The 9

by Madalyn Morgan

  ‘Yes. I could do with a drink, I’m still shaking.’ Ena followed Henry through the lobby to reception and asked for the key to her room.

  A minute later, they were in the hotel’s lounge. At the bar, Henry smiled and raised his eyebrows. ‘How about a brandy, calm your nerves?’

  Ena wrinkled her nose. ‘Gin and tonic will be fine. Better not mix them.’

  Henry waited at the bar to order the drinks while Ena, taking her case, looked for somewhere to sit. There were no free tables. On the far wall, tucked away in an alcove, she spotted a leather Chesterfield and made for it. She sat down, putting her case on the floor and her handbag next to it by her feet. She gasped with shock. Her shoes were scuffed at the front where she had crawled around behind the cars in the car park, the heels were caked in mud, her knees were as dirty as her brother Tom’s used to be after a game of football, and the hem of her dress was grass stained.

  Taking her handkerchief from her handbag, she spat on it and rubbed her knees. The dirt came off quickly, so did the leg makeup that she had so carefully painted on her legs that morning. Exasperated, she dropped her hankie back into her bag. There wasn’t time to go to the Ladies. Even if there had been, washing her knees would take more of the makeup off them and they’d look worse. She had a better idea and dragged the low table from in front of the Chesterfield nearer to her. With her feet under the table, her shoes couldn’t be seen, but her knees could. Rubbing them with her handkerchief had made the liquid makeup patchy. They looked better dirty, but there was nothing she could do about it until she got to her room.

  ‘The waiter’s bringing the drinks over,’ Henry said, taking the edge of the table and pushing it away so he could sit down. Ena grabbed at the hem of her dress in an attempt to keep her knees covered.

  ‘Oh dear,’ he laughed, sitting down. ‘Now you do look like Bess’s kid sister.’

  At that moment, the waiter appeared with the drinks. He put them on the table and, directing the question to Henry, asked if there was anything else. There wasn’t.

  Ena’s face was red with embarrassment. She began to get up, but Henry caught her arm and she sat down. ‘Stay and have your drink. No one can see you’ve got a bit of muck on your knees.’ He picked up his drink and turned his head away.

  Ena slapped him on the shoulder. ‘I can see you’re laughing. Oh, I give up.’ She poured tonic into the gin, and took a drink.

  ‘If the Station Hotel’s patrons have nothing better to do than look at your knees,’ Henry said, ‘then they must have very sad lives. Having said that, they are very nice knees.’ Ena tutted. She could feel her cheeks flushing.

  They sat and sipped their drinks, watching the hotel’s customers come and go for some time. It was Ena who broke the silence. ‘What made you come looking for me tonight?’

  ‘I was worried about you because you were angry when you left.’ Ena opened her mouth to protest, but Henry put his hand up, the palm directly in front of her face. Her eyes sparkled with anger. ‘Isn’t nice is it, being shut up in that way?’ Ena looked down. ‘I knew you were upset, angry, by the comments you made about my suit, and by the friendly way you kissed Freda goodbye, but made a point of giving me the kind of kiss your friend Binkie Brinklow would have given to an unwelcome hanger-on.’ It was Henry now whose eyes shone with anger. ‘And all that stuff about having to twist my arm up my back to get me to take you to the dance. That was unnecessary and damn-well not true!’ Henry caught his breath and took a swig of his beer.

  ‘So far you’ve given me half a dozen reasons why you wouldn’t come after me,’ Ena said quietly.

  ‘I know you were adamant that I didn’t walk you to the station, but I had invited you to the dance, and I wasn’t going to let you walk down on your own, especially at that time of night. So I grabbed my jacket, told Freda I’d see her at the station, and left. I could only have been a minute, two at the most, behind you but when I got outside you were nowhere to be seen. I saw a man in an overcoat and trilby walking down the drive. He stopped suddenly and then started walking again. I thought it strange when he turned into the car park. If you’ve got a car you go straight to it, not crouch down as if you’re stalking a wild animal. He halted a couple of times, for no reason that I could see. But it was when he began looking between the cars that alarm bells rang.

