Jackdaws (16 page)

"Down to two!" Paul said
despondently.

"It's not the numbers but the
quality that bothers me," Percy said.

"We knew from the start we'd be
looking at rejects." Percy's tone became angry. "But we can't risk
Flick's life with people like these!"

Percy was desperate to protect
Flick, Paul realized. The older man had been willing to hand over control of
the operation but was not able to give up his role as Flick's guardian angel.

Their argument was interrupted by a
phone call. It was Simon Fortescue, the pinstriped spook from MI6 who had
blamed SOE for the failure at Sainte-Cécile.

"What can I do for you?"
Paul said guardedly. Fortescue was not a man to trust.

"I think I may be able to do
something for you," Fortescue said. "I know you're going ahead with
Major Clairet's plan."

"Who told you?" Paul asked
suspiciously. It was supposed to be a secret.

"Let's not go into that. I
naturally wish you success with your mission, even though I was against it, and
I'd like to help."

Paul was angry that the mission was
being talked about, but there was no point in pursuing that. "Do you know
a female telephone engineer who speaks perfect French?" he asked.

"Not quite. But there's someone
you should see. Her name is Lady Denise Bowyer. Terribly nice girl, her father
was the Marquess of Inverlocky."

Paul was not interested in her
pedigree. "How did she learn French?"

"Brought up by her French
stepmother, Lord Inverlocky's second wife. She's ever so keen to do her
bit."

Paul was suspicious of Fortescue,
but he was desperate for suitable recruits. "Where do I find her?"

"She's with the RAF at
Hendon." The word "Hen-don" meant nothing to Paul, but Fortescue
explained. "It's an airfield in the north London suburbs."

"Thank you."

"Let me know how she gets
on." Fortescue hung up. Paul explained the call to Percy, who said,
"Fortescue wants a spy in our camp."

"We can't afford to turn her
down for that reason."

"Quite."

They saw Maude Valentine first.
Percy arranged for them to meet her at the Fenchurch Hotel, around the corner
from SOE headquarters. Strangers were never brought to number sixty-four, he
explained. "If we reject her, she may guess that she's been considered for
secret work, but she won't know the name of the organization that interviewed
her nor where its office is, so even if she blabs she can't do much harm."

"Very good."

"What's your mother's maiden
name?"

Paul was mildly startled and had to
think for a moment. "Thomas. She was Edith Thomas."

"So, you'll be Major Thomas and
I'll be Colonel Cox. No point in giving our real names."

Percy was not such a duffer, Paul
reflected.

He met Maude in the hotel lobby. She
piqued his interest right away. She was a pretty girl with a flirtatious
manner. Her uniform blouse was tight across the chest, and she wore her cap at
a jaunty angle. Paul spoke to her in French. "My colleague is waiting in a
private room."

She gave him an arch look and
replied in the same language. "I don't usually go to hotel rooms with
strange men," she said pertly. "But in your case, Major, I'll make an
exception."

He blushed. "It's a meeting
room, with a table and so on, not a bedroom."

"Oh, well, that's all right,
then," she said, mocking him. He decided to change the subject. He had
noticed that she spoke with a south of France accent, so he said, "Where
are you from?"

"I was born in
Marseilles."

"And what do you do in the
FANYs?"

"I drive Monty."

"Do you?" Paul was not
supposed to give any information about himself, but he could not help saying,
"I worked for Monty for a while, but I don't recall seeing you."

"Oh, it's not always Monty. I
drive all the top generals."

"Ah. Well, come this way,
please."

He took her to the room and poured
her a cup of tea.

Maude was enjoying the attention,
Paul realized. While Percy asked questions, he studied the girl. She was
petite, though not as tiny as Flick, and she was cute: she had a rosebud mouth
accentuated with red lipstick, and there was a beauty spot—which might even
have been fake—on one cheek. Her dark hair was wavy.

"My family came to London when
I was ten years old," she said. "My papa is a chef."

"And where does he work?"

"He's the head pastry cook at
Claridge's Hotel."

"Very impressive."

