She stepped cautiously into the room. Books lined every wall and neatly stacked papers sat on his desk. A sharpened quill sat on top of a half-written letter and a cup of tea steamed beside it. ‘The Nest, sir?’
‘The name of the network.’ Peregrine eyed her, his head to one side. ‘I see my being here has come as a shock to you. Perhaps you need to take a moment to warm yourself beside the fire.’
She gathered her cloak with shaky fingers and moved over to a wing chair in front of the hearth. In a daze, she sat and held her hands towards the flames and tried to still her rapid breathing.
Behind her, she heard Peregrine say to Finch, ‘All go well?’
‘Yes, except for a slight delay getting a coach.’
She glanced across the study and caught Finch’s unconcerned expression. He hadn’t mentioned the French sympathizer. Was he protecting her from Peregrine’s wrath or didn’t the dead man warrant further discussion?
A chill settled over her at that last thought. Were all the spies here as efficiently ruthless as Finch? Both Mallard and Heron seemed more than capable of killing someone. Maybe she would be expected to be the same.
‘No one followed you here?’ continued Peregrine.
‘I’m sure of it,’ Finch replied. ‘We drove through the night. No-one could have followed without us being aware of them.’
Peregrine nodded in agreement. ‘And the coach?’
‘Not as comfortable as your own,’ Finch said with a smile. ‘Gannet will organize for its return.’
‘Good.’ Peregrine left his desk and came over to her. ‘Adeline, now that you know where The Nest is located, you will be required under your terms to keep it a secret. Under no circumstances are you to divulge the presence here of His Majesty’s men or what they do. If it should get out there would be dire consequences for all concerned.’
‘I understand,’ she said. At his grave frown, she added quietly, ‘You have my word, sir.’
She’d seen exactly what could happen to the men who fought for her country and had no wish to put anyone’s life in danger. Least of all her own.
‘I believe you will keep it,’ Peregrine said with a murmur. ‘Now, as you may have noticed, agents have a code name. It is used to protect those who have families but more importantly, an agent cannot be readily identified in communications. There’s a policy of choosing a bird’s name but if you thought you would get one then I’m afraid I must disillusion you. You only get a code name when you finish your first mission.’
She flicked her eyes to Finch then back to Peregrine. She’d never considered a code name for herself but now that he’d raised the subject, her interest was piqued. ‘Why is that, sir?’
‘We’ve found over the years that so many do not return from their first mission that to give them a name is pointless.’
A tremor started in her hands and she had to clasp them together to stop the shaking. He didn’t expect her to survive.
‘You will have the rest of the day to get organized,’ Peregrine added. ‘Starting tomorrow, you will train for your mission. But be warned. You will be expected to work hard for the next six weeks after which time you will receive your orders.’
She breathed deeply, in and out, and tried to quell the uneasiness in her mind. ‘Six weeks? That doesn’t sound long.’
‘It isn’t,’ Peregrine agreed. ‘But the task I have in mind can’t be delayed any longer.’
‘And what exactly am I going to do?’
‘You’ll be told at the end of your training. I’m aware you won’t have developed enough skills to do it alone. That’s why I’m sending Finch with you.’
Mixed emotions warred in her chest. She’d hoped to be rid of Finch but maybe it was better to be with the devil she knew, and she was grateful she wouldn’t be doing this on her own.
‘Your training will begin in the courtyard at eight in the morning,’ Peregrine said. ‘Don’t be late Adeline, because you’ll have need of everything Finch will teach you.’
Finch’s mask-like face gave nothing away. Was he bothered about doing this mission with her? It was too hard to tell but it would be heartening if he didn’t consider her a complete fool.
Chapter Nine
After a disturbed night at The Nest, where she could not adjust to the softer bed, Mallard’s filling breakfast of eggs and ham went a long way to restoring her good spirits.
Gannet and Heron joined her at the table. They told her about some successful missions but she got the impression they didn’t hold out much hope for her.
Before eight she slipped into the yard to find Finch sharpening a knife. He grunted when he saw her and set down the knife with five others on the ground. None of them were like her seaweed cutting knife but they all had good handles and tapered blades.
‘What are we going to do?’ she asked warily.
‘Knife skills. They come in handy, remember?’
She didn’t need the reminder and looked down at the blades with a nervous skitter in her stomach. ‘Will I need the skills where we’re going?’
‘More than likely.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘And you won’t tell me where that is?’
‘Peregrine will give you the details when he’s ready. In the meantime, you must learn to defend yourself.’
That sounded sensible but if he expected her to use the knife as he had on Mr. Crawley then … she gulped … she wasn’t sure she could.
He picked up the first knife and balanced it on his finger at the hilt. The knife sat evenly without tipping to either side. ‘See how this is nicely weighted?’ She nodded. ‘Always look for a knife like this and keep your blade sharp. You’ll need to become proficient so the knife becomes an extension of your arm.’ He squinted at her. ‘Ever used a knife for more than cutting?’
‘No.’ She’d never had the need to use one as a weapon.
‘Then pay attention.’
He proceeded to instruct her in the correct technique for throwing a knife at a bag he’d set up in the corner of the yard. He stood behind her and watched her dismal first efforts but after more instruction, she got the hang of it.
