Moment of Truth

by Michael Pryor

  He’d been fiddling with ways to trap intruders, using a more literal interpretation of ‘entanglement’ – but all he’d ended up with was a number of extremely angry stray cats. He’d tried variation after variation, but for now he was now willing to put this work to one side and simply activate the perimeter alarm.

  Aubrey hurried around the exterior of the factory and the yard, stopping every so often to touch the dominoes he’d used for ease of similarity, activating them with a short spell. On the rooftop and along the fence line, twenty-four domino pieces established the line of sight connection, entangling perfectly. With a sigh of relief he touched the last domino, near the gate to the yard, and he rubbed his eyes. They were gritty and smarting, so he took a moment to revel in the cool night air – but he was already composing the message to headquarters as he went inside again.

  The report was short and pointed, updating the Directorate on the state of affairs in Divodorum, and about Baron von Grolman’s activity in Stalsfrieden. The most important thing was the last line: ‘Station 14 is ready to receive the Phase 2 team.’

  He crunched the message through the miniature encoding device – about the size of a cigar box – spinning the wheels and keys until a jumble of numbers and letters resulted. He copied these down and raced to Caroline’s radio station.

  She had already donned her headphones. She took the slip of paper and turned away. After that, all he heard was the tap-tap-tapping of a practised telegraph operator. He imagined the message winging its way across the night sky, through clouds and stars, until it was received by the operators at Lattimer Hall. The Special Services operators – banks of them – were on twenty-four-hour duty receiving messages from all over the world, from Directorate operatives on missions that were both trivial and dangerous. The message would be copied down and handed to runners, who would rush to the coding division. There cipher officers would reverse the process Aubrey had undertaken, turning the complicated string of numbers and letters back into standard Albionish, then direct the message to the correct place.

  Caroline turned, gracefully draping one arm over the back of her hard wooden chair. ‘Finished. Hot chocolate, anyone?’

  Seventeen

  When a message came back from the Directorate with the news that the arrival of the remote sensers would be delayed by three days, Aubrey, George and Caroline had little to do. The base was finalised – Aubrey having abandoned his improvements to the guardian spells around the perimeter – stores were laid in, antennae were tuned, and George had even livened up the basement with a coat of paint, declaring that buttercup yellow always made a place more welcoming.

  Another message arrived, advising of another three-day delay.

  Aubrey took this in his stride. All the reading he’d done about military command had warned him about bored troops and the mischief they could get up to. While he didn’t think this was strictly applicable to Caroline and George – although he did have a passing moment wondering what sort of mischief Caroline would get up to if given the chance – finding worthwhile activity was probably the best thing to do. For him, if for no-one else.

  Moving their belongings from the boarding house was an immediate task which was usefully time consuming. Once they were gathered, the delicacy of the living arrangements was something that couldn’t be ignored.

  A young woman, unchaperoned, with two young men. Living, sleeping in close proximity. The thought of it all made Aubrey extremely concerned. No-one had mentioned it during the construction of the sleeping quarters, but now that personal belongings were making them somewhat more than bare boxes, he felt he had to address the issue.

  ‘Caroline, George,’ he said. ‘We need to talk about our circumstances.’

  ‘I know,’ Caroline said.

  ‘You know? How?’

  ‘For ten minutes you’ve been staring at the sleeping quarters with that look on your face.’

  ‘That look?’

  ‘The one that says you’re trying to do the right thing but you’re not quite sure what it is.’

  ‘I see.’ He thought about this. ‘How many looks do I have?’

  ‘Oh, at least four.’

  ‘What are the other three?’

  ‘I can’t tell you,’ she said. ‘You’d become all self-conscious.’

  And I’m not already? ‘Thank you. You’re kind.’

  ‘Now.’ She strode to the sleeping quarters. ‘I’m going to try to make this easy for you. Times have changed. We are living in a modern world. We are in an unusual situation.’ She knocked on one of the dividing walls. ‘And these walls are extremely solid, thanks to George.’

  ‘My pleasure,’ George said. Aubrey noticed that his friend looked highly amused, but he wasn’t volunteering to help Aubrey steer this difficult conversation.

