‘She’s gone,’ Margaret said.
I felt Miriam’s neck, sure Margaret was wrong. There’d be a faint pulse. Hard to detect, but there nonetheless. The slightest proof of life.
But Margaret was right. Miriam was gone.
All of Bunny’s scheming had come to nothing. Morning would come, and again the skies would fill with German planes. The WAAFs in the shed, in the shadows of the transmission towers, would do their job, until someone in Berlin got fed up with waiting for Miriam’s report, and sent a bomber to destroy the mysterious facility in the middle of the invasion zone. Better safe than sorry, they’d say to themselves, and they’d be right.
This wasn’t the first time I’d known defeat, far from it, but that didn’t make it any less bitter.
‘We’ll take her back,’ I said.
‘No,’ Margaret said. ‘There’s a different plan.’
She pulled a sheaf of papers from inside Miriam’s jacket, and stuffed them in her own pocket.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked.
But Margaret didn’t answer. She didn’t look at me. Didn’t want me to see what she was thinking. She took Miriam’s handbag, zipped it up, and put the strap over her head and shoulder.
‘I told you,’ she said, ‘there’s a lot you don’t know about me.’
‘Whatever it is,’ I said, ‘this isn’t the answer.’
‘Get out of the boat,’ she said. I didn’t like the tone of her voice. The lightness was gone. The Margaret I knew, pushed aside.
‘I can’t let you go,’ I said.
‘John,’ she said.
There was a click in the darkness. A perfectly recognisable sound. Unmistakable, no matter how I tried to misinterpret it. The hammer of a Webley revolver, pulled back. Stage one of a two-stage firing process, ready for the finger on the trigger.
‘You won’t shoot me,’ I said.
‘What was it Bunny told you?’ she asked.
‘Margaret. This is insane.’
‘Whatever it takes.’
‘I’ll row you out there,’ I said, thinking frantically. As long as we were together, I’d have a chance to turn this around, regardless of what this turned out to be. Was it part of Bunny’s plan? Or had Margaret been playing me for a fool the whole time?
‘Margaret,’ I said.
‘Out of the boat,’ she said.
‘You can’t go out there.’
‘I’ll shoot you,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to, but I’ll do it if
I have to.’
‘Is this Bunny?’ I asked. ‘Or them?’
I didn’t get an answer. I didn’t expect one. What was she going to do? Give me some kind of cock-and-bull story? Besides, she didn’t need to say the words. The gun in her hand was speaking volumes.
‘Swim to the far bank, and don’t look back.’
Last chance, I realised. I looked down at the black water and made to put my hands on the side of the boat. I’d pivot from my waist, spinning back towards her, knock the gun from her hand.
