Page 66 of Tides of Resistance
‘If you want to help, there are other ways.’ Lizzie said softly as she gazed out to sea.
‘Oh yes, how?’ He jumped to his feet and walked around the boat checking all was in order, before standing in front of her. ‘What do you have in mind?’
‘You have heard of the Resistance, I take it?’
He nodded. ‘Who hasn’t?’
‘Well, it is the most dangerous way to pass the war, but if you can deal with the risk, speak to Fabian about helping him with the Corsairs. He’ll know what you mean.’
Alain’s gaze lingered on her, and then he nodded briskly, saying no more.
‘It’s very quiet out here,’ Lizzie said, sometime later. ‘I imagined we’d be stopped at a checkpoint, and I’d have to hide.’
‘It’s hit and miss but often quiet around mealtimes. We’ve been lucky so far. Remember to duck and then hide in the fish crates in the hold the second I raise the alarm. It could happen at any moment.’
Lizzie was cold, and her fisherman’s clothes were heavy and damp, but adrenaline raced through her veins as every mile brought her closer to Jersey. She could barely believe it was happening. When she’d set out from London, it hadn’t even occurred to her she would travel home to Seagrove, but now it seemed inevitable.
She imagined Jack striding into the cipher room and reading her message, a thunderous expression on his handsome face.
Please God, help me complete this mission successfully and deliver me back to London, to Jack, and watch over all the special people who have made this mission possible.
Lizzie thought of her grandparents, and the condition she might find them in. Fabian warned her to be prepared. After two years of living under German occupation at their age, they might not be in the best of health. He, too, was deeply concerned and said he’d had many a sleepless night wondering what had become of them.
Alain was not a man of many words, and she sat silently, thoughts running through her mind, thinking through what she would do when she landed.
On the one hand, one night wasn’t long to search for her grandparents and gather intelligence. Conversely, one night for a British spy infiltrating a Nazi-occupied island that was only nine by five miles in size, was quite long enough to get herself shot by a firing squad.
Lizzie trembled with a combination of the damp cold seeping into her bones and the sheer terror washing over her at what she was about to do.
She glanced at her watch.
‘Will we be there shortly?’ she asked.
Alain confirmed they would. ‘Soon we’ll approach the coast, and you’ll have to go below. They might just wave us through, but in the worst-case scenario, they’ll board the boat and do a thorough check.’
Lizzie’s heart thudded so hard she struggled to breathe.
‘Here, take a swig of this. You’re going to need it,’ he said, handing her a flask of brandy.
The strong liquid burned her throat and warmed her chest. The sun was setting and the light fading, casting shadows all around them as they chugged across the sea.
‘It will still be light when we dock at St. Helier. You stay in hiding, and I’ll head back out as soon as I can.’
Lizzie glimpsed Elizabeth Castle in the distance, and it hit her she was finally going home.
What would her mother say if she could see her now?
Alain barked, ‘The checkpoint is up ahead, get in the hold!’
Lizzie crawled below deck, and the fishy smell from the crates clawed at her senses, overwhelming her, and she almost wretched as the boat stopped at the checkpoint and she heard German voices.
CHAPTER 38
Lizzie was curled up behind the stinking fish crates, pure panic spiralling through her body as the boat rocked violently before grinding to a halt at the St. Helier harbour checkpoint.
She clutched her knees to her chest and shivered in the dark hold, the muffled German voices growing louder. Brisk footsteps sounded overhead, and she shrank further into a ball, silently praying she wouldn’t be discovered, as she listened to boots on the deck.
The smell of fresh fish from today’s catch mingled with the stale ingrained odour of catches past, and Lizzie tried not to breathe, but it only deepened her panic.
