The Prisoner in the Castle

by Susan Elia MacNeal

  Maggie pressed her lips together. “I’d prefer not to have an audience.”

  “I think you need help,” Sayid said. “As a physician—”

  “No!” Maggie responded. Then, “David can stay.”

  Sayid gave them an odd look, but both he and Frain left. “Come now, don’t brood,” David admonished, undressing her as though she were a small child.

  “I wasn’t brooding.”

  “You were. Or sulking. Yes, sulking. And you’re still shaking. Sulking and shaking.”

  “Not as much as before.” She lifted her arms to let him pull the shirt over her head. “So many people…” she said in a hesitant voice. “Dead.”

  “But some of your friends are still alive—Anna, Quentin, and Angus McNaughton. They’re being transported to the mainland. An ambulance will take them to hospital in Glasgow.”

  “Did Sayid—Dr. Khan—say anything? Do you think they’ll make it?”

  “He seemed confident in all of their recoveries,” David reassured her.

  “Thank heavens.”

  David was rummaging through her dresser. He pulled out a worn flannel nightgown. “Merciful Minerva, what is this schmatta?” he said, examining it with distaste.

  “What does that even mean?”

  “It’s Yiddish for ‘rag.’ No wonder you don’t have any lovers—your nighttime attire would scare off anyone. Speaking of lovers—” David’s familiar grin flashed.

  “Quiet, you,” she ordered with affection.

  “I think Durgin has it bad for you, Miss Hope. Stand up.” He lifted the flannel over her head.

  “Who knows? It’s been a long time,” she answered through fabric.

  “Still…And this Dr. Khan? You’re using first names?”

  Her head poked through. “Nothing happened. Well, not really. He has to marry a woman of his own faith.” She pushed her arms through the sleeves too quickly and winced.

  David quirked an eyebrow. “I didn’t say anything about marriage.”

  “David!” Maggie, now enveloped in dry, heavy fabric, sank back onto the wingback chair. “You should meet Quentin. He hates the castle too—called the décor ‘Sir Walter Scott Vomited,’ I think—I can’t remember….”

  “I come from new money,” he reminded her. “Doesn’t mean you don’t have taste. Or can’t hire someone with taste…” He found her quilted slippers under the bed.

  Slippers in hand, he turned. “Right, Mags? Maggie?”

  But she had fallen asleep.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Maggie floated up from the thick blackness of sleep, where she’d been dreaming of Blue Men, selkies, and U-boats.

  Wait—the U-boat was real. Groaning, she pulled the blanket over her head, hiding. And ten people dead. At some point someone must have moved her to the bed, she realized. The fire had burned out; the room was cold. Then she threw off the covers and sat up, every fiber of her being screaming in protest. Her hand crept around to the bandages at the back of her head. It still hurt, but less.

  She limped to the blackout curtains and pushed them aside. It was late; the sun was past dawn and the sky had a surreal bluish tinge. She peered out over the bay. The dinghies the men had used to come ashore were now tied to the dock. She could just make out the silhouette of a Royal Navy corvette on the horizon. For some bizarre reason, she remembered Mr. Churchill, who had been First Lord of the Admiralty, had had a hand in reviving the name corvette for the relatively small ships, and they all had flower names, such as the HMS Alyssum and the HMS Chrysanthemum. She almost smiled. It was easier to think of such things than of what had actually happened.

  Biting her lip as various aches announced themselves, she changed into underthings, trousers, a blouse, and sweater. She leaned over to tie her shoes, and the memories of all the deaths surfaced. She felt tears prick behind her eyes, and then let them flow.

  She cried until she had no more hot tears left, then went into the bathroom and scrubbed her salty, puffy face with harsh soap and cold water. Resolutely, she brushed her teeth and combed her hair, fixing it in low, tight rolls, checking them in the cracked mirror and adding extra pins for good measure. Pull it together, Hope, she told herself, even as she noticed her hands were shaking.

