Princess Elizabeth's Spy

by Susan Elia MacNeal

  David could smell petrol and the brackish Thames. It was cold in the back of the car, and he shivered. Gingerly, he tried once again to move.

  Trickles of blood from his head wound had run down his face and were now congealing.

  “David,” Gregory said, wiping at the man’s face with his handkerchief, “I wanted you to come with us,” he said, his breath reeking of alcohol. “But not this way.”

  David squinted up in the darkness. “Why?” Overhead, Messerschmitts and Heinkels whined, on their way to drop their deadly cargo on London.

  Gregory checked his watch. “Almost one,” he called up to Boothby, in the driver’s seat. “The window for our pickup opens in half an hour. We need to hurry.”

  “Jawohl, mein Herr” was Boothby’s response.

  “I suppose you’ve figured out what I’ve done,” he said to David.

  “You’ve kidnapped me—and my briefcase. And we’re going to Germany. But I still don’t understand why.”

  Gregory took another long draw on the bottle. “Oh, where are my manners? Would you like some?”

  “No,” David said. “I never drink while kidnapped.”

  Sarcasm was lost on Gregory. “More for me, then,” he said, taking a sip and spilling a little as the car hit a bump in the road. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “It wasn’t you so much as your tantalizing briefcase. It was a present, from Father Christmas himself. You, with that.” He looked at David. “Now, you mustn’t think I’m a monster, I did try to get you to come with me.” He grinned and placed his hand on David’s leg. “And I was very persuasive.”

  David was silent, repulsed by Gregory’s touch.

  “Still, you, the Jew patriot, were unmoved. And so, Boothby and I took more—definitive action. He wanted to cut your hand off, by the way, and leave you at Windsor. I was the one who said we should bring you with us.”

  “But why?”

  “I like you, David. And I’d hate to see you go down with the losing side. To be honest, I just don’t give a damn who wins this bloody war anymore. Quite frankly, despite all of Churchill’s brave talk, it looks pretty certain Germany will win—sooner or later.” He shrugged. “And, you see, in Germany, my contact will pay me—us,” he said, looking to Boothby in the driver’s seat, “dearly for the information you have. Whatever you have in your briefcase must be worth a small fortune. It’s enough to let me disappear quietly to Switzerland.”

  “Or Buenos Aires,” David said, remembering.

  “Somewhere like that.” Gregory looked at David. “The offer’s still good, you know.”

  “Go to hell.”

  Gregory smiled. “Germany first.”

  “This is it,” Boothby said in his perfectly enunciated English. He slowed and took a hard left, pulling up and cutting the motor.

  “And now,” Gregory said, pulling out his gold pocket watch, “we wait.”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Pretending she was going to the bathroom, Lilibet had successfully pulled off her escape from the nursery. “Thank you so much,” she whispered to Audrey as they tiptoed down long drafty corridors.

  “Of course, Miss,” Audrey said, letting Lilibet go on ahead. “I know I would do anything for l’amour.”

  “Ah, l’amour,” Lilibet sighed, pressing her hand to the note hidden in her skirt pocket.

  When they reached the castle’s vast kitchen, Lilibet headed for the telephone. She picked up the heavy receiver lying on the counter. “Hello? Philip? Hello?” Lilibet said as Audrey looked around to make sure they were alone, then pulled out a handkerchief and a small bottle of clear liquid from her apron pocket. She wet the cloth with the liquid, then reached from behind and held it over Lilibet’s nose and mouth. It had a sickly sweet smell. Lilibet struggled, then went limp in Audrey’s arms.

  When Lilibet didn’t return, Dookie went to the bathroom door and got up on his hind legs to growl and paw at it, agitated, his claws clicking on the wood for the door. “Dookie! Stop it!” Maggie whispered. But the dog continued to whine and paw. Maggie got up and knocked. “Your Highness?” she called. “Lilibet?” There was no answer. She and Dookie locked eyes and he gave a series of low whines that sounded like sobs. She pounded on the door. “Lilibet? Open the door!” She reached for the knob and the door opened easily. The bathroom led into Margaret’s rooms. The door to the hallway was still open.

