The Darkest Hour(77)

Colonel James sits back in the chair, studying me. “What of the coordinates and photographs he brought with him?”

“The coordinates were accurate, but everything else was a forgery. The whole lot of them.”

He goes quiet before springing to his feet. “Thank you, Miss Blaise. If you’ll excuse me.”

“Will you arrest Reinhard?” I’m quick to follow after him.

“I must speak with the others.”

“What others?”

“My superiors. If this man is indeed Elias Reinhard instead of Alexander Dorner, then we’ll need to question him at once.”

“Will you bring him here, to this facility?”

“That has yet to be determined.”

“I want to speak with him. One-on-one.”

A wan smile stretches over his dry lips. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Miss Blaise.”

“I can get him to talk like no one else can. I’ve spent days with him. I’ve studied him.” I watch the gears spinning in Colonel James’s head as he considers my proposition. “After you bring him in and have interrogated him yourselves, I want to see him.”

His eyes focus on me, shrewd and calculating. “Might I ask why?”

“He and I have unfinished business.” That’s all I’ll say about that. “Like I said, I’ll answer every question you throw at me about him. I’ll talk to your superiors if they’d like. Just get me a meeting with Dorner.”

Colonel James tilts his head to one side and, after considering my offer, tells me, “I'll see what I can do. And you best come with me.”

I don’t even have shoes on, but I follow him out the door in my bare feet. For the first time in weeks, there’s a bounce in my step and a zippy jolt in my veins.

Poor Dorner will never see this coming.





Four days later, Colonel James returns to my room at our appointed meeting time. I’m sitting at the edge of my bed, dressed in a pressed blouse and a black skirt that the SOE has supplied for me. I take a sip of hot water, wishing that it were tea or coffee, but the war rations haven’t been exempted for the SOE. I barely slept the night before. I was too busy counting down the hours and then the minutes to this meeting.

“Ready, Miss Blaise?” says Colonel James at my door.

“Ready,” I reply, and follow him out.

He takes me down the stairwell. We leave behind the sunny corridors of the upper stories and exchange them for the swinging overhead lamps of the building’s basement, which cast a harsh glow upon our faces. My heels strike against the dusty floor, and I tuck my hands behind my back to keep them from fidgeting. This will likely be the only chance I get with Dorner face-to-face. I have to make it count. Only one of us will leave this meeting alive today.

“How long will I have with him?” I ask.

“Five minutes.”

“Only five?”

“It’s all they’d agree to. Most of my superiors didn’t think it was a good idea for you to see him at all.”

“But you convinced them otherwise?”

“We had a deal, did we not?”

That’s something I’ve learned about Colonel James—he’s a man who keeps his promises. I told him all he wanted to learn about Dorner, and in return he has arranged for this little rendezvous, despite what our higher-ups at the SOE and the OSS have had to say. Both agencies have been in upheaval these last few days. First, the SOE interrogated me for hours about my dealings with Dorner. Then they dragged in Dorner himself—who had apparently burrowed himself within the British intelligence community quite well since his arrival—and questioned him separately. The interrogations lasted for days, with the OSS joining in, but both agencies kept me at arm’s length. They told me to rest; they thanked me for my service. But I saw the wariness in their eyes, the same look they gave Tilly. I knew they weren’t sure what to do with me, not after what I’d been through with Dr. Nacht. Would I start yelling Heil Hitler like Tilly sometimes did? Or worse?

A small part of me couldn’t blame them for thinking what they did, but the rest of me wanted to kick some sense into them. I’d put my life on the line countless times for the Allies, and yet my own agency thinks I might be some Nazi marionette. That stings, to be honest. The only person who doesn’t seem to look at me that way is Colonel James.

We walk through two sets of iron-barred doors and past a pair of uniformed guards who’ve been tasked with making sure no one enters or leaves the basement without permission. At the sight of Colonel James, however, they step aside at once.

We stop as we approach the last room along the dank hallway. There’s a small square window inset on the door, and Colonel James motions for me to look through it. When I do, I see the inside of a cell with concrete floors and a metal toilet. There’s a man sitting on a cement bench that’s bolted to the floor, positioned in a way that I can see only his profile. But it’s enough.

It’s Dorner, that’s for sure.

“He can’t see us,” Colonel James murmurs.

“How long has he been kept here?”

“Since you made us believe we should.”

“Will there be a trial?”

“Yes, though the date is to be determined. Until then he’ll remain here.”