Poison in Piccadilly, page 22
“Don’t you want to end the war?” He looked at me earnestly.
Always the idealist, Fredricks claimed together we could end the war. I wanted the war to end as much as he did. But, at this minute, I wanted him more. I leaned into his warmth and put my hand on his knee. He turned and smiled at me. Our eyes met. He kissed me. Breathless, I kissed him back. A passion for peace wasn’t the only passion we shared. There it was again. That tiny peeping sound. I tried to ignore it and continue the pressing business at hand. By the time we reached my building, I was dewy with expectation.
When the carriage stopped, Fredricks reached under the seat and pulled out a small parcel covered with a cloth. Was he about to perform a magician’s trick? At this point, nothing would have surprised me.
“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to the cloth.
“A wedding present.” He smiled.
“But I didn’t get married.” I grinned. Knowing Fredricks, he’d somehow delayed Archie and planned the whole thing.
“An engagement present, then.” He helped me down from the carriage. “I didn’t think I’d ever be so lucky as to have a real chance with you. Fiona, ma chérie, you’ve made me the happiest man alive.” He carried the mystery parcel in one hand and led me up the stairs with the other.
When we reached my door, he waited while I unlocked it.
“I believe it’s customary for the groom to carry the bride over the threshold.” He raised his eyebrows in a most mischievous way.
“I’m not your bride.” I leaned into him. “Not yet.”
“Thus, the blushing bride doesn’t appear too eager to consummate the marriage.”
“So, she has to be carried?” I rolled my eyes. “Against her will.” On tiptoes, I reached up and kissed him. “And what if she is eager?” I nuzzled his neck. “Awfully eager. Terribly eager. Urgently eager,” I whispered breathlessly.
With one hand, he scooped me up, and still kissing me, carried me into the flat. Once inside, I pushed the door shut… with a bit too much force. The bang scared whatever was in the mysterious cage and it let out a loud meow.
“For you, ma chérie.” Fredricks held up the cage. “Uncover it.” He beamed like a proud father.
So, I was to be the magician. I whisked off the cover. “Oh, my word.” My heart melted. Inside a gold cage sat the most adorable kitten I’d ever seen. White with a black mask and a pug nose. When I opened the cage, the little darling climbed out into my hand. I snuggled her to my chest. “I love her.” I looked up at Fredricks. “She’s perfect. And so are you.”
Glowing, Fredricks wrapped us both in an embrace. “Our little family.”
Either the kitten generated an excessive amount of heat or the proximity to Fredricks and the scent of rosewood was going to my head. Slowly, I untied his bow tie and began to unbutton his shirt. He bent down and kissed me with such passion I had to hold onto his shoulders to keep from falling over. I felt like I might combust.
“Perhaps we should show the kitten the bedroom,” I said breathlessly.
“Excellent idea.” Fredricks untied the sash at my waist. He nuzzled my neck. “Fiona, you smell delicious.” When he inhaled it sent tingles down my spine. “Like sweet peaches.”
I led him through the flat to my bedroom. I put the kitten on the floor. With its little tail pointed skyward, it sniffed and explored until it found a feathered slipper. It reared up and pounced. Fredricks and I both broke out laughing. While the kitten played with my slipper, I played with a lock of Fredricks’s beautiful black hair.
“I’ll be back in a second,” I said, tearing myself away. I had plans for the lacy chemise waiting by the door in my suitcase. I dashed out, retrieved the case, and took it into the lavatory. My chest was buzzing as I quickly tore off my wedding dress and most of my smalls and slipped into the delicate chemise. I glanced in the mirror. Oh, what the heck. I pulled off my wig and then washed my face clean with rose-scented soap.
“I miss you, ma chérie,” Fredricks called from the bedroom. “Hurry back.”
I stared at myself in the mirror. Did I really want to be Mrs. Fiona Figg Fredricks? There were worse things I could imagine. Mrs. Fiona Figg Fredricks. It was a bit of a mouthful… but so was Fredrick Fredricks.
I smiled, thinking of Captain Hall’s orders. “Stay on top of him. Don’t let him out of your sight.” I giggled. How far would I go for my country? We were about to find out.