  “Bloody hell,” Maggie muttered, as she ran through Margaret’s open door and then down the long corridor, calling “Lilibet! Lilibet!” Dookie followed her, barking loudly. She ran down the corridor to the kitchen, where she spied the two. “Lilibet!” she screamed, seeing the unconscious Princess. She looked at Audrey in shock. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “Nothing that concerns you,” Audrey said, dropping Lilibet to the floor, then going to the door to the wine cellar. She knocked and Poulter opened the door. “There you are,” he said.

  “We have company,” Audrey said, indicating Maggie, who ran to Lilibet and tried to rouse her. Dookie followed behind, ears pinned back and giving a low growl.

  Audrey came at Maggie, who stood up, ready for the attack. When Audrey tried to grab her, she reached for her right arm and twisted, bringing the Frenchwoman down to the floor. But Poulter had come behind Maggie, and before she could react, he picked up the handkerchief with chloroform and pressed it over her mouth and nose with one hand, while his other arm held her in a choke hold. Dookie tried to bite his ankle, but Poulter kicked the little dog so hard he was thrown against the wall, too stunned to stand.

  After a moment or two, Maggie slumped to the floor.

  “Leave her and the chien,” Poulter ordered Audrey, shoving her to the side with her boot.

  Audrey went back to the Princess. “Help me,” she grunted. “She’s not as light as you might think.”

  Poulter picked up Lilibet’s limp body. “We must hurry,” he warned, as he descended the stairs to the wine cellar and the tunnels through the dungeons. “We only have a very short window of time to get to the U-boat.”

  Maggie began to regain consciousness.

  “Are you all right, Miss Hope?” she heard Mr. Churchill say. “Damn it, girl—wake up!” he said, patting at her cheeks.

  Maggie tried to open her eyes, which were heavy and uncooperative.

  “Where?” she managed, trying to sit up.

  “The P.M.’s rooms. One of the guards carried you,” Hugh said, voice tight.

  She suddenly remembered. “Lilibet!”

  “What about her?” Frain asked.

  Maggie sat up, shaking her head to get rid of the fog from the drugs. “They took her.”

  “The Princess? Who took her?” Churchill barked.

  “Moreau. The maid, Audrey Moreau. She somehow lured Lilibet from the nursery, then chloroformed her. I followed them, and Moreau did the same to me. She was working with George Poulter, a footman.” The winking footman, Maggie thought.

  “I tried to stop them,” she said, the enormity of what had happened breaking over her. Why did I spend so much time being suspicious of Louisa? Why, when all the while it had been Audrey planning to abduct the Princess? And I had been suspicious when Cook told me about Audrey’s recent exodus from France. I just never pursued it.…

  “Is there anything else that you remember?” Frain said. “Quick!”

  “There was a trapdoor in the floor.” She rose, swaying, then steadying herself. “They must be using the tunnels to get out of the castle. Come on! I know the tunnels—the Princesses showed me. If we hurry, there’s still a chance we can catch them!”

  Lilibet, unconscious, had been carried over Poulter’s back, like a sack of potatoes, through the dark and winding tunnels and then up the stairs before being unceremoniously dumped on the cold flagstones outside the Henry VIII Gate.

  “Hurry!” Audrey hissed to Poulter. “We need to make it to Mossley while the U-boat’s still there.”

  While he was gone, Lilibet’s eyel
ids fluttered. She came to, then lay quietly, appraising her situation. She realized she was being kidnapped. She was gathering her strength to make a run for it, back into the castle, when she felt Moreau’s foot in her back. “Don’t even think about it,” she said, springing a switchblade.

  Normally, Lilibet could have outrun her, but not in her still-drugged condition. Then she saw a small stone and picked it up, considering. She began scratching on the stones.

  “Hey,” Audrey said, looking over, suspicious. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing,” Lilibet said in her clear voice. “Maths homework.”

  Audrey, with the help of light from the moon, partially obscured by dusty spiderwebs of clouds, looked at what the Princess was doing and saw:

  23172614121 +

  121117816114 +

  16+

  91115158121 +

  1724112316 +

  1252571712 +

  She gave a Gallic shrug. “People always wondered if you girls were right in the head, you know,” she said. “Especially with so much inbreeding.”

