Enigma (21 page)

“An hour late for work hardly constitutes a disappearance. She
probably overslept.”

“I don’t think she went home last night. She certainly wasn’t
back by two.”

“Then perhaps she overslept somewhere else,” said Miss Wallace,
maliciously. The spectacles flashed gain. “Incidentally, might I
ask how you know she didn’t come home?”

He had learned it was better not to lie. “Because I let myself
in and waited for her.”

“So. A housebreaker as well. I can see why Claire wants nothing
more to do with you.”

To hell with this, thought Jericho.

“There are other things you should know. A man came to the
cottage last night while I was there. He ran away when he heard my
voice. And I just called Claire’s father. He claims he doesn’t know
where she is, but I think he’s lying.”

That seemed to impress her. She chewed on the inside of her lip
and looked away, down the hill. A train, an express by the sound of
it, was passing through Bletchley. A curtain of brown smoke, half a
mile long, rose in percussive bursts above the town.

“None of this is my concern,” she said at last.

“She didn’t mention she was going away?”

“She never does. Why should she?”

“And she hasn’t seemed odd to you lately? Under any sort of
strain?”

“Mr Jericho, we could probably fill this bus shelter—no, we
could probably fill an entire double-decker bus—with young men who
are worried about their relationships with Claire Romilly. Now I’m
really very tired. Much too tired and inexpert in these matters to
be of any help to you. Excuse me.”

For the second time she mounted her bicycle, and this time
Jericho didn’t try to stop her. “Do the letters ADU mean anything
to you?”

She shook her head irritably and pushed herself away from the
kerb.

“It’s a call sign,” he shouted after her. “Probably German Army
or Luftwaffe.”

She applied the brakes with such force she slid off the saddle,
her flat heels skittering in the gutter. She looked up and down the
empty road. “Have you gone utterly mad?”

“You’ll find me in Hut 8.”

“Wait a moment. What has this to do with Claire?”

“Or, failing that, the Commercial Guesthouse in Albion Street.”
He nodded politely. “ADU, Miss Wallace. Angels Dance Upwards. I’ll
leave you in peace.”

“Mr Jericho…”

But he didn’t want to answer any of her questions. He crossed
the road and hurried down the hill. As he turned left into Wilton
Avenue towards the main gate he glanced back. She was still where
he had left her, her thin legs planted either side of the pedals,
staring after him in astonishment.

§

Logie was waiting for him when he got back to Hut 8. He was
prowling around the confined space of the Registration Room, his
bony hands clasped behind his back, the bowl of his pipe jerking
around as he chomped furiously on its stem.

“This your coat?” was his only greeting. “Better bring it with
you.”

“Hello, Guy. Where are we going?” Jericho unhooked his coat from
the back of the door and one of the Wrens gave him a rueful
smile.

“We’re going to have a chat, old cock. Then you’re going
home.”

Once inside his office, Logie threw himself into his chair and
swung his immense feet up on to his desk. “Close the door then,
man. Let’s at least try and keep this between ourselves.”

Jericho did as he was told. There was nowhere for him to sit so
he leaned his back against it. He felt surprisingly calm. “I don’t
know what Skynner’s been telling you,” he began, “but I didn’t
actually land a punch.”

“Oh, well, that’s fine, then.” Logie raised his hands in mock
relief. “I mean to say, as long as there’s no blood, none of your
actual broken bones—”

“Come on, Guy. I never touched him. He can’t sack me for
that.”

“He can do whatever he sodding well likes.” The chair creaked as
Logie reached across the desk and picked up a brown folder. He
flicked it open. “Let us see what we have here. “Gross
insubordination,” it says. “Attempted physical assault,” it says.
“Latest in a long series of incidents which suggest the individual
concerned is no longer fit for active duties.”” He tossed the file
back on his desk. “Not sure I disagree, as a matter of fact. Been
waiting for you to show your face around here ever since yesterday
afternoon. Where’ve you been? Admiralty? Taking a swing at the
First Sea Lord?”

“You said not to work a full shift. “Just come and go as you
please.” Your very words.”

“Don’t get smart with me, old love.”

Jericho was silent for a moment. He thought of the print of
King’s College Chapel with the intercepts hidden behind it. Of the
German Book Room and Weitzman’s frightened face. Of Edward
Romilly’s shaken voice. “My daughter’s movements are as much a
mystery to me as they seem to be to you.” He was aware that Logie
was studying him carefully.