  ‘And your point is?’ Aubrey asked Caroline.

  ‘Let me worry about my reputation. You don’t have to.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘And if you’re worried about your reputation, you’re more confused than I thought. Now.’ She tapped her foot. ‘I’m happy with the way things are and I hope you two are as well.’

  That was that. They never spoke of it again. Caroline’s attitude convinced him, too, that his mission of the heart had been entirely superseded by a more patriotic one. It was a moment of sadness, but he knew better than to dwell on it. Events moved on without consulting Aubrey Fitzwilliam and Caroline Hepworth.

  Immediately, keeping things brisk and professional, Aubrey suggested that some extra intelligence gathering would be worthwhile. Caroline and George greeted this with enthusiasm, so after a fine breakfast (Eggs Benedict and fresh fruit) they took their bicycles out to inspect the fortifications on the north-eastern edge of the town.

  They weren’t alone. ‘Don’t they know there’s a war on?’ Aubrey murmured as they drew up outside the fortress.

  ‘I’m sure they do,’ Caroline said. She was wearing a flat straw hat with a black ribbon. Aubrey thought it highlighted her face wonderfully. ‘But people have a habit of ignoring anything that’s more than a few miles away.’

  Many sightseers were strolling about the earthworks not far down the road from the fortress. The rampart was thirty feet high in places, and stretched for miles, north and south, protecting the city from attack from the east.

  People swarmed over the earthworks, taking photographs and generally having a splendid time. Grown-ups and children were climbing the heaped-up earth while a horde of dogs circled aimlessly, barking at the wind, the ground and that bird over there that really needed a good chasing. Several groups had spread chequered cloths and were picnicking amid the barbed wire, while donkey carts went backward and forward between the town and the formidable rampart – or the superb viewing point offering an unparalleled vista of Divodorum and surrounds, if the hastily printed postcards were to be believed.

  Naturally, a gathering like this couldn’t be allowed to happen without opportunists appearing, pushing barrows and selling everything from apples to cool drinks to parasols, and they were hard at work on this bright, sunny morning.

  Aubrey glanced at the fortress that faced the earthworks. In the tower, three soldiers were lounging about, surveying the carnival scene. Only one of them held a rifle. On the battlements either side of the tower, artillery peeped through the embrasures, but these weren’t manned, as far as Aubrey could tell, unless sleeping draped over the barrel was a new and exciting way of being on guard.

  ‘A mixed bag,’ Caroline said. ‘Serious preparations side by side with complete nonchalance.’

  ‘I don’t think the picnickers are serious about war,’ Aubrey said.

  ‘Seems not.’ George took out a pad and sketched the scene – the river, the road, the fortifications stretching away to where Holmland loomed in the distance. ‘I can see this as “Chapter One – A Fool’s Paradise”. With a little bit of imagination.’

  A laugh, then a distinctive voice came from behind them, in delightfully accent
ed Albionish. ‘Imagination, George Doyle, is one of your best qualities.’

  George nearly dropped his sketch, fumbled for it, then whirled, open-mouthed. ‘Sophie! What on earth are you doing here?’

  Aubrey thought that question a little unfair. Sophie Delroy, being a Gallian, had more right than George to be in Divodorum. ‘Hello, Caroline. Hello, Aubrey,’ she said. She was neatly turned out, as usual, in a jacket and skirt combination with a bold blue stripe. ‘I cannot wait to hear why you are here, in Divodorum.’

  ‘Steady on, Sophie,’ George said, and Aubrey couldn’t help noticing how his friend was straightening his tie and adjusting his jacket as he spoke. Ever since George had been introduced to Sophie while they were on their Gallian adventure last year, they had been what George was candid enough to admit were special friends. Petite, perpetually smiling, and stunningly golden-blonde, Sophie had been corresponding with George ever since. Despite few chances to meet, George’s admiration for Sophie hadn’t waned.

  Aubrey had wondered how much of George’s enthusiasm for journalism and writing was inspired by Sophie, who had a fierce ambition to work for the greatest Gallian newspapers, exposing corruption, investigating government scandals, and generally doing good.

