“Why us, sir?”
Meyer said, “You’ve both done scouting duty. I’ve had personal experience working with you, Hailey, and Southey, you think on your feet. Add to that, Southey speaks French, and—may I share this with Hailey?”
“Yes, sir.” Southey set his teacup on the table.
Meyer continued, “Corporal Southey grew up in a theater troupe and has some skill at disguises. I thought that would be particularly useful for this sort of mission.”
Hailey stared at him, astonished. He’d never, even once, performed in any of the regiment’s amateur theatricals. She knew he was good at imitations, but through all his talk about his family, she’d never had even a hint that he was bred to that sort of life. He’d been very skilled in avoiding it, in fact. Just as she avoided anything that might indicate she wasn’t a man.
Southey glanced at her. “I’m all right with you knowing, but I’d rather not spread it around.”
She reflected, actors weren’t entirely respectable, especially not the sort who traveled from town to town. That was interesting. There was more to him, hidden underneath. Always more to find out. And she wanted to find it out. Even without the money, she realized, she’d want to do this, for the chance to work with Southey. “All right.”
Major Fournier said, “If you travel in uniform, you will be easy to identify. However, if you travel in disguise and are then caught, the Boche will have every right to shoot you. You understand?”
Hailey felt Meyer’s gaze as she said, “I do, sir.” Then she glanced at him. His eyes were closed.
Southey grinned. “They’re trying to shoot me all the time anyway, Major. I thought we could dress up as a couple of old women, or maybe an old couple. I’m good with dresses.”
Better you than me, Hailey thought. She eyed him critically, shoulders to feet. Yes, he could carry off a dress, particularly if he balanced out his shoulders with a little extra at the hips. He wasn’t tall enough to stand out too badly, and his facial features were delicate enough to suit. He might even look…she blinked in surprise at how the mental image made her feel. He would look pretty. Hurriedly, she forced her mind back to the discussion.
Fournier nodded sharply. “Very well. Here is the information you will need.” He spread a map on the table.
* * *
Getting to the maps had taken more than a week of trudging along ill-kept roads behind the German lines. Hailey was disguised as an elderly man with a heavy beard and careful creases around her eyes, mostly hidden by her soft cap. She wore extra layers beneath her shabby smock and loose pantaloons to appear larger; the insides of her clumsy farmer’s boots had been stuffed with wool. She’d been glad of the padding at night; it kept her warm.
Southey had been unrecognizable at first, even to someone who had seen his transformation. He’d shown her how to use hot wax to remove his facial hair; it was lucky he did not have a heavy beard to begin with, or the pain would have been unbearable. As it was, she’d dosed him with a couple of stiff whiskeys first. To balance out his shape, he’d generously padded his hips and buttocks beneath several layers of skirts and petticoats. He’d used a combination of methods to make his lips more full, his cheeks more plump, and his striking blue eyes almost disappear amid sagging skin and dark circles. To top it all off, he had changed his walk drastically. That was the strangest part. It was as if he could shrug the imaginary woman on and off like a coat.
At night, they slept in fields and ditches, sometimes cuddling close as if they really were husband and wife. It was strange, how easy it all felt, how companionable. They didn’t have to talk much. Partly that was having a common duty. Partly it was just that the two of them got on. Even though they were walking through all kinds of danger every day, she had the feeling that with Southey, she was safe. It didn’t make sense, but it was true.
Now, with their target within sight, Hailey had to remind herself that the assignment was only half over. Once they’d managed to get into the cottage and fetch out the maps, there was still the whole job of getting them back again. On foot, that would take at least another week, and that was only if they didn’t run into any trouble. But first, they needed a better look, and this was their best chance to have one in daylight.
“Tell me how stupid I am,” she murmured to Southey.
He rearranged the scant layer of vegetables in his basket and straightened, shaking out his skirts. He started haranguing her, his “husband,” in French because she had forgotten something or other—it was too fast for Hailey to follow. Secure in her role by now, she ducked her head.
Under cover of the one-sided argument, she was able to spend several minutes examining the cottage from the corner of her eye. At one point, she pointedly turned her back on Southey, crossed arms over her chest and stared blatantly.
They couldn’t stand here too long, or the German officers billeted inside might emerge and want to know what they were about. That would be a disaster, given that the local occupying force probably knew a good portion of the local population, at least by sight.
Hailey snatched the basket from Southey and marched off, leaving him to trail behind. They stopped well before the borders of the village and headed out towards an empty pasture instead.
Southey sat beneath a tree, spreading his skirts out around him. Hailey sat, taking care to act as if she was old and stiff. She said, “There’s only the one entrance.”
“Could you fit through the pigeon loft?”
There was an idea. A much better idea than the front door. But— “There aren’t any pigeons up there. How do we know the shutters aren’t nailed down?”
“One of them was flapping in the wind, just a little. What if I boosted you up on my shoulders?”
Hailey nodded. “All right. Even if the ladder to the loft is gone, it’s not too far to drop.”
