The House at Mermaid's Cove(44)
“Good. In that case, you can help me. The binoculars are in that cupboard.” He pointed to the place with his foot. “Keep watch for me, will you? I need both hands on the wheel.”
“What am I looking for?” With some difficulty, I opened the cupboard.
“Any boat or ship. Particularly anything that looks as if it’s coming fast. There’s not much chance of encountering an enemy vessel yet, but the closer we get to France, the more likely we are to run into one. It’ll be dark in an hour or so—you just need to keep watch until then.”
I scanned the horizon, trying not to lose my balance. The ocean was alive, moving all the time. How on earth was I going to pick out any craft in such a swell? My mind started conjuring up phantom images. At one point I convinced myself that a submarine was emerging from the waves, away on the horizon. But it was just a trick of the light—the dying rays of the sun catching a lone column of rain.
By the time darkness fell I was exhausted. But the sea was much calmer than when we’d set out from New Grimsby. Miranda and the others, who’d been clinging to the sides of the boat, looking like death, had gone below to the hammocks.
“You should go down, too,” Jack said.
“I don’t think I’d be able to sleep again,” I replied.
He nodded. “We’re making good time now. In a minute I’ll send that message. You can hold the wheel for me, if you like.”
“But . . . I . . .” I stared stupidly at the weather-beaten circle of wood.
“It’s quite simple,” he said. “There’s the compass—we’re heading southeast. Just keep us going steady in that direction. You probably won’t need to turn the wheel at all, but if the needle shifts, you’ll only need to tweak it slightly to get us back on course.”
He stood behind me, placing both his hands over mine until I got the hang of it. The fear bubbling up inside me dissolved into a surge of guilty longing. I wanted to pretend I couldn’t do it, make him stay like that, holding me, his body braced against mine. But even as I thought it, he moved away. I heard his footsteps receding as he crossed the deck. I was afraid to look over my shoulder, terrified of taking my eyes off the needle of the compass. I wondered fleetingly what my other self would have said, had I had the ability to glimpse the future. If I’d been shown this vision of myself a year ago, a month ago, I would have dismissed it as pure fantasy. Yet here I was, a woman disguised as a man, at the helm of a French sardine boat, taking a band of secret agents into enemy territory. Would I have agreed to it if anyone other than Jack had asked me? I couldn’t answer that question. And it was far too late now to think of turning back the clock.
Chapter 13
The wooden dinghy was bobbing about in the water, tethered to the starboard stern of La Coquille. Miranda climbed down the rope ladder first, followed by the four men, and then me. We took up our positions: me sitting in the stern with a mackerel line at the ready; one of the men, whose code name was Ferdinand, at the oars; the others lying in the belly of the little boat, alongside the ammunition and the medical supplies they were taking. As Ferdinand began to row, I pulled a tarpaulin over the four people lying at my feet.
La Coquille was anchored less than half a mile from the coast of Brittany. The plan was that Jack would weigh anchor as soon as the dinghy was on the move. He would meander along the coast, dragging a net, to avoid drawing suspicion to the boat. Then, when enough time had elapsed, he would return to collect me and the men I was to rescue.
With no lights, it was difficult to navigate. We could see the land silhouetted black against an indigo sky, but we were going in blind, unable to detect any potential hazard. Jack had described the place we were heading for: a long stretch of sandy beach with no hidden rocks to threaten us. The people waiting for us were unable to signal their presence for fear of alerting any enemy craft that might be patrolling the coast. But they would be watching from their hiding place in the dunes, Jack assured us. They would see us, even if we couldn’t see them.
We were told not to speak to one another unless absolutely necessary. The only sound was the lap of the oars. I sat, rigid, in the stern, listening intently, dreading the throb of an approaching engine. But this part of the ordeal was soon over. Ferdinand was powerfully built. Half an hour after setting off, he pulled in the oars and let the waves take us onto the beach. He jumped out and held the boat steady while the rest of us scrambled out.
As we stood on the beach, peering into the darkness, I heard a soft hooting sound—the same sound Jack had made when we left the quayside at Mermaid’s Cove. Ferdinand cupped his hands to his mouth and hooted back. We heard the crunch of feet on sand. A figure loomed out of the dunes, coming toward us.
“Bonsoir à tous de La Maison de La Sirène.” The man’s whispered greeting was a version of the coded message Merle had passed to the BBC.
“Bonsoir, Oncle Pierre.” Ferdinand stepped forward, his hand outstretched. “Appelez les autres. Je tiendrai le bateau pendant qu’ils montent.”
The man hesitated, glancing over his shoulder. Ferdinand had asked him to signal to the men he’d brought to the beach so they could board the dinghy. I couldn’t see the Frenchman’s face, but his body language conveyed that something was wrong.
“Ils ont été fusillés. Ils ont rencontré une patrouille allemande sur le chemin.” They were shot. They encountered a German patrol on the way here.