Jackdaws (9 page)

"I'll explain in a
second," Graves said, and he sat down on a schoolboy bench, looking
flustered, and opened his briefcase.

Paul was irritated. Monty hated
surprises. But Paul could not throw Graves out of the room.

A moment later, Monty walked in. He
was a small man with a pointed nose and receding hair. His face was deeply
lined either side of his close-clipped mustache. He was fifty-six, but looked
older. Paul liked him.

Monty was so meticulous that some
people became impatient with him and called him an old woman. Paul believed
that Monty's fussiness saved men's lives.

With Monty was an American Paul did
not know. Monty introduced him as General Pickford. "Where's the chap from
SOE?" Monty snapped, looking at Paul.

Graves answered, "I'm afraid he
was summoned by the Prime Minister, and sends his profound apologies. I hope
I'll be able to help.."

"I doubt it," Monty said
crisply.

Paul groaned inwardly. It was a
snafu, and he would be blamed. But there was something else going on here. The
Brits were playing some game he did not know about. He watched them carefully,
looking for clues.

Simon Fortescue said smoothly,
"I'm sure I can fill in the gaps."

Monty looked angry. He had promised
General Pickford a briefing, and the key person was absent. But he did not
waste time on recriminations. "In the coming battle," he said without
further ado, "the most dangerous moments will be the first." It was
unusual for him to speak of dangerous moments, Paul thought. His way was to
talk as if everything would go like clockwork. "We will be hanging by our
fingertips from a cliff edge for a day." Or two days, Paul said to
himself, or a week, or more. "This will be the enemy's best opportunity.
He has only to stamp on our fingers with the heel of his jackboot."

So easy, Paul thought. Overlord was
the largest military operation in human history: thousands of boats, hundreds
of thousands of men, millions of dollars, tens of millions of bullets. The
future of the world depended on the outcome. Yet this vast force could be
repelled so easily, if things went wrong in the first few hours.

"Anything we can do to slow the
enemy's response will be of crucial importance," Monty finished, and he
looked at Graves.

"Well, F Section of SOE has
more than a hundred agents in France—in fact, virtually all our people are over
there," Graves began. "And under them, of course, are thousands of
French Resistance fighters. Over the last few weeks we have dropped them many
hundreds of tons of guns, ammunition, and explosives."

It was a bureaucrat's answer, Paul
thought; it said everything and nothing. Graves would have gone on, but Monty
interrupted with the key question: "How effective will they be?"

The civil servant hesitated, and
Fortescue jumped in. "My expectations are modest," he said. "The
performance of SOE is nothing if not uneven."

There was a subtext here, Paul knew.
The old-time professional spies at MI6 hated the newcomers of SOE with their
swashbuckling style. When the Resistance struck at German installations they
stirred up Gestapo investigations which then sometimes caught MI6's people.
Paul took SOE's side: striking at the enemy was the whole point of war.

Was that the game here? A
bureaucratic spat between MI6 and SOE?

"Any particular reason for your
pessimism?" Monty asked Fortescue.

"Take last night's
fiasco," Fortescue replied promptly. "A Resistance group under an SOE
commander attacked a telephone exchange near Reims."

General Pickford spoke for the first
time. "I thought it was our policy not to attack telephone exchanges—
we're going to need them ourselves if the invasion is successful."

"You're quite right,"
Monty said. "But Sainte-Cécile has been made an exception. It's an access
node for the new cable route to Germany. Most of the telephone and telex
traffic between the High Command in Berlin and German forces in France passes
through that building. Knocking it out wouldn't do us much harm—we won't be
calling Germany—but would wreak havoc with the enemy's communications."

Pickford said, "They'll switch
to wireless communication."

"Exactly," said Monty.
"Then we'll be able to read their signals."

Fortescue put in. "Thanks to
our code breakers at Bletchley."

