The Unlikely Spy(152)

Braithwaite nodded, and the aide went out. The first items were conventional stuff, intercepts of routine communications between U-boats and BdU. The fifth caught his attention. It was an alert issued by a Major Alfred Vicary of the War Office. It said the authorities were pursuing two individuals, a man and a woman, who might be trying to leave the country. Braithwaite smiled at Vicary's guarded understatement. Vicary was obviously from MI5. The man and woman were obviously German agents of some kind and whatever they were up to must be damned important; otherwise the alert wouldn't have crossed his desk. He put Vicary's alert aside and continued reading.

After a few more routine items Braithwaite came upon something else that caught his attention. A Wren at the Scarborough Y Service station had intercepted what she believed was a communication between a U-boat and a wireless onshore. Huff Duff had pinpointed the transmitter to somewhere along the east coast--somewhere from Lincolnshire to Suffolk. Braithwaite pulled the item out of his stack and set it next to Vicary's alert.

He rose and limped out of his office into the main room, stopping at the North Atlantic plotting table. Two members of his staff were repositioning some of the colored pins to reflect overnight movements. Braithwaite seemed not to notice them. He fixed his gaze on the waters off Britain's east coast, face grave.

After a moment he said quietly, "Patrick, bring me the file on U-509."





55


HAMPTON SANDS, NORFOLK





Jenny reached the grove of pines at the base of the dunes and collapsed with exhaustion. She had run by instinct, like a frightened animal. She had stayed off the road, keeping instead to the meadows and the marshes, flooded with rain. She had fallen more times than she could remember. She was covered with mud, smelled of rotting earth and the sea. Her face, beaten by the rain and the wind, felt as if it had been slapped. And she was cold--colder than she had ever been in her life. Her oilskin felt as if it weighed a hundred pounds. Her Wellington boots were filled with water, her feet were freezing. Then she remembered she had run from the cottage with no socks. She fell to her hands and knees, gasping for breath. Her throat was raw and tasted of rust.

She stayed that way for a moment until her breathing evened out, then forced herself to stand and enter the trees. It was pitch-dark, so dark she had to walk with her hands outstretched before her like a blind person groping through an unfamiliar place. She was cross with herself for not bringing her torch.

The air was filled with the sound of the wind and the pounding of the breakers on the beach. The trees seemed to be in a familiar pattern now. Jenny walked by memory, like someone shuffling through their own home in the dark.

The trees fell away; her secret hiding place appeared before her.

She slipped down the side and sat down with her back against the large rock. Overhead the pines writhed with the wind, but Jenny was sheltered from the worst of it. She wished she could make a fire but the smoke would be visible from a long way off. She dug out her case from the bed of pine needles, took out the old woolen blanket, and wrapped herself tightly.

The warmth took hold of her. Then she started to cry. She wondered how long she would have to wait here until going for help. Ten minutes? Twenty minutes? A half hour? She wondered if Mary would still be at the cottage when she returned. She wondered if she would be hurt. A horrid vision of her father's dead body flashed before her eyes. She shook her head and tried to make it go away. She shivered, then clutched the blanket more tightly to her body.

Thirty minutes. She would wait thirty minutes. They would leave by then and it would be safe to return.





Neumann parked at the end of the track, grabbed his torch from the seat next to him, and climbed out. He switched on the light and walked quickly through the trees. He scaled the dunes and scrambled down the other side. He switched off the torch as he walked across the beach to the water's edge. When he reached the flat hard sand where the breakers met the beach he broke into a light run, head down to push through the wind.

He thought of the morning he was running on the beach and saw Jenny, emerging from the dunes. He remembered how she looked, as though she had slept on the beach that night. He felt certain she had some kind of hiding place nearby where she went when things were bad at home. She was frightened, on the run, and alone. She would flee to the place she knew best, the way children do. Neumann went to the spot on the beach that served as his imaginary finish line, then stopped and walked toward the dunes.

On the other side he switched on the torch, found a trampled footpath, and followed it. It led to a small depression, sheltered from the wind by the trees and a pair of large boulders. He shined his torch into the depression; the beam caught Jenny Colville's face.





"What's your real name?" Jenny said as they drove back to the Doghertys' cottage.

"My real name is Lieutenant Horst Neumann."

"Why do you speak English so well?"

"My father was English and I was born in London. My mother and I moved to Germany when he died."

"Are you a German spy?"

"Something like that."

"What happened to Sean and my father?"

"We were using the radio in Sean's barn when your father burst in on us. Sean tried to stop him and your father killed him. Catherine and I killed your father. I'm sorry, Jenny. It all happened very fast."