The 9

by Madalyn Morgan

  ‘I am fully committed, sir,’ Ena said, sitting upright and looking him in the eye.

  ‘Good. So, to reiterate... Assume everyone you know, especially anyone who has befriended you since your work was sabotaged, is a potential threat to the country and the work we do here at Bletchley. And today, find out all you can about the young American.’ Ena nodded. ‘Listen for contradictions, or inconsistencies in what he tells you.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  The commander stood up. ‘Time you left. You don’t want to be late for your appointment. Do you want a car to drive you to the station?’

  Ena looked at her wristwatch. ‘No thank you, sir. I have time to walk down. The fresh air will do me good. Goodbye.’ She picked up her coat and turned to her boss. ‘I’ll see you at the station, Mr Silcott.’

  ‘Five o’clock, or thereabouts.’

  Ena could see in his eyes that Mr Silcott was worried.

  ‘And Ena,’ Commander Dalton said, as she opened the door to leave, ‘Be careful.’

  ‘I will, sir. Thank you.’

  When she was through the main gates, Ena stopped to breathe some fresh air. She was annoyed with the commander for assuming she would allow herself to be picked up by a spy. How would she know someone was a spy? They didn’t exactly go around wearing a badge with spy pinned to their lapel.

  She didn’t know anything about spies. She didn’t really know anything about Ben Johnson either. Walking on, Ena went over Commander Dalton’s instructions, reminding herself that, as much as she liked Ben Johnson, she mustn’t lose sight of what someone did to her on the train. Cold perspiration ran down her back. Could Ben have been the second person in the carriage? She strained to recall his voice, his demeanour, anything at all that would give her a clue as to who the other man was. But it was no good. All she could remember was a shadowy figure.

  She spotted Ben gazing out of the window as she approached the buffet. Opening the door drew his attention and before she had time to close it, he was on his feet.

  ‘Hi,’ he waved. ‘I thought you’d changed your mind.’

  ‘Am I late? It must have taken me longer than I thought to get here from my friend’s house. I’m sorry.’

  ‘No need to apologise, you’re here now.’ The waitress came to take their order. ‘Would you like tea?’

  ‘Yes please.’

  ‘Anything to eat?’

  Too nervous to eat anything, Ena said, ‘Thank you, but I’ve already eaten.’ The waitress made a note on her pad and returned to the counter with their order.

  ‘Wow! You’re even more beautiful without tears running down your cheeks.’

  ‘I should hope so,’ Ena said. ‘What a fright I must have looked that day in Euston.’

  Ben batted the suggestion away. ‘I don’t remember.’ Lowering his hand, he rested it on Ena’s hand and looked into her eyes. Ena felt her cheeks flush. ‘But I’m sure glad I was there.’

  ‘Two teas!’ Ben sat back and the waitress plonked the tray down with a clatter.’

  ‘I was glad you were there too. I don’t mind telling you, I was scared. Ending up in Euston on my own. I’d never been to London before.’ Ena bit her bottom lip and laughed. ‘You must think I’m a real baby. I was only a hundred miles from home and you are thousands of miles away from yours. Do you miss your home, your family?’

  ‘I guess, but my mom died when I was real young and my dad married again.’ Ena didn’t comment, hoping Ben would carry on talking about himself. He did. ‘I resented Grace, my stepmom, at first.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘I gave her a real hard time.’

  Ena tried to imagine how she would feel if her mother had died when she was little. She couldn’t. ‘It’s understandable. You must have missed your mother terribly.’

  ‘I did, and Grace understood that. She treated me like her own kid.’ Ben poured milk into their cups and lifted the teapot. ‘I’m real fond of my stepsister. She writes me every week,’ he said, laughing. ‘She was so cute when she was small. Smart too. She’s grown now, of course. I was six when she was born, so I’m her big brother.’

  Commander Dalton’s words, “No one called Benjamin F. Johnson works for the MoD in London” came into her mind. ‘What brings you to England? Are you with the military? Were you sent here after Pearl Harbor?’