Maude's file was on the table, and
Percy discreetly moved it an inch closer to Paul. Paul's eye was caught by the
slight movement, and his eye fell on a note made when Maude was first
interviewed.
Father: Armand Valentin, 39, kitchen porter at Claridge's
, he
read.

When they had finished, they asked
her to wait outside. "She lives in a fantasy world," Percy said as
soon as she was outside the door. "She's promoted her father to chef, and
changed her name to Valentine."

Paul nodded agreement. "In the
lobby, she told me she was Monty's driver—which I know she's not."

"No doubt that was why she was
rejected before."

Paul thought Percy was getting ready
to reject Maude. "But now we can't afford to be so particular," he
said.

Percy looked at him in surprise.
"She'd be a menace on an undercover operation!"

Paul made a helpless gesture.
"We don't have any choice."

"This is mad!"

Percy was half in love with Flick,
Paul decided, but, being older and married, he expressed his love in a
paternal, protective way. Paul liked him better for that, but realized at the
same time that he would have to fight Percy's caution if he was going to get
this job done. "Listen," he said. "We shouldn't eliminate Maude.
Flick can make up her own mind when she meets her."

"I suppose you're right,"
Percy said reluctantly. "And the ability to invent stories can be useful
under interrogation."

"All right. Let's get her on
board." Paul called her back in. "I'd like you to be part of a team
I'm setting up," he told her. "How would you feel about taking on
something dangerous?"

"Would we be going to
Paris?" Maude said eagerly.

It was an odd response. Paul
hesitated, then said, "Why do you ask?"

"I'd love to go to Paris. I've
never been. They say it's the most beautiful city in the world."

"Wherever you go, you won't
have time for sightseeing," Percy said, letting his irritation show.

Maude did not seem to notice.
"Shame," she said. "I'd still like to go, though."

"How do you feel about the
danger?" Paul persisted. "That's all right," Maude said airily.
"I'm not scared." Well, you should be, Paul thought, but he kept his
mouth shut.

THEY DROVE NORTH from Baker Street
and passed through a working-class neighborhood that had suffered heavily from
the bombing. In every street at least one house was a blackened shell or a pile
of rubble.

Paul was to meet Flick outside the
prison and they would interview Ruby Romain together. Percy would go on to Hendon
to see Lady Denise Bowyer.

Percy, at the wheel, confidently
wound his way through the grimy streets. Paul said, "You know London
well."

"I was born in this
neighborhood," Percy replied.

Paul was intrigued. He knew it was
unusual for a boy from a poor family to rise as high as colonel in the British
army. "What did your father do for a living?"

"Sold coal off the back of a
horse-drawn cart."

"He had his own business?"

"No, he worked for a coal
merchant."

"Did you go to school around
here?"

Percy smiled. He knew he was being
probed, but he did not seem to mind. "The local vicar helped me get a
scholarship to a good school. That was where I lost my London accent."

"Intentionally?"

"Not willingly. I'll tell you
something. Before the war, when I was involved in politics, people would
sometimes say to me, 'How can you be a socialist, with an accent like that?' I
explained that I was flogged in school for dropping my aitches. That silenced
one or two smug bastards."

Percy stopped the car on a
tree-lined street. Paul looked out and saw a fantasy castle, with battlements
and turrets and a high tower. "This is a jail?"

Percy made a gesture of
helplessness. "Victorian architecture."

Flick was waiting at the entrance.
She wore her FANY uniform: a four-pocket tunic, a divided skirt, and a little
cap with a turned-up brim. The leather belt that was tightly cinched around her
small waist emphasized her diminutive figure, and her fair curls spilled out
from under the cap. For a moment she took Paul's breath away. "She's such
a pretty girl," he said.

"She's married," Percy
remarked crisply.

I'm being warned off, Paul thought
with amusement. "To whom?"

Percy hesitated, then said,
"You need to know this, I think. Michel is in the French Resistance. He's
the leader of the Bollinger circuit."

"Ah. Thanks." Paul got out
of the car and Percy drove on.

