Edelweiss

by Madge Swindells

  Later that night, Marietta liaised by radio with the various Resistance groups. At dawn she learned from Georg Kolar, operating the Prague squad, that Dr Dietrich had been sent to Gestapo headquarters for interrogation, Milan Holub had been despatched to Theresienstadt, while Alex Jablonec had been arrested for breaking curfew, but no one knew where he was being held. She could only pray that all three of them would be sent into the mine.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  The canteen in the East End where Ingrid worked was dark and decorated with posters of pretty girls with cheery grins, scantily clad in bits and pieces of men’s uniform. The air was full of smoke and the strong smell of baked beans, bacon and beer. In the hot fumes from the stoves, a dim electric lamp swayed to and fro, lighting the soldiers’ faces as they sang. Ingrid was singing, too. She was leaning over the counter, filling teacups from the battered urn. Even in a shapeless blue overall, with a blue scarf tied round her head concealing her hair, she still managed to look exquisite. Her eyes were shining wistfully, her lips moving sensuously as she sang, the milky white skin of her throat glistening in the light. ‘There’ll be bluebirds over, the white cliffs of Dover, tomorrow, just you wait and see.’ In a sudden lull in the singing, her voice rang out clearly.

  Someone called out: ‘You’re as good as Vera Lynn. Carry on, Miss.’

  ‘Yes, sing some more,’ their voices called longingly.

  Ingrid began again and heard the men humming a background chorus. The song came to its poignant end and everyone clapped.

  ‘My goodness,’ Ingrid said shakily. ‘I’ve spilt the tea.’

  ‘Who cares. You gave them something more important than tea.’ Ingrid looked into Stephen’s eyes and blanched.

  ‘I’ve missed you,’ he said in a growl, as if the words hurt.

  How could anyone miss her? He was lying. Perhaps he was trying to trap her. ‘I’m always here. At least, most nights.’ She broke off as someone switched on the radio for the news.

  Several factories had been obliterated by the RAF in a raid on the Ruhr, she heard; 400 acres of Düsseldorf had been laid waste, while in Berlin the RAF were dropping 900 tons of bombs on the city centre each half an hour. Ingrid was filled with despair and she tried to block out the announcer’s voice. The next time she looked round, Stephen was nowhere in sight.

  When she left the canteen, she found Fernando waiting for her in the dark alley of the side entrance. He smiled grimly as he saw her flinch. ‘You haven’t brought anything in this week.’

  ‘I’ve told you before. It’s not safe for you to come here. I haven’t been able to get any news. People are wary. Looking for spies has become a national phobia.’ She wrapped her scarf round her head and scowled at him. ‘D’you know who’s here? Stephen Schofield! Didn’t you tell me how shrewd and clever he is? What if he saw you?’

  ‘This is an emergency,’ Fernando muttered. ‘Listen carefully. You are to contact a certain officer working for British Intelligence.’ His sinister voice as always chilled her to the bone. ‘We’re not sure what he does, but we know it’s important. Your job is to find out, and to photograph whatever documents he brings home. Live with him. That’s an order, but continue working at the factory and the canteen.’

  ‘What if he doesn’t want to live with me?’

  ‘That would be too bad because your orders come directly from von Hesse.’

  Ingrid scowled and lapsed into silence. ‘What’s the point of all this effort?’ she said rebelliously. ‘We’re losing the war.’

  She had uttered the ultimate betrayal. Fernando’s face turned ugly. He caught hold of her arm and twisted it. ‘There’s no way out for you, Ingrid, except in a coffin.’ He put pressure on her arm. ‘Here’s a dossier giving the details you will need to know about this officer. You’ll see the places he frequents. Arrange an impromptu meeting. Study the file and destroy it. Is that clear?’ With a final sneer, he hurried off into the dark. Ingrid rolled up the envelope and thrust it into her handbag.

  *

  Bill Roth could only see the back of the head and the line between the shoulders and the tiny waist of the woman sitting at the bar, yet he could not take his eyes off her. There was something familiar about her long smooth neck, the way she sat, upright and graceful, and her beautiful ash blonde hair.

  Feeling unsure but convinced that when he could see her properly he would know her, Bill walked across to the woman and tapped her on the shoulder. She turned her head and Bill found himself gazing into Ingrid’s slanting blue-green eyes.