  ‘No, I’ve been here a while.’ Ben took a drink of his tea. ‘When I was at high school there were a couple of rival gangs in our town and I got mixed up with one of them, so before I got into real trouble, Dad sent me over to England to visit with my grandma in Oxford. She’s my mom’s mom.’ A bright smile spread across his face. ‘She spoilt me rotten. She still does,’ he laughed. ‘I came over here after fifth grade, finished my schooling, and got into Oxford University.’ Ben reached out and took Ena’s hand again. ‘I have a confession to make.’

  Ena held her breath. ‘What is it?’

  ‘I don’t live in London. I live here in Bletchley.’

  ‘Is that all?’ she said, exhaling with relief.

  ‘All? Ben laughed. ‘What did you expect me to say, that I was the Brighton Trunk Murderer?’

  ‘Not exactly. But I’m pleased you’re not.’ A draught cut across Ena’s ankles as the buffet door opened and Mr Silcott entered. ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ he said to Ena, and taking in Ben.

  Jumping to his feet, Ben put out his hand. ‘Benjamin Johnson, sir.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you, Mr Johnson. Herbert Silcott.’ The two men shook hands. ‘I was wondering if you were ready to leave, Ena, or if you had decided to catch a later train?’

  ‘I have to go to work, sir,’ Ben said. Then, taking Ena’s hand, he said, ‘I would rather you didn’t travel on the train alone. Perhaps I could see you again, when you next visit your friend?’

  ‘The train leaves in two minutes. I’ll wait for you outside, Ena,’ her boss said, clearing his throat. ‘Nice to meet you, Mr Johnson.’

  ‘You too, sir,’ Ben said.

  ‘I’d better go then,’ Ena said, disappointed that she couldn’t stay longer with Ben. ‘Thank you for the tea.’

  ‘Will you write to me?’

  ‘I will,’ she said, looking up into Ben’s big brown eyes. He stepped closer, put his arms around her and lowered his head until his face was level with hers. Ena’s heart leapt with excitement. She stood on tiptoe, her mouth ready to meet his, when a sharp blast from a whistle sounded. ‘You’d better go.’

  ‘Yes.’ Ena giggled.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I can’t go until you take your arms from around me.’

  They both laughed. Ben held his hands up as if he was surrendering. ‘Bye, Ena.’

  ‘Goodbye,’ Ena said, and ran out of the buffet. Mr Silcott was waving to her with one hand and holding the door open with the other. Ena jumped onto the train as the station master blew his whistle again.

  Closing the door behind her, Ena pulled down the window and looked out. Steam hissed and smoke billowed from the train’s engine, enveloping everyone on the platform. She knew Ben wouldn’t be able to see her. She didn’t care and waved until the train was out of the station.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Taking work to Bletchley Park had become a regular event for Ena. She accompanied Mr Silcott who, when the MoD’s petrol coupons came on time and the garages in the area had petrol, drove them down in his motorcar. She still went down with Freda by train. But when the delivery date for work going to Beaumanor clashed with Bletchley’s delivery date, Freda took the car, and Ena and Mr Silcott caught the 9:45 train from Rugby.

  When Ena knew in advance that she was travelling by train, she wrote to Ben saying she would be in the buffet on Bletchley station at 4 o’clock. Once or twice he didn’t make it. He either had to work or her letter didn’t get to him on time. When they did meet, they held hands across the table and talked about their families and friends. Ben read Ena letters that he’d received from his stepsister. In one letter, she’d written, “I can’t wait until the w
ar is over, so I can meet the beautiful girl who has stolen your heart, Benny.”

  Ena blushed. Stolen his heart? She had no idea Ben felt so strongly about her. ‘I love you, Ena.’ She looked at him and a self-conscious laugh escaped her lips. He went back to reading his sister’s letter, but Ena was no longer listening. She was embarrassed by his declaration of love. It was much too early in their relationship to know how she felt about him. She liked him, cared for him, but love? And meeting his sister? Did that mean his sister was coming to England, or did Ben expect Ena to go to America? If he did, it was a huge step, and one that Ena had never considered. Ben finished reading the letter, looked at Ena, and said, ‘Well?’

  ‘Well?’ she repeated, taken aback. ‘Your stepsister seems to think I shall be going to America when the war’s over.’