  ‘I walked along the drive to the edge of the car park. I thought if I could see him quite clearly, which I could, he would be able to see me, so keeping low to the ground I made my way across the lawn to the huts and crept down from there. When you ran from behind the cars, I was watching the man who was following you from the side of the building. You gave me quite a start. One step nearer and you’d have run into my arms.’

  ‘I ended up in them anyway. Thank goodness you ignored me and came looking for me.’

  ‘You twisted one arm to get me to take you to the dance, I thought I’d give you the opportunity to twist the other, and walk you home,’ Henry laughed.

  ‘Don’t, it’s not a laughing matter. I behaved badly. I am sorry.’

  ‘Forget about it, unless you want to talk.’

  ‘No thank you. I feel embarrassed enough about my behaviour without going over it again. I can’t help wondering though, who the man was, and why he was following me.’

  Just then, the lounge door burst open and a group of noisy people tumbled into the bar. Ena and Henry looked across the room at the same time. ‘Oh no!’ Ena said, ‘It’s Binkie and her friends. I hope they don’t see us and come over.’

  ‘So do I. Freda’s with them.’

  Ena scanned the group of Bletchley revellers and gasped. ‘So is my American friend, Ben. He’s with Freda. He must have been at the dance. I had no idea--’ Feeling an assortment of emotions, and not understanding any of them, Ena grabbed her handbag. ‘Sorry, Henry. I don’t feel like explaining why I look as if I’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards. Do you mind if I sneak out?’ She nodded towards a corridor and a sign with an arrow that said Hotel.

  ‘No, you go. When they see me, I’ll say I’ve been sitting here having a quiet drink, while I waited for my train.’

  ‘Thank you. I’d kiss you goodbye properly this time, but--’

  ‘Next time.’

  ‘Next time,’ she agreed. ‘And Henry?’ Ena looked into his eyes, her own smarting with tears. ‘Thank you.’ Not wanting to leave but knowing she must, Ena edged along the Chesterfield, out of the alcove, and into the passage leading to the front of the hotel. She turned back to see Henry walking towards her carrying her suitcase.

  ‘That would have given the game away, wouldn’t it?’ Ena went for the case’s handle before Henry had let go, and her hand clasped his. Butterflies were flying around in her stomach and her pulse was racing. She stretched up and kissed him on the cheek. He didn’t move, but bent down until his face was level with hers. Ena closed her eyes and Henry kissed her on the lips. Feeling dizzy, her heart beating like a drum, all Ena could say when Henry let go of her case was, ‘Thank you.’

  The sound of raucous laughter interrupted the moment and broke the spell. ‘I had better go before they see me.’

  ‘Leaving me to the mercy of that lot. Shall I ever be able to forgive you?’

  Ena’s stomach somersaulted and she pulled a face, pretending to frown. There was loud laughter again and she mouthed, ‘Good night,’ and walked away.

  At the end of the passage, she looked back. Henry had gone.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Ena kicked off her shoes, nudged the door shut with her elbow and crossed the room. Throwing her handbag onto the bed as she passed, she dropped her suitcase next to the wardrobe, and sat down on a small stool in front of the dressing table. Leaning forward, she peered into the mirror. Her hair was untidy and she had cried off most of her mascara, leaving dark smudges under her eyes. She yawned. At that moment she would have given anything to pull back the sheets and fall into bed. But not with half the car park at Bletchley Park on her feet and le
gs.

  Turning the brass keyholes on her case, Ena took out her washbag, grabbed the towel that hung on the side of the hand basin, and went to the door. She had noticed when she arrived that morning that the bathroom was opposite her room. In a second she was out of her door and, locking it behind her, was across the narrow landing. Checking the small round disk next to the doorknob, and seeing it said vacant, she pushed open the door. Inside she slid the bolt into place to show the bathroom was occupied, put down her washbag, and turned on the hot water tap.

  By the time she had been to the toilet, washed her face and cleaned her teeth, the bath was half full – and very hot. She dropped in a bath salt and turned on the cold tap, swishing the water about until the temperature felt right. Then, taking off her clothes and hanging them up on a peg behind the door, she stepped over the rim of the bath and lowered herself into a half-sitting, half-laying position.

