by Daniel Wyatt
Her office phone rang and she answered it.
“Robbie. This is Spencer.”
“Yes, Spencer. How is boring old Bletchley?”
“Hot! Where’s Lampert?”
“He’s expected in at any moment.”
“Can you pass him a high-priority note, straightaway?”
“Don’t see why not,” she said slowly, massaging her temple. Her thought patterns were still in slow motion. “OK. Go ahead.”
“Let’s scramble on this one.”
“Right you are.” She slowly pressed the button on her phone. “Still there?”
“Yes, I am. Anything wrong, Robbie? You don’t sound yourself.”
“I’m fine. Really. The note, please.” She cupped her forehead in her hand and closed her eyes, wishing she could lie down. Anywhere. A cafeteria bench or a corner in her office.
“We’ve just intercepted a Falcon File message sent from Lisbon to a Luftwaffe fighter base in western France. British Airways Flight 725 out of Lisbon, bound for Whitchurch, is going to be shot down in flight.”
She opened her eyes. “Are your people certain?”
“Oh, yes. We are.”
“That’s absurd! Why would the Luftwaffe shoot it down?”
“I don’t know.”
“You mean the Germans would actually shoot down one of our passenger planes? That’s unheard of!”
“I know, but that’s how it comes out. And the airliner is already enroute.”
Langford scribbled down the information. “I’ll get on it.” She reached for her high heels by her feet, stumbled out of her office, and saw Hollinger traipsing through the hall.
“What are you doing here?” he asked. “Thought you weren’t in today.”
“Never you mind, mister,” she said, bending down, slipping her second shoe firmly in place. “There.”
“Why don’t you keep the darn things on?”
“Where’s Colonel Lampert? Have you seen him?”
“Yeah. I saw him drinking tea in the cafeteria. What’s up? What you got there? Let’s see.” He grabbed the sheet from her hand and read it.
“Do you mind?” Langford grabbed it back. “Now what do you say?”
“Flight 725! Why that’s the one we’re waiting for.”
* * * *
Over the Atlantic
The flight north was far from smooth. At 4,000 feet, the air pockets bounced the DC-3 around. The pilot took the machine up another 1,000 feet and the turbulence seemed to feather out.
“Settle down, Lydia,” Sims said to Harris in the seat beside him. “Everything’s going to be all right.”
“How long will this take?”
“Altogether ... ooh ... about eight hours.”
“Eight hours!” she replied.
“Of course. It’s over a thousand miles to Whitchurch. So there’s a long time yet. As the crow flies would have been quicker. But we can’t do that. Got to take a wide berth around the continent.”
“How close do we get to France?”
“We miss the tip of Brittany by a good hundred miles.”
“Will this thing make it? It whistles from one end to the other.”
“The DC-3 can fly around for half a day without refuelling.”
Once more, Harris recalled the close proximity of the BOAC and the Lufthansa hangars and offices at Sintra Field. The Germans knew they were making this flight. “Do any German aircraft come out here?”
“Quite often, I’m told.”
“They do!”
“They track our courses.” He raised a hand. “Relax. They won’t try anything. They take one look, see that we’re civilian, and scoot back to France.”
She didn’t feel comfortable with that. “But they know we’re here.”
“That goes without saying. BOAC takes to the air along this route nearly every day. The Luftwaffe haven’t tried anything before. Why would they start now? If they did, we might start shooting Lufthansa planes down.”
She tried to cheer herself up. She looked down to the floor to the brown leather briefcase — the diplomatic pouch where the negatives were tucked. The DC-3 hit an air pocket and she held her breath.
“Oh, I knew I shouldn’t have eaten all those eggs.” She turned to Sims. “I suppose I should’ve said something before.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I get airsick ... sometimes.”
Sims frowned. “Now you tell me.”
* * * *
Near Nantes
The ground crew chief slid the BF-110 canopy closed and clambered off the wing to the tarmac, staying clear of the spinning propeller of the sleek twin-engine two-seater. Von Reiden reached up and snapped the safety lever in place, then strapped himself to the seat.