Some of her shots weren’t central and one nearly cut the rope holding the bag up, but at the end of two hours, when her arm and fingers ached, she’d managed to hit the bag more times than not.
Finch called a halt. ‘You need more control but that will come with practice. I want you to do an hour of throwing each day.’
‘I’m not sure my arm is up to it.’ She rubbed her wrist and fingers.
‘You will adapt. Practice. One hour, every day.’
Then he showed her how to wrest a knife from someone, how to thrust and lunge at a target and how to hide a small blade in the side seam of her bodice so no-one could see it, yet she could reach it within seconds.
After lunch they continued with shadowing, stalking and what to do in the case of ambush. He remained controlled, patient, letting her find her natural rhythm and encouraging her to think.
‘What would you do if a man came up behind you and grabbed you around the throat?’
She hesitated. ‘Take out my knife and stab him in the arm?’
‘What if you couldn’t reach your knife?’
‘Um … bite him?’
Finch laughed and the sound reverberated through her body like a stormy sea. ‘It’s best to drop your weight and punch him in the throat.’ He demonstrated the move then motioned for her to turn around. ‘Let’s try it.’
She stood, every muscle alert. Finch lunged and grabbed her, his strong fingers splayed against her windpipe. Her heart fluttered at the constriction but then his citrus scent came to her, strong and sharp.
Something deep within her curled in response and she breathed rapidly, shamed that such a simple thing could undo her. His lower arm, shirtless and sprinkled with tiny dark hairs, enveloped her within his body warmth and she swallowed against his palm, her body pulsing at the closeness of him.
‘You would have died b
y now,’ he said softly behind her ear.
She blushed and tried to concentrate on her lesson, but it was difficult with the firmness of his chest pressed against her back.
‘Let’s try again,’ he said, releasing her.
Coolness whispered over her back where once his body had been and in position once more, she tried not to think about the smoothness of his skin. Drop and punch. That’s all she had to do.
When Finch approached again, she dropped and twisting her body slightly, launched her fist towards him. He caught it easily in his strong fingers and steadied her, hauling her back onto her feet. ‘You’ll have to move a lot faster if you’re to survive. And your punch needs more force behind it.’
She’d guessed that when he hadn’t even dodged backwards but it was galling to know she could have done better if she hadn’t been swayed by his nearness. ‘I … was a little thrown by the sensation.’
For a moment his eyes darkened. Charcoal became almost black before he cleared his throat. ‘It happens,’ he murmured. ‘Let’s do it again and this time, spin on your toes.’
She would have thought she’d done enough today, but it seemed she hadn’t and with gritted teeth she put all her energy into showing him she could learn this technique well.
Drop, twist and punch.
‘That’s got some power now.’ Finch let his hands fall from her.
Breathing heavily, she rubbed her knuckles. They had taken a hammering. ‘Good because I was trying to hurt you.’
‘You wouldn’t be the first.’ He smiled at her and she caught her breath. He really had a lot of charm when he chose to use it.
‘But that’s how you should think,’ Finch went on, oblivious to the flutter in her stomach. ‘Many a spy has died with a half-hearted response.’ He paused then jerked his head at the back door. ‘I’ll see you after dinner for navigation work.’
‘More lessons? Haven’t we got six weeks?’
He looked at her coolly and the flutter in her stomach died. ‘Most recruits need ten, and most recruits are men. You will need to work twice as hard.’
She gave him a steely smile and marched back inside the house. Six weeks instead of ten, huh? Well, he would see what a woman could do.
In the first week they covered elements of spying she’d never guessed she’d learn, such as inking invisible communications with lemon juice, how to dress appropriately in a disguise and understanding known ciphers and codes.
At the beginning of the second week, Finch announced they would practice shooting a flintlock pistol. He took her out to a field well away from the town and set up a pine cone on an old tree stump. They stepped away approximately twenty yards and turned. At this distance the pine cone looked hardly bigger than a pebble.
‘Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and sight down the barrel,’ he told her, holding his pistol out at arms length. He cocked the hammer. ‘Keep your arm steady and fire.’
He pulled the trigger and the pistol recoiled in his hand, sparks flying. The lead ball, unseen and deadly, struck the pine cone. Tiny fragments exploded into the air and when they settled nothing remained except a lingering smell of gunpowder. She shivered in the weak sunshine. That pine cone would have been a person.
When Finch had positioned a new pine cone on the fence, loaded up the pistol with more powder and lead shot and handed it to her, she found the weight of it echoing the heaviness in her heart. It was one thing to shoot at an object, another to shoot the enemy. She honestly didn’t know if she could do this but Finch was waiting and, gritting her teeth, she set her feet apart and raised her arm.
Sighting down the barrel as he’d shown her, she cocked the hammer and hesitated, cringing at the recoil to come.
‘Show some courage,’ Finch ordered. ‘You’re like a little wren who is too scared to attack and eat a bird’s egg.’
She cursed and pulled the trigger. Sparks exploded near her hand and flashed into her eyes. She yelped and dropped the pistol on the ground as her heart leapt into her throat.
