The Best of Our Spies

by Alex Gerlis

  Roger was a small, rotund man, florid of complexion and given to perspiring extensively. He had obviously been walking faster than normal because he was struggling to catch his breath. His neck bulged against his tight collar, the knot of his tie concealed by the excesses of his neck. He wiped his damp face with a large handkerchief.

  ‘Can I ask what on earth is going on, you barging into here?’

  Eventually, Roger caught his breath enough to attempt conversation, though it was punctuated by frequent pauses.

  ‘Owen. It is not simply a happy coincidence that I am your next door neighbour. I am a colleague of your friend Major Edgar, as are my three colleagues currently squashed together in your hall. I moved in just before you did. My brief was to keep an eye on you and your lady wife. Make sure nothing odd happens. I think that Major Edgar has explained your plans for the next few days?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good. I have two tasks now. The first is to ensure that when you set off tomorrow, our new friend goes with you. It is vital that he sees where you are going. His code name by the way is Cognac. He has a taste for it so I am told. Can’t see the attraction of it myself, foul stuff actually, but then most foreign drinks are. Where were we? Ah yes. Tomorrow. The streets around here will be well covered. We anticipate that Cognac will come by here tonight just to check that you are in. Our guess is that in the morning he will also be watching out for you too. We’re rather counting on that, actually. As soon as we are sure he is there, you will leave. You don’t need to worry, I will be here to tell you when and where to go. Is that clear?’

  ‘So far.’

  ‘Splendid.’

  ‘But ...’

  ‘Hang on, Quinn. My next task is altogether somewhat less pleasant. We need to thoroughly search the flat and I am afraid that my orders are to ensure that any trace of your wife is removed from this flat. For reasons of security I am told. I think that Major Edgar has explained her new … security status? Well, it rather follows that he needs to go through all of her possessions, don’t you agree? Everything I’m afraid. Apparently even the tiniest or most inconsequential looking item could be crucial, so there we are. Not my field as it happens, but I’m told they can find almost anything these days, eh! I know that this is not nice, but I am told that after a time some of it could be returned to you. If you want it, that is. My colleagues in the hall will take care of this. Did your wife have any valuables here?’

  ‘Some jewellery – not much. Earrings, necklaces, that kind of thing. Trinkets, really, but I wouldn’t ...’

  ‘Very well. I am sure that eventually anything of value will be returned. Now, if you don’t mind.’

  Owen spent the next hour slumped in the armchair as all trace of his wife was carefully removed from around him. A large whisky had been pressed into his hand and refilled as the two men and the woman methodically worked their way through the flat. He was never introduced to any of them. Roger fussed around the flat, annoying the other three who seemed to know what they were doing, and being unctuously attentive of Owen. (‘Another whisky? Tea? Biscuit? Put your feet up old chap ...’).

  Drawers were emptied and every item gone through. Anything to do with Nathalie or his work was put straight into a case. Other items were checked with Owen. All paperwork went into the case too. Even the bills.

  As his world was efficiently dismantled around him, Owen sat slumped in the armchair, creased in defeat and resignation. The glass of whisky was refilled yet again and he was beginning to feel very tired.

  By the time they were done, Owen was fighting an urge to curl up and sleep. He heard Roger telling the other three to put the cases in his flat next door. ‘We can remove them tomorrow when the coast is clear.’

  Roger explained the plan for the evening. The two men would stay with him (‘Don’t worry, Owen, they will be fine in the armchairs!’) ‘to make sure everything is in order’. To guard me, you mean, thought Owen. He would stay next door with the woman (‘She will have my bed! I’m on the settee’).

