The House at Mermaid's Cove(41)
“That’s what we’ll use for practice.” Jack pointed to a stack of hay bales a few yards in front of the summerhouse. “Come and stand on the steps and I’ll show you.”
The weapon he gave me looked like a tiny telescope. It was slightly longer than my hand and about two inches wide. “It’s called a sleeve gun,” he said. “You see this ring at the end?”
I nodded.
“You thread a rubber band through it, which goes around your arm, above the elbow. It’s designed to be worn up the sleeve, out of sight. You’re left-handed, aren’t you?”
“Yes.” I was surprised that he’d noticed.
“So, you’d wear it on your left arm. If someone threatens you, you slide it into your hand, point the muzzle, and operate the trigger with your thumb.”
I rolled up the sleeve of my blouse, and he showed me how to affix the rubber band to hold the pistol in place.
“It’s already loaded,” he said. “It has a silencer, so it won’t make a noise. The idea is that you pull it out quickly and when you’ve used it, it will just slide back into your sleeve, out of sight.”
He showed me how to operate the trigger. “There’s not much of a kickback on it, so you don’t have to worry about your arm being forced back when you fire it. You can only fire a single shot. Ready?”
I stared at the bales of hay. My legs were shaking. My arm felt like lead when I tried to raise it. There was a small popping sound as I pulled the trigger, and a puff of dust as the bullet hit the target. As it cleared, a memory of my father flashed before my eyes. He was standing at the kitchen sink with his shirtsleeves rolled up, washing blood off his hands. I was seven years old—too young to understand that he’d been dealing with the aftermath of a grenade attack by the IRA on British soldiers a few streets away from our house. When he’d seen me watching him, he’d turned to me and said: “It takes such a long while to make a man, Alice—and so little time to destroy one.”
Chapter 12
At half past three on Sunday morning, I let myself out of the boathouse. I hadn’t been able to get much sleep. I’d been ready an hour earlier, dressed in the latest set of clothes I’d been given: a man’s long-sleeved undershirt, a thick woolen jersey, and a pair of corduroy trousers with oilskins worn over the top of them. A cap like the one Leo Badger wore completed the outfit. The whole ensemble was even more cumbersome than a nun’s habit. I wondered how on earth real fishermen managed.
I made my way around the rocks to the village. It was tricky in the dark. The tide was coming in, and I couldn’t use a flashlight because of the danger of drawing attention to what I was about to do. Gradually my eyes became accustomed to the dark. The sky was clear and studded with stars. I could see the white foam of the encroaching waves as the tide crept closer.
Above the lapping of the waves I caught a throaty growling sound. The motor launch. Jack had told me they kept it hidden in one of the creeks along the river. “It’s very fast,” he’d said, tracing our route with his finger on a map. “Forty knots. It’ll get us over to New Grimsby in a couple of hours.”
I’d never heard of New Grimsby until then. It appeared as a red dot on the tiny island of Tresco—one of a group called the Isles of Scilly, off the southwest coast of Cornwall. It was where the fishing boat we were to take to Brittany was moored—a real French sardine boat that came over during the Dunkirk evacuation of 1940 and had been commandeered for secret missions.
The sound of the motor launch faded as it passed me by, heading for the quayside. When I reached the village there wasn’t a light to be seen. Roofs wet with dew glistened in the starlight. Five figures were standing at the water’s edge. The boat was already moored, bobbing gently in the water. As I drew nearer, I saw Jack’s profile silhouetted against the night sky.
The boat’s long streamlined shape reminded me of the motor yachts I’d seen racing across Dublin Bay as a child. Jack was up on deck, ready to help anyone who lost their balance as they stepped off the quayside. Everyone was wearing the same bulky clothing as I was. I’d been told that one of the agents was a woman—but from where I was standing it was impossible to distinguish which one she was.
As I watched, I saw someone trip and almost fall into the water. But there was no cry of alarm—not even a muttered expletive. Everything was done in total silence. When my turn came, Jack stood with his hands outstretched, waiting to catch me if I stumbled. When he saw that I was all right, he cupped his fingers around his mouth and made a soft hooting sound, like an owl. I heard footsteps on the quayside, then the sound of ropes slithering into the water. Jack was already starting up the engine. As the boat pulled away, I spotted a solitary figure standing on the shore. I caught a glimpse of his upturned face, pale and round in the starlight. It was George Retallack—the blind man.
We began to pick up speed and the front of the boat lifted slightly, planing across the water. I clung to the rail, gasping as spray drenched my face. When I licked my lips, they tasted of salt.
After a while Jack called to me over his shoulder. “You should go below—get some sleep!”
“I will, in a minute,” I called back.
I had no intention of going down there. I could imagine how crowded it was likely to be in the cabin—and I thought the agents were more in need of a few hours’ rest than I was. They were the ones who were about to risk their lives, going ashore in enemy territory. Besides, I was too nervous to sleep.