The Mersey Daughter (Empire Street #3)(43)
The commander smiled again. ‘Yes, he really is a very informal chap. But he happened to mention to one of our team that he’d come across a young fellow who had a natural aptitude for solving tricky puzzles, who in a short time had picked up enough to tackle the most fiendish ones – all without any former background in such things. That’s pretty rare, you know.’ His expression changed. ‘I must ask you to keep all of this absolutely to yourself. What I am about to propose needs to be treated as top secret. It is nothing short of being at the heart of what we do here at Western Approaches Command.’
Danny was taken aback at the change of direction. ‘Of course,’ he said. Who exactly was he going to tell, anyway?
‘We need you to take a short test,’ the commander went on briskly. ‘Nothing too bad; certainly nothing to someone like you if Forrester was right – and I’d trust him with my life.’ He rose and ushered Danny towards the door. ‘Through here. Lieutenant Commander Sykes will supervise you.’
They were in another small, anonymous room, but there was the man who had summoned Danny earlier that day, looking as though he wished he were somewhere else. He indicated a desk, on which there was a single piece of paper. ‘Do sit, Mr Callaghan,’ he said, his tone making it clear this was not a request. ‘After Commander Stephens has left the room you will work your way through these questions and then hand the answers to me. I am here to oversee you and not to help, so please do not direct any questions to me.’ He saluted as Stephens made to leave.
‘Good luck, Mr Callaghan,’ the commander said cheerily on his way out.
Danny glanced up at the wall but there was no clock. So he figured he might as well get on with the task in hand. Warily he skimmed the page. Well, those were easy; they were obviously anagrams. Those looked like some kind of verbal logic. There were a couple of numerical sequences he thought he’d be all right at; the final ones were some kind of maths he hadn’t come across. He’d worry about them later. He picked up the pen they had provided and set to it.
In what felt like no time at all, he looked up and met Sykes’s steady, unwelcoming gaze. ‘Finished,’ he said. ‘Or as finished as I can be.’ He hadn’t been able to do the final questions; they went beyond the simple arithmetic and geometry he’d done at school, which he’d been all too keen to get away from. He figured that was hardly his fault. No doubt most of the people they tested had gone to private schools, and quite likely university too. He’d done his best, and if that wasn’t good enough, then too bad. He was expecting to fail. He didn’t dare think about what this could lead to; there was no point, he wouldn’t make the grade.
‘Wait there, Mr Callaghan.’ Sykes took the paper and vanished through the door, leaving Danny on his own yet again.
Danny stretched his arms over his head and leant back in the chair. Well, it beat counting crates in the warehouse. Now the test was over he realised he’d enjoyed it, or at least the puzzle aspect of it. He wasn’t so sure about being shut in a small room with Sykes; he could tell the lieutenant commander thought all of this was an enormous waste of time. He could sense the friction between him and the commander, who presumably was his superior officer, and wondered if by some miracle he did pass, whether he’d end up being caught between the two of them. Still, he probably wouldn’t see any more of these men after today.
He stared at the ceiling. There was only one person who could be behind this: Frank Feeny. All of Empire Street knew he had come back to work in Derby House on some vital but hush-hush project. Quite how he had heard about Jonny, or Captain Forrester as he now knew him to be, Danny couldn’t work out, but he intended to ask him the next time he saw him. Frank was a good bloke and hadn’t deserved his injury – but then, as Danny knew all too well, fate had a habit of flinging unwelcome hardships at you.
A noise from the corridor brought an abrupt end to his thoughts, and he hurriedly stood as Stephens and Sykes re-entered the small room, which was stuffy with all three of them in there.
‘Well done, Mr Callaghan,’ said Stephens with his smile as wide as ever. ‘Now I notice you had some trouble with the final questions.’
So that was that, thought Danny. He’d failed. Still, nothing ventured. ‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘I have never seen anything like them, so didn’t know where to start.’
‘Very well, I understand,’ said Stephens. ‘But I have to say you were one hundred per cent on everything else. And in a very quick time, too. We were most impressed, weren’t we?’
Sykes nodded slightly and gave a noncommittal grunt.
‘All the more so as I understand you left school at fourteen and would have had no chance to experiment with any of the puzzles here other than those directly related to solving crosswords.’
Blimey, thought Danny, they have done their homework. It felt slightly alarming that they’d been checking up on him already. But he supposed they could simply have asked Frank.
‘We would therefore like to ask you to join us,’ Stephens continued. ‘You will be trained in all forms of code breaking. There can be no more vital task for a young man of your, what I have to say are quite exceptional abilities.’ He met Danny’s eye. ‘So you will have worked out that Warrant Officer Feeny has been involved in all of this and he vouches for your character and integrity. As he is highly thought of by those in command here, that is recommendation indeed. We propose that you are brought in as part of the Royal Navy, initially at midshipman level. What do you say?’