  A supper magically appeared from the kitchen and Owen picked it at while his two protectors ate theirs with gusto. Barely a word passed between them. Conversation was restricted to the occasional solicitous remark (‘pepper ... salt ... more water?’) After supper they brought him a mug of tea that was too strong and tasted almost bitter, but which he drank nonetheless before he ran a bath. He did not enjoy sounding like his mother, but there was no doubt that milk did go off much quicker these days. Looking round the bedroom, it was clear that there was now no evidence remaining that Nathalie had ever existed, let alone lived here. The photos of their wedding had gone along with all of her clothes, together with her make-up, jewellery, hairbrush, the silk stockings which hung on the inside of their wardrobe door and which he allowed to brush his face when he opened it, her few books and even the tiny, imperceptible scent of her which he would pick up from time to time and have his breath taken away.

  If anyone came to the flat now and he explained that his wife once lived here, they would surely question his sanity. She had vanished in more ways than one.

  He undressed for the bath, packing as he did so. ‘Two weeks you’ll be away, Edgar had said. Maximum three. You’ll be in uniform.’ Not too difficult to pack then. The last item he threw into the case was a travelling toiletries bag that Nathalie had bought him in November for his birthday. He had not used it yet and she had been annoyed. He unzipped the bag. Handy little thing. Neat compartments for his razor and shaving brush, a travelling toothbrush, a soap holder, hairbrush, comb. As he picked it up he felt a rattle, coming from inside the soap holder.

  He closed the bedroom door (‘just getting undressed’) and opened the soap holder. It was empty, apart from something weighty wrapped in tissue paper. A strip of gum-paper had held the little packet in place, but one end had come loose which was why the packet had rattled.

  He opened it. Carefully wrapped inside the tissue paper was a beautiful cameo brooch, the cream head of a woman with long ringlets of hair carved out of black shell, mounted on a gold base. He turned it over. Just under the pin was inscribed one word.

  Toujours.

  Always.

  ooo000ooo

  After his bath he had sat by the open window in his bedroom, the curtains and blackout pulled aside . The merest hint of a breeze drifted into the room, but its impact on the stifling heat was marginal. It stayed light until just before ten o’clock, but as darkness fell he began to feel angry again. He was surprised that since returning to the flat he had felt exhausted rather than upset or even angry. Perhaps he was still in shock. He remembered how he felt after being rescued from the sea. The exhaustion overwhelmed every other emotion. A packet of Senior Service lay open on the windowsill. Just two cigarettes remained. He had smoked eight since getting back to the flat. The road outside was quiet, the occasional couple returning home, one always slightly more drunk than the other. A cyclist. An elderly lady being pulled along by two dogs. An air-raid warden with a limp and a dipped torch that threw out a yellowy light just a foot or so in front of him.

  Which one of you is Cognac, then?

  One of his two guards knocked gently on the door, opening it before Owen had the chance to tell him to come in. He was carrying a tiny tray with a large glass of whisky, another mug of tea and a plate of biscuits.

  The tea was a bit weaker than before, more to Owen’s liking, but it still had the bitter taste of the previous drink. It was odd. He looked again at the cameo brooch, turning it in the half-light, feeling its every contour, studying it for clues.

  Was it possible that anyone other than Nathalie had put the brooch in the case? He could not imagine who. He racked his brain to see if he could picture her at any time wearing the brooch. Had she written toujours herself or had she had it specially inscribed? Had that word already been on the brooch? As far as he could tell, the brooch was not new but the word toujours looked fresh. The cream head of the woman looked as if it had once been whiter i
n colour and the gold reverse had tiny scratches. From somewhere at the back of his mind he recalled his mother and grandmother discussing a cameo brooch and remarking that tiny imperfections in the shell were a sign of authenticity. He imagined the brooch was a family heirloom that Nathalie or whatever her real name was had brought with her from France. For some reason, she had hidden it, wanting only him to find it. He brought it closer to his eye. At the very top of the reverse, in the centre, were two tiny capital letters. CT? He pivoted the brooch in his hand. The C could be a G, part of it having faded. He went and held it directly under his bedside light. It was a G. GT. Who was GT? Were those Nathalie’s real initials? Or those of her mother – and if so, was it her maiden name or married name? Or a grandmother? Or aunt? In truth, it told him little, but it took him a bit closer to her.