I fastened the belt and chatelaine bag around the waist of my chemise. I might need my notebook and pencil to record “all intercourse.” I smiled at my reflection. I was a sight. Shorn hair. Barely clothed. A belt and bag around my waist. Fredricks would be amused if nothing else. I replaced my notebook. I didn’t need it. “Not this time,” I said to myself. Thankfully, my photographic memory would allow me to keep my hands free. And I had a feeling that I would need both hands on deck to stay on top of Fredricks. I couldn’t stop giggling. I planned to memorize every inch of him. Stick to him, the captain had ordered. And I was a stickler for following orders.
“Pussy and I are both getting cold without you, ma chérie,” Fredricks called.
“I’m coming!” I called back.
For fun, I pressed my Horace moustache onto my upper lip with a dab of spirit gum. I laughed out loud. What fun!
I headed for the bedroom. Halfway there, I stopped. I dashed back to the coat rack, removed my new hat, and withdrew the emerald hatpin. The one Fredricks had given me. Espionage was a dangerous business. I tested the tip against my index finger. Ouch. It was sharp. Fredricks had better behave himself or I’d show him the tricks I’d learned at the Suffrajitsu demonstration.
I tightened my lips to keep from laughing and then tucked the weapon into my holster. “I’m coming.” Repressing a fit of giggles, I dashed back into the bedroom.
Oh, the things I do for king and country.
MORE FROM KELLY OLIVER
We hope you enjoyed reading Poison in Piccadilly. If you did, please leave a review. If you’d like to gift a copy, this book is available to purchase in paperback, hardback, large print and audio.
Arsenic at Ascot, another Fiona Figg & Kitty Lane Mystery from Kelly Oliver, is available to buy now by clicking on the image below. Or read on for an exclusive extract…
Chapter 1
The Telegram
I knew it would happen sooner or later.
In one week, I’d gone from fearless lady spy to glorified gopher. Well, perhaps not that fearless… and not that glorified either.
I reshuffled the already neatly stacked file folders and arranged them to exactly parallel to the corner of my desk. I may be a mere file clerk, but mine was the tidiest desk in the Old Admiralty. This wasn’t saying much, given the manly state of disorder in most of the War Office—especially Room 40, with its rows of drafting tables all overflowing with papers, telegrams, and folders. According to my dearly departed father, outward turmoil concealed inner peace. If so, the men in Room 40 had the souls of monks.
Thankfully, the converse wasn’t true, or my mind would be a battlefield. I patted the top of the stack. No. A well-ordered desk was a sign of a well-ordered mind.
A wooden screen kept my little corner separated from the pandemonium on the other side where the codebreakers worked on deciphering German telegrams and secret messages. The room was long and narrow, like the barrel of a rifle. Standing at one end, you could barely see out the windows at the other. At the far end of the room, a few desks held teletype machines. Most of those were operated by women working alone. But the male codebreakers worked in packs like wolves. One such pack—three of the best codebreakers in the business—huddled around a drafting table just on the other side of my screen. They howled whenever they cracked a German code.
A lot of crucial deciphering of enemy telegrams and such happened in Room 40.
Just not by me.
My boss, Captain Reginald “Blinker” Hall, had assured me this wasn’t a demotion. I was just back where I belonged. And not because I’d failed on my last mission, or because of my penchant for “silly disguises” as he called them. To be fair, I hadn’t had the opportunity to wear a disguise on my last assignment, unfortunately.
As Captain Hall informed me, my singular mission—besides filing and fetching tea—was to follow the notorious German spy and South African huntsman, Fredrick Fredricks, expert in war propaganda and agent provocateur. Over the last seven months, I’d followed him across the globe from Paris to Cairo and back again as he disposed of double agents and undermined the British war efforts. Always one step ahead of me, he’d taunted, teased, and shamelessly flirted. Cheeky cad. Captain Hall insisted Fredricks was of more use to us alive. But I wasn’t so sure.
Heat spread up my neck as I remembered our one secret kiss in the mountains of Northern Italy. Not a real kiss, mind you. Merely an espionage ruse to avoid detection. We’d almost been caught following a couple of socialists and had to stage a kiss. When I closed my eyes, I could almost conjure his sandalwood scent. Get a grip, Fiona. He’s your enemy, for goodness’ sake.