  ‘Ingrid!’ He was too stunned to say anything else. ‘Dear, dear Ingrid.’

  With a look of complete astonishment, she flung her arms around his neck and pressed her cheek against his. ‘Bill . . . Bill . . . Oh God . . . It’s you . . . Don’t say anything. Just don’t say anything,’ she whispered. ‘Please . . . hold me.’ Bill put his arms around her shuddering body. He felt how thin she was beneath her expensive gown.

  Good natured whistles and catcalls echoed round the bar. They drew apart, laughing with embarrassment, and sat down at a corner table. For Bill, seeing Ingrid was like a blow in the stomach. She brought a vivid recall of the past. Suddenly, he could visualise Marie sitting beside her cousin as clearly as if she were real. The pain was almost unendurable. He tried not to show how moved he felt. He said: ‘This calls for a celebration.’ He attracted the attention of the barman. There was no champagne and they settled on Scotch to toast their reunion.

  Ingrid had changed since he saw her last, Bill observed. Her thinness made her eyes look even larger. With her white face, pointed chin and slanting eyes, she resembled a mythical sprite. Bill felt a surge of compassion for what she had suffered.

  ‘Oh Bill! Thank God we met. I can’t tell you what it’s like to be alone in a foreign country . . . I long for Vienna, but those days have gone for ever. I mustn’t dwell on the past. Now you’re here in the present and I’m grateful.’

  Feeling obscurely threatened, Bill listened to Ingrid babbling on. He took her proferred hand and squeezed it in his.

  ‘It’s not bad. Oh no! Don’t get me wrong,’ she was saying. ‘The girls at the factory are very kind, but I’m a stranger here . . . and I’m homesick . . .’

  So she had work, that was something. He would do whatever he could for her, Bill promised himself. He owed that to Marie.

  Ingrid listened to her voice aimlessly rambling on and tried to pull herself together. The shock of seeing Bill had almost caused her to break down. She had an almost irresistible impulse to tell him the mess she was in and beg him to extricate her from the nightmare she lived. She felt the same old attraction and once again it weakened her loins, brought sticky heat between her thighs and an overwhelming need to clutch him close to her.

  I can’t afford to be a woman, she thought. To her horror she felt tears pouring down her cheeks. ‘You remind me of Vienna and Marietta, and our happy past,’ she said with a surge of pure inspiration. ‘I’m sorry, I’m embarrassing us both.’

  Bill put his arm around her frail, trembling body. ‘Don’t cry . . . I miss her, too, you know, dreadfully.’ He almost choked on the last word, and with a visible effort shook off his memories. ‘This won’t do either of us any good, let me get us some food and you can tell me what you’re up to.’

  While they ate a pub lunch, she told him about her life in London to date. Bill marvelled at the coincidence which had led her to come here of all places.

  He gripped her hand and squeezed it. ‘I must be back in the office by two-thirty,’ he said, ‘but how about Sunday? Are you free?’

  She nodded and smiled tremulously. Part of her was crowing with triumph. She’d pulled it off! What an actress she was! Bill was as good as hooked. Yet underneath, a small voice was saying, ‘You weren’t acting, Ingrid. You love him. You always will. And now you must deceive and betray the man you love.’

  ‘I’ll pick you up at eleven,’ Bill was saying. ‘If that’s suitable, of course. Write down yo
ur address here.’ He handed her a pen and pad.

  ‘But Bill.’ She became aware of how he was dressed and managed to sound puzzled and slightly disappointed as she gazed at his civilian clothes. ‘You always said you were going to join up.’

  It was the kind of remark Bill hated. ‘I have a cushy job in civvy street instead,’ he retorted.

  *

  Bill arrived home late that night, but instead of rushing to bath and getting into bed, which was his usual routine, he poured himself a stiff Scotch and sat in his one and only armchair, in his shoddy room, absorbed by the past. He could not banish his memory of Marie, looking lost but determined, as she sat on the train in Vienna, guarding her refugee children. He had always loved her, but on that night he became inextricably bound to her forever. Now she was gone and fate had thrust Ingrid into his life.