  Almost immediately, she felt a stinging sensation on her knees. She sat up and, bringing her knees up to her chest, saw cuts and grazes beneath the dirt – a consequence of crawling around on her hands and knees. She took her flannel and dabbed her knees in turn until the cuts looked clean.

  Ena stretched out, her legs floating until her feet touched the smooth cast iron of the end of the bath. Relaxing back, slowly, so she didn’t make the water swell, Ena lowered her body until her shoulders were under water and closed her eyes.

  The water was cooling, Ena sat up and lathered the flannel. She washed herself all over, submerged her body again to rinse off the soap, and then climbed out of the bath. Aware that there were people in the corridor, other guests going to their rooms, Ena quickly dried herself. Pulling on her dress, she gathered her belongings in the wet towel, and opened the bathroom door. There was no one in the corridor, so she ran across to her room, unlocked her door, and was inside in a second. Locking the door behind her, she dropped the wet towel on the floor and threw herself onto the bed exhausted.

  Ena had no idea how long she’d been asleep when a train rattled into the station and woke her. She stretched and opened her eyes. She felt lonely and a little disappointed that her friends Henry and Freda had left Bletchley. She looked at her watch. It was quarter past twelve. They’d have been gone more than an hour. Ena took off her filthy dress, which, being damp after her bath, felt cold against her skin.

  Yawning several times, she put on her nightdress, switched off the light, and crawled into bed. She was bone-tired, but she was too keyed-up, too anxious, to sleep.

  After tossing and turning for goodness knows how long, Ena got up, took her notebook and a pen from her case, and returned to bed. Tucking the bedclothes under her chin, but leaving her hands free, she wrote down everything that had happened after arriving at Bletchley that morning to getting back to the hotel at night, in chronological order. She wrote down what she had actually seen, followed by what she thought was suspicious.

  At 3am, the events of the night blurring, Ena fell back onto the pillow. She wriggled down in the bed and pulled the blankets over her head. Five minutes later, or so it seemed, she heard a gong and groaned. Breakfast.

  The journey back to Rugby was what the clerk in the ticket booth called Sunday service. ‘Not only slower than usual, the train waits longer in each station, but the benefit,’ the shiny cherubic-faced man beamed, ‘is the time of day you’re travelling. On a Sunday, at this time of day, you’ll get a seat. They’re all having their Sunday dinner, you see.’

  The clerk was right. Ena found a seat in the first compartment. The only other occupants, two women, were both reading magazines. They looked up at Ena and smiled when she entered, quickly going back to their reading.

  Putting her case on the overhead rack, Ena settled into her seat and took her notebook from her handbag. Reading it, Ena felt disloyal to Henry and Freda. She’d noted the way they behaved to one another, concluding with the observation that Henry had taken Freda to tea, which led to Freda hoping for more from the relationship than Henry was willing to give.

  Mm… Ena still wondered why neither of her friends had mentioned going to tea. A thought crossed her mind and her heart took a dive. Was Henry ‘H’ who had been writing to Freda? What a ridiculous idea! Just because Henry’s name began with H. Millions of people’s names began with H – Herbert Silcott and Horace Dalton to name but two. Ena stifled a giggle, dismissing Horace Dalton, but Mr Silcott? The factory had once been rife with rumours about Freda and the boss. Perhaps they were true.

  How long had she known Freda, and what did she really know about her? Ena cast her mind back. Freda had been working at Silcott Engineering for at least six months when Coventry was blitzed in November 1940. At a guess, she had begun working at the factory in May of that year, making it three years since they became work colleagues. But it wasn’t until after Coventry, when they went to Bletchley together, that they became friendly.

  Friendly? Freda appeared to be very friendly with the man on the train who, in 1942, poisoned Ena and stole her work. But being friendly – laughing with someone – doesn’t necessarily mean you know them. Thinking about it, Freda couldn’t have known the man. He later tried to strangle her.

  Ena thought back to that terrible day, the day she had killed the man attacking Freda. Freda had shown herself to be a real friend, taking control of the situation, insisting Ena stay in their compartment while she went back to see if the man was alive or dead. Freda was convinced that if Ena hadn’t stopped him, the man would have killed her, and then Ena. And when she told Commander Dalton, he agreed with Freda that Ena had acted in self-defence.

