With a groan, Cilla rested her temple against the car window. “He’s out there. Why didn’t he come to the station?”
“I’m praying he was swept out to sea.”
Cilla grimaced. She couldn’t pray that.
“Do you have a notepad?” Yardley gestured to Cilla’s handbag. “Start composing your message. Make it short. You won’t have much time to encipher it.”
“Yes, sir.” Cilla pulled out her notepad and wrote her message.
She read it to Yardley. “Last night recovered canister with excellent contents. No Jericho last night or at station today. I’m worried about him. Please send further instructions.”
Yardley edited out the wordplease—but retained “I’m worried about him.”
Cilla capped her pen. She was indeed worried about Jericho, but not in the way Kraus would interpret it.
****
Scapa Flow
Saturday, April 4, 1942
The boom defense vessel bobbed on waves high from stiff winds, but Lachlan and Arthur stood at attention in the morning mist.
The battleship USSWashingtonpassed before them through the parting in the antisubmarine nets in Hoxa Sound, following the heavy cruisersWichitaandTuscaloosa. In the distance, the carrier USSWaspand several destroyers waited to enter the harbor.
Hundreds of sailors in blue manned the battleship’s rails. TheWashington’s colors had been lowered to half-mast—someone must have died, and Lachlan frowned as he and Arthur saluted.
For months, even before the US had declared war on Germany, American warships had been escorting British convoys. But to have them come to British waters, whilst America faced horrific losses in the Pacific and off her own East Coast, prompted a swell of gratitude. “I’m glad to see them.”
“I am too,” Arthur said. “I’ve heard the Yankee ships have ice cream.”
Lachlan laughed. “Aye, and they’ll have heard our ships have port and rum.”
Arthur lowered his salute. “Throwing our tea into the harbor was abomination enough. But to throw out rum and port as well? Dry ships are sheer lunacy.”
Due to Neil’s example, Lachlan never imbibed, but Arthur had a point.
The battleship passed, and Lachlan bent his knees as the ship’s great wake rolled under their vessel.
Across Hoxa Sound to the east, the island of South Ronaldsay lay flat and green under the leaden sky. Out of Lachlan’s sight but not out of his mind, the four Churchill Barriers were slowly growing beneath the waves. Someday they would connect South Ronaldsay to Burray to Glimps Holm to Lamb Holm to mainland Orkney—and one of the barriers would soon break through the waters at low tide.
Only months before, the Italian prisoners of war had aimed guns at British soldiers, some motivated by fascist fanaticism and some caught up in a war for which they cared nothing. Now at Scapa Flow, they’d proven able workers.
Only months before, Lachlan would have given them fair and humane treatment, but nothing more. Now compassion and mercy moved him when he dealt with these men, brought to an inhospitable climate on enemy shores.
An American destroyer passed, and Lachlan and Arthur saluted again.
“Your command is ready for our guests?” Arthur asked.
“Aye.” Scapa Flow’s defenses had never been stronger. A new Chain Home Low RDF station had become operational in the Orkneys, and squadrons of Royal Navy Swordfish and Skuas and RAF Spitfires and Hurricanes patrolled the area.
Lachlan’s stomach muscles contracted. Yet he himself would soon cause a security breach—and a controversy—at the base. His reputation would be shattered. His favor with Blake, grudgingly given, would be ripped away.
Lachlan eyed the man by his side. Would he lose Arthur’s friendship as well?
He would enjoy it as long as it lasted. “How go the wedding plans?”
The corner of Arthur’s mouth puckered. “My parents may not be able to obtain passes to Orkney in time.”
