World War II Thriller Collection (79 page)

As a small boy in Sunday school, Paul had been vexed by a theological problem. He had noticed that in Arlington, Virginia, where he was living with his parents, most of the children of his age went to bed at the same time, seven-thirty. That meant they were saying their prayers simultaneously. With all those voices rising to heaven, how could God hear what he, Paul, was saying? He was not satisfied with the answer of the pastor, who
just said that God could do anything. Little Paul knew that was an evasion. The question troubled him for years.

If he could have seen Grendon Underwood, he would have understood.

Like God, the Special Operations Executive had to listen to innumerable messages, and it often happened that scores of them came in at the same time. Secret agents in their hideaways were all tapping their Morse keys simultaneously, like the nine-year-olds of Arlington kneeling at their bedsides at half past seven. SOE heard them all.

Grendon Underwood was another grand country house vacated by the owners and taken over by the military. Officially called Station 53a, it was a listening post. In its extensive grounds were radio aerials grouped in great arcs like the ears of God, listening to messages that came from anywhere between the arctic north of Norway to the dusty south of Spain. Four hundred wireless operators and coders, most of them young women in the FANYs, worked in the big house and lived in Nissen huts hastily erected on the grounds.

Paul was shown around by a supervisor, Jean Bevins, a heavy woman with spectacles. At first she was terrified of the visiting bigshot who represented Montgomery himself, but Paul smiled and talked softly and made her feel at ease. She took him to the transmitting room, where a hundred or so girls sat in rows, each with headphones, notebook, and pencils. A big board showed agents' code names and scheduled times for transmission—known as “skeds” and always pronounced the American way—and the frequencies they would use. There was an atmosphere of intense concentration, the only sound being the tap of Morse code as an operator told an agent she was receiving him loud and clear.

Jean introduced Paul to Lucy Briggs, a pretty blonde girl with a Yorkshire accent so strong that he had to concentrate hard to understand her. “Helicopter?” she said. “Aye, I know Helicopter—he's new. He calls in at
twenty hundred hours and receives at twenty-three hundred. No problems, so far.”

She never pronounced the letter aitch. Once Paul realized that, he began to find it easier to interpret the accent.

“What do you mean?” he asked her. “What sort of problems do you get?”

“Well, some of them don't tune the transmitter right, so you have to search for the frequency. Then the signal may be weak, so that you can't hear the letters very well, and you worry that you might be mistaking dashes for dots—the letter B is very like D, for instance. And the tone is always bad from those little suitcase radios, because they're so small.”

“Would you recognize his ‘fist'?”

She looked dubious. “He's only broadcast three times. On Wednesday he was a bit nervous, probably because it was his first, but his pace was steady, as if he knew he had plenty of time. I was pleased—I thought he must feel reasonably safe. We worry about them, you know. We're sitting here nice and warm and they're somewhere behind enemy lines dodging the bloody Gestapo.”

“What about his second broadcast?”

“That was Thursday, and he was rushed. When they're in a hurry, it can be difficult to be sure what they mean—you know, was that two dots run together, or a short dash? Wherever he was sending from, he wanted to get out of there fast.”

“And then?”

“Friday he didn't broadcast. But I didn't worry. They don't call unless they have to, it's too dangerous. Then he came on the air on Saturday morning, just before dawn. It was an emergency message, but he didn't sound panicky. In fact I remember thinking to myself, He's getting the hang of this. You know, it was a strong signal, the rhythm was steady, all the letters clear.”

“Could it have been someone else using his transmitter that time?”

She looked thoughtful. “It sounded like him . . . but yes, it could have been someone else, I suppose. And if
it was a German, pretending to be him, they would sound nice and steady, wouldn't they, because they'd have nothing to fear.”

Paul felt as if he were wading through gumbo. Every question he asked had two answers. He yearned for something definite. He had to fight down panic every time he recalled to mind the dreadful prospect that he might lose Flick, less than a week after she had come into his life like a gift from the gods.