Paul knew, though not many other
people did, that British intelligence had cracked the codes used by the Germans
and therefore could read much of the enemy's radio traffic. MI6 was proud of
this, although in truth they deserved little credit: the work had been done not
by intelligence staff but by an irregular group of mathematicians and
crossword-puzzle enthusiasts, many of whom would have been arrested if they had
entered an MI6 office in normal times. Sir Stewart Menzies, the foxhunting head
of MI6, hated intellectuals, communists, and homosexuals, but Alan Turing, the
mathematical genius who led the code breakers, was all three.

However, Pickford was right: if the
Germans could not use the phone lines, they would have to use radio, and then
the Allies would know what they were saying. Destroying the telephone exchange
at Sainte-Cécile would give the Allies a crucial advantage.

But the mission had gone wrong.
"Who was in charge?" Monty asked.

Graves said, "I haven't seen a
full report—"

"I can tell you," Fortescue
interjected. "Major Clairet." He paused. "A girl."

Paul had heard of Felicity Clairet.
She was something of a legend among the small group who knew the secret of the
Allies' clandestine war. She had survived under cover in France longer than
anyone. Her code name was Leopardess, and people said she moved around the
streets of occupied France with the silent footsteps of a dangerous cat. They
also said she was a pretty girl with a heart of stone. She had killed more than
once.

"And what happened?" Monty
said.

"Poor planning, an
inexperienced commander, and a lack of discipline among the men all played
their part," Fortescue replied. "The building was not heavily
guarded, but the Germans there are trained troops, and they simply wiped out
the Resistance force."

Monty looked angry. Pickford said,
"Looks like we shouldn't rely too heavily on the French Resistance to
disrupt Rommel's supply lines."

Fortescue nodded. "Bombing is
the more reliable means to that end."

"I'm not sure that's quite
fair," Graves protested feebly. "Bomber Command has its successes and
failures, too. And SOE is a good deal cheaper."

"We're not here to be fair to
people, for God's sake," Monty growled. "We just want to win the
war." He stood up. "I think we've heard enough," he said to General
Pickford.

Graves said, "But what shall we
do about the telephone exchange? SOE has come up with a new plan—"

"Good God," Fortescue
interrupted. "We don't want another balls-up, do we?"

"Bomb it," said Monty.

"We've tried that," Graves
said. "They hit the building, but the damage was not sufficient to put the
telephone exchange out of action for longer than a few hours."

"Then bomb it again," said
Monty, and he walked out.

Graves threw a look of petulant fury
at the man from MI6. "Really, Fortescue," he said. "I mean to
say.. really."

Fortescue did not respond.

They all left the room. In the
hallway outside, two people were waiting: a man of about fifty in a tweed
jacket, and a short blonde woman wearing a worn blue cardigan over a faded
cotton dress. Standing in front of a display of sporting trophies, they looked
almost like a head teacher chatting to a schoolgirl, except that the girl wore
a bright yellow scarf tied with a touch of style that looked, to Paul,
distinctly French. Fortescue hurried past them, but Graves stopped. "They
turned you down," he said. "They're going to bomb it again."

Paul guessed that the woman was the
Leopardess, and he looked at her with interest. She was small and slim, with
curly blonde hair cut short, and—Paul noticed—rather lovely green eyes. He
would not have called her pretty: her face was too grown-up for that. The
initial schoolgirl impression was fleeting. There was an aggressive look to her
straight nose and chisel-shaped chin. And there was something sexy about her,
something that made Paul think about the slight body under the shabby dress.

She reacted with indignation to
Grave's statement. "There's no point in bombing the place from the air,
the basement is reinforced. For God's sake, why did they make that
decision?"

"Perhaps you should ask this
gentleman," Graves said, turning to Paul. "Major Chancellor, meet
Major Clairet and Colonel Thwaite."

Paul was annoyed at being put in the
position of defending someone else's decision. Caught off guard, he replied
with undiplomatic frankness, "I don't see that there's much to
explain," he said brusquely. "You screwed up and you're not being
given a second chance."

The woman glared up at him—she was a
foot shorter than he—and spoke angrily. "Screwed up?" she said.
"What the hell do you mean by that?"

Paul felt himself flush. "Maybe
General Montgomery was misinformed, but wasn't this the first time you had
commanded an action of this kind, Major?"