  Lilibet didn’t reply but kept at her message, impervious to everything, even the cold seeping through her wool dress and cardigan. Poulter returned, pushing the car, but even with the extra precaution, he drew the attention of one of the Coldstream Guards patrolling.

  “Stop!” the young man said.

  Poulter fired. The wound spurted a gush of blood between his eyes that looked black in the darkness, and then the man crumpled.

  As Lilibet closed her eyes in horror, Poulter came with a length of rope, swiftly tying the girl’s hands and feet, and dumping her into the back of the van without ceremony. He didn’t notice the markings she made with the stone. She didn’t know who would find them, or when, but she did know that Margaret and Maggie would be able to read them. And then they would know where she was being taken.

  She quietly prayed that they would find her in time.

  With Mr. Churchill manning the situation from Windsor, Maggie, Frain, and Hugh ran down the corridors to find the trapdoor in the wine cellar floor.

  “Here it is!” Maggie said. She grabbed the iron ring, opened the trapdoor and started down the stairs, grabbing Lilibet and Margaret’s hidden flashlight and switching it on. “Follow me,” she said. “I know the way. If we continue through, we’ll end up at the Henry the Eighth Gate.”

  After running through the tunnels, through twists and turns and past dungeons, they found the stairway up and opened the trapdoor. They climbed, then ran on outside, in the cold, wet air, to the Gate. Have they already gone? Maggie wondered, heart pounding. Did we miss them? The dread of the unknown made her feet fly. At the gate, they all stopped.

  Frain sniffed the air. “A car’s been here,” he said.

  “Look,” Hugh said, pointing to the still body of the Coldstream Guard. He ran over and put his hand to the guard’s throat. “Dead.”

  “Yes, I’d say they came this way,” Frain said.

  Oh, no, thought Maggie. Too late, too late. She wanted to stamp her feet, throw rocks, swear at the top of her lungs. But she had a job to do. “They could be taking her anywhere,” she said, pacing. “They could have a plane tucked away somewhere, they could be going anywhere on the coast for a ship.…” Maggie looked down. Then she used the flashlight to take a better look. “Wait—Lilibet left us a message!”

  Frain and Hugh came over and looked at the markings, then looked at each other.

  But Maggie was already kneeling, her heart bursting with hope. “Oh, smart girl,” she said. “Brilliant, brilliant girl.”

  “We can’t read that,” Hugh said.

  “But I can.” She quickly decrypted the message, using the alphabet code Lilibet had created. “Audrey and Poulter are taking her to Mossley. For a U-boat pickup.” Finally, a lead! At least this way we have a shot at intercepting them before they get to the water.

  She got back to her feet and wiped her hands on her skirt. “Peter, call the cavalry and tell them we’re going to need them in Mossley.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Frain said, his face twisting in a grim smile.

  Maggie began running to the castle’s car park. “Come on, Hugh,” Maggie said over her shoulder, “let’s get going!”

  From the P.M.’s rooms in the castle, Peter Frain ran the search. Every police station from Windsor to Mossley was alerted. Descriptions of Audrey Moreau and George Poulter were circulated. Frain used motorcycle couriers to dispatch photographs of the two to cities, towns, and villages en route. Most were only told that there had been a kidnapping.

  Frain contacted the Admiralty and advised them to be on the lookout for U-boats approaching the coastline in the Norfolk area. He contacted the Coast Guard and asked them to keep a watch for any small craft heading out to sea. He telephoned the Y-service radio monitors and asked them to be on the lookout for suspicious wireless transmissions.

  When Frain had done all he could think of, he rose from the desk, rubbing the back of his neck. Things were grim, he knew, and every second that passed made things worse.

  The Prime Minister looked at him from across the room. They exchanged the glance of battle survivors—dazed and weary. The King had joined them on hearing the news. He now sat alone, head bowed, hands twisting around each other. His arm was bandaged and in a white sling. The P.M. rose and walked to him. The room was silent.

  “We’ve covered every possible escape route,” Frain said. “Now we just have to wait.”

