to their original positions. After closing the wardrobe, she dashed across the room to slide the bolt on the door and, just in time, she snatched up her duster, which she was busily wiping across the dressing table as Edward burst in.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing in here?’ he snapped.
Ruby turned her honest brown eyes on him and answered with a simple smile, ‘Dusting, Your Lordship; it’s Tuesday, we always dust on a Tuesday.’
Edward scowled. ‘Well, get out!’ he barked. ‘I’ve work to do.’
Ruby gave a little bob as she replied, ‘Yes, your lordship.’
Grabbing her mop, she exited the room, then hurried down the length of the corridor. She walked slap-bang into Raf, who was skulking in a dark corner. Covering her mouth to stifle a scream, Ruby fell against her husband. ‘What are you doing, hiding there?” she whispered.
Raf tapped the top pocket of his borrowed boiler suit. ‘I have gun here. If bastard lordship lay hand on my Rubee, I blow bloody brains out,’ he answered grimly.
Ruby stared at her young husband, whose sweet face was creased with anxiety.
‘You’re my knight in shining armour,’ she whispered fondly.
‘What is “shining night”?’
‘My hero!’ she said, as grabbed his hand and headed for the back staircase. ‘Come on, I’ve got news for the Brig.’
When everybody was gathered in the kitchen and the doors were firmly shut, Ruby informed the tense group seated around the table.
‘I found a radio set in a suitcase in his wardrobe. It looks exactly like you said, Bella. There are wires leading out of it, and a headset, too. There’s even an instruction manual.’
‘Excellent work, Ruby,’ the Brig said, as he and Bella exchanged a meaningful look.
‘He’s transmitting from here!’ Bella cried incredulously. ‘From his own home! The bare-faced cheek of him!’ she raged.
The Brig nodded slowly, as he tamped down the tobacco in his pipe.
‘A bold move, even for Edward,’ he said quietly.
‘So, what now?’ Maudie asked, baffled.
‘Inform Kit, of course,’ the Brig answered.
‘But what about the police?’ Ruby cried. ‘Shouldn’t they be told there’s a spy in Walsingham Hall?’ she asked melodramatically.
‘We don’t know exactly what he’s up to yet, Ruby,’ the Brig replied with a smile. ‘We need to be patient.’
‘Well, he’s not got a bloody radio set hidden in his room to listen to “Workers’ Playtime”, that’s for sure,’ Ruby answered robustly.
Everybody burst out laughing.
‘Oh, Ruby, you’re a card!’ Ava chuckled.
‘First we’ve got to find out if Edward is actually transmitting,’ the Brig continued. ‘If he is, then we’ve got to find out who’s he’s communicating with. If we find anything incriminating, then we’ll alert the appropriate authori
ties.’
‘How will you be able to make those checks?’ clever Maudie asked.
‘We have our own transmitter which we use for training purposes. I keep it under lock and key in my office,’ the Brig explained. ‘If Walsingham does transmit, Bella and I will listen in and work on cracking his code. We’ll work in shifts, day and night – one of us will even sleep next to the damn transmitter,’ he said with a low chuckle.
‘What happens when Walsingham leaves here?’ Ava asked. ‘How do you keep tabs on him then?’
‘If he’s operational, we can pick up his messages anywhere,’ Bella replied. ‘As long as we’ve set our receiver to the frequency he’s using, we can pick him up wherever he is.’
Ruby’s eyes were wide with amazement. ‘How long will it take?’
‘It all depends on how good we are at breaking his cypher,’ the Brig replied.
Ruby, who’d been agog with curiosity since she found the ‘spy suitcase’, as she always referred to it, asked, ‘What’s a cypher?’
‘It’s the rule you use for decrypting and encrypting,’ the Brig answered.
Ruby looked baffled. ‘Huh!’ she grunted.
Recalling the problems she’d had a few months before when the Brig was teaching her how to decrypt a poem code, Bella smiled as she sat down at the table and gestured to her friends to sit down, too.
‘Come on,’ she said excitedly. ‘I’ll show you how to create a cypher based on a poem. First of all me, the sender, and you, the receiver.’ She pointed at Ruby. ‘We two have to agree on a poem.’
‘Oh, dear,’ Ruby giggled. ‘I’m rubbish at poetry!’
‘Don’t worry,’ Bella assured her. ‘I’ve recently been working on a poem by Robert Browning,’ she said, as she wrote out the first line on a piece of paper.
‘Oh to be in England now that April’s there.’
‘Now underneath each letter, and space, too, write out the alphabet,’ she said to a nervous Ruby. ‘Write neatly so you can keep track of your changes, making sure each letter represents only one other letter,’ she advised.
