The Code Girls

by Daisy Styles

  Kit looked up sharply. ‘Deuterium oxide,’ he said knowingly. ‘A vital component in the production of nuclear energy.’

  Claus nodded grimly. ‘I’d guess the Germans are racing towards the development of an atomic bomb.’

  ‘Jesus!’ Kit exclaimed. ‘That’s all we need – an atomic bomb in the hands of Hitler, the maddest man in the world.’

  Claus dropped his husky voice to a low whisper. ‘Our Norwegian agents have received instructions from the Allies to destroy the hydro-plant.’

  ‘Good!’ Kit cried. ‘Anything to deny Hitler the pleasure of blowing up Europe.’

  ‘They’re already putting together a crack team to take the target out,’ Claus said, before pausing to add, ‘I put your name forward for the operation.’

  ‘Me!!’ Kit was surprised. ‘Why me?’

  ‘I’ve seen you work: you have all the qualities for this mission – I know you’re an excellent radio operator, and I’m told on good authority you can ski, shoot straight, fly a plane and lay charges.’ He looked Kit straight in the eye. ‘Would you be prepared to take on this highly dangerous mission?’

  Kit considered his options for about ten seconds before replying, ‘Yes … on condition that I get a safe passage back to England when the job’s done.’

  Claus grinned. ‘That girlfriend won’t leave you alone, eh?’

  Kit shrugged, as he answered, ‘Let’s just say I made a promise I have to keep.’

  ‘I’m sure there won’t be a problem about getting you home.’ Helsberg paused, before adding heavily, ‘Once the job is done.’

  Five days later Kit said goodbye to Captain Helsberg and his crew and set off on the next part of his journey home. After taking a train to Oslo, he was parachuted on to a desolate snow-covered plateau in central Norway. The noiseless glider which dropped him whispered through the sky without alerting the enemy to its presence. Once on the ground, Kit made his way through the icy terrain to a disused logger’s hut. Here he met the men he’d be working with – Arne, Knut, and Jens, the team leader. With the temperature at well below zero, they impatiently awaited instructions, and when the message finally came through they skied across the mountains to the target area, which was built on the side of a steep, icy gorge.

  ‘How do we get in?’ Kit asked Jens, who had done several recces to the hydro-plant.

  ‘We’ll climb up the rockface to the railway line which runs directly into the plant,’ Jens answered, pointing to a railway track, which Kit could just about make out through his binoculars. ‘Safer to go under cover of the dark,’ he added tensely.

  Hidden in a pine forest with snow falling all around them, they waited for it to get dark, then Jens led the way to the sheer rockface, which they clambered up until they reached the ridge, along which ran the railway track.

  ‘That’s our way in,’ Jens said in a low whisper.

  They entered the factory by slicing through hefty padlocks on the factory gates with a pair of bolt cutters, then, dipping and diving through the icy darkness, they ran past a row of sheds and on towards a cellar door.

  Jens pushed hard against it. ‘Damn!’ he muttered under his breath. ‘Locked, of course.’

  Looking tensely about, he added in a whisper, ‘There’s a tunnel nearby that leads into the plant. If we can find the opening, we can use that to get in.’

  It was Kit who found the entrance to the tunnel, by accidentally falling through a sheet of ice that cracked under his weight. Smothering a cry, he landed on all fours in front of the opening.

  ‘This way,’ he called softly to his friends.

  After scrambling on their hands and knees about fifty feet along the tunnel, they came to another opening, through which they could see the rooms at the heart of the plant where the vast chemical tanks were stored.

  Jens smiled and gave his comrades the thumbs-up. ‘That’s our target!’

  Wasting no time Kit, Jens and Knut went on to autopilot, placing charges at strategic points around the tanks while Arne stood guard at the door, which they’d locked behind them on entry. Working swiftly and in silence, they laid all the charges, then turned to Jens for instruction.

  ‘Light the fuses, then get the hell out of here!’

  As the fuses started to fizz and spark, the four men dashed back down the tunnel, then out into the yard, where they ran past the sheds. They stopped dead in their tracks as they saw two German soldiers smoking cigarettes under the railway gate.