"Is that what you've been told?
That it was my lack of experience?"

She was beautiful, he saw now. Anger
made her eyes wide and her cheeks pink. But she was being very rude, so he
decided to give it to her with both barrels. "That and poor planning—"

"There was nothing wrong with
the damn plan!"

"—and the fact that trained
troops were defending the place against an undisciplined force."

"You arrogant pig!"

Paul took an involuntary step back.
He had never been spoken to this way by a woman. She may be five feet nothing,
he thought, but I bet she scares the damn Nazis. Looking at her furious face,
he realized that she was most angry with herself "You think it's your
fault," he said. "No one gets this mad about other people's mistakes."

It was her turn to be taken aback.
Her mouth dropped open, and she was speechless.

Colonel Thwaite spoke for the first
time. "Calm down, Flick, for God's sake," he said. Turning to Paul,
he went on, "Let me guess—this account was given to you by Simon Fortescue
of MI6, was it not?"

"That's correct," Paul
said stiffly.

"Did he mention that the attack
plan was based on intelligence supplied by his organization?"

"I don't believe he did."

"I thought not," said
Thwaite. "Thank you, Major, I don't need to trouble you any further."

Paul did not feel the conversation
was really over, but he had been dismissed by a senior officer, and he had no
choice but to walk away.

He had obviously got caught in the
crossfire of a turf war between MI6 and SOE. He felt most angry with Fortescue,
who had used the meeting to score points. Had Monty made the right decision in
choosing to bomb the telephone exchange rather than let SOE have another go at
it? Paul was not sure.

As he turned into his own office he
glanced back. Major Clairet was still arguing with Colonel Thwaite, her voice
low but her face animated, expressing outrage with large gestures. She stood
like a man, hand on hip, leaning forward, making her point with a belligerent
forefinger, but all the same there was something enchanting about her. Paul
wondered what it would be like to hold her in his arms and run his hands over
her lithe body. Although she's tough, he thought, she's all woman.

But was she right? Was bombing futile?

He decided to ask some more
questions.

CHAPTER

NINE

THE VAST, SOOTY bulk of the
cathedral loomed over the center of Reims like a divine reproach. Dieter
Franck's sky-blue Hispano-Suiza pulled up at midday outside the Hotel
Frankfort, taken over by the German occupiers. Dieter got out and glanced up at
the stubby twin towers of the great church. The original medieval design had
featured elegant pointed spires, which had never been built for lack of money.
So mundane obstacles frustrated the holiest of aspirations.

Dieter told Lieutenant Hesse to
drive to the château at Sainte-Cécile and make sure the Gestapo were ready to
cooperate. He did not want to risk being repulsed a second time by Major Weber.
Hesse drove off, and Dieter went up to the suite where he had left Stéphanie
last night.

She got up from her chair as he
walked in. He drank in the welcome sight. Her red hair fell on bare shoulders,
and she wore a chestnut silk negligee and high-heeled slippers. He kissed her
hungrily and ran his hands over her slim body, grateful for the gift of her
beauty.

"How nice that you're so
pleased to see me," she said with a smile. They spoke French together, as
always.

Dieter inhaled the scent of her.
"Well, you smell better than Hans Hesse, especially when he's been up all
night."

She brushed his hair back with a
soft hand. "You always make fun. But you wouldn't have protected Hans with
your own body."

"True." He sighed and let
her go. "Christ, I'm tired."

"Come to bed."

He shook his head. "I have to
interrogate the prisoners. Hesse's coming back for me in an hour." He
slumped on the couch.

"I'll get you something to
eat." She pressed the bell, and a minute later an elderly French waiter
tapped at the door. Stéphanie knew Dieter well enough to order for him. She
asked for a plate of ham with warm rolls and potato salad. "Some
wine?" she asked him.

"No—it'll send me to
sleep."

"A pot of coffee, then,"
she told the waiter. When the man had gone, she sat on the couch beside Dieter
and took his hand. "Did everything go according to plan?"

"Yes. Rommel was quite
complimentary to me." He frowned anxiously. "I just hope I can live
up to the promises I made him."