WRENS Headquarters
WHEN NIKI ROUTINELY CHECKED her mailbox and found the manila folder containing orders to report to Colonel Thornton’s London office the next day, she was amazed. In the weeks since her interview, she had resigned herself to the fact that she was not going to be called for any kind of special assignment.
She was both excited and apprehensive. This was what she wanted, wasn’t it? Yes, but that was before she and Fraser …
Quickly she thrust those thoughts aside. This was wartime. If there was anything she could do to free her beloved France or help in any way the effort to defeat the Nazis, no personal consideration mattered.
If Fraser were ordered to some special duty, he would not hesitate.
Niki ran up the steps to her cabin, two at a time. She would have to catch the next train to London. There was hardly enough time to do anything but pack, make a few phone calls.
Her heart was beating so fast, she could hardly breathe. At last something was happening. A new kind of challenge. As Tante used to say at the start of any new phase in life, “Think of it as a great adventure.”
Colonel Thornton looked up as she was ushered into his office. Niki saluted and he gestured to a chair opposite his desk.
Briefly he told her that her application had been reviewed and in light of her bilingual skills, she was being assigned to a special training unit. She would be issued a travel warrant from London to Scotland, where she would be met at … He wrote the name of the town on a slip of paper, handed it to her, saying tersely, “Top secret. Read it, memorize it, tear it up.”
Niki felt a chill, like a cold finger trailing down the back of her neck. She’d asked for something like this. But after nothing had come of her first interview, she had given up hope that she would ever be called. Colonel Thornton gave her a hard look from under his bushy eyebrows.
“You haven’t changed your mind, have you?” he demanded.
“No sir,” she said quickly.
“Good. You understand it is absolutely essential that you discuss this with no one. Not even your closest friend, your family.” He frowned. “Or boyfriend. Do you have a boyfriend?”
The thought of Fraser flashed through her mind, and Niki pushed it away. She couldn’t call him a boyfriend after only four meetings, could she?
“No sir.”
“Good. That’s all, then. The date and time of your train is on this.” Another slip of paper was passed over to her. Then Colonel Thornton stood up, saying, “Good luck.” He saluted her.
Niki got to her feet, saluted, and walked out of the office, the slip of paper that was going to change her life clutched tightly in her hand.
Niki stepped off the train at the bleak Loch Ennis station and was immediately chilled by the cold, damp wind. She felt stiff and achy from the long trip north to Scotland, as well as apprehensive as to what lay ahead.
It had been a tense time. Elly of course had been curious, but all Niki could tell her was that she’d been tapped for some special training. She told the same story to Bryanne when she called Birchfields. She had tried to reach Fraser but had only been able to leave a message. The voice that had answered at his base said only that he wasn’t available and that he would put her message in his box. Niki hated leaving without talking to him. But she couldn’t have told him anything anyway. Maybe it was better not to clutter up her resolve but to be totally committed to whatever this new assignment involved. She knew their attraction for each other was strong and could make her less willing to take on whatever it was.
Niki straightened her jacket, her hat, knowing that her uniform—which had been neatly pressed, her shirt fresh, when she boarded the train yesterday—was now rumpled and looked as though it had been slept in, which it had.
There were six people standing in a group at the other end of the nearly empty platform, one officer, four men in army fatigues, and one woman in the uniform of the army nurse corps. Since there was nobody else about, Niki decided this must be the rest of the team she’d be joining. She shouldered her overarm bag and walked slowly over to them. She smiled and tried to make eye contact, but most of them did not respond. Everyone stood, shoulders hunched, obviously trying to brace themselves against the cutting wind.
The officer, a stern-faced man, approached. “I’m Captain Mullen,” he announced and went down the line, shaking hands, the four men first, then the nurse, and finally Niki. She started to say, “I’m Wren Gilbreaux” when he snapped, “Name not necessary.”
Rebuked, Niki blushed hotly.
“We’ll be boarding the bus now,” the officer barked. “Briefing then.”
As they lined up to get on the gray-brown camouflaged bus, the army nurse whispered, “I guess this is going to be bare knuckles, no Marquess of Queensbury rules.” Niki gave her a grateful smile, glad that someone in this crowd had a sense of humor.