“I can circle round and guard the door once you’re in,” Southey said.
“Good.”
Southey rummaged in their basket. Supplies here behind the German lines were not easy to come by. The occupying forces requisitioned most of the available fresh food, and the rest was strictly rationed. They’d brought dried beef and fruit with them, and some cheese, but the cheese had run out and they’d been unable to get more. Last night, Southey had stolen bread and boiled eggs, leaving coins and a packet of tobacco behind. It was worth the risk, he’d convinced her, because they’d need all their strength to escape once they had the maps.
“One egg left. You’d better have it,” he said, peeling it rapidly.
“You’ll be doing the lifting.”
“You don’t weigh much more than my little brother. You eat it.” He held out the egg on his palm. Their gazes locked. Feeling as if she couldn’t breathe, Hailey carefully took the egg from his hand, trying to not brush his skin with her fingers. They both looked away abruptly, at the same moment. Southey took out a strip of dried beef, eyed it without enthusiasm, and popped it into his mouth.
She saved a bite of the egg for Southey and he took it from her without protest. She pretended she didn’t feel the warmth that rushed up her arm at his touch.
That evening, they watched from cover as first one and then a second German officer left the cottage, presumably to direct patrols. Hailey had shed her bulky disguise, including the beard, in order to fit through the narrow opening into the pigeon loft. It was a near thing, but she made it, skidding on her elbows in a litter of musty feathers and guano.
She made more noise than she’d intended. Breathless, she dug her fingertips into rough boards, as if that could take back the racket of her arrival. Her calf muscles trembled as she tried to maintain her awkward crouch.
Nothing. No sound from below of voices, movement, breathing. The dusty air felt still. She could smell stale unwashed clothing and a lingering odor of sausages.
Carefully, she drew a long breath. Downstairs, Southey would already have ghosted around to the front entrance, to keep an eye on the road. Hailey crept forward, hands out to find the edge of the loft in the pitch dark. She collected a splinter in one palm before her reach found empty air. Crawling carefully to one side, then the other, she finally found the ladder down and breathed a relieved sigh.
She’d never been terribly brave. It turned out that getting onto that ladder, in utter blackness, one slip risking a hurtling crash onto a stove or furniture or God knew what, took a lot more bravery than merely waiting to see if a shell might smash you into jam. She was shaking, hard, by the time she got both feet braced firmly on the wooden rungs of the ladder.
After that, though, it wasn’t so bad. She climbed down carefully and found the stove by feeling its heat. She burned her hand, fumbling, but managed to locate and unhook its door, to let a little red glow into the cottage’s single room.
Thanks to the French spy’s report, she knew exactly where to find the maps. Over against one wall was a low wooden bin, filled with grain for the now-dead pigeons, killed to prevent them being used to send messages into Allied territory. The bin had a simple rope latch. Hailey knelt, lifted the slanted lid, and buried her hands in the stale grain. Something warm and wriggly caressed her fingers; she stifled a scream and yanked her hands free. Of course mice would have got at the grain. Ruefully, she shook her head before reaching in again. Towards the back of the bin, she touched oilcloth.
After winkling out the package, she hastily checked to make sure the maps were still within. It was lucky the mice hadn’t devoured them, but she supposed with so much better food available, they hadn’t bothered. Sliding the package safely down her shirt, she took one last look around, orienting herself, before she shut and latched the stove. Done. Now to get out.
She laid her hand on the doorknob.
Outside, yelling: German, loud, male. A scrambling sound: clumsy wooden clogs, in an awkward run—Southey was trying to draw them off. Hailey pressed tightly against the door, as if by force of will she could be on the other side, could help him. He would not be able to run fast enough, not in his peasant woman costume. She realized, belatedly, that he wouldn’t want to do so. If he was caught, any evidence of disturbance Hailey had left behind would be attributed to him.
She squeezed her eyes shut, fists clenched against the inside of the door. She could not be taken. She had the maps. Her duty was to take them back behind the British lines, deliver them as she’d been ordered.
But if she couldn’t rescue Southey, it was likely no one else could.
* * *
Hailey didn’t speak enough French to convince anyone of anything, nor did she have any idea who might be trustworthy and who was in the pockets of the German occupying force. She was on her own.
Her first action was to retreat and change her appearance. She and Southey had been seen numbers of times together and in these same guises.
No one had conveniently forgotten their laundry out to dry overnight. Instead, she waited until curfew, when all the villagers were summoned out by the German commander to answer roll call. The patrols were lackluster—lucky for her. She slipped into a darkened cottage by the rear door, glanced around hastily by the light of its fireplace, and found nothing of use. In the third cottage she checked, she found a basket near the back garden door, laundry piled up high. She crouched and dug through it. Nothing but threadbare sheets, women’s underthings and a couple of muslin dresses.
And…that wasn’t really a problem, was it? She certainly knew how to wear a dress.