Closed in, von Reiden pointed down. Two ground crew yanked the chocks free of the wheels. He pressed the intercom button with his gloved hand. “ARE YOU READY, LEUTNANT?”
“READY WHEN YOU ARE, HERR HAUPTMANN,” his navigator behind answered.
Von Reiden revved the dual Daimler Benz V-12 powerplants — two thousand horsepower at his command — to 2,000 RPM, held them there, then dropped them to idle. He pressed his radio transmitter button. “STAFFEL LEADER TO RED FLIGHT. DO YOU READ?”
“RED TWO, HERE, STAFFEL LEADER.”
“RED THREE.”
“RED FOUR, HERE.”
“RED FIVE, STAFFEL LEADER.”
Von Reiden was satisfied. “PROCEED. STAFFEL LEADER OUT.”
The five grey-blue camouflaged Messerschmitt BF-110’s pulled out of dispersal in a disciplined follow-the-leader fashion. They snaked their way to the longest runway, facing west.
Von Reiden swerved his fighter around, into the stiff wind. He applied the toe brakes. They squealed. He had set down the rules in pre-flight. He’d take off by himself. The others would bring up the rear in pairs, two minutes apart. The BF-110 was his baby. He had been flying them since the war began. The Luftwaffe knew it as the Zerstorer — Destroyer, manufactured by Messerschmitt to wage war on German enemies to National Socialism.
He pressed his R/T. “RED STAFFEL LEADER TO TOWER. READY FOR TAKE-OFF.”
“PROCEED, RED STAFFEL LEADER.”
Von Reiden ran through the routine. Left hand on the throttle levers, he revved his engines until the raw power screamed in his ears. Blue flames spit out the exhaust pipes. He pressed a switch on his right to give the wing twenty-degree flap. He looked through the windscreen to the flopping windsock, halfway down the runway. A thousand yards of beige-white concrete stretched out over the nose. He turned to his side and raised his thumb to the navigator. Then he released the brakes. The fighter jolted into motion.
Laden with fuel, ammunition, and two men in bulky flying gear, the 12,000-pound Messerschmitt was off. She gained speed slowly for the first few moments. Then the props caught the airflow, combining with the lift under the wing. A strong force was at play, building up. The windsock came and went in a flash. Von Reiden applied hard rudder to prevent swinging in the early stages. The end of the runway appeared ahead. Tail up. The wheels thumped over the concrete sections and cracks.
Lift-off.
Von Reiden sighed when the wheels left the concrete. He pressed the undercarriage switch, ahead-left. The hydraulic action pulled the wheels into the belly with a thunk.
Von Reiden advanced the throttles to his twin engines.
SIXTEEN
MI-6 Headquarters
Langford glanced at Hollinger. The C-phone conversation with Churchill wasn’t what the two of them had anticipated.
Colonel Lampert tilted his smoking pipe towards him, examining the end of it. “It’s already in the air, sir. We can send our fighters to intercept the German fighters.”
“Absolutely not. They’ll know we have broken the code.”
“But, sir, the photographs,” Lampert pleaded. “If Eiser is allowed to roam about free as a bird—”
“He’s only one man! You want us to spoil the
single most outstanding intelligence coup of the war for one man who had plastic surgery? We’ll not give up the Enigma secrets for the sake of knowing the identity of one German agent. Besides, haven’t you set a trap for him?”
“If it is him. Well, then there’s one other option.”
“And what is that, colonel?”
“Once the aircraft gets into radio communication with Whitchurch, we could order them to return to Lisbon.”
“Nothing doing. The Morse code would be intercepted by German controllers. There’s no secret code between Whitchurch and its pilots.”
“But, sir, the only other option is to—”
“Let Flight 725 get shot down.”
“Sir! There are twenty people on it. They’ll all be killed!”