Trouble was, no one knew where to find the bounder. He’d vanished without a trace. His trail had gone cold and as a result so had my spying activities.
I gathered the stack of folders and went to the filing cabinet. Balancing the stack on one forearm, I opened the top drawer. A familiar smell hit my nose. The earthy scent of aging paper laced with stale cigar smoke and a hint of lingering futility. At least I could console myself that I’d developed the world’s best filing system.
“Miss Figg, be a good girl and bring us some fresh tea.” The booming voice coming from the other side of the screen was unmistakably that of Mr. Dillwyn “Dilly” Knox, former papyrologist at King’s College, Cambridge, known as much for his dalliances as his codebreaking.
Moving my fingers along the tops of the folders in the drawer, one by one, I slid the new ones into their proper places, and pretended I hadn’t heard Mr. Knox.
“Did you hear me, Fiona?” He bellowed so loud, everyone in the building had heard him.
I stacked the remaining folders on top of the filing cabinet and poked my head around the screen. “You rang, sir.”
“A spot of fresh tea, if you please.” His thick lips parted into a lascivious smile. “Mine has gone cold.”
Cold tea. Cold trails. Cold careers. What hadn’t gone cold?
I stepped in front of the divider.
“Yes, sir.” I bobbed a quick curtsy. “Very well, sir.”
He laughed and waved me along.
I’d been right about one thing. Without Fredricks, I was nothing but ordinary, boring Fiona Figg, head file clerk and twenty-five-year-old war widow on her way to spinsterhood. Truth be told, my husband had divorced me before he was killed, which made me neither a widow nor a spinster but something far worse, a divorcee. I sauntered to the kitchenette, making a show of dragging my feet and taking my time. Making tea when I should be trailing spies. Sigh. How I missed the adventure already.
“Shake your tailfeathers, Miss Figg,” Mr. Knox called after me. “I’m dry as an ancient Egyptian papyrus.”
Tailfeathers, my flat feet.
“Oh, go stick your head in a bucket,” I said under my breath.
“What’s that, Miss Figg?”
I turned and flashed a fake smile.
He was peering over the top of his eyeglasses at me.
“Oh, with a bit of luck it—” I rounded the corner into the kitchenette “—will be ready in two shakes.”
“It had better be.” He sighed. “Monday mornings are cursed.”
The kitchenette was a narrow rectangle with yellowing wallpaper, chipped floor tiles, and a stained counter sporting a Bachelor’s Stove. As usual, the small sink was overflowing with dirty dishes. Really. Couldn’t these brilliant men clean up after themselves? How hard was it to wipe out a cup? I huffed as I stood staring at the mess. Too busy with national secrets to drop an empty biscuit box into the rubbish bin. Shaking my head, I put on the kettle and set to work washing the dishes while I waited for the water to boil. The kettle whistled and I rushed to remove it lest it disturb the codebreakers. They could be a cranky bunch.
I whirled hot water around in a stained porcelain teapot that had obviously seen better days, and then emptied it in the newly cleaned sink. I poured a goodly amount of black tea from a paper bag into the pot and followed with boiling water. After letting it steep into a nice strong brew, I loaded a tray with a little jug of milk and several cups. Anyone wanting a slice of lemon was out of luck. I hadn’t seen a lemon since the bloody war began almost four years ago. Thanks to the Defense of the Realm, Cake and Pastry Order, however, tea was declared a weapon of war and thus essential to our troops’ success. It certainly was essential to my success. As my grandmother always said, “With a good strong cuppa, you can get through anything.”
“I say.” A familiar voice came from the doorway. “Fiona, old thing, there you are.” Captain Clifford Douglas, good friend, compulsory chaperone, and blabbermouth. With his receding hairline and long face, he looked rather like a horse. A well-groomed horse.
The wet dog at his feet shook itself, spraying me with mist.
Almost anything.
The little beast, Poppy the Pekingese, belonged to my erstwhile espionage partner Kitty Lane. The girl had stayed behind on our last mission to tie up loose ends. Unlike me, she had not been recalled from the field.