  ‘Bugger!’ Kit fumed. ‘They’re blocking our escape route.’

  ‘Get behind the sheds before they see us,’ Jens called softly.

  ‘We can’t hang about here,’ Knut gasped. ‘The whole bloody plant’s going to blow in less than seven minutes!’

  Adrenalin pumped through their veins, they waited for the soldiers to move on, which they did at a leisurely pace, after stubbing out their cigarettes.

  ‘Go! Go! Go!’ Jens urged his men, and they ran for their lives, down the railway line towards the rockface they’d climbed up. As they reached the end of the track, the first explosion went off and the light from the flames silhouetted the fleeing men.

  ‘Halte!’ the German soldiers they’d just evaded yelled, and fired their pistols.

  Knut and Jens, already descending the ridge, were well out of range but Arne, bringing up the rear, was a clear target. Running, he stumbled as he was shot straight through the chest. Hearing his scream, Kit turned around, but Arne lay bleeding, sprawled full length across the tracks. As the guards advanced on him, Kit boldly held his position as he took aim with his pistol. Waiting until both guards were in range, Kit shot them one after the other in the head. A second and a third explosion lifted the roof of the plant, and flames combined with toxic chemicals to create a blazing inferno of smoke and heat. With the swirling smoke briefly obscuring him, Kit swung himself over the ridge, and quickly climbed down. After recovering their skis, the three men skied back in the dark to the logger’s hut, where they quickly tuned into their transmitter.

  ‘Mission accomplished,’ Kit tapped out in rapid Morse code as the last charge they’d laid at the hydro-plant went off, turning the entire site into a massive bonfire. Knowing that any surviving Germans would soon be swarming the countryside looking for them, and that if they were captured they’d surely be tortured to death, they waited for their rescuers with their hearts in their mouths. When they heard the sound of a Lysander aircraft, they literally ran for their lives towards the prearranged landing site and pick-up point.

  The Lysander took the three men to an obscure airfield outside Oslo, where they briefly shook hands, then swiftly melted into the night in different directions. Kit’s instructions were to go to the harbour, where he was to buy a beer in the Pelican café and wait for his contact, who turned out to be a drunken sailor. Almost falling on Kit, he swung an arm about him and dragged him to his feet. Then, in a totally sober voice, the seemingly drunken sailor whispered in English, ‘Come with me.’

  Swaying and bumping against each other, they staggered to a trawler that stank to high heaven. As the grinning sailor released Kit from his grip, he said, ‘This stinking herring trawler is your ride back to Blighty, mate!’

  Kit laughed out loud. ‘Who cares what it is ‒ just so long as it takes me home!’

  39. Coming Home

  By the time Bella visited the family doctor in Fakenham, she’d missed her second period and had absolutely no doubt at all that she was pregnant. Ablaze with happiness, she drove home, desperate to tell her mother and her friends, but the person she longed to tell most in the world was, obviously, her husband. She could imagine the joy on his face when he heard the news, the way his soft brown eyes would widen in surprise and his lips curl into an incredulous smile ‒ which was exactly why she didn’t want to tell him she was expecting his baby over the phone.

  ‘I’ll go to London at the weekend,’ Bella told her mother and friends, as they took it in turns to hug and congratulate her.

 
‘Is that safe?’ queried Ruby, as she rocked Rose to sleep in her arms. ‘You might stumble into a bomb crater and never be seen again,’ she giggled.

  ‘I’ll make absolutely sure I don’t do that,’ Bella promised. ‘And I’ll avoid all falling bombs, too!’

  The Brig was delighted that Bella was coming to visit him. ‘We’ll go out for dinner,’ he said excitedly. ‘Maybe go dancing afterwards?’ he tentatively suggested.

  Bella knew too well how much the Brig disliked dancing, and the fact that he was trying so hard to please her made her smile to herself. ‘Let’s not waste precious time dancing when we could be doing other things,’ she said with a cheeky giggle.

