by Eric Walters
“Watch yourself, you bloody idiot!” the driver called out of his window as he slowly drove by.
So much for English hospitality. In the short time I’d been in England, I’d been detained by government agents, threatened with a full cavity search, been practically dumped at the side of the road and now had almost been run over. At least the guy in the taxi had reason to be annoyed at me. It would have been an incredibly bad way to end this adventure—hit by taxi on the streets of London. How would I explain that to my mother? How would I explain any of this?
I looked to the right—and to the left—and proceeded safely across the street and up the stairs of 221. It was a nice-looking home, almost identical to the rest of the houses up and down the street. I rang the bell and it sounded out loud and clear. I waited. No answer. I waited a few more beats, so I wouldn’t be rude, and then rang again. There was still no answer. Did I mishear the number? Did he say 221 or something else? Would I have to go door to door to find Doris? Surely some of her neighbors would know her even if this wasn’t the right house.
I started to walk away and then turned back. I reached out and turned the doorknob. The door was unlocked. I opened it slowly and poked my head inside. Overhead was a big crystal chandelier, and on the floor was an ornate carpet. The walls were adorned with paintings, and there was a dark wooden table with a big gold-framed mirror above it. I don’t know much about home décor, but I do know when things look expensive.
“Hello!” I called out, my voice echoing down the hallway. I was starting to think this wasn’t such a smart idea, that I should close the door and retreat before anybody called the police on me.
“DJ, is that you?” a faint voice answered.
“Yes! Doris?”
“I’m up here…upstairs!”
There was a flight of stairs at the end of the hall. I raced to it, almost tripping on the rug, and then took the stairs two and three at a time. And there she was, in a big comfy chair with her leg up on a stool and a big white cast on her leg! I rushed over and threw my arms around her and gave her a big hug. I felt happy and relieved and confused.
“It is so wonderful to see you, dear boy!” she said, beaming. “Now, let me have a look at you!”
I straightened up.
“I do believe you have grown since I last saw you. Perhaps not taller but thicker, stronger-looking.”
“I’ve been doing a lot of weight training for football, so I’ve added fifteen pounds of muscle.”
“It shows. And I’m so happy to see you wearing the beret. It looks like it belongs up there!”
I reached up and touched it. “Your grandson commented on it as well.” I decided not to repeat what he had said.
“And where is my grandson?”
“He seemed to be in a hurry. I thanked him and he was gone. He mentioned you’d had an accident but wouldn’t tell me what happened. So…what happened?”
“I tripped on one of my cats.”
“Really?”
She laughed. “I climbed Kilimanjaro, and I was felled by a tabby. It happened only last night.”
“Is it bad? Does it hurt?”
“It’s a little sore, but nothing I can’t live with. I’m afraid it’s my pride that was damaged as much as my leg. Please, come and have a seat.”
I sat down in a big chair across from her. I looked around. This room was as fancy as the hall.
“You have a beautiful home,” I said.
“It’s most comfortable. I’ve thought about moving. It’s a bit big for just one old woman to ramble around in.”
“You climbed Kilimanjaro, so you’re not that old.”
“Sweet of you to say, but it may be time to move. Thank goodness I have my housekeeper and cook to help me.”
“Wow, servants,” I said without thinking.
“Just part-time, but very essential right now to take care of me. My dear husband left me very comfortable,” she said. “He was, as they say, active in government circles.”
He must have been very active to afford a house like this.
“I’m just so sorry that this has happened now, and I won’t be able to ferry you around London and show you the sights.”
“Don’t worry about that. I can get myself around, no problem.”
“I’m sure you can, but what sort of a host would I be if I left you to your own devices?” she asked. “I’ve arranged for Charlie to take you around.”
“And Charlie agreed?” I asked, feeling very surprised. He didn’t seem much like a Charlie or very agreeable.
“Right away. I’m sure the two of you will get on brilliantly.”
And I was sure if Doris had been along for the car ride, she would have thought different.
“You will get to see the London Eye, the museums, Buckingham Palace, the changing of the guard—perhaps even have a night out. You will be here for New Year’s Eve, correct?”
“I’m not scheduled to head back until the third.”
“I think Charlie is planning on taking in the celebration in Trafalgar Square,” she said. “It’s the English version of Times Square.”
“That’s really not necessary.” Or possible, if I was relying on Charlie to befriend me.
“It is, unless you want to bring in the New Year sipping tea with an old woman with a broken leg.”
“I can think of worse ways to celebrate,” I replied.
“Then you have a far better imagination than I possess.” She paused. “So tell me, not that I’m not thrilled to have you here, what prompted this very impulsive decision to come to London?”
I had tried to rehearse this moment in my head without success. Explaining to Doris why I was here was going to be only slightly easier than explaining it to my mother when I got home.
“You’re going to think this is crazy.”