  * * *

  —

  In the castle’s kitchen, men in uniforms collected about the fireplace, smoking and drinking mugs of tea as they listened to the wireless. Mrs. McNaughton was the first to spot Maggie. She called, “Would you like some porridge, dear?” It was the first time she’d ever used a term of affection, and Maggie was suddenly unsure whether to laugh or start weeping again.

  Maggie went to her. “How’s your husband?”

  “He’s in Glasgow,” the older woman responded, reaching for a mug. “And Murdo is with his father.” Her emphasis was unmistakable. “We just received word—it might be slow going for a while, but my Angus is expected to keep his leg and make a full recovery.” She laid a gentle hand on Maggie’s arm. “We all will.”

  “Oh, that’s wonderful news,” Maggie said, with a genuine smile as she accepted the cup.

  “Here.” Mrs. McNaughton ladled salted porridge into a pottery bowl. “Have something to eat. You’ll feel better.”

  Maggie took the offered dish and spoon. She sat down at the table as men in coast guard uniforms made room for her and passed buttered toast. The warm bread smelled heavenly. She heard the newscaster say: The Allied forces of the Eighth Army, led by General Bernard Montgomery, have routed the Axis forces led by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. The Huns are bolting in chaos as the Nazis panic after the Second Battle of El Alamein…

  The uniformed men cheered. But she saw in their eyes they knew all too well the cost in blood such a victory demanded.

  “Any word on Miss O’Malley and Mr. Asquith?” she asked, taking a sip of steaming tea.

  “The two from the chapel?” one guardsman, his skin the color and texture of leather, asked. She nodded. “Looks like they’ll both pull through, lassie.”

  Maggie’s throat unlocked. “Thank goodness.” She realized she was ravenous.

  A man in a police officer’s uniform asked, “You’re Miss Hope, yes?” Maggie nodded as she swallowed an enormous spoonful of salted porridge. “The police are examining the bodies now. They’ll want your statement. Er, after you’ve eaten, of course.”

  So many dead. Tears stung her eyes and her stomach cramped. “Of course.”

  Colonel Martens appeared in the doorway. He caught Maggie’s eye and she nodded, touching a napkin to her mouth and rising. “Colonel Martens,” she said stiffly.

  “Miss Hope,” he replied in kind. “Would you mind coming with me? I’m using Captain Evans’s office for the moment and I’d like to go over a few things with you. Tie up the loose ends.”

  As long as you don’t have a hypodermic needle in your pocket, she thought as she followed him at a decided distance. “How long will you be here?” she inquired as she took a seat across from him in the castle’s former library.

  “Not long. Back to London tonight on the sleeper train.”

  Not me? She swallowed hard, trying to contain her disappointment. She was doomed to stay behind on the island, seeing ghosts of her fallen comrades around every corner, sitting out the war, doing nothing to help….

  Damn it, she had kept their precious secret. She didn’t deserve to be here. She lifted her chin and looked Martens in the eye. “And me?”

  Before Martens could answer, Frain entered the room without knocking. “Ah, there you are, Maggie,” he said, dapper as ever, as if he’d just come from his club. “I was searching for you.” He appraised her with cool admiration. Martens’s eyebrows raised at the major general’s use of her Christian name.

  Both gave Maggie a small glow of satisfaction. “And I wanted to speak with you, Peter.”
They had used first names ever since her work for MI-5 at Windsor Castle.

  “You’ll be coming back with us, of course,” he told her. “DCI Durgin, Mr. Greene, and me. We’ll travel by train to Fort William. From there, we’ll take the train down to London.”

  “I’m—I’m coming with you? I don’t have to stay here?”

  “That’s correct,” Frain answered, staring down Martens, who slowly nodded his agreement.

  “I can go? Leave? I’m free?”

  “Of course. If you can keep your secrets when confronted with a murderous Nazi spy on a deserted island, you can surely hold your tongue in London. And I want to offer you a new assignment—a job with the Double Cross Committee. Frankly, we need your help. This war’s not half over yet. As Mr. Churchill said recently, ‘It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.’ ”

  Home. She felt as if she couldn’t quite catch her breath for the amazement of it. And then she smiled.

  Frain nodded to Martens. “Turn the radio to the Royal Observer Corps frequency, would you?”