“Perfect timing.” Grinning, Clifford eyed the tea tray. Why the War Office thought I needed a chaperone was beyond me. Still, I had to admit, I’d come to rely on good old Clifford. He was as loyal as a hound.
“Be a lamb and carry this out, will you?” I handed him the tray.
He stared at me like I’d asked him to walk naked across Whitehall. I pushed it at him and reluctantly he obliged. If I could deliver tea, so could he. After all, he had been grounded too. The only place he’d chaperoned me in the last week had been to the canteen for lunch. While he’d enjoyed toad-in-the-hole and suet pudding and nattered on about god-awful hunting adventures, I’d nibbled on buttered toast and sipped tea.
We delivered the tea to Mr. Knox’s workstation, where three codebreakers stood, heads together, examining a telegram.
“I say.” Clifford shoved a pile of papers out of the way and sat the tray on the table. “Have you broken a code?”
The men clammed up. Mr. Knox flipped over the telegram.
Curses. If Clifford wasn’t along, they might have given me a glimpse. I had helped solve the Zimmerman telegram that got the Americans to join the war.
I poured a splash of milk into each cup. The men could help themselves to the tea. I wasn’t a servant.
“Is it true you have a photographic memory, Miss Figg?” Mr. Nigel Grey slid a cup and saucer off the tray. The other men called him “dormouse,” presumably because he was petite with a pointed nose and sleepy eyes. The grandson of the fifth Lord Walsingham, he’d been a whizz at languages at Eton and was recruited by the head of cryptography.
“Let’s see a demonstration, shall we?” Mr. Knox chuckled. Glancing around the mess of papers strewn across the table, he plucked one out and thrust it at me. “Take a look and then we’ll test you.”
“I’m not a trained monkey at a circus.” I put my hands on my hips. I wasn’t about to humor him with a demonstration. Ridiculous man.
“I’ll bet you can’t do it,” Mr. Knox said, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
I scowled, determined not to be baited.
He waved the sheet of paper under my nose. “If you can reproduce this word for word, we’ll let you see the latest telegram we intercepted.” He nodded to his pals. “Right, lads?”
“Don’t pester Miss Figg.” Mr. Montgomery came to my defense. With his pinched face and spectacles, Mr. William Montgomery still looked more like a preacher than a codebreaker. A Presbyterian minister and an expert translator of German theological texts before the war, now he was the head of cryptography.
Too late. “You’re on.” I’d already snatched the paper from Mr. Knox’s meaty paw.
Good heavens. The document was in German. While my French was passable, my German was rudimentary at best. It was no use trying to read the bloody thing. I stared at it, forming a mental snapshot. That was the way my memory worked. I could commit any document to memory just by looking at it. It truly was as if my mind took a photograph and later, I could reproduce it in full even without comprehending one whit.
Mr. Knox grabbed the paper out of my hand. “You’ve studied it long enough.” He slapped a fresh piece of paper onto the table and then pulled out a chair. “Have a seat, Miss Figg. Let’s see what you can do.” Smiling, he winked at the other men.
“Fiona has a brilliant memory.” Clifford removed a pencil from his breast pocket and handed it to me. “The old bean can probably recreate every document in that bloody filing cabinet.” He pointed toward my workstation.
I nodded. At least someone believed in me. “Tea, if you please.” If I was putting on a show, I might as well get celebrity treatment.
Clifford fetched a cup from the tray and sat it on the table next to the blank sheet of paper.
“Quit stalling, old bean.” Mr. Knox chuckled, causing his ample belly to shake. “Worried you can’t do it?”
Even Poppy, the little beast, looked up at me expectantly.
Pencil in hand, I took a sip of tea, and then began transcribing from memory. Once I started, I couldn’t stop, lest the text unravel. I had to reproduce it all at once, as fast as I could, or the picture lingering before my mind might vanish. The document was in front of my mind’s eye just as it was before my physical eye only moments ago. But this version was ethereal and fragile, like the vapor floating up from my teacup. An automaton, without any idea of their meaning, I wrote out the German words.
“By God!” Mr. Knox said. “She’s doing it.”