  Bill drained his glass and stood up. He had a hard day tomorrow and he needed his sleep, but his memories of Marie kept him awake for most of the night.

  *

  Lieutenant Anton Klima, of the Free Czech Liberation Movement, stirred restlessly in his poky, Baker Street office. It was a semi-basement, looking up to London’s pedestrians, splashing past in galoshes and boots. The rain fell in dirty trickles into the drain outside the window, adding a dismal background dirge to a thoroughly depressing scene. He sighed and longed for the hills and lakes of his native Bohemia.

  He frowned as he re-read the message he had just decoded: a research project believed to be for a new type of missile . . . or a new type of missile fuel . . .

  He called to his colleague, who was also his cousin. ‘Hey, Miro, take a look at this.’ Miro was an oddity in their blond-haired, blue-eyed family. He looked like a Turk, and he was different in his ways: introverted, restless, and very clever.

  ‘Have we had messages from this agent before?’ Miro asked.

  ‘He’s new, but some weeks ago, Jan warned us to expect another radio operator – code name Edelweiss.’

  Miro lit a cigarette and perched on the edge of Anton’s desk. ‘We’d better make sure it’s from a genuine source . . . contact the Wolf. Yes, and Kolar’s group.’

  ‘Will do.’

  A day later, Anton asked Bill to drop round to their office. After welcoming the big American into their tiny quarters he handed Bill the decoded message.

  ‘We received this yesterday. Edelweiss is authentic, we’ve checked. He’s some sort of assistant to Jan.’

  Bill immediately visualised the enigmatic face of the Count’s driver and he physically shook his head to clear away the memories. He scanned the transcribed message: . . . believed to be engaged in research into long-range missiles, an advanced missile fuel . . . research plant in a converted mine. . . .

  With a shiver of excitement, Bill wondered if they’d hit the jackpot at last. ‘Okay. There’s not much to go on, but it seems we have something. Send a message back to Edelweiss. Tell him to get more information . . . somehow. Ask if they could just find out the names of the. German scientists working in the mine. They must have families nearby. That would help us a good deal. We know what subjects most of them specialised in, and just how good they were, prior to the war. Meantime, I’ll pass this info up the line.’

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  For the first time since Bill had begun working for Schofield, he used some of his petrol ration for pleasure and on the Sunday drove Ingrid to Oxfordshire for a pub lunch. Later they walked along the river bank, enjoying the hot August afternoon, and leaned over the bridge to talk about any old thing except pre-war Vienna. After a while, Ingrid reached out and took his hand. Bill could feel her fingers caressing and kneading his palm and wrist. Unexpectedly, she wound her arms around his neck, brushing his lips with hers.

  Bill kissed her gently, trying to keep sex out of the embrace. When he felt her body pressing against his, and her tongue moving against his lips, he pushed her gently away. ‘Ingrid, you don’t want to start something between us, do you?’ He bent forward and stroked her face with his finger, outlining her lips, her nose and the beautiful line of her cheek. ‘I’m sure you know what a desirable woman you are. Those appalling experiences you endured haven’t spoiled your looks. If anything, you’re even lovelier. But even though she’s gone, I still love Marie.’

  Ingrid pouted. ‘I was only flirting. I wasn’t proposing marriage. I wanted a little warmth, a little love, perhaps something to tide us both over until the war ends.’

  Bill put his arm round her in what he hoped was a brotherly gesture. ‘I was thoughtless once,’ he began clumsily, feeling the need to clear the air between them. ‘You were hurt and I felt a heel for months. Well . . . to tell the truth, I still feel bad about it. I don’t want to hurt you again, Ingrid.’

  ‘Stop being so serious.’

  ‘Okay. I’m sorry.’ He kissed her on her cheek and hugged her tightly against him. Perhaps that was what they both needed, someone to hang on to for a short-term affair. An interval of warmth and happiness. Was that so bad? All over England, men and women were snatching what comfort they could, never knowing how long they would survive, or whether they would see the end of the week, never mind the end of the war.

  It began to rain. ‘That’s England for you,’ Bill said, feeling glad of the reprieve. ‘One minute you have a fine day, and then it’s pouring. Damn!’

  They ran back to the car and on the drive back to town chatted easily about nothing important.