  ‘Maybe sooner than that,’ Ben said, his eyes bright with excitement. ‘I shouldn’t be telling you this, but my boss and I have been working with the British on a special project. I can’t tell you what it is, but the US top brass are sending us home. Not home exactly, we’re going to Washington to build the same kinda facility there as you have here at Bletchley.

  ‘Your guys do a great job, but the operation’s too small. We have the money and the manpower to set up a much bigger operation. We’d be able to do ten times what they do here. So,’ Ben’s eyes brightened, again, ‘if the British agree to what we want, I shall be going back to the States. And when I go,’ he said, leaning forward and looking into Ena’s eyes, ‘I want you to come with me, as my wife.’

  ‘Oh!’ Ena gasped, shocked this time by Ben’s out-of-the-blue proposal. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

  ‘Don’t say anything now,’ he said, putting his forefinger to her lips. ‘It takes time to get these things okayed by Washington. We may have months.’ He told her again that he loved her, and told her again that she didn’t need to give him an answer today. ‘Take your time, Honey, there’s no rush.’

  Holding her at arm’s length, Ben leaned back, as if Ena was a painting that he wanted to admire from a distance. ‘You’re gonna love it in the States. You won’t have to work in a factory anymore, you won’t have to work at all. You’ll be able to stay home all day, visit friends, go shopping.’ Ben pulled Ena to him and kissed her. ‘My kid sister’s gonna love you,’ he whispered, burying his face in her hair and rocking her gently, ‘and I know you’ll love her.’

  Marriage, America, his sister? Ben had presumed too much. How could he think she would want to leave her job, her family, her friends, and go off with him to the other side of the world when her country was at war? He may not know how important the work she did for Bletchley was, or even care, but he must think her very shallow to want to up and leave while her friends and family were risking their lives fighting.

  Ena heard the train rattle into the station. ‘I must go.’ Grabbing her handbag and gasmask, she flew out of the buffet with Ben at her heels.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, opening the train door, ‘I didn’t mean to pressure you.’

  ‘You didn’t,’ she lied.

  ‘That’s great. So you’ll think about it?’ Ena mounted the steps. ‘Ena?’ Ben called.

  ‘What? Yes,’ she called back, and shut the door.

  ‘I’ll write you as soon as I get back to my billet!’ Ben shouted as the train clunked off its brakes and began to chug north.

  On the journey home, Ena thought about her relationship with Ben. She liked him very much, but marriage? Going to live in America? Ben’s feelings for her were greater than hers were for him – and his plans were moving at a far greater speed. He said he wasn’t rushing her, but he was. He was suffocating her.

  Thinking now about what Ben had said, what he had presumed, it struck Ena that the man she had been seeing for the last several months didn’t know her at all. And by the time the train pulled into Rugby station, Ena’s feelings for Ben had begun to change.

  Ena wasn’t able to see Ben when she went to Bletchley with Freda, which wasn’t a bad thing. She needed to put some time and space between them. She still wrote to him several times a week, which she had done since they had first met, but the letters were less intimate. She now signed off with Yours, Ena, instead of Love, Ena.

  Going to Bletchley with Freda was always fun. They had recently got into the habit of having a sherry in the Station Hotel before catching the train back to Rugby. Or they would walk up to the Market Tavern on Station Road and have a port and lemon, until it was time to catch the bus to Lowarth.

  Ena liked Freda, and had told the commander at the beginning of the investigation that she wouldn’t spy on her colleague and friend. He’d said she had no choice, that it was an order. He reminded her that not only had she agreed to find out if there was a mole at Silcott’s Engineering, or at Bletchley Park, but she had wanted to – and more importantly, it had been sanctioned by Mr Silcott. Ena was watching Freda closely, not because she thought she was a spy, but to find evidence that she wasn’t, so Ena could prove Commander Dalton wrong.

  She hated spying on her friend, going through her desk, reading her private letters, eavesdropping on her telephone calls, which Ena thought was the worst thing she had to do. She didn’t mind watching people at Bletchley, listening in on their conversations. It was what she had to do if she was ever going to find out who had sabotaged her work. Commander Dalton didn’t believe it was anyone from Bletchley Park. But Ena needed to find out – and crossing people off the extensive list of suspects was as important as adding them to it.