“I told you.” The way Clifford beamed, I wondered if he’d put a wager on me.
Always the idealist, Fredricks claimed together we could end the war. I wanted the war to end as much as he did. But, at this minute, I wanted him more. I leaned into his warmth and put my hand on his knee. He turned and smiled at me. Our eyes met. He kissed me. Breathless, I kissed him back. A passion for peace wasn’t the only passion we shared. There it was again. That tiny peeping sound. I tried to ignore it and continue the pressing business at hand. By the time we reached my building, I was dewy with expectation.
When the carriage stopped, Fredricks reached under the seat and pulled out a small parcel covered with a cloth. Was he about to perform a magician’s trick? At this point, nothing would have surprised me.
“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to the cloth.
“A wedding present.” He smiled.
“But I didn’t get married.” I grinned. Knowing Fredricks, he’d somehow delayed Archie and planned the whole thing.
“An engagement present, then.” He helped me down from the carriage. “I didn’t think I’d ever be so lucky as to have a real chance with you. Fiona, ma chérie, you’ve made me the happiest man alive.” He carried the mystery parcel in one hand and led me up the stairs with the other.
When we reached my door, he waited while I unlocked it.
“I believe it’s customary for the groom to carry the bride over the threshold.” He raised his eyebrows in a most mischievous way.
“I’m not your bride.” I leaned into him. “Not yet.”
“Thus, the blushing bride doesn’t appear too eager to consummate the marriage.”
“So, she has to be carried?” I rolled my eyes. “Against her will.” On tiptoes, I reached up and kissed him. “And what if she is eager?” I nuzzled his neck. “Awfully eager. Terribly eager. Urgently eager,” I whispered breathlessly.
With one hand, he scooped me up, and still kissing me, carried me into the flat. Once inside, I pushed the door shut… with a bit too much force. The bang scared whatever was in the mysterious cage and it let out a loud meow.
“For you, ma chérie.” Fredricks held up the cage. “Uncover it.” He beamed like a proud father.
So, I was to be the magician. I whisked off the cover. “Oh, my word.” My heart melted. Inside a gold cage sat the most adorable kitten I’d ever seen. White with a black mask and a pug nose. When I opened the cage, the little darling climbed out into my hand. I snuggled her to my chest. “I love her.” I looked up at Fredricks. “She’s perfect. And so are you.”
Glowing, Fredricks wrapped us both in an embrace. “Our little family.”
Either the kitten generated an excessive amount of heat or the proximity to Fredricks and the scent of rosewood was going to my head. Slowly, I untied his bow tie and began to unbutton his shirt. He bent down and kissed me with such passion I had to hold onto his shoulders to keep from falling over. I felt like I might combust.
“Perhaps we should show the kitten the bedroom,” I said breathlessly.
“Excellent idea.” Fredricks untied the sash at my waist. He nuzzled my neck. “Fiona, you smell delicious.” When he inhaled it sent tingles down my spine. “Like sweet peaches.”
I led him through the flat to my bedroom. I put the kitten on the floor. With its little tail pointed skyward, it sniffed and explored until it found a feathered slipper. It reared up and pounced. Fredricks and I both broke out laughing. While the kitten played with my slipper, I played with a lock of Fredricks’s beautiful black hair.
“I’ll be back in a second,” I said, tearing myself away. I had plans for the lacy chemise waiting by the door in my suitcase. I dashed out, retrieved the case, and took it into the lavatory. My chest was buzzing as I quickly tore off my wedding dress and most of my smalls and slipped into the delicate chemise. I glanced in the mirror. Oh, what the heck. I pulled off my wig and then washed my face clean with rose-scented soap.
“I miss you, ma chérie,” Fredricks called from the bedroom. “Hurry back.”
I stared at myself in the mirror. Did I really want to be Mrs. Fiona Figg Fredricks? There were worse things I could imagine. Mrs. Fiona Figg Fredricks. It was a bit of a mouthful… but so was Fredrick Fredricks.
I smiled, thinking of Captain Hall’s orders. “Stay on top of him. Don’t let him out of your sight.” I giggled. How far would I go for my country? We were about to find out.