He wondered if Flick would be angry
that he and Percy had turned up so few prospects from the files. He had met her
only twice, and on both occasions she had yelled at him. However, she seemed
cheerful, and when he told her about Maude, she said, "So we have three
team members, including me. That means we're halfway there, and it's only two
pip emma."

Paul nodded. That was one way of
looking at it. He was worried, but there was nothing to be gained by saying so.

The entrance to Holloway was a
medieval lodge with arrow slit windows. "Why didn't they go the whole way
and build a portcullis and a drawbridge?" said Paul. They passed through
the lodge into a courtyard, where a few women in dark dresses were cultivating
vegetables. Every patch of waste ground in London was planted with vegetables.

The prison loomed up in front of
them. The entrance was guarded by stone monsters, massive winged griffins
holding keys and shackles in their claws. The main gate-house was flanked by
four-story buildings, each story represented by a long row of narrow, pointed
windows. "What a place!" said Paul.

"This is where the suffragettes
went on hunger strike," Flick told him. "Percy's wife was force-fed
in here."

"My God."

They went in. The air smelled of
strong bleach, as if the authorities hoped that disinfectant would kill the
bacteria of crime. Paul and Flick were shown to the office of Miss Lindleigh, a
barrel-shaped assistant governor with a hard, fat face. "I don't know why
you wish to see Romain," she said. 'With a note of resentment she added,
"Apparently I'm not to be told."

A scornful look came over Flick's
face, and Paul could see that she was about to say something derisory, so he
hastily intervened. "I apologize for the secrecy," he said with his
most charming smile. "We're just following orders."

"I suppose we all have to do
that," said Miss Lindleigh, somewhat mollified. "Anyway, I must warn
you that Romain is a violent prisoner."

"I understand she's a
killer."

"Yes. She should be hanged, but
the courts are too soft nowadays."

"They sure are," said
Paul, although he did not really think so.

"She was in here originally for
drunkenness; then she killed another prisoner in a fight in the exercise yard,
so now she's awaiting trial for murder."

"A tough customer," Flick
said with interest.

"Yes, Major. She may seem
reasonable at first, but don't be fooled. She's easily riled and loses her
temper faster than you can say knife."

"And deadly when she
does," Paul said.

"You've got the picture."

"We're short of time,"
Flick said impatiently. "I'd like to see her now."

Paul added hastily, "If that's
convenient to you, Miss Lindleigh."

"Very well." The assistant
governor led them out. The hard floors and bare walls made the place echo like
a cathedral, and there was a constant background accompaniment of distant shouts,
slamming doors, and the clang of boots on iron catwalks. They went via narrow
corridors and steep stairs to an interview room.

Ruby Romain was already there. She
had nut-brown skin, straight dark hair, and fierce black eyes. However, she was
not the traditional gypsy beauty: her nose was hooked and her chin curved up,
giving her the look of a gnome.

Miss Lindleigh left them with a
warder in the next room watching through a glazed door. Flick, Paul, and the
prisoner sat around a cheap table with a dirty ashtray on it. Paul had brought
a pack of Lucky Strikes. He put them on the table and said in French,
"Help yourselF" Ruby took two, putting one in her mouth and the
other behind her ear.

Paul asked a few routine questions
to break the ice. She replied clearly and politely but with a strong accent.
"My parents are traveling folk," she said. "When I was a girl,
we went around France with a funfair. My father had a rifle range and my mother
sold hot pancakes with chocolate sauce."

"How did you come to
England?"

"When I was fourteen, I fell in
love with an English sailor I met in Calais. His name was Freddy. We got
married—I lied about my age, of course—and came to London. He was killed two
years ago, his ship was sunk by a U-boat in the Atlantic." She shivered.
"A cold grave. Poor Freddy."

Flick was not interested in the
family history. "Tell us why you're in here," she said.

"I got myself a little brazier
and sold pancakes in the street. But the police kept harassing me. One night,
I'd had some cognac—a weakness of mine, I admit—and anyway, I got into a
dispute." She switched to cockney-accented English. "The copper told
me to fuck off out of it, and I gave him a mouthful of abuse. He shoved me and
I knocked him down."