Langford shot a look at Hollinger. He shook his head at her. She could sense a slow burn in him.
“Anything we do will be suspicious.” Churchill sighed. “If we had gotten the message before he left, we might have been able to do something. Colonel, this is a hard decision. But it’s my decision. Mine alone. Someday you’ll see that I’m right. Goodbye.”
Lampert hung up, a sorrowful, glazed look to his eyes.
Hollinger sprang from his chair. “They’re dead ducks, aren’t they?”
Lampert stared past the American, the strain of the decision telling on him. “Seems so. Ours not to reason why.”
“What good is intercepting the enemy’s messages if you can’t utilize the information? What the hell’s he waiting for!”
The colonel looked up at the American. “The time when it really counts, I imagine.” He stared at Langford. “You know what I mean?”
“The son-of-a-bitch!”
Langford swallowed hard.
“Wesley,” the colonel said, stiffly. “How dare you. I don’t want you referring to our Prime Minister in that tone and using that language. We can’t have that sort of thing. Besides, you only need to think on this matter for a moment to understand why he decided the way he did.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yes. We’re saving it for the time when we’ll be able to save hundreds and thousands of lives. Not ... just twenty.”
Hollinger moved closer to Lampert. “Tell that to the families of the twenty. And don’t forget Coventry. How many died there?”
“You’re non-partial in this war, Wesley, as I recall.”
“A fence-sitter, you mean.”
“They’re mostly our people, Wesley. Not yours. Stay out of it.”
“Well, that sure as hell makes me feel better.”
Langford saw Lampert look to her for support, but there was nothing she could say. She agreed — partly — with Hollinger.
“Perhaps we can we obtain another set of negatives?” she asked, her voice low.
Lampert shook his head. “Afraid not, Miss Langford. The Germans know what we have. Breaking into the plastic surgeon’s a second time is out of the question. Too dangerous. They’re on to us.”
“Didn’t our agent in Zurich make photos from the prints?”
“Yes,” Lampert answered Langford’s next question. “I contacted Shean about that very thing. He left prints in the care of his girlfriend in Zurich, in a sealed letter. Trouble was, her place was ransacked. The prints have vanished.”
“Then we’re up the creek without a paddle,” Hollinger said.
“You had better go to Scotland, Wesley,” the colonel said, “and see who this blasted Tommie is.”
“Swell,” Hollinger snapped. “Excuse me.” He scuffed out of the office, slamming the door behind him.
Lampert shrugged. “Damned if we do. Damned if we don’t. He’s a wee bit bothered, as you can see. Poor devil. Doesn’t see our point.”
“Let me have a go at talking to him, sir.”
He looked at her with fatherly eyes, tired, head down. “Good luck.”
“Thanks. I’ll need it, sir.”
* * * *
10 Downing Street
A few miles across London, Prime Minister Winston Churchill fidgeted quietly in the depths of the dingy War Room. He knew the logistics of the situation only too well. The image of Coventry in rubble the year before had come to his mind many times already.
It was on November 14. The British cipher agents knew what was coming. But Churchill could take no action. Coventry was bombed, something awful.
Now BOAC Flight 725.
Tears of anger filled Churchill’s eyes. He wasn’t God, but he was playing God. One day ... some day people will thank him or at least understand why he had to make such decisions on who lived, and who died. How many more Coventry’s and Flight 725s would there be along the way?
* * * *
Near MI-6 Headquarters
Langford found Hollinger perched against the counter in his favourite pub on a side street near Whitehall, lifting a glass of dark-brown liquid to his mouth, his fedora on the counter. The place was half-full, and smelled of stale liquor. A fire was hissing along the far wall, beneath a picture of the King of England.
A group of airmen watched Langford walk in. One of them — nursing a drink — stepped forward, smiling, eyeing her. “Hello there, red. What you doing later?”
“Piss off, flyboy,” she said, firmly. “I’m not in the mood.”
“OK. Just trying to be friendly.” He gave way and let her pass, and she shouldered her way through the young men.