  Aubrey was ready to admit he was pleased to see her as well. Sophie and Caroline got on famously, and he enjoyed Sophie’s disarming good humour – as well as her charming way of pronouncing his name so it started with ‘Ow’.

  She didn’t look like someone whose family was experiencing difficulty, as his grandmother had put it. Perhaps it was just something with her parents?

  ‘Sophie,’ Caroline said warmly. ‘It’s good to see you. Are you with The Sentinel on this trip?’

  ‘But of course! It is the duty of the press to bring the truth to the people.’ She smiled, and Aubrey heard George grunt as if punched in the stomach. ‘With so much happening, they are calling on all their writers, no matter how inexperienced.’

  Sounds familiar, that, Aubrey thought.

  ‘But it’s dangerous, Sophie,’ George protested. ‘Jolly dangerous.’

  ‘It is? Then why are you here?’

  ‘Vinegar,’ George said gamely. ‘Divodorum has the best vinegar in all Gallia.’

  ‘And you, all three of you, had a yearning to sample vinegar? You are making fun of me, George.’

  ‘No, honestly, Sophie,’ George said. ‘It’s not like that at all.’

  A distant rumbling noise made Aubrey look to the heavens. Thunder? ‘Are we expecting rain?’

  ‘Aubrey, you try to distract me, to help your friend,’ Sophie said, shaking her head. Then, laughing, she had to tuck her curls back under her bonnet. ‘But I will not be diverted so easily. The son of the Albion Prime Minister, visiting Divodorum unannounced? This could be a story of great interest to Sentinel readers.’

  ‘I don’t think so...’ Aubrey began, but the distant rumbling rolled toward them again.

  ‘Smoke.’ Caroline pointed to the north-east, past the earthworks and past the ridge toward the hilly country that lay beyond.

  Caroline wasn’t the only one who had noticed the plume of black smoke. A spirited argument was going on in the tower above their heads. Aubrey shaded his eyes and saw that it was over who had the use of the single pair of field glasses.

  ‘A lightning strike?’ George suggested. ‘How far away do you think it is?’

  ‘Not lightning,’ Sophie said. Her face was pale, and she jumped when an unearthly howl rose from the fortress. One of the guards in the tower was cranking away for all he was worth on a large siren. ‘We have troops stationed over there, a forward post near the village of Remerci.’

  George quickly unfolded a map he produced from his bicycle basket. ‘Fifteen miles away?’

  More thunder, and a second tower of smoke rose, to the north of the first. Suddenly, the party on the earthworks was over. People scrambled to pack up hampers. A man rushed about, ending the donkey rides and leaving children crying. An accordion player, high on the rampart, stopped playing and gazed to the northeast. Then he slung the accordion over his shoulder and ran, barely keeping his balance, down the long, sloping face of the earthworks. When he reached the road back to the city he didn’t stop, but kept going, panting and huffing as he loped past.

  Aubrey finally said what everyone was thinking, but dared not utter. ‘Artillery.’

  ‘But they said the Holmlanders would never attack through Divodorum,’ Sophie said. She gazed at the horizon. Three plumes of smoke were now rising.

  ‘Ah,’ Aubrey said. ‘And these would be the same people who said that Holmland would never invade the Goltans?’

  ‘You have a good point,’ Sophie said, but she looked troubled, far from the sunny Sophie Delroy that Aubrey had known.

  The massive gates of the fortress swung back. Instead of the coordinated column of military hardware Aubrey expected, a single lorry rolled out. Behind it, a dozen soldiers ran out of the gates, shouting. The lorry stopped and the soldiers – some of whom looked only half-dressed – threw themselves into the back. With a belch of smoke, the lorry lurched onto the road and ground its way past Aubrey and his friends. Picking up speed, it followed the road through the gap in the earthworks.

  ‘I hope someone is going to barricade that gap,’ George said. ‘It’s like leaving the front door open.’

  ‘I’m sure they will,’ Aubrey said, thinking that, if the worst came to the worst, he’d do it if no-one else did. A displacement spell, carefully sited on the top of the ramparts, would tip a few tons of earth and rock onto the road.