  Ena leaned back in her seat and gazed out of the window at the Buckinghamshire countryside. Of the detective books she’d read, she mused, which of the amateur sleuths would she most like to be. She wouldn’t want to be Agatha Christie’s Marple. Clever, always worked out who had done it, but Miss Marple was too old. She could be Tuppence Beresford. She was more Tuppence’s age. And Tuppence had a handsome husband called Tommy. Tuppence and Tommy Beresford. She racked her brain, trying to remember what the name Tuppence was short for. Prudence, she remembered. No, she didn’t want to be a Tuppence or a Prudence. They were both silly names for a detective.

  Ena, like her sisters, had been encouraged to read books from an early age by their father. Her favourites were Dorothy L Sayers’ mystery stories. But Sayers’ detective was a man, Lord Peter Wimsey. Wimsey was as whimsical a name as Tuppence. But there was a female in some of the books called Harriet Vane. Sayers described her as a detective novelist with a husky voice and dark eyes. That’s who I shall be like, Ena decided, dismissing Tuppence Beresford from her mind. Besides, she thought, Harriet Vane ends up with a lord. Tuppence’s husband was a crook, a blackmailer, before becoming an amateur detective.

  Ena sighed at her own silliness, brought her attention back to the carriage and looked across the aisle at Freda. Her friend enjoyed reading out snippets of interest from her Woman’s Own magazine: today they had been how to make rayon nylons last longer, a knitting pattern for the gayest girl in town, and how a jacket can turn an ordinary day-dress into a dressy outfit. Ena would have liked the chance to put all three ideas to the test. She hadn’t been out for ages. All work and no play, her dad had warned.

  She was about to suggest to Freda that they went to the flicks at the weekend when her friend said, ‘Next stop Bletchley. Want the magazine?’

  Ena shook her head. ‘I’ll read the short story on the way home, there’s no time now.’

  ‘All right.’ Freda stood up and dropped the magazine on the seat. ‘I’m going to the lavatory. Won’t be a minute.’

  Ena looked at her wristwatch. Fifteen minutes and they’d be in the station, another two and they’d be at the Park. Although she had been there lots of times, Ena still had the collywobbles until her work had been verified and passed as perfect by Commander Dalton’s engineers.

  Ena relaxed back in her seat and thought about Henry telling her that he loved her and smiled. It was sweet of him, but… Good Lord! She shook her head. She meant Be
n – she thought about Ben telling her he loved her, not Henry. It wasn’t the first time Ena had thought about Henry Green recently. She’d been thinking about him while getting ready for bed during the week. She put it down to having spent time with her sister Bess, who had walked out with Henry before he went to work at Bletchley Park. An association, not of words, but of people, Ena told herself. She blew out her cheeks and put both Henry Green and Ben Johnson out of her mind.

  She looked at her watch again. Freda was taking her time. Getting up, Ena stretched and crossed to the door. She reached out to slide the door open and froze. The man who had drugged her, who had stolen her work, was walking past the compartment. She turned her back on the door and gasped for breath. She only saw him for a second, from the side, but she remembered his profile clearly. She remembered everything about him.

  He hadn’t seen her. He hadn’t looked into the compartment. Ena turned round and faced the door, half expecting him to be there, but he had gone. Not daring to leave the work, but needing to warn Freda, Ena grabbed the suitcase’s handle. Her heart was thudding. She left her handbag and gas mask and returned to the door. Without making a sound, she slid the door open and poked out her head. The man was standing in the corridor with his back to her, smoking a cigarette. She ducked back into the compartment and waited a couple of minutes. When she looked again, he was opening a door at the end of the corridor.

  As the man disappeared into his compartment, Ena saw Freda walking towards her from the direction of the lavatory. She beckoned Freda to hurry. Freda smiled and lifted her hand as if to wave, but before she had time, the man who Ena recognised as her attacker came out of his compartment and bumped into Freda. Ena took a step back and, peering round the door, saw Freda move to her left. The man moved to his right at the same time, blocking Freda’s way. They both laughed. Then the man said something, which Ena couldn’t hear, and Freda shook her head, as if to say it was all right. The man bowed, returned to his compartment, and Freda walked on.