FRIDAY 28 AUGUST

AIRBASE DEBDEN

The ground has opened up and swallowed him.

Or perhaps it only feels that way.

Or perhaps I just wish that it would, he thinks.

Like everyone else here, Andrew has known for weeks that they are all to be transferred quite soon – the base is being handed over to the U.S. Army Air Force. They have been waiting to hear where each squadron will go. Andrew's only fear has been that Group Captain Galloway, a petty tyrant with ideas about honour, duty and toughness that can best be described as peculiar, will still be his commanding officer at his new post.

But Galloway has just announced that 605 Squadron is being moved to Hastings. Andrew and the other two instructors will go with it.

'I suppose the two of you are aware,' Galloway goes on, turning toward Wing Commander Palgrave and Flight Lieutenant Chatto, 'that Foyle here not only began his war service with several months of flying ops out of Hastings, but has the advantage of being a native. Your father is a policeman there, isn't he, Foyle?'

'Yes, sir, that's correct. Detective Chief Superintendent,' says Andrew.

'I'm sure you'll be pleased to hear that Wing Commander Turner is still the commanding officer at R.A.F. Hastings. I wonder what words of wisdom you can share with your colleagues, Foyle?'

'Well, to begin with,' says Andrew, turning to the others, 'it's definitely excellent news that Wing Commander Turner is still there. He's a superb officer and a very good man and it really was an honour to serve under him.'

No need to dissemble about that, at least.

'And of course, Debden and Hastings, that's apples and oranges,' he goes on, grinning a bit in spite of himself. 'I suppose that's actually something we should bear in mind, as instructors. There are more opportunities for recreation in Hastings than there are here, which will surely be a benefit to our pupils, but there are also many more distractions. And in fact, if I am being given permission to speak freely, sir... ' He looks at his commanding officer, who is now frowning but nods assent.

'Well, I have to say that I do hope Command have given serious thought to the size of the Hastings base,' Andrew continues.

He chooses his words with caution now. He will have to be very careful not to give himself away. Being sent back to Hastings is the last thing he expected, and is fraught with problems – or, more accurately, with one overwhelming problem, he thinks.

'It makes the Debden base look quite vast by comparison, and it was already overcrowded when I was transferred here. I know that many bases are being expanded to accommodate a larger fighting force, but as you say, sir, my father lives in Hastings, and I think he would have told me if that were happening there.'

His father's recent letters have actually been quite terse, written only in response to his own, now that Andrew has been given a release to resume writing them. He has even begun to wonder whether he has put a foot wrong somehow.

Idiot, Andrew thinks. Bleeding idiot. Yes, I did do something wrong, not to say profoundly stupid, and Dad will have figured that out by now. That's if Sam hasn't told him herself.

He's been wondering about this. His father hasn't so much as mentioned her since April, not even in passing.

Andrew waits for Galloway to cut him off but it doesn't happen, so he says the next thing that occurs to him.

'Hastings isn't precisely out of harm's way, either. It's only fifty miles across the Channel to France, so it's an easy target, and of course it's a very important city to the whole country because of its place in history, and the Jerrys know all that. There've been more than enough air raids in Hastings. They haven't only targeted the base. There was a raid there only last week. And -'

He is laying it on too thick now. The three other men, he realizes, are looking at him as though he were slightly mad. I wonder if I am.

'Yes, well,' Galloway said abruptly, 'forewarned is forearmed, isn't it? Dismissed!'

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

'Foyle, I do hope you'll make good use of your pre-transfer leave,' says Palgrave, when they are out of Galloway's earshot. 'You seem like a chap who could use some of what the Yanks call R&R. You catch my drift, I'm sure.'

Chatto manages to be both less vulgar and more direct, once Palgrave has gone.

'You never talk anymore about that girl of yours in Hastings,' he observes.

'No,' Andrew admits. I wouldn't dare.

'When you got here you couldn't seem to stop talking about her,' Chatto goes on.

Andrew likes Chatto, but not enough to confide in him, he decides.

'There are wheels within wheels,' is all he says.