  “How’s your shoulder, sir?” Churchill asked the King.

  “I can’t even th-th-think about the shoulder,” the King replied, his eyes still unfocused.

  The P.M. lit yet another cigar. “How’s Her Majesty?”

  “She’s with Margaret now,” he said, almost inaudibly.

  “Good, good,” Churchill boomed. “Best place for her.”

  “Would you like to lie down and rest, sir?” Frain asked.

  “I want to be here,” the King replied. “In case there’s any news.”

  “Gutsy move of theirs,” Churchill said, pacing back and forth in front of the fireplace. “An assassination attempt and a kidnapping right under our very noses! They’ve got stones, I’ll give them that,” he said, punctuating his words with jabs of his cigar. “Stones! But they won’t leave this island. I swear to you.”

  The King blanched.

  “We’ve covered every possibility,” Frain said. “Now we just have to wait for something to break.”

  “There’s a map in the glove compartment,” Hugh said as he drove. The blue-black sky was encrusted with stars. A waning moon hung in the sky.

  Maggie opened the box. In it were the map, a flashlight, and a gun. She held the lit flashlight in her teeth, pulled out the map, and squinted at it. “Yes, we’re on track,” she said through the flashlight.

  They drove together in silence for a time. Finally, Maggie spoke: “What happened between us—”

  “Yes?”

  “Well, it can’t ever happen again. There’s a reason why agents can’t be involved with each other. We’re working together.”

  “Of course,” Hugh agreed. “I’d never do anything to compromise your safety.”

  “That’s just the point. It’s not my safety you need to worry about—it’s the Princess’s safety.”

  “I know, Maggie. I know this may be hard to understand, but I’ve been doing this longer than you have.”

  Maggie felt a flash of anger—then realized he was right. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  She took a brief moment to think of how it might work for them. Then dismissed the thought. “Thank you for the painting. It’s beautiful.”

  “Glad you like it.” Hugh cleared his throat. “So, what’s the plan, once we get there? Sounded like you had one.”

  Maggie’s smile was crooked. “As we say in America, Hugh—we’re going to wing it.”

  Frain’s call to Scotland Yard had caused local police precincts to scramble
to put up roadblocks, but the van with the Princess was already racing along the AI, on its way to Mossley. Poulter and Audrey were in the front seats, while Lilibet, tied up, was lying in the very back. The van, one used by the castle staff for transporting large game animals from the grounds where they’d been shot to the slaughterhouse, had the metallic smell of old blood. Poulter drove past cities, villages, and hamlets: Hatfield, Welwyn, and Stevenage; Letchworth, Foster, and Baderton.

  The winds had picked up. Between the motion of the van as it sped over the darkened roads and the gusting of the wind, the insides shuddered and shook. The passengers were silent as Poulter turned off the main road onto a narrower one, less likely to be blocked by the police. It was rough going, and he had to reduce speed, but he was convinced it was better to be safe than sorry.

  “Shit,” he said, seeing lights and a roadblock ahead. He could see at least four men in police uniforms, gesturing for him to slow down and stop.

  Audrey’s eyes were wide as she reached into the glove compartment. There she found two guns. She passed the first to Poulter, then picked up the second, wrapped her hands around the pistol, hiding it in the folds of her skirt. “Merde,” she whispered.

  Then she turned back to Lilibet. “Lie down and keep silent!”

  Poulter slowed the van, braking to a stop in front of the barricade. He rolled down his window. “Good evening, officers,” he said, smiling.

  “Please step out of the van, sir,” the fresh-faced officer said.

  “Look, it’s late,” Poulter said, “and my wife and I are tired. Would you mind just letting us pass?”

  “Where are you and your ‘wife’ going, sir?” the bobby asked.

  Poulter could see the other officers conferring in the background, probably matching their faces to an issued description.

  “Grimsby—visiting family there,” Poulter answered, even as one of the officers came up to Audrey’s door and the two others around to the back of the van.

  The young officer pulled out his gun and then opened Poulter’s door. “All right, sir, we’ll need you to get out of the vehicle. Slowly, please. Mind the step.”