  A few days later, on a Saturday afternoon, Bella alighted at King’s Cross station into a seething crowd rushing in all directions. Soldiers, sailors and young men in RAF uniforms, all bearing bulging kit bags, dashed across the station to catch departing trains. Evacuees clinging to their mothers’ skirts were swooped away by nurses supervising their journey out of London, leaving desolate mothers weeping on the platform. In the chaos, Bella was relieved to see the Brig walking towards her.

  ‘Darling!’ she cried, and rushed into his arms.

  Hugging her close, he inhaled the sweet smell of her soft, curling hair, which he stroked fondly. Standing back to look at her, he smiled at the sight of her radiant, glowing face.

  ‘Darling, you look wonderful!’ he cried. ‘What have you done to yourself?’ he asked.

  Bella blushed, as she shrugged his question away.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, tucking her arm through his. ‘Let’s get you home.’

  As they drove in a cab to the Brig’s Pimlico flat, Bella was shocked at the sight of bomb-torn London. Barrage balloons floated high overhead. Five years into the war, the city had been crushed by relentless bombing raids. Bella gasped as they drove by block after block of shattered offices, factories, tenement buildings and centuries-old churches, former London landmarks, all reduced to piles of rubble and brick dust.

  ‘Poor London!’ she murmured sadly.

  ‘Poor London, indeed,’ the Brig agreed. ‘She’s taken quite a beating, but nothing kills her spirit. Londoners will never give up their city.’

  ‘Bloody right there, guv!’ the taxi driver chuckled through a smoking cigarette dangling from his lips. ‘The bastard Hun ‒ begging you pardon, Miss ‒ will never rule Britannia!’

  When they got to his flat, which the Brig had tried to brighten up with a couple of bunches of spring flowers, he mixed them both a gin and tonic, which Bella firmly set aside. As the Brig sipped his drink he gazed admiringly at his wife.

  ‘Well, you seem to have shaken off that bug that laid you low. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you looking better, darling.’

  ‘I don’t think I’ve ever felt better,’ Bella replied with a mysterious smile.

  ‘Being away from your new husband obviously suits you,’ he teased.

  ‘I had something to remind me of you,’ she answered coyly.

  Completely unaware of the bombshell that she was about to drop, the Brig laughed. ‘Oh! And what might that be?’

  She took his hands in hers, before saying softly, ‘I’m pregnant.’

  The Brig gripped her hands so hard it hurt.

  ‘But … we only had one night together!’ he gasped.

  Bella burst out laughing, as she repeated Ruby’s wise words: ‘That’s all it takes!’

  Pulling her into his arms, the Brig held her so tightly Bella could barely breathe. ‘My love, my lovely girl,’ he said on a sob.

  As he loosened his hold on her, Bella was able to see what she’d travelled all the way from Norfolk for: the Brig’s face suffused with joy, and his soft brown eyes brimming with emotion. Shaking his head and swallowing hard, the Brig murmured incredulously, ‘We’re going to be parents!’

  Still stunned, he asked, ‘When …?’

  ‘October.’

  Anxious about her and the baby’s health, the Brig frowned. ‘Does that mean we can’t make love till after the baby’s born?’

  Rising to her feet, smiling, Bella held out her hand and said boldly, ‘I’m not waiting six months – take me to your bedroom, Brigadier Rydal!’

  As Bella and the Brig were rejoicing in their good news, the smelly herring trawler bringing Kit home lumbered into King’s Lynn port after ten days out on a stormy grey sea. Tears stung the back of Squadron Leader Halliday’s sky-blue eyes. A year had passed since he’d flown out of Holkham air base that fateful night, and what a year it had been: he’d been captured, imprisoned and then been a POW on the run. Right now, all he wanted was Maudie in his arms. After he’d seen her, he planned to get straight back into a Lancaster and bomb the bloody hell out of the enemy. But his ultimate wish was to track down Edward Walsingham, wherever he was on God’s earth, and have his revenge on a man who had murdered Raf and caused the death of so many other airmen.

  On a bucolic spring evening, with cow parsley and bluebells knee-deep in the hedgerows, Kit stood by the side of the coastal road, where he hitched a lift from an army truck driver who dropped him right by the gates of Walsingham Hall. Filled with an emotion that completely overwhelmed him, Kit could only stand and stare at the long sweep of drive that led up to the house where the woman he loved was waiting for him. Dressed in scruffy fishermen’s clothes and tanned by months at sea, bearded Kit was barely recognizable as the suave RAF officer from Holkham airbase. Peter, driving his old jeep, would certainly have driven past Kit had he not flagged him down.