  He was sorting through the elements for such a spell when a glint in the air near one of the columns of smoke made Aubrey squint. ‘Is that an ornithopter?’

  He looked around. George and Sophie had moved away a little, and were speaking urgently, in whispers. Caroline glanced at them, then answered. ‘A scout, I’d say.’

  ‘Or battle observers.’

  The thunder had intensified. It was now almost continuous, a bass drum beat that was frightening in its regularity. ‘It’s no skirmish,’ Aubrey said. ‘That’s dozens of guns.’

  He had a heart flutter of fear. The rational part of his brain told him it was a natural response to prospective annihilation, but he found he still had to swallow to keep his insides under control.

  Streams of erstwhile picnickers hurried past. Aubrey wholeheartedly agreed with their decision to leave. ‘Erstwhile picnicker’ would be a poor thing to have carved on a gravestone.

  Sophie’s voice rose. ‘But you must.’ Aubrey turned to see George and Sophie in close discussion. She turned and appealed to Aubrey and Caroline. ‘Aubrey, all of you, you must leave Divodorum now, with me.’

  ‘Sorry, Sophie. You go. It’s probably best. We can’t. We have things to do.’ As lame excuses went, Aubrey realised, that was probably one of the lamest. Any lamer and it would have been taken out and shot.

  The image didn’t cheer him at all.

  Sophie was on the verge of tears. She was about to speak again when more lorries roared out of the fortress. Most of these were packed with soldiers in rather better state than the first detachment, and most towed artillery pieces ranging from light field guns to heavy howitzers. This was brutality unleashed.

  ‘Sophie!’ George cried over the roar of engines. ‘We can’t leave! You go!’

  Sophie glared at the military column, which now included horses and carts, and overladen pack mules trailing behind. Commotion was spreading through the civilian part of the city as the picnickers arrived with the news.

  Gallia had been invaded.

  Sophie bit her lip. She looked after her countrymen, then at the dust raised by the military column, then at the distant and ominous smoke. ‘No,’ she said in a small voice, after glancing at George. ‘I must stay.’

  Aubrey was the one who convinced George that arguing with Sophie could be done while they walked back to the city. While they made progress in that direction, however, Georg
e made no progress with Sophie. Once her mind was made up, it appeared, it was set. She refused to be moved by his entreaties, his logic or his passion. Her response was inevitably, and inarguably, ‘You are staying, George. So will I.’

  Aubrey had always admired his friend’s easy manner with females. George liked them and they liked him. He found it straightforward to engage them in a light-hearted manner that most found appealing. Aubrey, however, always found such a thing a mystery.

  So it was with some ambivalent satisfaction that Aubrey watched George’s becoming more and more tongue-tied as he tried to persuade Sophie to leave. It didn’t help, of course, that George enjoyed Sophie’s company so much that he actually didn’t want her to leave. That sort of double thinking was Aubrey’s typical downfall, second-guessing himself constantly.

  He imagined George and he would have much to talk about.

  They crossed the bridge over the Salia, which was hastily being sandbagged by a squad of local militia. The workers were being shouted at by an extravagantly moustachioed man dressed in a Gallian uniform that was at least forty years old. To emphasise his points he brandished a sword that looked as if it had come from a museum.

  Aubrey paused on the city side of the bridge and looked back. The fortress had snapped out of its lethargy and was now the centre of activity. Engineers were sprinting to the earthworks with wheelbarrows. Tractors towed lengths of steel and bales of barbed wire. Soldiers were rushing out of the city toward the fortress, all thoughts of leave abandoned. Aubrey noted their faces. Grim resolve was the standard demeanour of the older troops, while anyone younger – officers and enlisted men alike – had the mixture of bravado and shifty-eyed panic that comes from the unfortunate combination of inexperience and imagination.

  The city itself was working up to a state of pandemonium. From appearances, many residents had been waiting for this moment, for fully laden motorcars and carts were already on their way out of the city, heading south and west, away from the artillery noise that was sounding more and more like drum beats. Shops and markets were being besieged both by those fleeing and those staying. Aubrey was grateful for George’s preparation. Their base had enough food for weeks, depending on how many it had to support.