“When does he want me to go?”

“Well, now, you bloody idiot. “Send him back to King’s and this
time letter the bugger walk”—1 seem to recall those were my
specific instructions.” He sighed and shook his head. “You
shouldn’t have made him look a fool, Tom. Not in front of his
clients.”

“But he is a fool.” Outrage and self-pity were welling in him.
He tried to keep his voice steady. “He hasn’t the foggiest idea of
what he’s talking about. Come on, Guy. Do you honestly believe, for
one minute, that we can break back into Shark within the next three
days?”

“No. But there are ways of saying it and there are ways of
saying it, if you follow me, especially when our dearly beloved
American brethren are in the same room.”

Someone knocked and Logie shouted: “Not now, old thing, thanks
all the same!”

He waited until whoever it was had gone and then said, quietly:
“I don’t think you quite appreciate how much things have changed
round here.”

“That’s what Skynner said.”

“Well, he’s right. For once. You saw it for yourself at the
conference yesterday. It’s not 1940 any more, Tom. It’s not plucky
little Britain stands alone. We’ve moved on. We have to take
account of what other people think. Just look at the map, man. Read
the newspapers. These convoys embark from New York. A quarter of
the ships are American. The cargo’s all American. American troops.
American crews.” Logie suddenly covered his face with his hands.
“My God, I can’t believe you tried to hit Skynner. You really are
pretty potty, aren’t you? I’m not at all sure you’re safe to walk
the streets.” He lifted his feet off the desk and picked up the
telephone. “Look, I don’t care what he says, I’ll see if I can get
the car to take you back.”

“No!” Jericho was surprised at the vehemence in his voice. In
his mind he could see, perfectly replicated, the Atlantic plot—the
brown landmass of North America, the Rorschach inkblots of the
British Isles, the blue of the ocean, the innocent yellow discs,
the shark’s teeth, set and loaded like a mantrap. And Claire?
Impossible to find her even now, when he had access to the Park.
Shipped back to Cambridge, stripped of his security clearance, he
might as well be on another planet. “No,” he said, more calmly.
“You can’t do that.”

“It’s not my decision.”

“Give me a couple of days.”

“What?”

“Tell Skynner you want to give me a couple of days. Give me a
couple of days to see if I can find a way back into Shark.”

Logie stared at Jericho for five seconds, then started to laugh.
“You get madder and madder as the week wears on, old son. Yesterday
you’re telling us Shark can’t be broken in three days. Now you’re
saying you might be able to do it in two.”

“Please, Guy. I’m begging you.” And he was. He had his hands on
Logie’s desk and was leaning over it. He was pleading for his life.
“Skynner doesn’t just want me out of the hut, you know. He wants me
out of the Park altogether. He wants me locked up in some garret in
the Admiralty doing long division.”

“There are worse places to spend the war.”

“Not for me there aren’t. I’d hang myself. I belong here.”

“I have already stuck my neck out so far for you, my lad.” Logie
jabbed his pipe into Jericho’s chest.

“‘Jericho?” they said. “You can’t be serious. We’re in a crisis
and you want Jericho?” He jabbed his pipe again. “So I said: “Yes,
I know he’s half bloody cracked and keeps on fainting like a maiden
bloody aunt, but he’s got something, got that extra two per cent.
Just trust me.”” Jab, jab. “So I beg a bloody car—no joke round
here, as you’ve gathered—and instead of getting my kip I come and
drink stale tea in King’s and plead with you, bloody plead, and the
first thing you do is make us all look idiots and then you slug the
head of section—all right, all right, try to slug him. Now, I ask
you: who’s going to listen to me now?”

“Skynner.”

“Come off it.”

“Skynner will have to listen, he will if you insist you need me.
I know—” Jericho was inspired. “You could threaten to tell that
admiral, Trowbridge, that I’ve been removed—at a vital moment in
the Battle of the Atlantic—just because I spoke the truth.”

“Oh, I could, could I? Thank you. Thanks very much. Then we’ll
both be doing long division in the Admiralty.”

“‘There are worse places to spend the war.’ ”

“Don’t be cheap.”

There was another knock, much louder this time. “For God’s
sake,” yelled Logie, “piss off!” But the handle started to turn
anyway. Jericho moved out of the way, the door opened and Puck
appeared.

“Sorry, Guy. Good morning, Thomas.” He gave them each a grim
nod. “There’s been a development, Guy.”

“Good news?”