Hurriedly checking the sizes, she took the smaller dress, along with petticoats and a pair of drawers. No shoes, but her boots would pass. She had francs with her; she tossed a handful into the basket and fled.
It wasn’t difficult to find where Southey was being held. Two guards barricaded a door on the far end of the village’s single street. Hailey saw them clearly when one of them struck a light and stood for long moments, lighting his pipe. Both were large men, seeming even larger in their long overcoats and helmets, probably worn as much for appearances as for protection. She would have the element of surprise. She ought to be able to take them.
She crept as close as she could, sliding from garden to garden, her feet silent in the damp soil, keeping in the shadows, hoping her charcoal-gray dress would blend in. She had quickly remembered how to hold her skirts high enough to move freely, though it still felt odd to have so much fabric gathered around her legs, and she worried about catching on something. Her breasts were free beneath the dress’ snug bodice, which once had felt confining, but after so many years of tight binding, now felt almost dangerous. She stopped short, leaning against a garden shed, and controlled her little spurt of laughter. It was too bad her dangerous breasts didn’t shoot bullets. She would have given twenty pounds right now for an Enfield.
The two guards were talking; she only knew a few phrases of German, but the chat sounded idle. One man spoke, and the other grunted in reply, perhaps around his pipe stem. Hailey closed her eyes, listening for any noise from within the cottage, anything to let her know that Southey was truly within and all right. Had his disguise been discovered? As a French peasant, he’d be in enough trouble; as a British man disguised as a French woman, he could be shot as a spy.
The maps itched against her back, as if reminding her that they were the primary reason she was in this situation in the first place, but she refused to believe it made sense to leave Southey behind. He was the one who spoke French. She would need him to escape back to the British lines. And she could hardly abandon one of His Majesty’s best sharpshooters.
The guards fell silent. Hailey held her breath, listening as hard as she could in the eerie silence. In the distance, a cow lowed. From within the cottage, she heard a voice speaking French, steady and low as if praying; Southey, keeping to his disguise.
Did he know she was out here?
The voice was interrupted by what might have been a blow; she flinched. How many guards were inside with him? She listened for voices, and finally decided there might be just one.
She had to get Southey out of there before things grew worse and he could no longer hold on to his role.
She had already imagined and discarded a dozen plans as impracticable. She was left with the flimsiest: pretend to be a woman trying to seduce her way into the occupiers’ good graces. Unfortunately, the guards would likely know at once that she wasn’t a local, which would make them suspicious.
She’d just have to be distracting enough that it didn’t matter. She lifted her skirt and untied the knife from around her calf, concealing it in her sleeve. It was her sole weapon. She wasn’t entirely sure she could kill both guards without outcry. Sergeant Pittfield had trained her in knife work, but she’d never had the occasion to put the training into practice; so far, she’d only fought with a rifle. She could kill one guard, most likely, but then she could hope the other’s noise would draw the interrogator outside. That would be her only chance.
She bit her lips a few times to summon up some color, and p
inched her cheeks. Flicking open the top few buttons of her bodice, she closed her eyes, summoning up images of the prostitutes who hung about the garrison towns. Then, hips swaying, heart pounding in her ears, she strolled into battle.
Rather than expose her minimal French, she used her terrible German. “Soldiers! Do you have any bread?”
The one with the pipe eyed her with distaste. The other swiftly put his finger to his lips and smiled, beckoning her closer. Idiot. Sergeant Pittfield had been right about men getting cocky.
The guard died quickly, her knife striking clean. As the other guard made outcry, she smacked his pipe hard, driving it into his teeth while wrenching her knife free. He swung wildly. She caught a dizzying blow on the side of the head but struck with her knife before he could raise his rifle.
The door opened as the second guard’s body hit the ground, his hands still clutching in futile defense. She attacked without thought, using her momentum to shove her opponent backwards, the knife buried in his innards, driving deeper as she fell to the floor atop his thrashing body. It had all happened so fast. She’d expected to feel sick, but she just felt relieved. So much for women not being able to kill. She wished she could tell the army how wrong they were.
There was a brief silence, then Southey said something in French. It sounded like a question.
Hailey wrenched her knife free and stabbed again, this time more cleanly, up into the heart. The officer fell limp and she stood up, so quickly her head reeled. There was blood on her dress.
Southey spoke again. Without looking at him, she said, “‘S me. I’ll get you loose in a mo.”
“Hailey—Hailey.”
She cleaned her knife on the officer’s leg. The locals were going to have trouble over this, but she didn’t know what they could do about it. She didn’t dare take time to even hide the bodies.
Southey was manacled to the chair, but the key was right to hand, laid out on the table with a few threatening objects. She got him loose and he sagged forward, biting his lip and bringing his arms around very slowly. Hailey almost kissed his bruised face, she was so glad to see him alive. Instead, she grabbed his shoulders and roughly massaged her way down to his hands, ignoring his strangled noises of pain, then helped him to his feet.
Under Her Uniform Page 4
