TS01 Time Station London

by David Evans

  “There you are then. If it was really that bad, would he be doing it?” Tony stiffened then, raised the brim of his slouch hat. “Uh-oh, don’t we know that chap?”

  Across the street and down half a block, a slightly built man who looked to be in his mid-thirties, with a dark smear of beard stubble and wearing a leather trench coat, paused outside the pawnshop. He furtively glanced both directions along the street, then entered.

  “Yes, indeed,” Hank gloated. “It’s the one we’ve been calling Hans. Wonder what he’s up to?”

  “He’s here to pick up some information, I’m sure.”

  Hank opened a notebook. “I’ll log his arrival and departure.” He touched a pencil lead to thick lips to wet it and lowered long, blond lashes over his cobalt eyes.

  Tony stared intently at the pawnshop. “I’d give anything to be inside there, hear what they are saying.”

  Hank looked up from his pad. “Fly on the wall, eh? Not by half, chum. We haven’t even radios for our cars, let alone equipment to listen in on these traitorous scum.”

  Tony caught at his partner’s coat sleeve. “He’s out already. Going down toward the tube station. Wasn’t in there five minutes.”

  “How long does it take to pass over a piece of paper or two, Tony? It’s not like this pawnshop’s doing fabulous business, now is it?”

  “You’ve a point, Hank. We’ve one fish in the net. Good thing we know where Hans lives.”

  “That indeed. If we can’t land him here the next time, we can scoop him out of his digs. I wonder how that Chelsea Square flat compares to wherever he came from in Germany.”

  Tony pursed his full lips. “A lot better, I’d say. Most of these Abwehr types are the dregs of the Munich beer halls.”

  Hank laughed, a short, sharp sound. “The sewers, more likely, And a good thing. They’re not motivated enough to use those cyanide capsules old Canaris issues them. We’ve learned quite a bit out of them.” “A good thing, too. Let us hope this is a busy day for Mr. Cowerie.”

  By closing time, Tony Bellknap had his wishes fulfilled. Two more known Nazi agents entered the pawnshop during the day. One shortly before noon, the other only five minutes ago. He had not as yet come out. Bellknap glanced uncertainly at Simmons.

  “What do you think, Hank?”

  “We had ought to report in. I’ll get out and keep watch for Ludwig; you go find a call box and ring up the colonel.”

  “Sounds reasonable.” Tony started the engine.

  Hank opened his door and stepped onto the sidewalk. The rain had ceased and blue sky vaulted over Soho, while buildings cast dark shadows toward the east. Tony rolled away down the street. and Hank settled in a doorway. At the far end of the block, the proprietor of the news kiosk was shuttering his establishment.

  Five minutes later, the Nazi agent MI-5 had nicknamed Ludwig stepped out on the walk and turned toward Hank. What should he do? Follow Ludwig or wait for Tony to return?

  Brian Moore received the call at 5:25. He listened to what Tony had to say, then spoke crisply. “Might as well scoop up Cowerie now. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.” When he rang off, he turned to Samantha. “That was Tony. Three German agents visited David Cowerie today. One is believed to still be there. Want to come along?”

  “You’d have to fight me to keep me away. I’ll be going back to Coventry next week, to seek the ones on your list. I want to know how to handle it properly.”

  “Good on you, Sam.”

  They left the Home Office building five minutes later. With Wigglesby driving, the Austin weaved its way through the evening crush of buses, cars and pedestrians. Wigglesby delivered them in Soho only a minute off Brian’s estimate. Hank climbed from the panel wagon.

  “Ludwig flew the coop, Colonel. Cowerie is in there alone.”

  Brian stepped out of the rear seat of the Austin. “Why don’t we join him?”

  Samantha trailed only a short distance behind as the three male MI-5 agents crossed the street diagonally and paused only a moment outside the door to the pawnshop. Brian reached into his suit coat and produced his .45 Webley revolver. Hank and Tony drew their Belgium 9mm Browning autoloaders. Brian gave a curt nod.