“Frankly, no, to be entirely honest. It is probably not good
news. You had better come.”

“Hell, hell” muttered Logie. He gave Jericho a murderous look,
grabbed his pipe and followed Puck out into the corridor.

Jericho hesitated for a second, then set off after them, down
the passage and into the Registration Room. He had never seen it so
full. Lieutenant Cave was there, along, it seemed, with almost
every cryptanalyst in the hut—Baxter, Atwood, Pinker, Kingcome,
Proudfoot, de Brooke—as well as Kramer, like a matinee idol in his
American naval uniform. He gave Jericho a friendly nod.

Logie glanced around the room with surprise. “Hail, hail, the
gang’s all here.” Nobody laughed. “What’s up, Puck? Holding a
rally? Going on strike?”

Puck inclined his head towards the three young Wrens who made up
the Registration Room’s day shift.

“Ah yes,” said Logie, “of course,” and he flashed his smoker’s
teeth at them in an ochre smile. “Bit of business to attend to,
girls. Hush hush. I wonder if you wouldn’t mind leaving the
gentlemen alone for a few minutes.”

♦

“I happened to show this to Lieutenant Cave,” said Puck, when
the Wrens had gone. “Traffic analysis.” He held aloft the familiar
yellow log sheet, as if he were about to perform a conjuring trick.
“Two long signals intercepted in the last twelve hours coming out
of the Nazis’ new transmitter near Magdeburg. One just before
midnight: one hundred and eight four-letter groups. One just after:
two hundred and eleven groups. Rebroadcast twice, over both the
Diana and Hubertus radio nets. Four-six-oh-one kilocycles.
Twelve-nine-fifty.”

“Oh, do get on with it,” said Atwood, under his breath.

Puck affected not to hear. “In the same period, the total number
of Shark signals intercepted from the North Atlantic U-boats up to
oh-nine-hundred this morning: five.”

“Five?” repeated Logie. “Are you sure, old love?” He took the
log sheet and ran his finger down the neatly inked columns of
entries.

“What’s the phrase?” said Puck. “‘As quiet as the grave’?”

“Our listening posts,” said Baxter, reading the log sheet over
Logie’s shoulder. “There must be something wrong with them. They
must have fallen asleep.”

“I rang the intercept control room ten minutes ago. After I’d
spoken to the lieutenant. They say there’s no mistake.”

An excited murmur of conversation broke out.

“And what say you, O wise one?”

It took Jericho a couple of seconds to realise that Atwood was
talking to him. He shrugged. “It’s very few. Ominously few.”

Puck said: “Lieutenant Cave believes there’s a pattern.”

“We’ve been interrogating captured U-boat crew about tactics.”
Lieutenant Cave leaned forwards and Jericho saw Pinker flinch at
the sight of his scarred face. “When Donitz sniffs a convoy, he
draws his hearses up line abreast across the route he expects it to
take. Twelve boats, say, maybe twenty miles apart. Possibly two
lines, possibly three—nowadays he’s got the hearses to put on a
pretty big show. Our estimate, before the blackout, was forty-six
operational in that sector of the North Atlantic alone.” He broke
off, apologetically. “Sorry,” he said, “do stop me if I’m telling
my grandmothers how to suck eggs.”

“Our work’s rather more—ah—theoretical,” said Logie. He looked
around and several of the crypt-analysts nodded in agreement.

“All right. There are basically two types of line. There’s your
picket line, which basically means the U-boats stay stationary on
the surface waiting for the convoy to steam into them. And there’s
your patrol line, which involves the hearses sweeping forwards in
formation to intercept it. Once the lines are established, there’s
one golden rule. Absolute radio silence until the convoy’s sighted.
My hunch is that that’s what’s happening now. The two long signals
coming out of Magdeburg—those are most likely Berlin ordering the
U-boats into line. And if the boats are now observing radio
silence…” Cave shrugged: he was sorry to have to state the obvious.
“That means they must be on battle stations.”

Nobody said anything. The intellectual abstractions of
cryptanalysis had taken solid form: two thousand German U-boat men,
ten thousand Allied seamen and passengers, converging to do battle
in the North Atlantic winter, a thousand miles from land. Pinker
looked as if he might be sick. Suddenly the oddity of their
situation struck Jericho. Pinker was probably personally
responsible for sending—what?—a thousand German sailors to the
bottom of the ocean, yet Cave’s face was the closest he had come to
the brutality of the Atlantic war.