‘For pity’s sake,’ muttered Finch coming to stand at her side. He shaded his eyes and stared into the distance.
The lead ball had gone wide, landing somewhere in the wood. The pine cone sat unmolested on the fence, mocking her efforts.
‘Your arm wavered to the left at the last moment,’ Finch said, looking at her. ‘Next time lock your shoulder to keep it steady.’
‘That’s easy for you to say,’ she muttered. ‘I don’t have your strength.’
‘You will in time.’ He glanced critically at her. ‘You’re too uptight. You need to relax.’ He moved behind her and placed his hands on her neck.
She jumped at his touch and swung around. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Your shoulders are tense. You’ll never be able to shoot straight with them all bunched up like that.’
‘Oh.’ She wriggled her arms trying to loosen up.
‘Here, let me knead the knots away.’
She didn’t get a chance to pull away before his fingers snaked around the bone that ran along her shoulders and dug in. Circling around and around, they teased at the muscles beneath her skin and she breathed out slowly, letting her head fall forward.
Miraculously the tightness started to ease and she closed her eyes and drank in the sensation of his fingers massaging her skin. Round and round they went, stroking her neck, down her shoulder blades and across to the tops of her arms. She could have lapped it up all day.
‘That’s it,’ he said soothingly. ‘Just relax. It’s only a pine cone.’
‘I know,’ she murmured, too entranced by the play of his fingers to pay much attention to his words.
‘Don’t think about it being a person. Just a faceless enemy that you must shoot first, otherwise they will shoot you.’
She shrugged off his hands and turned. He was close, so close that she could see the little lines around his eyes and the tiny freckles across the bridge of his nose. ‘It’s just that I’ve never killed a person before and I don’t know if I can.’
An odd expression crossed his face. He lifted her chin with his finger and said quietly, ‘The first time is the hardest. Pray that you won’t need to shoot but you should be prepared nonetheless.’
There was sense in what he said, but she couldn’t reconcile her belief that life needed to be lived to the full. Who was she to take that away from someone, no matter what they had done?
His eyes held hers for a long, breathless moment before he leaned forward a fraction. She leaned in too, expecting … no wanting to taste the moist beauty of his lips. But he only reached across to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.
Disappointment thrummed in every part of her body followed immediately by dismay. What had she been thinking? A kiss from Finch would complicate matters entirely — yet she still felt strangely cheated, as if she had been on the verge of something wonderful.
‘I’ll reload,’ Finch murmured, his voice not quite steady, ‘and this time, do not think. Shoot to save yourself.’
It was impossible not to think. About his eyes as he’d looked into her own and the softness of his hands upon her hair. Still, if she wanted to stay alive, she must concentrate on the job and not the man.
Finch picked up the pistol, poured a measure of gunpowder down the barrel then rammed the lead ball on top. He snapped the frizzen in place and handed the pistol back to her. ‘You’ll do better this time.’
He edged away and she sucked in a sharp breath, aware of his watchful gaze centered on her back. This time she ‘locked’ her shoulders and aimed, her heart thudding. She could do this. She must. Underneath her breath she counted to three and fired.
She missed. The recoil sparked just as badly but she managed to hold on to the pistol this time. ‘How was that?’ she asked, turning to him.
‘Better.’ Finch came up and reloaded the pistol. ‘But do you think,’ he said with an innocent gaze as he gave her the gun, ‘that you could aim for the pine cone this time?�
��
Her eyes narrowed. Aim for the pine cone, indeed. As if she hadn’t already been trying.
She fired the pistol at least twenty more times and did not hit the target once. At the end of an hour, Finch called a halt. ‘I think that’s enough for our first session.’
Her arm ached and she couldn’t hear properly but she didn’t want to be beaten. ‘I’d like to achieve some success. Can’t we continue?’
He sighed. ‘No. We’ll try again tomorrow.’
Tomorrow wasn’t any better and by the sixteenth morning when Peregrine called them both into his study, she had only hit the pine cone twice, once a glancing blow that did not really count.
‘Unfortunately your training must come to an end,’ Peregrine said, as they sat down.
She stared at him in dismay. ‘I thought I had six weeks.’
Peregrine picked up a tattered letter from his desk. The parchment was covered in jerky scrawls that looked to have been made with a stick. ‘I’ve just received this message that makes it clear your mission must begin immediately.’
She glanced at Finch and met his worried eyes. Obviously he didn’t think she was ready and neither did she. What little she’d learned had shown her how unprepared she was for spying — and her shooting was abysmal.
‘Immediately, sir? Finch said. ‘But there’s still so much to teach Adeline.’
‘I’m sorry you’ve not had longer,’ Peregrine said with a frown, ‘but this letter was written two weeks ago and matters have become urgent. Adeline, I’m sending you to find Nicholas Mayfield, code name Skylark, who has disappeared in France.’
‘France?’ she echoed. ‘You’re sending me to France?’
The possibility that she could spy in another country had never occurred to her. Small sparks of excitement and dread in equal measure coursed through her. She would see the land her mother had told her about for years.
‘You were chosen because you are fluent in the language. Also you’re prepared to take risks and that will be essential.’
An Unwilling Spy Page 9