  At one level, the brooch gave him some hope. Would a German spy really leave a keepsake behind? Maybe she was trying to reassure him. But then he thought that perhaps it was her way of leaving him with one memento and hoping he would be satisfied with that.

  He lay back on the bed, pulling an extra pillow across from Nathalie’s side of the bed it and had another sip of the tea, but decided to give up on it. Whisky was always a preferable option anyway. He held up the tumbler with its generous measure of whisky. Like the cameo brooch a few minutes before, it caught the fading light. He noticed something strange. Tiny white crystals floating at the bottom of the glass. A dozen of them and only visible if he held the glass at eye level and directly against the light.

  He wondered and then he realised. The tiredness and even calmness that he had felt since returning to the flat were no coincidence. He must have been drugged. The endless glasses of whisky and the bitter tasting tea. They were to make him compliant. It would ensure he was easy to handle for what they had in mind the next day.

  He placed the whisky glass back on the bedside table and lay there, becoming increasingly unsettled as the effect of whatever they had been sedating him with wore off. The breeze had picked up now as the darkness took hold and as it did so a most terrible thought came to his mind, which he dismissed as ridiculous.

  He got up to close the curtains. He climbed into bed. He needed a good night’s sleep.

  But sleep turned out to be a hopeless prospect. The terrible thought that he had had before gnawed away, crushing him. He sat bolt upright in bed, totally awake.

  What was it that Roger had said earlier when he came into the flat?

  ‘I moved in just before you did. My brief was to keep an eye on you and your lady wife. Make sure nothing odd happens.’

  They had moved into this flat in June 1942. Two years previously. But according to Edgar, they had only discovered that Nathalie was a spy after she went to France. It didn’t make sense. If they really had no idea that his wife was a spy, why had Roger been keeping ‘eye on you and your lady wife’ for almost two years?

  And then there were other things that had played on his mind when they happened and which he had dismissed. Maybe they now had a plausible explanation.

  The happy coincidence of her arrival at Calcotte Grange; his being told so unexpectedly that he wasn’t going back to sea despite the assurances he had from the doctors until then; the way in which the Royal Navy had been so understanding over their relationship and so accommodating about their getting married, even helping to find them this flat.

  He had thought it odd, though this thought as with the others never really strayed too far from the back of his mind, that she was allowed out on her own from the safe house in Holland Park. And then the fact that he had eventually been allowed to take secret papers home and even use his wife as an unofficial translator. Even at the time he was surprised that Archibald had allowed that, especially as it coincided with starting work on the Pas de Calais landings.

  He wrenched open the door to the darkened lounge where the two guards were both slumped in the armchairs.

  ‘Get Roger for me.’

  ‘It is rather late, sir. Perhaps in the morning ...’

  The shorter of the two had stood up; he had clearly not been asleep. He was adjusting his jacket, discreetly moving his hand inside it.

  ‘I don’t give damn how late it is, I want to see him now.’

  The other guard got up.

  ‘Very well, sir. Just keep your voice down though if you would. Can’t be seen disturbing the neighbours.’

  A minute later Roger bustled in wearing a large check-patterned dressing gown over striped pyjamas. He wondered what the matter was.

  ‘I’m not doing it.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  ‘Doing what you want me to do tomorrow. I’ve decided not to do it.’

  ‘I’m afraid that is not an option that you have, Owen. I know you’re upset but you are also tired. Get a decent night’s sleep and you’ll feel fine in the morning. Be a good chap. Another whisky, perhaps?’

  Quinn moved to stand right in front of Roger, towering above him. One of the guards moved towards him but Roger gestured him to hold back.

  ‘What is it, Owen. What is the matter? Shall we talk in your bedroom?’

  Owen talked. Not for long. Five minutes was enough to convince Roger that this was above his rank. He opened the bedroom door and spoke to the guards.

  ‘I need you to go and get Major Edgar and ask him to come here. It is rather urgent. Thank you.’

  ooo000ooo

  Edgar arrived within the hour, clearly none too pleased at his summons. He told Roger and the two guards to go and wait in Roger’s flat.