  ‘Hey!’ he called. ‘It’s me!’

  Astonished, Peter screeched to an abrupt half. ‘You’re back, sir!’ he cried.

  Kit nodded and smiled, revealing teeth that gleamed white against his thick blond beard.

  ‘I’m looking for Maudie.’

  ‘You’ve missed her,’ Peter told him.

  Kit’s face dropped in disappointment. ‘Where is she? What’s happened?’ he asked anxiously.

  Peter chuckled. ‘Nothing serious, sir. She’s just walked down to the beach for a breath of fresh air, she won’t be long.’

  Desperate to see her, Kit said impatiently, ‘I’ll go and find her.’

  Knowing how big Holkham beach was, Peter leant over to open the passenger’s door. ‘Hop in, sir, I’ll take you,’ he said kindly.

  Ten minutes later Kit was standing in the fading light on the vast, wide sweep of the beach, which was empty apart from one person walking along the water’s edge. Scared that it would go dark and he would miss Maudie, Kit broke into a run, and as he did so some instinct made Maudie turn inland, where she saw the man she’d dreamed would somehow make it home safely running towards her.

  Overwhelmed with joy, they covered the space between them as if they had wings on their feet, throwing themselves into each other’s arms before – unable to stand – they fell to the ground, where they lay, their lips locked, lost in an ecstasy of love. It was only the hissing sound of the incoming tide that brought them to their senses.

  ‘I’m all wet,’ Maudie giggled.

  ‘I don’t care,’ he replied, burying his lips in her glorious auburn hair. It tasted of sea water.

  ‘We might drown,’ she giggled again.

  ‘I don’t care,’ he repeated, as his lips traced the seductive line from her chin to her shoulder and down to her breast. ‘I’d happily die right here in your arms.’

  Eventually, they managed to drag themselves to their feet and walked the two miles back to Walsingham Hall gripping each other tightly, stopping every five minutes to gaze at each other in wonder and kiss over and over again.

  ‘You kept your promise,’ she said. ‘You came back to me.’

  Kit pulled her close to whisper their motto, ‘To the stars and back, my darling … To the stars and back!’

  40. Double Bluff

  One lovely late April morning, Bella was called from her class by Ava, who looked tense and anxious.

  ‘You’d better go to your mot
her right away, Bella,’ she said urgently. ‘She’s had some bad news.’

  Hurrying up the elegant main staircase to her mother’s suite, Bella wondered what could have happened. Was her mother sick? When she entered the drawing room she immediately saw from the stricken look on her mother’s face that it was very bad news. Handing her daughter a letter to read, Lady Caroline burst into tears.

  Bella sank on to the sofa next to her weeping mother and, with some trepidation, began to read the letter out loud.

  Greenhalgh and Son, Family Solicitors

  69 Long Meadow Lane,

  Holt, Norfolk

  April 20th 1944

  Dear Lady Walsingham,

  It is with deep regret that I write to inform you that your son, Lord Edward Walsingham, died in Berlin by his own hand on 4 April 1944.

  Bella stopped short. ‘Edward’s dead!’ she gasped. Shocked, she turned back to the letter: ‘ “We learnt of this shocking news from his wife –” Oh, my God! He was married, too!’

  ‘Why did he never tell us he had a wife?’ her mother sobbed.

  Bella squeezed Lady Caroline’s hand. ‘Mummy, face it: Edward told us very little.’

  She continued to read: ‘ “I enclose a letter sent to you, care of ourselves, from Lord Edward’s widow, plus copies of a wedding certificate and Lord Edward’s death certificate.” ’

  Bella quickly turned the page to read the widow’s letter to her mother.

  Dear Lady Walsingham,

  We met when you visited Edward in Cambridge. You may recall that we were close friends?

  Bella stopped short again. ‘My God! He married Geraldine!’ she cried. ‘Remember the posh dumpy girl he studied German with?’