Chapter 65

Miss Kendall. Mrs. Gray. ” Commander Travis sat weary and upright behind his desk, his office crowded with blandly suited intelligence swots. “You’ve been asked here to provide corroborating information. We’ll be quick; we’ve all more important things to do tonight. ” He leafed through a personnel folder, and even upside down, Osla had no trouble reading the name on it. Osla’s roil of anger and exhaustion gave way to confusion—why, a matter of hours until the attack launched on Normandy and all Bletchley Park was plunged into madness, was Commander Travis nose-deep in a file on Beth?

“I understand you two ladies have billeted with Bethan Finch for the past four years, ” he said. “What can you tell us about her? ”

Osla and Mab exchanged looks. Mab clearly had no idea what to say, either. However angry either of them were at Beth, outpourings about new grudges and old griefs were not relevant.

He clicked his tongue, impatient. “When did you last see her, and how would you describe her emotional state? ”

“We saw her just before coming here, ” Mab said at last, voice crisp, “and she was completely hysterical. ”

A man behind Commander Travis made a hmm noise. “Would you agree with that, Miss Kendall? ”

Osla didn’t really want to, but yes—hysterical was an accurate way to describe Beth’s laughing-crying jag. “I suppose so. She doesn’t normally flip her wicket like that, ” Osla felt compelled to say. “She’s very level. ”

“What did she say when was she hysterical? ” That was one of the intelligence men. Osla recognized him—the smarmy fellow who had hinted she’d stolen files outside her hut. “Did she spout any wild theories? Talk about someone from her section? ”

“No. ” Mab had drawn herself up cool and correct. You would have to know her very well, Osla thought, to know that she was still boiling with fury.

“Did she say anything about messages she’d broken? ”

Osla pushed a curl behind one ear. “No. ”

“We understand she had a rather long-term liaison with a colleague in Hut 8. ” Pinstripes put a nasty edge on liaison. “A married colleague—Harry Zarb? The wog. ”

They both nodded reluctantly. No point denying it; everyone at BP knew.

“I understand he broke it off when he enlisted, and she became upset. ”

“The break came more from her than from him, ” Osla said.

Mab shrugged. “Yes, she was upset. ”

“She was already behaving erratically before this romantic disappointment, I believe? The death of her mentor Dilly Knox—did it make her unreliable? Unstable? ”

Mab and Osla looked at each other. “That was part of her work, so it never came up. ”

Pinstripes bent over, murmuring. “We already had the other girls in, Miss Rock and what was the other one? ”

“—Phyllida Something—”

“—and they said Miss Finch used to talk to Dilly after he was dead, as though he was still there in ISK working. Miss Rock said it gave her the shivers. ”

“Talking to people who aren’t there—that’s not the strangest thing you’ll see in this place by a long shot, ” Osla began, but Commander Travis waved her off. He looked like a man who wanted nothing more than a few hours’ sleep before the invasion, who had instead been dragged backward out of bed through a thornbush to be at this desk. What is going on? Osla thought in mounting unease. Beth couldn’t possibly be in trouble over the Coventry raid; she’d get nothing but approval if her superiors knew she had kept the raid secret even at the risk of her friends’ safety.

“I think we have more than enough evidence of worsening erratic behavior, ” Pinstripes said. “The real question—”

Commander Travis looked at Osla and Mab. “Did Bethan Finch ever violate the Official Secrets Act by repeating secret information outside Bletchley Park? ”

Osla looked at Mab, who looked straight ahead and said, “Yes, she has. Once. ” Three women in a pitch-dark room, whispering classified information among themselves to feel safer in a cold, violent world.

Travis turned to Osla. “Miss Kendall, can you confirm this? ”

An hour ago, Osla had flung the postponement of the German invasion in Beth’s face. There was still the rock of anger in her middle about the Coventry raid, but she would never have chosen to tell Bletchley Park’s higher-ups about Beth’s single incident of indiscretion. She still wouldn’t have. But now they were all staring at her cold-eyed, and Osla knew she couldn’t lie. They might have very critical reasons to need the information—and if she lied, she could be charged with a crime. “Beth disclosed secret information once, ” Osla said reluctantly. “It was off BP grounds, but only to the two of us, in private, no possibility of eavesdroppers. She never did anything like that again. ”

“Irrelevant, ” Pinstripes snapped, and someone else began to lecture, “You two girls should have—” But Osla cut him off.

“Why is everyone getting hacked off about Beth and her moods? ” Something here smelled off, all this information suddenly cascading down over Travis’s desk at once. On Mab and me, too, Osla thought. “Beth’s one of the best people we’ve got—now is not the time to put her out on the tiles. ”

“Thank you, Miss Kendall, Mrs. Gray. ” Travis cut her off. “You may return to your posts. I imagine you’ll both be needed. ”

Osla tried again. “Sir, this frankly looks like someone trying to nobble Beth. I don’t think—”

“Just don’t think, you silly deb, ” one of the MI-5 swots snapped.

Osla’s eyes stung, but she would have kept arguing. Only it wasn’t going to do any good. Travis was pivoting in his chair, saying, “Can we close this matter, gentlemen? We’ve heard from the girl’s billet-mates; we’ve called in her section colleagues and her mother. You may have noticed that there is considerably more to do tonight than deal with one broken-down—”

The office door swung shut, cutting off his voice. Osla drew breath, puzzled and angry and full of foreboding, but a buzzing sounded overhead, outside. She looked at Mab, and they both bolted for the entrance hall and out the door. They stood, faces turned toward the rainy black sky, as codebreakers began spilling out of the mansion and blocks. Osla’s ears pounded as the shadows passed overhead under the clouds: hundreds and hundreds of RAF bombers towing gliders behind them, winging toward the channel.

“It’s started, ” someone whispered, and then they were all shouting. “It’s started—it’s started! ”

Nothing for it now. Osla ran for her block, Mab ran back into the mansion, and everything was forgotten except the fact that the invasion had at long last begun.

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