by Ariel Lawhon
He repeats the address. “Two o’clock this afternoon. Fifty-seven. Orchard Court.”
MARYLEBONE
57 Orchard Court
I wear the same dress so they can see me coming. I’ve always liked this one. Navy, with a scoop neck and mother-of-pearl buttons down the front. Black leather belt. Black leather pumps. New stockings. Lipstick. Attitude.
I stand on the sidewalk looking up at the six-story apartment building. Cream-colored stone. Flat edifice. Plain windows. Nothing fancy or ornate about the thing. There is no indication of what lies within. But I’ve been pondering my circumstances since the mysterious call this morning and I think I’ve got an idea of what might be going on. My unsolicited arrival at the Free French headquarters garnered immediate suspicion. I am a British subject, after all. So they rejected me out of hand in the belief that I’m a pawn, sent by the British. But my visit was also noted by the Brits, who are, in fact, spying on the French, though not with any help from me. They saw me come and go. Followed me home. Ascertained my identity. Given that the British vice consul alerted London of my departure from Spain, it wasn’t all that hard for them to connect the dots. Nancy Fiocca, Resistance figure, back in London.
I step through the front door, into the lobby, and walk toward the stairwell. An elevator would be nice given my choice of footwear, but I’ll make do. I smooth the front of my dress and take a deep breath once I’ve reached the fifth floor. It’s not like I’m out of shape, but really, they should install an elevator. High heels weren’t made for climbing. I look for number fifty-seven. Eight doors down, on the left. I knock.
“Come in!”
I enter the sprawling flat and see a young, pretty woman at a desk in what I assume—under other circumstances—would be the living room. She has blue eyes and blond hair and she reminds me so much of Stephanie that I can hardly look at her.
“Can I help you?” she asks as I close the door behind me.
“Yes. I think so, at least. I was told to come for an…appointment…? At two o’clock.” I check my watch. Right on the money.
“Name?”
“Nancy Fiocca.”
She doesn’t glance at a notebook or check a list. Simply gives me a curt nod and points at a door down the hall. “He’s waiting for you.”
“Who is waiting for me?”
Her only answer is a smile.
I do love a mystery. And truth be told, I have nothing else to do today, so I follow her slender arm and the pointed finger at the end of it down the short hallway.
The floors are carpeted, the walls beige, and the doors solid oak. I knock again and am instructed to enter. A man sits behind a desk in what was once a bedroom. The plaque on the polished wood surface indicates one Major Morell.
“Nancy Fiocca, I presume?” he asks, then steps out from behind his desk and offers his hand. “Please, have a seat.”
I shake it. Sit down. “You are the one who called this morning.”
He raises an eyebrow.
“Your accent,” I explain.
“What about it?”
“Wherever it is you come from, you’re trying very hard to hide it.”
This wins me a grin. “Experimenting.”
“On?”
“You.”
I grunt. “Seems a waste of time, honestly. Why not say, ‘This is Major Morell with…’ ” I wait for him to supply the answer. It takes a moment, but he finally obliges me.
“…The Special Operations Executive…”
“ ‘…with the Special Operations Executive’—what the hell is that anyway?”
Another grin. “We’ll get to that in a moment.”
“Right. Morell. With the…ah…SOE…and I’d like to chat. By the way, I’m from Bristol.” I catch him blink, quickly, several times, and I know that my guess hit home. “That would have done the job. I would have come. Why all the secrecy?”
Major Morell has been standing through all this, looking at me as if I’ve grown feathers out of my nose. Finally, he shakes his head, astounded, and sits down opposite me at his desk.
“He did say you were sharp.”
“Who said?”
He ignores that question but answers the other. “The thing is, Mrs. Fiocca, the SOE is a covert organization and I can’t just go announcing it when I call.”
“And why did you call?”
“You were recommended to us.”
“By?”
“A mutual friend.”
Now I’m just frustrated. “Recommended. For. What?”
“I apologize. You’ve been out of country, so of course you wouldn’t know. The Special Operations Executive was formed three years ago to conduct…shall we say…clandestine…operations in occupied Europe. We engage in sabotage. Reconnaissance. And a bit of…” He searches for an acceptable word that will not frighten me.
“Spying?”
“Yes.”
“Excellent. How do I join?”
He blinks at me. “Well, that is why we would like to speak with you. We’ve heard of your work in France. Forging documents. Smuggling downed British pilots and Jews across the border into Spain. We have been told that you and your husband financed a great deal of the work yourselves. We believe you would be an excellent fit for our organization.”
If he’d told me he wanted to make me queen of the British Empire I couldn’t be more pleased. But I still have questions. “You keep saying ‘we.’ Who do you mean? Exactly.”
“Myself, of course,” he says. “And Maurice Buckmaster.”
“And who the flaming hell is he?”
Major Morell is a blinker. If you impress him, he blinks. If you astonish him, he blinks. And if you offend him? His eyes flutter at such a rate you’d think they were in danger of falling out.