  Freda kept Ena’s shocking secret and they had become good friends. Freda had told Ena about her uncle in Northampton. Her brother Walter in the army. How she had lost her father in the First World War, and her mother dying... Thinking about it, Freda had confided in Ena much more than Ena had in her.

  Ena hadn’t told Freda much about herself at all. She had told her about meeting Henry, and that he was an old boyfriend of Bess’s, and about meeting Ben. Not the circumstances in which she had met either of them, just that she had. Strange, she mused. Not that Freda had met Henry and Ben, but that she hadn’t told Ena that she knew them.

  Herbert Silcott: Ena had written NO next to his name. She skipped to Henry Green. She was positive Henry had nothing to do with spies or sabotage. Henry Green, involved with someone who was capable of poisoning her? Never. There was something he was keeping from her though, or why hadn’t he told her that he knew Freda, and that Freda was fond of him?

  Ena read what she’d written about Henry the first time she met him at Bletchley, the day her work was stolen. Henry Green was in the hut. What a shock to see him. I thought I’d have an ally, but no. He didn’t let on he knew me when I arrived with Commander Dalton. Think that was a bit fishy. He said later that if I was in some sort of trouble, he would be better placed to help me if no one knew we were friends. Hum!

  At the time, Ena had thought it a reasonable explanation, now she wasn’t so sure. Henry lived in Northampton and so did Freda’s uncle – and Freda visited her uncle regularly. Henry had moved there after leaving Oxford, so he’d been there a while. Ena scanned the next couple of pages, but couldn’t find what she was looking for, or perhaps she hadn’t written it down. There had been some sort of fuss when Henry had left University. If she knew what is was at the time, she had forgotten now. Bess would know. Ena made a note at the bottom of the page to ask her.

  The next name she came to was, Ben F. Johnson. She felt foolish now, but when she first met him she had underlined his name and drawn a small heart by it, which she later rubbed out. Tilting the notebook so the sun shone on it, she could still see the imprint beneath the grey smudge.

  Ena read through the endless notes she’d made on Ben. Smitten by his good looks and kindness, she wrote how caring he had been in the buffet on Euston station. Most men would have run a mile if they saw a girl crying, but Ben didn’t. He gave her his handkerchief, fetched her a cup o
f tea – and listened to her. Ben cared. He went with her to buy her ticket, put her on the right train, even travelled with her to Bletchley to make sure she arrived safely. Ben had swept her off her feet. She went over what he had said when he told her he loved her, when he asked her to marry him and go to America with him. She had only seen Ben as a young man in love, until last night.

  After Freda accused her of betraying Ben, and later seeing them arrive at the Station Hotel together, Ena had written a different profile on him. On the day my work was stolen, Ben could easily have been the second figure on the train. He could have left the train after me and followed me into the buffet on Euston station. He could have befriended me to find out if I’d seen anything on the train that I shouldn’t, or remembered anything that happened after I was drugged. Ena remembered coming to for a few seconds and seeing two figures. She shut her eyes and squeezed them tight. It was no good. She couldn’t even define whether the second person in the compartment was a man or a woman.

  If Ben were a spy, he had done everything Commander Dalton warned her to look out for, which at the time she had largely ignored. He had approached her, befriended her, bought her gifts, swept her off her feet, and told her he loved her. And he had made her think she loved him.

  Leaning back in the seat, Ena closed her eyes. They ached from straining to read her scribblings of the night before. The only notes left were those she had written about the girls who worked on the factory floor. Several manufactured parts for Bletchley and Beaumanor. Ena ran her eyes down the list. None knew what the work was for, nor did they care. She had long since crossed their names off the list.

  Leaving the train at Rugby station, Ena headed for the telephone kiosk. Bess had taken her to Rugby station on Saturday morning, thinking she was going to Northampton to stay with Freda and her uncle, and would be going to a dance with Freda at night. Half the story was true… She put her money in the slot and dialled the telephone number for Foxden Hall. Bess had said she’d be happy to pick her up, but it was tea time. She wouldn’t ask her sister to come to Rugby, she would suggest Lowarth – if anyone ever answered the telephone at Foxden. She heard the pips, pressed the ‘A’ button and listened to the money rattle through. ‘Hello, could I speak to Bess, please?’