Jean had disappeared, and returned now with a sheaf of papers in a plump hand. “I've brought the decrypts of the three signals received from Helicopter,” she said. Her quiet efficiency pleased him.

He looked at the first sheet.

 

CALLSIGN HLCP (HELICOPTER)
SECURITY TAG PRESENT
MAY 30 1944
MESSAGE READS:
ARRIVED OK STOP CRYT RENDEVOUS UNSAFE STOP NABBED BY GGESTAPO BUT GOT AWAY STOP IN FUTURE RENDEZVOUS AT CAFE DE LA GARE OVER

 

“He can't spell for nuts,” Paul commented.

“It's not his spelling,” Jean said. “They always make errors in the Morse. We order the decoders to leave them in the decrypt, rather than tidy them up, in case there's some significance.”

Brian's second transmission, giving the strength of the Bollinger circuit, was longer.

 

CALLSIGN HLCP (HELICOPTER)
SECURITY TAG PRESENT
MAY 31 1944
MESSAGE READS:
ACTIV AGENTS NOMBER FIVE AS FOLOWS STOP MONET WHO IS WOUNED STOP COMTESSE OK STOP CHEVAL HELPS
OCASIONLY STOP BOURGEOISE STILL IM PLACE STOP PLUS MY RESCUER COD-NAME CHARENTON STOP

 

Paul looked up. “This is much worse.”

Lucy said, “I told you he was in a rush the second time.”

There was more of the second message, mainly a detailed account of the incident at the cathedral. Paul went on to the third:

 

CALLSIGN HLCP (HELICOPTER)
SECURITY TAG PRESENT
JUN 2 1944
MESSAGE READS:
WHAT THE DEVIL HAPPENED QUERY SEND INSTRUCTIONS STOP REPLY IMEDIATELY OVER

 

“He's improving,” Paul said. “Only one mistake.”

“I thought he was more relaxed on Saturday,” Lucy said.

“Either that, or someone else sent the signal.” Suddenly, Paul thought he saw a way to test whether “Brian” was himself or a Gestapo impersonator. If it worked, it would at least give him certainty. “Lucy, do you ever make mistakes in transmission?”

“Hardly ever.” She threw an anxious glance at her supervisor. “If a new girl is a bit careless, the agent will kick up a hell of a stink. Quite rightly, too. There should never be any mistakes—the agents have enough problems to cope with.”

Paul turned to Jean. “If I draft a message, would you encode it exactly as it is? It would be a kind of test.”

“Of course.”

He looked at his watch. It was seven-thirty p.m. “He should broadcast at eight. Can you send it then?”

The supervisor said, “Yes. When he calls in, we'll just
tell him to stand by to receive an emergency message immediately after transmission.”

Paul sat down, thought for a moment, then wrote on a pad:

 

GIVE YOUR ARMS HOW MAN AUTOMATS HOW MY STENS ALSO AMMO HOW MNY ROUNDS ECH PLUS GREDANES REPLY IM-MMEDIATLY

 

He considered it for a moment. It was an unreasonable request, phrased in a high-handed tone, and it appeared to be carelessly encoded and transmitted. He showed it to Jean. She frowned. “That's a terrible message. I'd be ashamed of it.”

“What do you think an agent's reaction would be?”

She gave a humorless laugh. “He would send an angry reply with a few swear words in it.”

“Please encode it exactly as it is and send it to Helicopter.”

She looked troubled. “If that's what you wish.”

“Yes, please.”

“Of course.” She took it away.

Paul went in search of food. The canteen operated twenty-four hours a day, as the station did, but the coffee was tasteless and there was nothing to eat but some stale sandwiches and dried-up cake.

A few minutes after eight o'clock, the supervisor came into the canteen. “Helicopter called in to say he had had no word yet from Leopardess. We're sending him the emergency message now.”