“I bet you were.”
“Who bit her tail off?” a slurred voice in the group said.
“My word. What do you think you’re doing?” she asked Hollinger, sitting on the barstool next to him.
Hollinger tried not to hear, then finally said, “What the hell does it look like?”
“Oh, I dunno,” she said. “Let me guess. One of those self-inflicted cases? Planning to get drunk?” She lit a cigarette.
“Yes. Good and slobbering drunk. I might even close the place.”
“That’ll be quite the achievement considering you have the whole day ahead of you.”
“I feel quite up to the challenge. Right now I want to enjoy being miserable.” He put the glass to his lips. “Imagine, we sit here on our fannies while innocent people bite the bullet in a matter of minutes.”
“What is that you’re drinking?”
“Stout.”
“Do you like it?”
“No, actually. The worst thing I ever tasted.”
He belched.
“Good etiquette certainly isn’t one of your strong points today.”
“OK, then. Excuse me.”
“That’s better. If it’s any consolation to you, I agree with you about the Portugal flight,” she whispered a few inches from his ear.
“You do?” He swung to her.
She nodded, exhaling cigarette smoke. “I would have sent either an escort out or fighters to intercept the Germans. But I’m not the Big Guy. I’m not in his shoes. And neither are you.”
“Nice speech.” He sighed. “I’ve had it. I’m getting out of this God-forsaken business.”
“Serious misgivings?”
“Yes.”
“I see. You mean quit?”
“Yep. Going AWOL. Goodbye, Charlie.” He tilted the glass and drank heavily.
“Up and quit?”
“That’s what I said. You deaf? Should I draw you a map?”
“Don’t get your knickers tied in a knot. And while you’re at it, stop your moaning.”
“Moaning?”
“Can’t hack it, boy? I think you’re downright gutless.”
“Me gutless?” He shrugged. “Well, maybe I am. Maybe I’m developing a conscience,” he said, bitterly. “Like Hess defecting, and trying to warn you people of what’s coming.”
She saw the airmen looking at them from across the pub. “Look, Wesley. Not here,” she advised Hollinger firmly. “Let’s go for a walk. Get some fresh air before this gets out of hand.”
He drained the rest of the glass and grabbed his fedora. “Good
idea.”
In the street, the air stank of exhaust mixed with a damp mist.
“Slow down, Wesley. Don’t walk so fast.”
“Sorry. Habit of mine.”
Langford surprised Hollinger by throwing away her cigarette, and sliding her hand in his inside his greatcoat. The gesture seemed to identify them as comrades, two young people who had to grow up awfully fast for their ages, thrust into an unfair uncompromising world of politics and classified documents.
“I didn’t think you cared, or are you suddenly feeling sorry for me? Wait a minute.” He removed her arm to look at it. “Hey, no ring?”
“It wasn’t meant to be, for now. We need time to think. Put some breathing space between us.”
“You’re kidding. But how did you decide so quickly? Last night—”
“Please, don’t press it.”
“Who called it off?”
“I did. We both did, I mean. Forget it. I don’t wish to talk about it.”
“Does this mean you’re available?”
“Shut up. I’m just cold,” she said. “Don’t take it as anything else.” She returned her hand to his coat pocket, finding his hand. His skin felt warm. “I could use a friend. Please.”
“What about the shadow? What if he should get the wrong idea?”
She shrugged. “Piss on him.”
“That’s the second time, you’ve used that word today. Don’t look around. He’s out there somewhere. He’s going to squeal to the Judge that we have something going.”
“But we don’t, though. Do we?”
“Oh, no. Nothing. Do we?”
“Nothing.”
“Right.”
They looked into the other’s eyes, each probing for a dent, a sign. Something. Neither knew what.
“You sure you don’t want to talk about it?”
“I’m sure. Let’s walk.”
He decided to back off. “All right. All right!”
They strolled shoulder to shoulder, stride for stride.