“Maurice Buckmaster is the head of the French Section of the SOE.”
“He’s in charge?”
“Yes.”
“Where is he, then? Why isn’t he conducting this interview?”
“The interviews are my job.”
“And have I got it? The job, I mean?”
“That depends on how you do with the admissions tests.”
I wave the idea of tests aside. As far as I’m concerned, I’ve proven myself ten times over. “I will accept the position on one condition.”
Poor Major Morell. He may have been told of my arrival, but he has absolutely no idea what to do with me. “And what condition is that?”
“That you send me back to France.”
“Why France? Do you think it will be glamorous?”
“Glamorous? If I wanted glamour I’d go back to New York. Or take up residence at Buckingham Palace. France is occupied by the Nazis, for God’s sake. There is nothing glamorous about it. Why would you even ask such a question?”
He shrugs. “I just wanted to see your reaction. It’s my job to gauge your reactions.”
“Then gauge this. Record it somewhere so I don’t have to say it again. I want to go back to France because my husband is there. Because half my friends are there. My dog is there. Because the damn Nazis have turned it into a hellhole, and I can’t live with the idea that they could do the same with the rest of the world.” I stand up. Square my shoulders. Clutch the handles of my purse so tightly my knuckles turn white. “Where am I supposed to report for duty?”
KENT
“The Mad House”
As much as I dislike tests, I am unable to avoid them. And I am certain that I fail the first one. But it can’t be avoided. I despise psychiatrists, and I suspect the feeling is mutual.
I sit in his office, the day after my interview with Morell, on the bottom floor of a manor home outside Kent that I am told is called “the Mad House.” And no won
der, given this first bit of bizarre intellectual prodding. I do not ask his name, but I assume he has mine because there is a file open on the table before him. He scribbles something in the margins before holding up another inkblot.
“What kind of test is this, anyway?” I ask.
“It is called a Rorschach test.”
“It sounds German.”
“It’s Swiss,” he tells me.
“Do you really think the Nazis are going to tie me down and show me inkblots when I go back?”
“Please answer the question. What do you see?”
“An inkblot. Like I said with the last one.”
“What. Does. It. Look. Like. To. You?”
It’s a stupid game and I can’t see how it tells him anything about my mental state. He lifts up one card, then another, and I answer honestly each time.
“Blot…blot…blot.”
On and on we go. He probably shows me fifty before stopping. “Surely you can see something?”
I nod. “Yes. I see that someone has thrown an ink bottle on a pile of cards and you were charged with picking them up.”
It’s the most spectacular thing. There is no expression on his face whatsoever. I can read nothing as he collects the cards and taps them back into place.
“How about a different line of questioning?” he asks.
“By all means.”
“Do your parents have a happy marriage?”
I can’t see how this has anything to do with espionage or is, in fact, any of his business at all, so I make sport out of finding creative answers to his questions.
“Quite happy. They’ve been married over forty years and have six children.”
“Do you want children?”
“I find them rather smelly.”
“Have you ever run away from home?”
“Not unless you count one failed attempt at joining the circus.”
“Have you ever put yourself in harm’s way for attention?”
I answer this one truthfully. “No. That would be an absolutely stupid thing to do.”
My thoughts on government, nutrition, exercise, labor unions, agriculture, feminine hygiene products, train schedules, and technology are likewise explored. By the time he’s done I am so bored that I have resorted to picking at a patch of dry skin on my nose.
“That will be all, Mrs. Fiocca. Someone will meet you in the hallway shortly.”
“For what?”
He closes my file. “Your next test.”
* * *
—
Another young, pretty, nameless woman finds me in the hallway and hands me a blouse, a pair of trousers, and British army boots. The sizes are approximate, and I don’t look attractive once dressed, but she leads me out of the manor home, through a manicured garden, and into the woods.
“Where are we going?”
“To the obstacle course,” she says.
I slow, mid-step, and curse under my breath. Athletics have always bored me.
“Do you see those two gentlemen at the bottom of the hill?” she asks.
“I do.”
“Go to them. They will take it from here.”
And then she turns and retreats to the comfort of the house while I traipse on alone.
The men in question could not be more different. The first is tall, thin, and in his mid-thirties, with a receding hairline. His nose is straight, his eyes are blue, and he has the fine bones of a gentleman. He extends his hand the moment I reach them.
“Maurice Buckmaster,” he says. “And you are Nancy Fiocca.”
“I am.”
“And a fellow journalist, I hear. I was a reporter for Le Martin in France.”
“Former journalist,” I tell him. The Special Operations Executive has done a great deal of research on me in a short amount of time, and I can’t decide whether to be impressed or unnerved.
The second man is my height, roughly my age, with brown eyes, dark hair, and an aristocratic set to his mouth. He’s holding a clipboard in one hand, but he extends the other.