HASTINGS

Not in a good mood, is Milner's first thought as he sits down on one of the visitors' chairs in Foyle's office. His boss is looking through the contents of a file folder that lies open on his desk. Foyle's brows are knitted and his mouth is tight.

'Sir?' Milner ventures after a moment.

'What? Oh. Sorry. Bit too much going on all at once this morning. I've just had three telephone calls from departments to the west of us. There's been a rash of burglaries. Portable typewriters have been taken from a solicitor's office in Littlehampton and a surgery in Eastbourne. They were both Hermes models, manufactured in Switzerland before the war and widely exported. A firm in Brighton that resells business equipment was also burglarized – they lost something called a book typewriter.'

'What's that, I wonder?'

'I'd never heard of it, either, until this morning. Apparently it allows one to type directly into a blank book. A pretty large machine, it seems – not especially portable.'

'Something that would take two people to move, then.'

'Precisely. I'll need you to find out if there's anything more that we ought to know. There also seems to have been an attempt to break into a stationers' shop in Brighton last night,' Mr Foyle went on. 'A Civil Defence warden put a stop to that, but couldn't provide much of a description.'

'Paper's in short supply, there's a demand for it on the black market, so that's not really surprising,' Milner observes. 'But why typewriters, I wonder?'

'Hard to say,' Foyle agrees. 'I've also heard from Hilda Pierce this morning. That name ring a bell? I can't recall whether you've had the pleasure of meeting her.'

'Only once or twice, sir, and then quite briefly, but I know who she is.' No wonder he looks out of sorts, Milner thinks.

'She was very eager to remind me that the anthrax experiment, and the test on the Foxhall Farm cattle, are covered by the Official Secrets Act, which of course we knew, and that while the S.O.E. weren't directly involved – so she says – they do have an interest, effective as of now, in keeping it as quiet as possible.'

'Meaning that we can't discuss Sam's absence, or the real reason for it, with anyone who doesn't know about it already.'

'Precisely.'

'Well, as you say, sir, we already know the lay of the land as far as that situation is concerned. But I've been wondering how this is going to work,' Milner admits. 'I can ask E... Miss Ashford, I mean, I can always her to be careful about discussing the case with anyone, which I'm sure she'd do anyway, but by now most of the hospital staff must know that there were two anthrax patients there this month. And I'm not certain how many people in this department actually know why Sam's been gone.'

'That's what I tried to explain to Miss Pierce! She seems to feel that the department should've realized from the first that there would be a connection to the S.O.E. The thing to do now is to keep the information from spreading, she said.'

'On that subject, sir, any word on Sam coming back to work?'

'Sam telephoned this morning as well. Told me that Dr Brindley has cleared her to come back on Monday. I confirmed that with Dr Brindley myself, but he says in addition that she's not to exert herself for at least a fortnight – no long drives, no going out in heavy weather, no driving during blackout hours if possible. We'll need to keep her busy here.'

'I'll arrange to have a constable available as a stand-by driver.'

'Thank you.'

'The S.O.E. are casting a pretty wide net these days, aren't they, sir?'

'Yes. Disturbingly so.'

SATURDAY 29 AUGUST

'Please, Edith, keep your voice down! This is strictly in confidence.'

She is in high dudgeon; Milner has not seen her so infuriated since someone accused someone else of cheating at yet a third person's card party, and that must be twelve years ago now.

The din in the Plume of Feathers, he had thought, would serve as a cover for their conversation, but it has only tricked both of them into shouting.

'Of course, Paul, you're right. I'm sorry,' says Edith, more quietly now. 'But honestly, this feels a bit like the last straw.'

'What do you mean?'

'Until this month, you see, I'd never actually seen an-'

'Edith.'

'- any cases of that type, which is what I was going to say, Paul,' Edith goes on.

'Sorry.'

'But I do know a few things about infectious diseases.'

'I'm sure you know a great deal!'

'What Miss Stewart has had, it's not that quick to recover from. She ought to convalesce for at least another week. A fortnight would be better. She's out of danger, and a relapse is quite unlikely, but she could be quite vulnerable for a while to anything else that might be spreading 'round. A month's convalescence would be standard, really.' Edith sums up.