  It appeared to Samantha that Brian took a deep breath before he swung the door inward and the trio crowded inside. She closed the distance to the portal before it shut in her face. In her hand she competently held a Walther PPK in 9mm kurtz. From inside, she heard a whiny voice raised in complaint.

  “I’m sorry. We’re closed for the day. Say, what are you doing with those? Is this a robbery?”

  Brian Moore’s voice crackled with intensity. “David Cowerie, you are being charged with espionage. Come with us, please. Men will be sent to search the premises.”

  “You can’t do that,” bleated Cowerie. “I’m a British subject, I have my rights. You police cannot arrest me without a warrant, nor search my place.”

  Brian stilled him with a glare. “We’re not from the police. We’re with Home Office.”

  “OhmyGod. You c-can’t do this.”

  “We’ll take him out the back. Sam, keep watch here until some fellows show up to toss this place.”

  She had to smile. He knew she had not stayed outside but had entered. “Right, Colonel.” Dreary place, she thought as she looked around.

  Led by Brian, Tony and Hank hustled Cowerie out a rear door. Wigglesby had anticipated them and was waiting with the Austin sedan. Brian entered the rear. Tony shoved Cowerie ahead of him and took the other door seat. Hank got in up front.

  Wigglesby looked over his shoulder to Brian. “Where to?”

  “High Street Jail, I think,” Brian instructed.

  Time: 1810, GMT, June 25, 1940

  Place: High Street Jail, Thameside,

  London, England

  An eighteen-foot curtain wall surrounded a three-story keep on a low knoll overlooking the Thames, near the Tower of London. Early evening fog drifted lazily off the oily surface of the river, mantling the light posts along the railing of Tower Bridge. Sgt. Wigglesby pulled the Austin up to a high, iron gate and sounded the horn only once. A gatekeeper appeared and opened a smaller hinged section of the barrier and waved them in.

  David Cowerie had recovered himself enough to try bluster. “Where is this place? What is it? Where are you taking me?”

  “That is no concern of yours,” Brian Moore told him coldly. “Suffice that you are in our charge now.”

  “This is not under jurisdiction of Scotland Yard or the Home Office. Not even the Foreign Office uses dungeons like this,” Cowerie bleated, his stormy mood deflated.

  “Get out, Cowerie. Or I’ll have Tony here drag you out.” Brian exited and stalked off toward the heavy oak door to the keep.

  Wouldn’t Dr. Ogilve like this place, he mused. The subterranean jail below the keep had once been a dungeon used to interrogate members of the nobility suspected of being disloyal to the monarch. And it had been so from the time of the Lancaster kings through those of the House of Tudor. “Bloody Mary” had kept Lady Jane Grey here for a while, and Elizabeth I had imprisoned Sir Francis Drake here until he accepted her usurious share demands on the booty and prize money he obtained from the sale of captured Spanish ships. Then, to show her gratitude and generosity, she had him moved to the Tower. Nice lady. He turned back to the others.

  “Bring him on down. We have a lot of questions to ask him.” Once we get what MI-5 wants out of him, Tony and Hank can be dismissed, Brian figured. Then he can be made to give up his Home Culture and sent back.

  Time: 2200, GMT, June 25, 1940

  Place: Spencer’s, Trafalgar Square,

  London, England

  Brian Moore took Samantha Trillby to Spencer’s for a celebration dinner. A string quartet played discreetly in an ornate alcove, filling the famous restaurant with mellow tones. Muted conversa
tion made surf sounds among the elegant and ennobled who numbered among the clientele. Among them was Sir Rupert Cordise. Brian recognized the corrupt peer immediately and switched chairs so his back was to Cordise. To cover his action, he took Samantha’s hand and caressed it.

  Her eyebrows arched at that. “I hadn’t expected public romance with dinner,” she teased.

  “There’s someone over there by whom I don’t want to be seen. I doubt that he would recognize me, but it’s not worth the risk.”

  Samantha probed. “An old enemy? A rival for some young woman’s affections, perhaps?”

  Brian shook his head and bent to kiss Samantha’s hand. “Nothing of that sort. Sometime I’ll let you see his file. It is quite enlightening.”