I fastened the belt and chatelaine bag around the waist of my chemise. I might need my notebook and pencil to record “all intercourse.” I smiled at my reflection. I was a sight. Shorn hair. Barely clothed. A belt and bag around my waist. Fredricks would be amused if nothing else. I replaced my notebook. I didn’t need it. “Not this time,” I said to myself. Thankfully, my photographic memory would allow me to keep my hands free. And I had a feeling that I would need both hands on deck to stay on top of Fredricks. I couldn’t stop giggling. I planned to memorize every inch of him. Stick to him, the captain had ordered. And I was a stickler for following orders.
“Pussy and I are both getting cold without you, ma chérie,” Fredricks called.
“I’m coming!” I called back.
For fun, I pressed my Horace moustache onto my upper lip with a dab of spirit gum. I laughed out loud. What fun!
I headed for the bedroom. Halfway there, I stopped. I dashed back to the coat rack, removed my new hat, and withdrew the emerald hatpin. The one Fredricks had given me. Espionage was a dangerous business. I tested the tip against my index finger. Ouch. It was sharp. Fredricks had better behave himself or I’d show him the tricks I’d learned at the Suffrajitsu demonstration.
I tightened my lips to keep from laughing and then tucked the weapon into my holster. “I’m coming.” Repressing a fit of giggles, I dashed back into the bedroom.
Oh, the things I do for king and country.
MORE FROM KELLY OLIVER
We hope you enjoyed reading Poison in Piccadilly. If you did, please leave a review. If you’d like to gift a copy, this book is available to purchase in paperback, hardback, large print and audio.
Arsenic at Ascot, another Fiona Figg & Kitty Lane Mystery from Kelly Oliver, is available to buy now by clicking on the image below. Or read on for an exclusive extract…
Chapter 1
The Telegram
I knew it would happen sooner or later.
In one week, I’d gone from fearless lady spy to glorified gopher. Well, perhaps not that fearless… and not that glorified either.
I reshuffled the already neatly stacked file folders and arranged them to exactly parallel to the corner of my desk. I may be a mere file clerk, but mine was the tidiest desk in the Old Admiralty. This wasn’t saying much, given the manly state of disorder in most of the War Office—especially Room 40, with its rows of drafting tables all overflowing with papers, telegrams, and folders. According to my dearly departed father, outward turmoil concealed inner peace. If so, the men in Room 40 had the souls of monks.
Thankfully, the converse wasn’t true, or my mind would be a battlefield. I patted the top of the stack. No. A well-ordered desk was a sign of a well-ordered mind.
A wooden screen kept my little corner separated from the pandemonium on the other side where the codebreakers worked on deciphering German telegrams and secret messages. The room was long and narrow, like the barrel of a rifle. Standing at one end, you could barely see out the windows at the other. At the far end of the room, a few desks held teletype machines. Most of those were operated by women working alone. But the male codebreakers worked in packs like wolves. One such pack—three of the best codebreakers in the business—huddled around a drafting table just on the other side of my screen. They howled whenever they cracked a German code.
A lot of crucial deciphering of enemy telegrams and such happened in Room 40.
Just not by me.
My boss, Captain Reginald “Blinker” Hall, had assured me this wasn’t a demotion. I was just back where I belonged. And not because I’d failed on my last mission, or because of my penchant for “silly disguises” as he called them. To be fair, I hadn’t had the opportunity to wear a disguise on my last assignment, unfortunately.
As Captain Hall informed me, my singular mission—besides filing and fetching tea—was to follow the notorious German spy and South African huntsman, Fredrick Fredricks, expert in war propaganda and agent provocateur. Over the last seven months, I’d followed him across the globe from Paris to Cairo and back again as he disposed of double agents and undermined the British war efforts. Always one step ahead of me, he’d taunted, teased, and shamelessly flirted. Cheeky cad. Captain Hall insisted Fredricks was of more use to us alive. But I wasn’t so sure.
Heat spread up my neck as I remembered our one secret kiss in the mountains of Northern Italy. Not a real kiss, mind you. Merely an espionage ruse to avoid detection. We’d almost been caught following a couple of socialists and had to stage a kiss. When I closed my eyes, I could almost conjure his sandalwood scent. Get a grip, Fiona. He’s your enemy, for goodness’ sake.