It was a jolting, rough journey until they finally arrived at a bleak stone building. It looked as though it might be the kind of boarding school to which Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre had been sent to, Niki thought with some amusement. But that was about the last amusing thought Niki was to have in several long weeks.
At Loch Ennis their day began at five. A stand-up breakfast of bread, tea or coffee, was followed by a two-mile walk whatever the weather. Scotland at this time of year seemed terminally overcast or raining. After this came an hour’s calisthenics. The midday meal consisted of a nondescript soup, more bread, rice pudding or junket. In the afternoons there where lectures—some on the geography of France, others on how to identify various kinds of German aircraft by learning the parts from fuselage to tail. Niki had never been the least bit interested in mechanics, so she found it hard to remain alert and attentive during these hours. Harder still for a girl like her with no mechanical ability were the radio labs. Here they were given the components of small transmitter radios, told to construct one from the instructions, then take it apart, put it together again. Niki felt hopelessly clumsy at this. Before the day ended, another hour was spent in a saturation course in phonetic French. Of course, this was easier for her. In this she could help Jennifer and Max, the two members of the team with whom she had become friends. It was hard to make real friends during such intense indoctrination. The fact that everyone was so focused on making the grade created an unnatural atmosphere, not one conducive to easy friendship. Evenings were supposed to be more relaxed, but actually most everyone was worn out from the long day of physical and mental effort. People tended to make it a short evening, with few lingering in the huge lounge after dinner.
Some nights Jennifer would knock on Niki’s door and come in for a brief chat. Niki could tell that in spite of how arduous her nurse’s training might have been, Jennifer found this hard going. Niki sensed her nervousness and sympathized. But neither of them allowed themselves to confess their fears or their doubts. It was as if expressing them would make them too real. All they wanted was to qualify for whatever the point of the training was. Rumors were rife, but no one knew exactly what their mission would be. Were they to be couriers, agents, radio operators? All they knew was that they were being closely monitored to determine the category for which they would best be fitted.
The morning after their first rock climbing exercise on the cliffs above the stormy ocean, one of the team was missing. No one asked why. He had had an obvious emotional problem about heights. As they were climbing, linked by a rope, he had frozen, unable to go up or down. Both those above him and those below him were stuck in their positions by his immobility. Eventually he pulled it together and made it to the top. But there he was shaking so visibly that it was impossible for him to hide it from the others. The next morning he didn’t show up. Nothing was explained. But it was clear to the rest that there were no second chances. The experience troubled Niki deeply. She had been scared silly herself but somehow had managed this climb. Still, there were two more climbs ahead, each progressively more difficult.
The morning of the second climb, Niki tried not to think of what had happened to her teammate. When they hiked to the bottom of the rock cliff, she did not dare look up to the top. There was nothing to do but clench her jaw, grit her teeth, and begin. Look for the first handhold, grip it, search for a toehold, move steadily upward, keep climbing. “Nice view,” Max quipped from behind her, but Niki only clamped her teeth together harder and reached for the next crevice. Only sheer grit kept her going.
The days passed until they’d been there three weeks—the halfway point. There were still five of them. They knew the final physical trial was coming, a survival test. The morning it was scheduled, Niki woke up with a stomachache. Nerves, she told herself. She managed to swallow some tea, a crust of bread. They were issued a compass, a basic ration pack, a tarpaulin folded into an oilskin envelope. They piled into a van and were driven out to a stretch of moor at least thirty miles from the building. There they were told to report back in twenty-four hours.
Niki knew this was the ultimate physical test. The make-or-break one. If, as the teammates had discussed among themselves, they were to parachute into occupied France, they would be on their own, have to manage on minimum supplies, having been given a map to get to the nearest “safe house.” There, presumably, a member of the French Resistance would help them until they set up the shortwave radio in the designated place. So this was the test to see if they could pass muster. It was a preview of what they’d face on a mission. They’d either pass or be sent away.
Niki was determined. She’d come this far, and she was grimly committed to making it. Captain Mullen had been particularly hard on her and Jennifer. Privately they thought that his discriminatory attitude toward them was because he didn’t think women should be recruited for this kind of duty. He almost expected them to fail. That made Niki doubly resolved.