  Bill left Ingrid sitting in the car outside his block of flats, while he stopped to pick up a raincoat. ‘I’m not going to take you inside. It’s the shoddiest apartment imaginable and down in the dungeons,’ he told her.

  By the time he returned the rain had turned torrential, so they settled for the cinema and saw Walt Disney’s Dumbo.

  While Bill was driving Ingrid home, he tried to explain why he was inextricably bound to the past. ‘Most of the time I think about my work. I’ve kept my emotions tucked out of sight for the past two and a half years, but seeing you . . . well, it sort of made everything fresh again.’ Bill stretched out and gripped her hand. ‘I still love Marie.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Only she’s dead. I’ve got to get over her. When she was arrested I nearly went crazy . . .’ He broke off.

  ‘Bill, don’t feel alone. I loved her, too. That gives us a bond, doesn’t it? Let’s be friends, we both need it.’

  He parked outside Ingrid’s cottage and opened the door for her. She kissed Bill lightly on the cheek and ran inside. As she leant against the door, listening to the sound of the engine fade away, she dropped her mask. There was anger and sadness on her face, but lately she had acquired a new expression: a certain stealthy wariness, like a predatory cat crossing the road on a dark night.

  She took a deep breath. ‘Oh God. There’s no future for failures. Not in my situation,’ she whispered to the empty hallway. The thought of what Paddy might do to her if she didn’t succeed with Bill made her feel sick, but even stronger was her sense of rejection. ‘Damn him! He’s in love with a corpse. Why can’t he take me. I’m living . . . and I’m longing for him.’ With gritty determination, she went to her bedroom and with feminine calculation changed her clothes. Fifteen minutes later she left the house and was lucky enough to find a late taxi.

  The driver dropped her outside Bill’s flat. She was shaking as she made her way through the dark interior to the basement. She could hear the sound of running water behind the door and she knocked loudly. After a while she heard footsteps. The door swung open and Bill stood there, naked except for a towel wrapped round his lower torso.

  ‘Ingrid!’ He swore quietly, pulled her inside and shut the door. Then he pulled down the blackout and switched on the light. ‘What is it? What’s the matter?’

  ‘Bill, listen to me,’ she pleaded urgently. ‘I love you. There’s no point in trying to stop me from getting hurt. I’ve always loved you. Let me have a little of you . . . please Bill.’

  The words kept tumbling out. She wasn’t sure whe
ther this outpouring of emotion was real or whether she was the world’s most accomplished actress. And when Bill put his arms around her, her tears and gratitude felt real. When she wrapped her arms around his naked torso, her longing felt real, too.

  She looked up and saw pity in Bill’s eyes. Damn him! Trying to conceal her desperation, she took off her raincoat and laid it over the chair. She was surprised to find herself trembling. But why? He was only one in a long line of men. Not true, she knew. Bill was special.

  Her skin was tingling, her lips felt dry and feverish, her eyes were burning, and she was panting slightly. She took off her blouse and skirt and flung them on the bed. She fumbled with her bra, and all the while Bill was staring at her with the strangest expression in his eyes. How dare he feel sorry for her. She flung the bra on the floor. Suddenly her eyes were brimming with scalding tears and she couldn’t see.

  To Bill, the sight of Ingrid’s genuine hurt was baffling. What had he ever done to provoke this adoration? Years back in Vienna he’d been sure that she was simply after the Roth fortune. Perhaps he’d been wrong. After all, he’d been wrong about so many things concerning Ingrid. Her dedication in fighting the Nazis had been a complete shock.

  He watched her moodily as she stripped. He longed for more than she was offering, both physically and mentally. On the few occasions when he had bedded British girls, he’d gone for milky white complexions, full, firm breasts and shapely hips. He liked to feel soft flesh in his hands. Something substantial! But here was this wraithlike girl, naked and begging for love. Perhaps he could forget Marie . . . accept second-best . . . but Ingrid deserved more than that. There was no denying her beauty and her need. He said: ‘Dearest Ingrid, please don’t cry,’ and folded her shivering body in his arms. ‘I’m not running away,’ he said mildly. ‘For starters, I’ve got no pants on. Relax.’

  What gave him the right to be so damned patronising? Damn him and damn Paddy and Fernando and Hugo to hell. All of them!