Trouble was, no one knew where to find the bounder. He’d vanished without a trace. His trail had gone cold and as a result so had my spying activities.
I gathered the stack of folders and went to the filing cabinet. Balancing the stack on one forearm, I opened the top drawer. A familiar smell hit my nose. The earthy scent of aging paper laced with stale cigar smoke and a hint of lingering futility. At least I could console myself that I’d developed the world’s best filing system.
“Miss Figg, be a good girl and bring us some fresh tea.” The booming voice coming from the other side of the screen was unmistakably that of Mr. Dillwyn “Dilly” Knox, former papyrologist at King’s College, Cambridge, known as much for his dalliances as his codebreaking.
Moving my fingers along the tops of the folders in the drawer, one by one, I slid the new ones into their proper places, and pretended I hadn’t heard Mr. Knox.
“Did you hear me, Fiona?” He bellowed so loud, everyone in the building had heard him.
I stacked the remaining folders on top of the filing cabinet and poked my head around the screen. “You rang, sir.”
“A spot of fresh tea, if you please.” His thick lips parted into a lascivious smile. “Mine has gone cold.”
Cold tea. Cold trails. Cold careers. What hadn’t gone cold?
I stepped in front of the divider.
“Yes, sir.” I bobbed a quick curtsy. “Very well, sir.”
He laughed and waved me along.
I’d been right about one thing. Without Fredricks, I was nothing but ordinary, boring Fiona Figg, head file clerk and twenty-five-year-old war widow on her way to spinsterhood. Truth be told, my husband had divorced me before he was killed, which made me neither a widow nor a spinster but something far worse, a divorcee. I sauntered to the kitchenette, making a show of dragging my feet and taking my time. Making tea when I should be trailing spies. Sigh. How I missed the adventure already.
“Shake your tailfeathers, Miss Figg,” Mr. Knox called after me. “I’m dry as an ancient Egyptian papyrus.”
Tailfeathers, my flat feet.
“Oh, go stick your head in a bucket,” I said under my breath.
“What’s that, Miss Figg?”
I turned and flashed a fake smile.
He was peering over the top of his eyeglasses at me.
“Oh, with a bit of luck it—” I rounded the corner into the kitchenette “—will be ready in two shakes.”
“It had better be.” He sighed. “Monday mornings are cursed.”
The kitchenette was a narrow rectangle with yellowing wallpaper, chipped floor tiles, and a stained counter sporting a Bachelor’s Stove. As usual, the small sink was overflowing with dirty dishes. Really. Couldn’t these brilliant men clean up after themselves? How hard was it to wipe out a cup? I huffed as I stood staring at the mess. Too busy with national secrets to drop an empty biscuit box into the rubbish bin. Shaking my head, I put on the kettle and set to work washing the dishes while I waited for the water to boil. The kettle whistled and I rushed to remove it lest it disturb the codebreakers. They could be a cranky bunch.
I whirled hot water around in a stained porcelain teapot that had obviously seen better days, and then emptied it in the newly cleaned sink. I poured a goodly amount of black tea from a paper bag into the pot and followed with boiling water. After letting it steep into a nice strong brew, I loaded a tray with a little jug of milk and several cups. Anyone wanting a slice of lemon was out of luck. I hadn’t seen a lemon since the bloody war began almost four years ago. Thanks to the Defense of the Realm, Cake and Pastry Order, however, tea was declared a weapon of war and thus essential to our troops’ success. It certainly was essential to my success. As my grandmother always said, “With a good strong cuppa, you can get through anything.”
“I say.” A familiar voice came from the doorway. “Fiona, old thing, there you are.” Captain Clifford Douglas, good friend, compulsory chaperone, and blabbermouth. With his receding hairline and long face, he looked rather like a horse. A well-groomed horse.
The wet dog at his feet shook itself, spraying me with mist.
Almost anything.
The little beast, Poppy the Pekingese, belonged to my erstwhile espionage partner Kitty Lane. The girl had stayed behind on our last mission to tie up loose ends. Unlike me, she had not been recalled from the field.