  “Who is that?” Samantha persisted.

  “Sir Rupert Cordise.”

  “You mean we have a file on him?”

  “That we do.”

  Samantha looked levelly at Brian. “Wasn’t he an MP?”

  “Yes, he was in Parliament until a nasty accident two years ago.”

  Sudden suspicion clouded Samantha’s words. “Were you involved in any of that?”

  “I… don’t think so. I wasn’t even working for the Home Office when that happened. Not until a month or so later.”

  Samantha shaped an “O” with her lovely lips. “You’ve certainly risen quickly in the Service.”

  Brian tried to look modest. “Sir Hugh says I have a knack at sniffing out Nazis. Remember what I told you the first day, ‘Performance counts.’ That’s quite true, you know. I got lucky; the powers above credited it to phenomenal ability and—voilà tout!”

  Extracting her hand from his grasp, Samantha clapped them together. “You speak French,” she said delightedly.

  “No. Not well. German and Spanish, but I’m shaky on French.”

  Trying to be helpful, Samantha suggested, “You could go to the Military Language School.”

  “What? And be assigned to the commandos and get dumped in France with all those Germans?”

  “Bri—an, that’s not like you. You’re not a coward. I know that. And you are good at what you do. You can make light of it if you wish, but I think it’s wonderful when someone speaks another language. Especially a man.”

  That proved an unconscious revelation to Brian. “How is that? Is a man supposed to lack the intellectual capacity? Are we all caveman brutes?”

  Samantha wrinkled her nose. “It’s not that, Brian. Really, I mean that. It’s just that, as a woman, I see men much as other women do. You are all supposed to be involved in business, or a military career, or science. You know the typical image of the British gentleman.” She closed her eyes and quoted. “They are always saying, ‘If I speak slowly and loudly enough, the blighters will have to understand. The nerve of these native louts, too lazy to learn the King’s English.’ One doesn’t expect to see an Englishman speaking foreign languages.” She stopped to silence a giggle with her napkin.

  “You’re teasing me.”

  “Yes, and I love it, Brian. You look so… so stricken.” This time the titter escaped.

  They ate in silent appreciation of the excellent meal. The wine was superb and, after dessert, they enjoyed coffee. Brian called for the check and they departed. Samantha would be leaving at the end of the week. In spite of that, Brian found himself reluctant to rush her off to his apartment. He took her on a stroll through Hyde Park instead. A sidewalk orator had attracted a smattering of crowd and began to wax eloquent as Brian and Samantha approached.

  “Hitler’s a monster, yes,” he bellowed. “He is also not truly a Socialist. Real Socialism as defined by the Communist Party International, and the leadership of our friends in the Soviet Union, is the natural champion of the working class. Not until you English drag down and exterminate the decadent aristocrats who oppress you, will you throw off your chains and join the liberated workers of the world.”

  “Shut your pinko mouth!” a burly, broad-shouldered, muscle-bulging ironmonger shouted at him. “I own me own business an’ am proud of it. I couldn’t do that in any country run by you communist-socialist scum.”

  “That’s tellin’ him, Alf!” another spectator encouraged him.

  “I love the King, too, God bless ’im. You talk about our draggin’ him down an’ killin’ ’im. I oughta come up there and knock yer block off.”

  “Do it, Alf. Do for him right now!” a man near the front urged.

  “Running dog of the capitalist vermin. You are a part of what’s wrong with England today.”

  “Get stuffed,” Alf snarled. “Or I’ll up an’ do it for you. Look at yer. Yer a sorry piece of work.”

  “Good on yer, Alf.”

  Samantha looked up appealingly to Brian. “Oh, dear, haven’t we, as a people, something better to get excited about?”

  Brian thought over the hundreds of years of history that spanned the gulf between himself and this perceptive, sensitive young woman and sighed. “Sometimes I wonder.”