The weather that morning was beastly. The wind was sharp as a steel knife, penetrating even through their parkas and wool caps. Then it began to rain. The wind increased, driving the icy rain against them as they struggled to find their way back across the desolate stretch of stubbled grassland. Moors provided very little possibility of shelter. When the rain began to come down in sheets, they huddled together next to a large boulder, spreading the tarp over themselves.
I’ve never been this cold in my life, Niki thought, shuddering, her teeth chattering. I wish I were anywhere else but here. Why did I think I wanted this?
The other four were just as miserable, but Max managed a joke. He told them this reminded him of the time he’d gone to Wimbledon to see the tennis matches. He’d dressed to the nines, in white flannels, new shoes, and a new straw hat, when he’d been caught between the courts in a downpour. It wasn’t that funny, but they needed some comic relief, and they all laughed heartily.
Niki was never sure how, but the team did manage to straggle back to the building twenty minutes before the deadline. Bedraggled, soaked, bone weary, and bleary-eyed with lack of sleep, she barely remembered staggering upstairs, into a hot bath, then to sleep.
The next morning they came down to a breakfast the likes of which they had not seen here before. Platters of sausage, eggs, cinnamon rolls, fried apples, were set out for them. Best of all, Captain Mullen congratulated them on their accomplishment.
That afternoon a rumor circulated regarding the arrival of some top brass. This meant the team would have to appear for an oral interview, which would result in an evaluation that would be the final hurdle, determine if they would make the cut.
Jennifer and Niki waited their turn, talking in whispers in the lounge while the three men were being interviewed. Adding up all the various elements in their training, they were convinced that passing this last test would mean being secreted into occupied France to carry out a mission.
In her mind Niki went over her chances. She knew she had passed the physical tests successfully, had done fairly well on some of the others parts of the training, such as map reading and airplane recognition, but had been weak on the mechanical stuff. Her one sure advantage was her fluency in French, however.
“Gilbreaux.” The sound of her name snapped her to attention. She stood up, straightened her uniform jacket, and walked into the interview room.
Niki tried to stay calm, give clear, concise answers to the questions they asked. One of the officers launched into a rapid flow of French. Niki made a quick switch from English and was able to understand and reply to all that he said. He gave a brief nod, and the other officers exchanged looks that she interpreted as approving.
When it was over, she was told she had a three-day leave during which she could make her final decision as to whether she wanted to be included in the mission her team would be assigned.
“But I can answer that right now. Yes, of course.”
Jennifer was waiting for her and they hugged each other, relieved that they had both made the cut. Since Niki had discovered that Jennifer had no immediate family and her boyfriend was in North Africa, and because Niki decided it would be too difficult to go to Birchfields and keep the secret of her new assignment, they decided to spend their leave together at a nice Scottish inn they’d heard about.
Niki felt sad not to see Garnet and Bryanne, but she thought the dear old lady would have a fit if she knew what she was about to do. She didn’t dare tell Luc either. He still had his image of her as irresponsible, flighty, self-centered. She must prove herself a grown-up, capable person, someone he could be proud of. She thought of calling Fraser but decided against that too. It would just complicate things between them. When Iget back, I’ll confide in him, Niki promised herself. She didn’t listen to a small voice inside that suggested she should change that when to an if.
One question she had been asked during the final interview bothered her now a great deal. It had been put to her by Colonel Thornton: “You will be issued a suicide pill before embarking to France. Do you have any religious scruples about taking it in the event you are captured?”
She had been so anxious to make the grade, to be considered the right stuff for this dangerous work, that she had answered without hesitation. “No sir.”
But that night she lay sleepless, knowing that it wasn’t true. She hated the thought of being tortured, but ending her own life? It would never come to that, she tried to reassure herself. Still, that haunting thought hovered when she woke up the next morning. It was too late to recant. She was in this for the long haul. The small band of interrogating officers had left, and all the others were embarking on their short final leave. She would just have to rely on her new faith, her trust in God to keep her safe, bring her through whatever happened.