“I’m British. We thrive on outlandish thinking, eccentric ideas and people. Please.”
I pulled the papers out of my jacket pocket and handed them to her. “These are from a notebook my grandfather kept. It was hidden; my cousins and I discovered it by accident.”
She studied the pages one after the other and then looked up at me. “This appears to be in code.”
I nodded.
“And you’re sure it’s his doing, that this is his writing?”
“Positive.”
“That means one of two things. Either he was a little off his rocker or he was a spy.”
FIVE
In one quick burst I told her everything: the money, the disguises, the loaded Walther PPK and, of course, the passports. I didn’t mention the bag of golf balls because, well, it seemed too bizarre and not to the point.
“I have two of the passports with me,” I said. I dug down into my bag, pulled them out and handed them to her.
She opened both to the identification page. “Your grandfather was certainly a handsome young man in his younger days.”
“He claimed he was still a handsome man in his older days.”
“I can certainly see the family resemblance,” she said.
“People have always said I look like him, but I could never see it until recently. My mother says I’m growing into him.”
“Particularly in this picture—this could be an older you.” She held the Spanish passport up. My grandfather had a beard and mustache in that picture.
I still only saw my grandfather, but maybe there was some resemblance around the eyes. If I had a beard and mustache—if I could grow any facial hair beyond a dark smudge over my mouth—I might have been able to use that passport.
“I don’t know about the Spanish passport, but I’m certain this UK passport is real,” she said.
“Are you trying to tell me my grandfather’s name is really Nigel Finch?” I asked.
“Well, probably not.”
“Definitely not!” I said. “He lived his whole life as David McLean.”
“There have been recorded cases of people living under false identities for scores of yea
rs, either given a new name for protective reasons or because they are deep sleepers.”
I wanted to ask what a deep sleeper was, but this was all going in too crazy a direction. My grandfather was David McLean, not somebody named Nigel Finch…or Pedro Martinez.
“Please believe me, I’m not saying that his name was Nigel, only that the actual passport is genuine stock. You need government contacts to obtain these.” She held it up to the light and scratched at it with her fingernail. “And this is certainly a very good forgery. I’m very impressed.”
“I don’t think the people at Passport Control would have been so impressed. That’s why I was late. I was pulled over for extra inspection.”
“Why would they do that?”
“They said my passport lit up their system like a Christmas tree, but before they started searching me or my bag, they discovered that they were looking for another David McLean.” I paused. “Somebody my grandfather’s age.”
“Ah, the plot thickens. So your grandfather is somehow known to the UK Border Agency.”
“Or somebody else with the same name,” I said.
“Perhaps. Tell me, what did your grandfather do for a living before he retired?”
“He was in the import/export business.” I thought back to Adam saying that was a great cover for a spy.
“So I imagine he traveled a great deal,” Doris said.
“He’d retired before I was born, but I guess so.”
What I didn’t mention was that after he’d retired, he’d still traveled all around the world to play golf. I knew where this conversation was going.
“And did he speak multiple languages, by any chance?”
“Not well, but he did speak some German and French…and Spanish.”
“And how did your grandfather feel about weapons, guns and such?” Doris asked.
“He hated them. He said nobody but police officers and the military should carry weapons.”
“The lady doth protest too much methinks,” Doris said.
Now she’d lost me completely.
“It’s a line from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, spoken by Queen Gertrude. It means that she doubted the truth of a statement because it was so vehemently denied.”
I understood her knowing Shakespeare, but I had one other question. “So how do you know all these things about spies?” I asked.
“I love a good espionage novel—and didn’t you notice my address?” she asked.
“Um…221…right?”
“Yes. We’re only missing the B for this to be Sherlock Holmes’s address. My husband insisted we purchase our home based on the address. We were both fanatical Baker Street Irregulars.”
I put my head in my hands. This was all moving too fast.
“I understand this is hard to take in, but you must believe some of what I’m saying. After all, you wouldn’t have suddenly come here if you didn’t already suspect something,” Doris said.
I shook my head. “That is a good deduction.”
“Thank you, Watson.”
“I suspect something, but I don’t believe he was James Bond,” I said.
“Nobody is saying that he wore a tuxedo, drove around in an Aston Martin and drank martinis—shaken, not stirred.”
“My grandfather hardly drank, ever.”
“Most agents don’t drink. They need to be in constant control of their faculties. Believe me, I’m not saying that he was a James Bond-type agent. That isn’t what most agents are like. Most of them are private citizens enlisted by the government to observe and make note of specific things in the countries in which they travel. They use their contacts to bring materials into and out of certain countries, crossing borders and delivering messages to other agents. Do you think your grandfather could have been involved in those kinds of activities?”
“Yeah, he could have been doing those things.”
“Now if we could only make sense of what is written here,” she said, tapping the sheets of paper.