“Thank you.” It would take Brian—or his Gestapo impersonator—at least an hour to decode the message, compose a reply, encode it, and transmit it. Paul stared at his plate, wondering how the British had the nerve to call this a sandwich: two pieces of white bread smeared with margarine and one thin slice of ham.

No mustard.

THE RED-LIGHT DISTRICT
of Paris was a neighborhood of narrow, dirty streets on a low hill behind the rue de la Chapelle, not far from the Gare du Nord. At its heart was “La Charbo,” the rue de la Charbonnière. On the north side of the street, the convent of la Chapelle stood like a marble statue in a junkyard. The convent consisted of a tiny church and a house where eight nuns dedicated their lives to helping the most wretched of Parisians. They made soup for starving old men, talked depressed women out of suicide, dragged drunk sailors from the gutter, and taught the children of prostitutes to read and write. Next door to the convent stood the Hôtel de la Chapelle.

The hotel was not exactly a brothel, for there were no whores in residence, but when the place was not full the proprietress was willing to rent rooms by the hour to heavily made-up women in cheap evening gowns who arrived with fat French businessmen, furtive German soldiers, or naive young men too drunk to see straight.

Flick walked through the door with a mighty sense of relief. The gendarmes had dropped her off half a mile away. She had seen two copies of her Wanted poster on the way. Christian had given her his handkerchief, a clean cotton square, red with white dots, and she had tied it over her head in an attempt to hide her blonde hair, but she knew that anyone who looked hard at her would recognize her from the poster. There had been nothing she could do but keep her eyes down and her fingers crossed. It had seemed like the longest walk of her life.

The proprietress was a friendly, overweight woman wearing a pink silk bathrobe over a whalebone corset. She had once been voluptuous, Flick guessed. Flick had stayed at the place before, but the proprietress did not appear to remember her. Flick addressed her as “Madame,” but she said, “Call me Régine.” She took Flick's money and gave her a room key without asking any questions.

Flick was about to go upstairs to her room when she glanced through the window and saw Diana and Maude arriving in a strange kind of taxi, a sofa on wheels attached to a bicycle. Their brush with the gendarmes did not seem to have sobered them, and they were giggling about the vehicle.

“Good God, what a dump,” said Diana when she walked in the door. “Perhaps we can eat out.”

Paris restaurants had continued to operate during the occupation, but inevitably many of their customers were German officers, and agents avoided them if they could. “Don't even think about it,” Flick said crossly. “We're going to lie low here for a few hours, then go to the Gare de l'Est at first light.”

Maude looked accusingly at Diana. “You promised to take me to the Ritz.”

Flick controlled her temper. “What world are you living in?” she hissed at Maude.

“All right, keep your hair on.”

“Nobody leaves! Is that understood?”

“Yes, yes.”

“One of us will go out and buy food later. I have to get out of sight now. Diana, you sit here and wait for the others while Maude checks into your room. Let me know when everyone's arrived.”

Climbing the stairs, Flick passed a Negro girl in a tight red dress and noticed that she had a full head of straight black hair. “Wait,” Flick said to her. “Will you sell me your wig?”

“You can buy one yourself around the corner, honey.” She looked Flick up and down, taking her for an
amateur hooker. “But, frankly, I'd say you need more than a wig.”

“I'm in a hurry.”

The girl pulled it off to reveal black curls cropped close to her scalp. “I can't work without it.”

Flick took a thousand-franc note from her jacket pocket. “Buy yourself another.”

She looked at Flick with new eyes, realizing she had too much money to be a prostitute. With a shrug, she accepted the money and handed over the wig.

“Thank you,” said Flick.

The girl hesitated. No doubt she was wondering how many more of those notes Flick had. “I do girls, too,” she said. She reached out and brushed Flick's breast lightly with her fingertips.

“No, thanks.”

“Maybe you and your boyfriend—”

“No.”

The girl looked at the thousand-franc note. “Well, I guess this is my night off. Good luck, honey.”

“Thanks,” said Flick. “I need it.”

