“Yes.” Of course, she would not be telling the girl everything, just that she was going. The rest would come later, when she needed to know.
Then remembering the sleeping girls, she was flooded with doubts anew. “I don’t know if she’s ready,” she confessed.
“She has to be.” They couldn’t wait any longer.
There was a click on the other end of the line and then Eleanor set the receiver back into the cradle. She tiptoed back to the girls’ dorm.
Josie was curled into a ball like a child, her thumb close to her mouth in a habit she had surely broken years ago. A wave of protectiveness broke and crested over Eleanor as she remembered the sister she had lost so many years ago. She could protect these girls in a way she hadn’t been able to her own sister. She needed them to do a job that was dangerous, potentially lethal, though, and then she needed them to come home safely. These were the only two things that mattered. Would she be able to manage both?
A faint smile played about Josie’s lips and Eleanor wondered what she was dreaming. Just a young girl with a young girl’s dreams. Eleanor would let her remain that—at least for a few more hours.
She tiptoed from the room, closing the door softly behind her.
Chapter Seven
Marie
Scotland, 1944
Marie still hated running.
She had been at Arisaig House for almost six weeks and every morning it was the same: five miles up and back, partway around the loch and up a dreaded incline only known among the girls as “The Point.” Her heels were cracked and bleeding and the blisters on her feet from all of the damp hikes seemed on the constant verge of infection. Just thinking about doing it again made her bones ache.
But, she reflected as she made her way to breakfast after splashing some water on her face to freshen up, she no longer ran at the rear of the pack. Over the weeks she had been here, she had built up speed and stamina she hadn’t imagined herself to possess. She liked to keep up with Josie so that they could talk as they ran. Nothing detailed really, just a few words here or there. Josie, who had spent much of her early childhood summers in the mountains of Cumbria, would point out bits of the Scottish landscape or tell stories she’d heard from the war.
Marie had gotten to know Josie well during her weeks at training. Not just through the classes and meals; they spent long sleepless nights talking, Josie sharing stories of her childhood on the streets of Leeds with her brother, fending off scoundrels who wanted to take advantage of defenseless children. Marie shared her own past, too, of how Richard had left her penniless. She felt silly, though, complaining after all Josie had been through at such a young age. Her own childhood, while cruel, had been one of unmistakable privilege, not at all like Josie’s street urchin–like experience. The two would not have known each other in different circumstances. Yet here they had become fast friends.
In the dining hall, they took their usual spots at the women’s table, Josie at the head, Marie and Brya on either side. Marie unfolded her napkin carefully and placed it in her lap and started eating right away, mindful that Madame Poirot was, as ever, watching. Meals were constantly part of the lesson. The French wipe up their gravy with bread, she’d learned soon after arrival. And never ask for butter—they no longer have any. Even at mealtime, it seemed the girls were being scrutinized. The slightest mistake could trip you up.
Marie recalled a night shortly after she had arrived at Arisaig House when they had been served a really good wine at dinner. “Don’t drink it,” Josie had whispered. Marie’s hand froze above her glass. “It’s a trick.” For a second she thought Josie meant the drink had been poisoned. Marie lifted the wineglass and held it beneath her nose, sniffing for the hint of sulfur as she had been trained but finding none. She looked around and noticed them plying girls with a second glass, then a third. The girls’ cheeks were becoming flushed and they were chatting as if they didn’t have a care. Marie understood then that the test was to see if they would become reckless after drinking too much.
“You’re in an awful hurry,” Josie observed as they ate breakfast. “Hot date?”
“Very funny. I have to retake codes.”
Josie nodded, understanding. Marie had already failed the test for the previous unit in radio operator class once. There would not be a third chance. If she couldn’t do it today and prove that she could transmit, she would be sent packing.
What would be so bad about that? Marie mused as she ate. She had not asked for this strange, difficult life, and a not-so-small part of her wanted to fail and go home so she could see Tess.
She’d trained intensively from morning until night since coming to Arisaig House. Most of her time was spent in front of a radio set, studying to be a wireless telegraph operator (W/Ts, they were called). But she’d learned other things, too, things she could not have possibly imagined: how to set up dead and live letter drops and the difference between the two (the former being a pre-agreed location where one agent could leave a message for another; the latter an in-person, clandestine meeting), how to identify a suitable rendezvous spot, one where a woman could plausibly be found for other reasons.
But if running had gotten easier, the rest of the training had not. Despite all she learned, it was never enough. She couldn’t set an explosives charge without her fingers shaking, was hopeless at grappling and shooting. Perhaps most worryingly, she could not lie and maintain a cover story. If she could not do that under mock interrogation, when the means of coercion were limited, how could she ever hope to do it in the field? Her one strength was French, which had been better than everyone else’s before she arrived. On all other fronts, she was failing.
Marie was suddenly homesick. Signing on had been a mistake. She could take off the uniform and turn it in, promise to say nothing and start home to Tess. Such doubts were nothing new; they nagged at her all through the long hours of lecture and at night as she studied and slept. She did not share them again, of course. The other girls didn’t have doubts, or if they did they kept them to themselves. They were resolute, focused and purposeful, and she needed to be, too, if she hoped to remain. She could not afford to show fear.
“Headquarters is here,” Josie announced abruptly. “Something must be going on.”
Marie followed Josie’s gaze upward to a balcony overlooking the dining hall where a tall woman stood, looking down on them. Eleanor. Marie had not seen the woman who had recruited her since that night more than six weeks earlier. She’d thought of Eleanor often, though, during these long, lonely weeks of training. What had made Eleanor think she could do this blasted job, or that she would want to?
Marie stood and waved in Eleanor’s direction, as though seeing an old friend. But Eleanor eyed her coolly, giving no sign of recognition. Did Eleanor remember their meeting in the toilet, or was Marie one of so many faceless girls she had recruited? At first, Marie’s cheeks stung as if slapped. But then Marie understood: she was not to acknowledge her past life or anyone in it. Another test failed. She sat back down.