“All I know is, it involves England and, specifically, Cambridge. I spent the whole flight staring at it, but it seemed to make less sense the more I looked at it.”
“Did you sleep at all?”
“I basically haven’t slept since all this started. I was hoping it would begin to make sense once I got here.”
“Often, things make greater sense after a good night’s sleep. You must be exhausted.”
“It would be good if I could lie down for a bit.” I picked up the passports and went to take the notebook pages. Doris stopped me.
“Let me have a look at them. Fresh eyes might be the solution. I’ve had the guest room at the end of the hall made up for you,” Doris said. “It has fresh sheets, already turned down by the maid. Just go to sleep.”
“Thanks.”
I stood and picked up my bag. It felt heavy. My legs felt heavy. My head felt heavy. How could any of this be true? I trudged to the guest room and flopped down on the bed. The springs groaned loudly. I should have changed or washed up or even taken off my shoes, but I was just too tired. My body was exhausted, but my mind was still spinning. Nigel Finch…if that was really his name, then if I was named after him I’d be Nigel instead of David. I closed my eyes. I wondered if I would dream David’s dreams or Nigel’s?
I heard loud voices arguing and opened my eyes. It was dark, but there was enough light coming in through the window for me to see that I was someplace unfamiliar. Then it came back—I was in London, at Doris’s home. I looked at my watch, pushing the little button to light the dial. It glowed green. It was three in the afternoon, so why was it dark out? Okay, it was three in the afternoon at home; here, it was…six hours’ difference…it was nine, so it made sense that it was dark outside.
I got out of bed and opened the door; the voices got louder. There were a lot of them, and they weren’t arguing so much as having a noisy discussion. I went down the corridor and was greeted by the sight of a bunch of old people—older people—in the living room. Doris seemed to be at the very center of the group.
“This makes no bloody sense,” one man exclaimed, his voice rising above the din of the others.
He was dressed in a strange hat like the one Sherlock Holmes wore in the old movies. He lifted up his hand—he was holding a page from Grandpa’s notebook.
“This is rubbish!” he said as he ripped the sheet in two and dropped the pieces to the floor.
“What are you doing?” I exclaimed. I practically jumped across the room, dropped to my knees and grabbed the torn halves. I was so shocked, I didn’t know what to say.
“Don’t worry. I have the original right here,” Doris said. She held up a sheet and turned it to show me. “I made copies,” she explained. “We’re all working on copies. Let me introduce my friends and fellow Holmesians.”
“Holmesians?” I asked.
“We belong to a Sherlock Holmes club,” the man in the odd hat said. “We gather on a monthly basis to discuss all things Sherlock Holmes.”
“And I couldn’t think of any other group who would be more able to break this code,” Doris said.
“Well, short of Sherlock and Watson,” a woman said, and they all laughed politely.
“Our illustrious group includes a mathematics professor.”
The man who had torn up the sheets tipped his hat at me.
“An international chess grand master.”
“Charmed,” an older woman said.
“A children’s writer.”
Another woman greeted me with a smile.
“And a former military encryption officer.”
“Retired,” he said. He gave a two-fingered salute. With his short hair and thick mustache, he still looked like a military man.
“I guess from what I’ve heard you haven’t broken the code yet,” I said.
Doris shook her head.
“We’ve made a basic assumption that it is a substitution formula where the numbers and letters on the page represent another number or letter,”
the mathematics professor explained.
“The difficulty is discovering the transposition key,” Doris added.
“And believe me, we’ve applied very advanced applications to this task. We’ve used a dozen of the most complex cipher formulas, but have not been able to provide a successful translation,” he added.
“But we are completely confident that we can break the code,” the military officer said. “It’s all just a matter of time.”
“How much time?” I asked.
“I’d say no longer than two weeks at the most.”
“But I don’t have that long. I’m only here for a few days,” I explained.
“Perhaps I can convince an old colleague to allow me to borrow the supercomputer at Oxford,” the professor said.
“That would be brilliant!” Doris beamed.
“And most helpful. It’s just that this code was obviously written by a person with expertise in encryption.”
“My grandfather wrote it,” I said. “But I don’t think he was really an expert.” Then again, what did I know?
“With the holiday break, it is more likely that the computer will be sitting idle, so we might be able to nab some time, especially if we go in the middle of the night,” the professor said.
“Of course, with a code of this complexity, it might take even a supercomputer over an hour to run all the variables.”
“I wonder,” the chess master said. “English is not my first language—or even my second or third—so can somebody tell me which word is most common in your language?”
“The,” three of them said at once.
“And the most common letters?” she asked.
“I believe it is the vowel e, followed by the consonant t and then the vowel a,” the military man said.
They all started to chuckle. It was like a light had gone on for all of them simultaneously.
“We’re looking for something complex when the answer was hiding in plain sight!” Doris exclaimed.
“This is child’s play!” another snorted.