She found her room, put her case on the bed, and took off her jacket. There was a small mirror over a washbasin. Flick washed her hands, then stood looking at her face for a moment.

She combed her short blonde hair back over her ears and pinned it with hair clips. Then she put on the wig and adjusted it. It was a bit big, but it would stay on. The black hair altered her appearance radically. However, her fair eyebrows now looked peculiar. She took the eyebrow pencil from her makeup kit and darkened them. That was much better. Not only did she look like a brunette, she seemed more formidable than the sweet girl in the swimsuit. She had the same straight nose and severe chin, but that seemed like a family resemblance between two otherwise different-looking sisters.

Next she took her identity papers from her jacket pocket. With great care, she retouched the photograph,
using the eyebrow pencil to draw faint lines of dark hair and narrow dark eyebrows. When she was done, she looked hard at the picture. She did not think anyone would be able to tell it had been doctored unless they rubbed it hard enough to smear the pencil marks.

She took off the wig, stepped out of her shoes, and lay on the bed. She had not slept for two nights, because she had spent Thursday night making love to Paul and Friday night on the metal floor of a Hudson bomber. Now she closed her eyes and dropped off within seconds.

She was awakened by a knock at the door. To her surprise, it was getting dark: she had slept for several hours. She went to the door and said, “Who is it?”

“Ruby.”

She let her in. “Is everything all right?”

“I'm not sure.”

Flick closed the curtains, then switched on the light. “What's happened?”

“Everyone has checked in. But I don't know where Diana and Maude are. They're not in their room.”

“Where have you looked?”

“The proprietress's office, the little church next door, the bar across the street.”

“Oh, Christ,” Flick said in dismay. “The bloody fools, they've gone out.”

“Where would they have gone?”

“Maude wanted to go to the Ritz.”

Ruby was incredulous. “They can't be that stupid!”

“Maude can.”

“But I thought Diana had more sense.”

“Diana's in love,” Flick said. “I suppose she'll do anything Maude asks. And she wants to impress her paramour, take her to swanky places, show that she knows her way around the world of high society.”

“They say love is blind.”

“In this case, love is bloody suicidal. I can't believe it—but I bet that's where they've gone. It will serve them right if they end up dead.”

“What'll we do?”

“Go to the Ritz and get them out of there—if we're not too late.”

Flick put on her wig. Ruby said, “I wondered why your eyebrows had gone dark. It's effective, you look like someone else.”

“Good. Get your gun.”

In the lobby, Régine handed Flick a note. It was addressed in Diana's handwriting. Flick ripped it open and read:

 

We're going to a better hotel. We'll meet you at the Gare de l'Est at 5 a.m. Don't worry!

 

She showed it to Ruby, then ripped it to shreds. She was most angry with herself. She had known Diana all her life, it was no surprise that she was foolish and irresponsible. Why did I bring her? she asked herself. Because I had no one else, was the answer.

They left the flophouse. Flick did not want to use the Métro, for she knew there were Gestapo checkpoints at some stations and occasional spot checks on the trains. The Ritz was in the Place Vendôme, a brisk half-hour walk from La Charbo. The sun had gone down, and night was falling fast. They would have to keep an eye on the time: there was an eleven o'clock curfew.

Flick wondered how long it would take the Ritz staff to call the Gestapo about Diana and Maude. They would have known immediately that there was something odd about them. Their papers said they were secretaries from Reims—what were two such women doing at the Ritz? They were dressed respectably enough, by the standards of occupied France, but they certainly did not look like typical Ritz clients—the wives of diplomats from neutral countries, the girlfriends of black marketers, or the mistresses of German officers. The hotel manager himself might not do anything, especially if he was anti-Nazi, but the Gestapo had informants in every large hotel and restaurant in the city, and strangers with implausible
stories were just what they were paid to report. This kind of detail was drummed into people on SOE's training course—but that course lasted three months, and Diana and Maude had been given only two days.

Flick quickened her step.