'Mr. Foyle told me that Sam telephoned first thing yesterday morning to say that Dr. Brindley told her she could come back to work on Monday, and that he telephoned Dr. Brindley himself to confirm it,' Milner recalls.

'Did he? Why? Doesn't he trust her?'

'She's probably been champing at the bit, and perhaps he wanted to make sure she wasn't just... being over-eager,' Milner says. "Dr. Brindley did tell Mr. Foyle that Sam's to take it easy for a while – no strenuous duty of any kind – which she apparently didn't say.'

'I still don't understand why he would allow it at all,' says Edith, almost to herself.

'Do you think he's a good doctor?'

'Oh, yes, no question about that! That's what makes this so strange!'

'When did he last see her?'

'Thursday, late in the afternoon. So if she told anyone on Friday that he's letting her go back to work, that's when he must have told her that she could. Please do be careful that she doesn't get worn out, Paul. And I know that Dr. Brindley arranged for her to be on sick rations until the middle of September, so please make sure that she eats enough.'

'Well,' Milner says, laughing now, 'this is Sam Stewart we're discussing, so getting her to eat should be no problem at all. The first part is going to be quite a challenge, though – if she thinks she's being kept idle she'll be miserable, and probably quite annoyed.'

'I'll tell you something, though,' Edith goes on. 'It might be just a coincidence, of course, but a strange thing happened Thursday morning, just after I began my shift. Dr Brindley had a visitor in his consulting room – I assumed at first she was a patient, but he didn't examine her. I know he didn't, because he didn't close the door all the way, not at first.'

'Someone from his family, perhaps.'

'No, I don't think so. I definitely heard him call her "Miss" something-or-other, and they didn't seem... cordial. She might have been someone from a patient's family, though – that's possible. I had to pass by his door a couple of times before he finally did close it – I was preparing the morning dosages for my ward – and it sounded as though they were having some sort of argument about a patient. She complained that someone had been discharged too quickly, and Dr Brindley said that it couldn't be avoided, she was no longer contagious and her bed was needed. And then his visitor said that in that case, it was essential to make things look as normal as possible.'

'The discharged patient was a woman?'

'They both said "she" and "her," yes. Definitely.'

'And Dr Brindley's visitor was also a woman?'

'Yes.'

'You didn't catch her name, by any chance?'

'Aren't you meant to be off-duty at this hour, Paul Milner? No – if I did, I've forgotten it. I'm sorry.'

'No, I'm sorry, Edith, it's just that -'

'It was one syllable, though – I'm almost sure of that,' Edith adds suddenly. 'A one-syllable name.'

Milner is silent for a moment. He doesn't like the idea that has just occurred to him.

'Let's talk about something else,' he says at last.

'Hello, Dad.'

'Andrew? Good to hear you.'

'I can't talk for long – there's a queue for this call-box – but I have some news.'

Author's notes:
It is an historical fact that the R.A.F. transferred the airbase in Debden, Essex, to the U.S. Army Air Force in September 1942 (the 12th according to Wikipedia; the 29th according to the website of the 4th Fighter Group Association). The U.S.A.A.F. remained there until September 1945.

As far as I have been able to determine, it is also an historical fact that there has never been an R.A.F. base in or adjacent to Hastings. I have therefore felt free to create a completely imaginary base with a completely imaginary history and geography.

R&R is military – and perhaps especially male American military – shorthand for rest and recreation. During the World War II era, at least, the term seems to have been generally understood to include the use of prostitutes.

The great British humorist P.G. Wodehouse was very fond of the expression there are wheels within wheels (meaning this situation is more complex than it may appear). The earliest written use of it that I've been able to find anywhere is in his story The Great Sermon Handicap (1922): "I have lent him the manuscript at his urgent desire, for, between ourselves, there are wheels within wheels." It shows up in many other places in his work as well. Famously, but in a very different mood and context, the American playwright Arthur Miller used the same phrase in The Crucible (1953): "There are wheels within wheels in this village, and fires within fires!"