“Perfect timing.” Grinning, Clifford eyed the tea tray. Why the War Office thought I needed a chaperone was beyond me. Still, I had to admit, I’d come to rely on good old Clifford. He was as loyal as a hound.
“Be a lamb and carry this out, will you?” I handed him the tray.
He stared at me like I’d asked him to walk naked across Whitehall. I pushed it at him and reluctantly he obliged. If I could deliver tea, so could he. After all, he had been grounded too. The only place he’d chaperoned me in the last week had been to the canteen for lunch. While he’d enjoyed toad-in-the-hole and suet pudding and nattered on about god-awful hunting adventures, I’d nibbled on buttered toast and sipped tea.
We delivered the tea to Mr. Knox’s workstation, where three codebreakers stood, heads together, examining a telegram.
“I say.” Clifford shoved a pile of papers out of the way and sat the tray on the table. “Have you broken a code?”
The men clammed up. Mr. Knox flipped over the telegram.
Curses. If Clifford wasn’t along, they might have given me a glimpse. I had helped solve the Zimmerman telegram that got the Americans to join the war.
I poured a splash of milk into each cup. The men could help themselves to the tea. I wasn’t a servant.
“Is it true you have a photographic memory, Miss Figg?” Mr. Nigel Grey slid a cup and saucer off the tray. The other men called him “dormouse,” presumably because he was petite with a pointed nose and sleepy eyes. The grandson of the fifth Lord Walsingham, he’d been a whizz at languages at Eton and was recruited by the head of cryptography.
“Let’s see a demonstration, shall we?” Mr. Knox chuckled. Glancing around the mess of papers strewn across the table, he plucked one out and thrust it at me. “Take a look and then we’ll test you.”
“I’m not a trained monkey at a circus.” I put my hands on my hips. I wasn’t about to humor him with a demonstration. Ridiculous man.
“I’ll bet you can’t do it,” Mr. Knox said, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
I scowled, determined not to be baited.
He waved the sheet of paper under my nose. “If you can reproduce this word for word, we’ll let you see the latest telegram we intercepted.” He nodded to his pals. “Right, lads?”
“Don’t pester Miss Figg.” Mr. Montgomery came to my defense. With his pinched face and spectacles, Mr. William Montgomery still looked more like a preacher than a codebreaker. A Presbyterian minister and an expert translator of German theological texts before the war, now he was the head of cryptography.
Too late. “You’re on.” I’d already snatched the paper from Mr. Knox’s meaty paw.
Good heavens. The document was in German. While my French was passable, my German was rudimentary at best. It was no use trying to read the bloody thing. I stared at it, forming a mental snapshot. That was the way my memory worked. I could commit any document to memory just by looking at it. It truly was as if my mind took a photograph and later, I could reproduce it in full even without comprehending one whit.
Mr. Knox grabbed the paper out of my hand. “You’ve studied it long enough.” He slapped a fresh piece of paper onto the table and then pulled out a chair. “Have a seat, Miss Figg. Let’s see what you can do.” Smiling, he winked at the other men.
“Fiona has a brilliant memory.” Clifford removed a pencil from his breast pocket and handed it to me. “The old bean can probably recreate every document in that bloody filing cabinet.” He pointed toward my workstation.
I nodded. At least someone believed in me. “Tea, if you please.” If I was putting on a show, I might as well get celebrity treatment.
Clifford fetched a cup from the tray and sat it on the table next to the blank sheet of paper.
“Quit stalling, old bean.” Mr. Knox chuckled, causing his ample belly to shake. “Worried you can’t do it?”
Even Poppy, the little beast, looked up at me expectantly.
Pencil in hand, I took a sip of tea, and then began transcribing from memory. Once I started, I couldn’t stop, lest the text unravel. I had to reproduce it all at once, as fast as I could, or the picture lingering before my mind might vanish. The document was in front of my mind’s eye just as it was before my physical eye only moments ago. But this version was ethereal and fragile, like the vapor floating up from my teacup. An automaton, without any idea of their meaning, I wrote out the German words.
“By God!” Mr. Knox said. “She’s doing it.”
“I told you.” The way Clifford beamed, I wondered if he’d put a wager on me.