  ‘I gather that there seems to be some kind of a problem, Quinn?’ he said with calculated understatement. His meaning was clear: this had better not be a waste of my time.

  ‘How long have you known?’

  ‘Known what, Quinn?’

  ‘How long have you known that my wife is a German spy?’

  ‘I told you in the park. We found out not long after she went over to France. A matter of weeks ago.’

  ‘And you didn’t know before that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I don’t think I believe you, Major Edgar.’

  ‘Quinn,’ said Edgar, his earlier irritation now having turned to anger ‘it is not your place to disbelieve what I say. You attitude is bordering on insolence and—’

  Quinn carried on, ignoring Edgar, his voice shaking with anger. ‘I’ll tell you what I think, Edgar. I think that you knew long ago before she went to France that Nathalie was a spy. I am not sure when you found out, but I’m beginning to think that you may have known all along, certainly before I met her.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, I told—’

  ‘I think that I’ve been set up, Edgar. I think I’ve been used as part of some complicated clever plan of yours. Your chap Roger out there, he let slip earlier that he’d moved into the flat next door just before we moved in. “To keep an eye on you and your lady wife” were his words. Why would he do that, Edgar, if you had no idea then that Nathalie was a spy? Tell me?’

  Edgar said nothing. He sat still, eyeing Quinn like a boxer trying to find his way through an opponent’s tight defence.

  ‘You see, Edgar, I think that you were counting on me being in shock at first, which, of course, I was. And then when I got back here – well, Roger and his friends were busier than the waiters at the Savoy plying me with tea and whisky. Plan was to keep me nice and sedated and calm and not causing any trouble, eh? So as soon as I realised that, I stopped taking your liquid refreshment. And then I began to think more clearly, helped along by poor old Roger’s little slip. And do you know what I think? I think that you knew all along that Nathalie was a German agent. I even think that you knew that long before I met her.

  ‘And I’ll tell you why I think that. When your sedatives started to wear off, I asked myself how come I believed you in the park? Why didn’t I just get up there and then and tell you to get lost? How come that despite the fact that you gave me no evidence, I knew deep down that what you said may we
ll be true? I’ll you why. Because at the back of my mind, there were things that I ought to have been more suspicious about. Small things. Like the fact that I knew so little about Nathalie. Why did such an important project like the one I’ve been working on have such a small office with such a frankly second-rate group of people to work with? And why was I allowed to take work home with me? It was terribly convenient, of course, for me to do so, but it didn’t really make sense, did it?’

  Edgar started to speak, but Quinn raised his hand. Wait.

  ‘So I’ll do a deal with you, Edgar. You tell me the truth. Everything. Then I’ll go along with your plan. Otherwise, I’m not playing. You can arrest me, beat me up, put me in the bloody Tower of London, I don’t care. But I know that you need me toco-operate with you, so I have think that you are going to have to tell me everything.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Quinn. Stop behaving like a schoolboy who’s had his bat and ball taken from him. This is war, not some silly game which you decide whether you want to play or not. I think you’ll find that you have to—’

  ‘Oh really? And what are you going to do? Drag me along there in handcuffs? That will look good, won’t it? That will convince whoever’s watching. Tell me the whole truth, Edgar.’

  Quinn was breathing heavily through his nose, arms folded tightly across his chest.

  Edgar leaned back and removed his trilby which he had been wearing since he came in. He looked carefully at Quinn. Maybe he had underestimated him. There was more steel there than he could ever have imagined. He slowly turned the trilby round in his hand, carefully studying the brim and flicking a piece of fluff from it. They had not expected Quinn to cotton on quite so quickly. Roger would be made to pay for this. He would have to tell him. If he did not co-operate tomorrow – later today, actually, he thought glancing at his watch – then this carefully crafted operation was buggered, not to put too fine a point on it.

  He placed his hat on the small table in front of them and turned to face Owen.