  A new radio had been brought in to replace the one Maggie had destroyed. Martens did as he was told. “Scarra calling,” Frain said. “Patch me through to the Former Naval Officer in London, over.”

  Yes, sir. Hold on, sir.

  There was a long pause, then a familiar voice inquired, Frain. That you, Frain? Maggie couldn’t help herself—she gasped.

  “Prime Minister,” Frain replied, smiling at Maggie. “We caught our prey, sir. He’s dead.”

  Good, good! Elation bubbled through the P.M.’s familiar rumble. Did he chat with his friends before he was taken out?

  “Absolutely not.”

  Well done, then, well done!

  “Don’t congratulate me,” Frain said. “By the time we arrived, it was all over. Agent Margaret Hope took down the quarry herself. The Spitfires destroyed the fishing boat. And then one of the corvettes took care of the U-boat.”

  Splendid. Told you we could rely on her. Where is she?

  “Miss Hope is sitting right here with me, sir. She was injured, but we expect her to be back in fighting shape in no time.”

  Miss Hope!

  Maggie beamed, hearing the imperious bellow. How many times, when she’d been his secretary, had he roared at her in exactly those cadences? “Yes, Mr. Churchill?”

  Well done, Miss Hope.

  “Thank you, sir.” His words did a great deal to lift her battered heart.

  The quarry…The P.M. paused and Maggie pictured him chewing on his cigar….Are his friends aware of his untimely demise?

  She knew what he was thinking. The U-boat had been destroyed. There were no witnesses to Teddy’s death. She and Frain exchanged a look of understanding. “No, sir,” she replied. Theodore Crane’s identity could be used in the future by the XX Committee to send disinformation.

  Excellent. Churchill chortled. Make note of that, Frain! Out.

  Martens had risen and Frain turned to leave, when Maggie called, “Wait.” She wanted to forget and yet she also wanted to know. “Who was Teddy—Theodore Crane—really?”

  “I’ve done some investigating,” Martens told her. “Theodore Crane was a real Briton. He died under, shall we say, unusual circumstances and his identity was stolen by the German agent Adlar Geier. He was born on twenty-six May, nineteen hundred, in Berlin. His father and his father’s family had been in the Army for generations. He graduated from Gross-Lichterfelde, married twice, had no children, and joined the National Socialist Party early on. He became friendly with Admiral Canaris and began a career in intelligence.”

  “Most of Wilhelm Canaris’s spies have been, to be blunt, morons,” Frain continued. “Poorly trained and unprepared for their missions. We caught most of them at the beginning of the war. But Geier was a different kind of agent, a sleeper—smart, superbly trained, patient. He faded into English life and waited to be activated. He was hired by Churchill’s Toy Shop but couldn’t pick up much. Then he somehow found out about this little camp Martens and Bishop established”—he didn’t bother to hide the disdain in his tone—“and talked enough to have himself sent here. Thought it would be a terrific place to pick up secrets. And he wasn’t wrong.”

  Maggie nodded.

  “Crane—Geier—is another German spy who will be ‘working’ for us and the Double Cross Committee.” Frain grinned wolfishly. “I say—let’s deliver a message to his handlers, shall we? Would you like to do the honors?” He indicated the telegraph they had brought from the mainland.

  “Me? Transmit to Abwehr?”

  “I think you’ve earned it.” He looked to the colonel. “Wouldn’t you say, Martens.” It was not a question.

  “Er, yes.”

  “All right then.”

  “His code name is Petrus,” Marcus said.

  Peter, fisher of souls. “But my fist will differ.”

  Frain shrugged. “Tell them you’re injured.”

  Maggie cracked her knuckles, then poised her index finger over the telegraph’s black knob.

  MISSION COMPROMISED. STOP. RENDEZVOUS INSECURE. STOP. INJURED. STOP. WILL MAKE CONTACT AGAIN ASAP. STOP. PETRUS. STOP. HEIL HITLER. END MESSAGE.

  When she was finished, she leaned back in her chair, exhausted. Frain appraised Martens. “And we’re shutting this place down.”

  Martens reddened. “We need a cooler. You know we do.”