  Time: 1800, EST, June 30, 1940

  Place: Jagdfliegerführer II, Beauvais,

  Occupied France

  At long, long last. Colonel Werner Ruperle climbed eagerly aboard the Ju-52 transport. An improved model of the old Fokker Tri-Motor, the powerful three-engined aircraft had become the workhorse of the modem Wehrmacht, providing cargo transportation and a platform for paratroopers. He fitted his frame into one of the webbing seats and leaned back against the sparse padding affixed to a metal strip that ran the length of both uninsulated outer walls. Sighing, he stretched his legs full length across the duckboard deck. Only he and three couriers would be aboard.

  After a week and a half delay, his leave papers had come through. Damn well about time, he thought again angrily. A short hop to München, the train home, and he would be in the arms of his family before nightfall. His only regret seemed insignificant. to that prospect.

  He felt badly about leaving the squadron in the hands of Captain Ludwig von Gruder, replacement for Captain Ferdy Kleiber, who had been promoted and given a squadron to acquire command experience. Musing, Ruperle noted that Ferdy saw it as a demotion. Metal clanged as the passengers climbed in the wide side door. A moment later, the starter cartridge ignited with a bang and the fuselage-mounted center engine coughed to life, the throttle came out, and the three-bladed propeller spun lazily.

  His heartbeat increased. To him he was headed the correct way. In their last raid, his aircraft had taken several terrible tears in the fuselage. A fragment of shrapnel from one of them had slashed the throat of his waist gunner. The poor boy had died before the squadron reached the coast of England. For an irrational moment, fury had bridled Col Ruperle. It drove out reason and caused him to wish fervently he could release his load of bombs over the nearest English city.

  Immediately ashamed of himself, he had said a prayer for young Reisheimer, a Catholic boy from near-to-home Prier, on the opposite side of the Ammersee. Then he had so perfectly led his squadron to the target, his fifth beyond leave eligibility, that not a bomb fell off the factory complex. On the way back to France, he allowed himself a brief time to grieve for Reisheimer.

  It all came flooding back now as the engines began to throb and the Ju-52 rolled onto the taxi strip. He had written Reisheimer’s parents. Perhaps a personal call would be in order. After all, the boy had been on his aircraft. Yes, that is what he would do. It would make them feel better, he knew, even if it would not erase the tiny, cold spot of misery in his own heart.

  Time: 1321, GMT, July 5, 1940

  Place: Coventry, Warwickshire, England

  Back in Coventry Samantha set up surveillance on a man suspected of operating a directional beacon for the Luftwaffe. For two days she tagged along through the streets of the city from his home to the shop where he worked as an accounting clerk. She even ate her noon meal from the same gr
easy fish and chips stand. On the third day, his routine changed unexpectedly.

  At noon, he left the shop, as usual, then bypassed the wheeled barrow of the fish vendor and went directly to his house. There, a short while after he entered, a dim light appeared in the small window of the attic. Samantha made note of the time and kept watch from half a block away.

  When the half hour of his usual lunch break passed without his leaving the house, let alone returning to work, Samantha felt a thrust of interest. Another ten minutes went by. Then she heard the all too familiar, distant drone of aircraft engines. The Germans were coming. And Samantha did not need a radio or radar to know that they would bomb the rail yard at Birmingham again.

  Nazi squadrons passed by close enough to Coventry that Samantha could make out the shape of the individual aircraft and name them. Once they had gone by, the sudden appearance of her subject on his doorstep caught her by surprise. He left, walking briskly, and she set out to follow.

  Samantha tailed him to a narrow alley, between tall, brick buildings. That stopped her momentarily. She knew she dare not enter directly behind him. It went against all her training. Gnawing on her lower lip, she forced herself to walk past the alley. When she reached the mouth of the dark passage, she gave a quick glance down its length.

  Her man had completely disappeared. Quickly she turned into the opening and advanced along the alley. Walking on tiptoe to avoid the loud ring of her low, sensible heels, she neared the midway point. Suddenly a hand and arm flashed out of a dark, recessed entryway and yanked Samantha off her feet and into an unlighted room. She hadn’t even time to cry out before a chloroformed gauze pad clamped tightly across her nose and mouth.

  Time: 1520, GMT, July 5, 1940

  Place: High Street Jail, Thameside,