“Denis Rake,” he says. “I am one of the instructors.”
“Pleased to meet you both.”
“I hear that you had opinions about the psychological exam,” Buckmaster says.
“Did you? That was rather fast. But yes, it was an idiotic test.”
He chuckles. “A lot can be communicated while an applicant is in the changing room.”
“And I suppose your good doctor gave his negative opinion of my performance?”
“On the contrary. He said you will make an excellent candidate for our program.”
I turn to Buckmaster, plant my fists on my hips, and search his face for dishonesty. “I was sure I’d failed.”
“You wouldn’t have been sent on for the next round of tests if you had.” Buckmaster tips his head to the side, trying to identify whatever his psychiatrist saw in me, I suppose. “As unreasonable as that test may appear to you, Mrs. Fiocca, he can tell as much from a stubborn, churlish interviewee as he can from an eager, compliant one. The point is not to get the correct answer, but to determine the kind of person one is dealing with.”
“And what did he determine?”
“That you are…spirited.”
Denis Rake is watching me through this exchange, looking me over, determining, I think, whether that same stubborn, spirited streak will get me through his obstacle course in one piece.
I survey the wide swath of country estate before me. Water-filled ditches crisscross the field. There are enormous tractor tires half-buried in the ground. Platforms with ropes hanging from them. Barbed-wire fences. Rope netting that stretches across a slimy pond. Barrels. At the far end of the field is a woman climbing a tree in a pair of men’s trousers.
“Who is she?” I ask.
“An applicant,” Buckmaster says.
“She’s French.”
“How can you tell?”
I shrug. “I just can. They all have a look.” By which I mean that she is entirely flat-chested and has an arrogant set to her mouth. I watch her shimmy to the top, ring a bell, and climb back down the tree. Once finished with the obstacle course, she trots over to us.
“Well?” she demands.
Denis Rake nods but betrays no indication of his thoughts. He presses his clipboard to his chest. “Thank you, Miss Sainson. You may return to the house.”
“Did I pass?” she demands.
“We will notify you of your score shortly. Please wait inside.”
She glares at him. Glares at me. Does everything within her power not to glare at Buckmaster. Then she flicks her hair over her shoulder and returns to the house with chin held high.
“What is the point of this?” I ask.
“To see how fast you can think. How fast you can move,” Rake says.
“I moved fast enough the last time I had to escape the Germans.”
“And how, exactly, did you escape them?” Buckmaster asks.
“I jumped off a train and ran through a vineyard while they shot at me,” I say. “An entirely unpleasant experience, if you want to know the truth.”
Buckmaster and Rake glance at each other. Something—I cannot tell what—is communicated in that quick flash of their eyes.
“No one is going to shoot at you today,” Rake says. “But you will be graded. Each obstacle on the course has been assigned a point value. There is a placard next to it, indicating how many points you will receive if properly completed. There are eighty-five total points that can be accrued, but you will pass if you score a minimum of fifty. You can start anywhere, and you only have to complete the obstacles you choose. Which one would you like to attempt first?”
I answer honestl
y. “None of them.”
He laughs.
“How many obstacles did that last woman complete?” I ask.
He smiles but says nothing.
I leave Maurice Buckmaster and Denis Rake and jog toward the trees if for no other reason than the Frenchwoman saved them for last. Honestly, who climbs trees past the age of ten? That is what I’m thinking as I climb up the low-hanging branches. It isn’t difficult, but it does feel somewhat awkward. Up, up, up and I ring the bell.
Down is harder—it requires a different set of muscles. I reduce my speed and focus on where I place my feet. Then I’m off again once I reach the ground. I jump over ditches. I climb the net and almost drop into the pond but save myself at the last second by pure stubbornness and quick reflexes. I take a running jump at a wooden slat wall, make it only halfway up, fall off, and have to go again. Dammit. Whatever. I get over the thing in the end. I crawl through a trench covered in barbed wire. I climb over and through tractor tires. I jump off a platform, grab a rope, and swing to the other side. I hate every second of it. But I finish every obstacle, then jog back to where Buckmaster and Rake are standing.
“How did I do?”
“You took to it like a duck to water,” Rake says.
“My score?”
He laughs. “Eighty-five points.”
“So, I can go back to the house and change?”
Rake shakes his head. “No. Next come the group exercises.”
“But you sent that Frenchwoman back to change!”
“She didn’t pass the test,” he tells me. “Climbed one tree and gave up.”
* * *
—
The group exercises are worse. I am assigned to an all-male group that has, apparently, been waiting on me before they can continue. One of them—a tall, pale chap named John Farmer—stiffens the moment he sees me.
“What?” I demand.
“You’re the holdup?” he asks.
“Not my fault I had a better time slot than you did.”
Before we can get into it further, Rake gives us our instructions. We are to search the basement—which, for the purposes of this test, will be considered an imaginary room—for imaginary papers.