  “Yes,” agreed Frain, “but not here, and certainly with better rules in place. And you can’t expect an SOE agent, just back from a mission, to turn on her fellow agents. No man left behind—nemo resideo—it’s as old a concept as war itself. It’s the spirit of Dunkirk!”

  “Frain, you of all people should know: to win this war you must harden your heart. Christ, you need to rip the damn thing right out of your chest! We don’t have time for honor—none of us. We must do whatever it takes to win.”

  “Yes,” Frain replied, “but you’ve served in battle—you should understand that no soldier will turn on his—or her—fellow soldier. They are brothers—and sisters—in arms. And we shouldn’t ask them to betray their own.”

  “They’re spies, not soldiers.”

  “They’re soldiers,” Frain insisted. “Maybe not along traditional lines, Colonel Martens, but soldiers nonetheless.”

  “So it’s all right to ask someone else to do it? Someone from the outside, then?” Martens’s lip curled. “That will make it better? Neat and tidy?”

  “I’ll review it all when we return to London,” Frain said. “Including the allegation that F-Section cells are compromised and no one’s looking into what’s happening.”

  “It’s funny,” Maggie mused, “how animals fight, and animals kill. There’s a dignity to what they do. That’s not a judgment on humans, mind you,” she added, “especially given our opponent—but an observation.”

  Frain nodded. He offered his hand to Maggie, who accepted it and rose. “As Dostoyevsky said, ‘People speak sometimes about the animal cruelty of man, but that’s terribly insulting and offensive to animals.’ ” He straightened his cuffs, their golden links gleaming. “Still, until we’ve won this war, I make no apologies.”

  Martens appeared flabbergasted. But Maggie knew Frain outranked him. With the confidence from her redemption, she asked Martens, “Are we done now? Sir?”

  “I—I do believe we are, Miss Hope.” Martens looked from her and the cat to Frain and then back again. “I do believe we are.”

  * * *

  —

  “There you are—” Durgin managed before Maggie leapt into his arms.

  “James!” She buried her face in his shirt, her own arms reaching up and around his broad shoulders. After a long embrace, he pulled away, his eyes searching hers.

  “Are you well?” The last time they h
ad seen each other was on the tarmac before she’d gone to France, in April. So many things have happened, she thought, and yet he’s here.

  “Just a little worse for wear is all.”

  David cleared his throat. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but Durgin here was trying to find you—”

  “The Blackout Beast case—” The detective chief inspector nodded. “But I was also worried—”

  “—we both were. No one knew where you were, not Chuck, not Sarah…”

  “Sarah—is she well?” Maggie asked. “All things considered?”

  “She’s fine—living with her mother in Liverpool at the moment,” Durgin assured her. “She even spoke of returning to London.”

  “And Chuck?”

  “Doing well. Although I think her little boy and that feline of yours are quite demanding.”

  “And what about the Blackout Beast’s case?”

  “Reitter pleaded not guilty,” Durgin said, frowning. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to testify in court.”

  “So be it.” Maggie blinked back happy tears. “I’m glad Chuck and Sarah are both all right. And I’m glad you noticed I was gone. Even if it was for a case.” She tried to grin but her mouth didn’t want to cooperate. “Was wondering exactly how long it might take.”

  “Noticed!” David spluttered. “We were worried sick about you, young lady!”

  “Well, it’s not as if I had any choice in the matter—” As Maggie looked at David and Durgin, she was filled with so many conflicting feelings—gratitude, resentment, joy, sadness…She inhaled, not wanting to cry. “Well, a lot’s happened,” she finished.

  “I know,” David replied. “And knowing you, that’s an understatement.” Durgin put his arm around her, and she leaned into his embrace.

  “Ah, Maggie, er, Miss Hope, there you—” Sayid walked in, then stopped short at the sight of the three of them. “I, er, Major General Frain asked me to examine your head before you left.” Sayid removed the cotton and adhesive tape.

  “Yes, well, then,” David said. “Perhaps we should leave you two. Right, Detective Chief Inspector?” Durgin made a noise of agreement, and they both left.