Page 8 of Summer of Fire
The last courier was a contact in France who had gone to the designated location on the border of Germany, but Hannah wasn’t there. The courier returned empty-handed and was now unavailable.
The data was too important not to give Hannah another chance. She was incredibly wily in the field, so he suspected that her going quiet meant she was lying low whilst she waited for a chance to re-establish contact.
Or she was captured, or dead.
He fervently hoped that wasn’t the case, or he might be about to endanger another life for nothing. They needed to give Hannah the opportunity to get out before it was too late.
The bell rang and startled him out of his dark thoughts. He covered the distance of the hallway with long strides and told himself this would be the right person to get the job done.
He showed the woman who was in her thirties, into his unremarkable office overlooking the unremarkable road. Aperfect location for a secret agent. Jack offered her a drink, but she declined, so he got straight into the interview.
Her French was fluent, but her accent was a little odd. ‘My father is from Belgium and my mother is English. He taught me French.’
Jack preferred the agents to speak pure French, but beggars can’t be choosers, he reminded himself. They could make up some sort of story to suit if anyone asked questions. He was thinking he would select her and save himself hours of frustration ploughing through more interviews, when with no prompting she lapsed into English with a strong Cockney accent.
Jack raised one dark eyebrow, and she stammered. ‘Sorry, I sometimes slip into English. Got that from my father, too,’ she said. ‘We speak a sort of Flemish, French, and London cocktail at home. I forget I’m doing it sometimes.’
Jack groaned and cursed inwardly. This wouldn’t work. ‘I’m afraid that slip of the tongue could get you killed, so we won’t be able to move forward.’
He saw the woman out and was just wondering whether he should have accepted the Jersey girl after all, when Drake arrived and followed him inside. ‘Any luck with finding your new courier, yet?’
Jack shook his head. ‘No, I’ve interviewed quite a few of the recommended candidates, but none of them would stand a chance without months of intensive training. I thought the last one was going to pass, but she blew it.’
‘From what I hear, it’s not so much that they are recommended, but more that they speak French, and are willing and available.’
‘Yes, that sounds about right, although the last one spoke a bizarre combination of French, Flemish and Cockney.’ Jack’s laugh was hollow.
‘You were a damned fool to turn Lizzie Beaumont down.’
Jack cast his eyes heavenwards. ‘Why not tell me how you really feel?’
Drake laughed, and his mirth was genuine. ‘You are your own worst enemy sometimes, King. No one can say you’re not brilliant at your job, but you’ve got to go easier on yourself—and everyone else.’
Drake pointed his pipe at the younger man and continued. ‘Lizzie is ideal, you know. She does the work of her predecessor in half the time, never complains, and comes up with a solution for anything I throw at her. I have had my eye on her for Military Intelligence for a while now. I’m sure someone else will jump at the chance to get her involved.’
Jack held up his hands in mock surrender. He knew when he should step aside and take Drake’s advice. He had saved his skin in Whitehall more times than Jack could count. ‘Alright, alright. I don’t have anyone else, so I suppose we can give her a simpler version of the mission to carry out. See how she does. She’s so young, that was all.’
‘Good man,’ said Drake, nodding with approval as he puffed on his pipe. ‘You’ll have to eat humble pie though, and I think I’d rather like to see you do it.’
Jack coughed and waved his hand in front of his face like a fan. Then he leaned over to open the window, stuck his head out and took a big gulp of air.
He grumbled, ‘That dreadful thing you smoke will do for us before the Nazis. Why can’t you smoke cigarettes?’
‘Nonsense. It’s good for one’s mood. You should try it. It might lift your spirits—you could certainly do with it. This desk life is turning you into a right old misery guts.’
‘If you say so. More importantly, where is this paragon of virtue—Miss Beaumont—to be found?’
CHAPTER 5
Lizzie awoke bleary-eyed after a restless night. She had drifted off at dawn after fighting thoughts of her grandparents subjected to Nazi occupation. Then she imagined what it must be like for those trying to sleep where the bombing raids grew more intense each day.
They heard on the radio the previous evening that the Luftwaffe was bombing airfields and installations in Essex, Kent, Sussex and Hampshire and the attacks were going on for hours at a time.
Lizzie didn’t think of herself as the nervous type, but lying in bed in the dark, silent hours between midnight and dawn, she was afraid the Germans might reach England like they threatened.
Her fears spiralled into the kind of panic that seems only to strike in the middle of the night. The Nazis had invaded the Channel Islands and the rest of Europe. Even she could see, with her limited knowledge of war, that if something didn’t change soon, Hitler would invade the whole of Britain and then what would become of them all?
Lizzie tossed and turned, unable to sleep for more thanhalf an hour at a time. She prayed the Allies would win the war and peaceful days would return soon. She prayed for her grandparents, for her brother Archie, and for her future brother-in-law Oliver.
