‘At ease,’ Toby said, looking at the roomful of men and women whose eyes were all trained on him. He strode to the brand-new blackboard at the front of the ops room. As he did so he was aware of some of the younger women watching him with particular interest. He knew he cut a fine figure in his army uniform and his rank always gave him an extra edge with the opposite sex. Reaching the blackboard, he picked up a stick of chalk. There were certainly some lookers in the room. There was a time when he would have earmarked at least one of them for a date, but not now that he had Dorothy. The moment he had first clapped eyes on her at Lily’s, he’d fallen for her. Well and truly.
‘We are here today,’ Toby said, his voice commanding and serious, ‘to be a part of one of the most important special operations of this war.’ Toby knew how to inspire those under his command so that they gave it their all, making them feel that what they were doing was just as important as being out in the field. ‘The purpose of the work you will begin today, and will most likely continue to do over the next six months or more, is to enable the successful delivery of military supplies, and the parachuting of weapons and equipment to resistance groups in enemy-occupied countries. Namely, France, Denmark, Norway, Belgium and Holland.’ He paused. ‘There will also be times when personnel – specialised agents conversant in transmissions, demolition or armaments – will be dropped into the field and occasions when they will be brought back.’
Toby looked at the military personnel and civilian workers standing, listening intently to every word he spoke. He smiled. ‘You can all sit down.’
He waited until chairs had been scraped back and the room was once again quiet.
‘This operation that you are now all a part of is called …’ he turned and started scrawling on the blackboard before facing his audience again and pointing at what he had just written ‘… Operation Carpetbagger.’
He waited a beat before continuing. ‘It will be written about in years to come. It will be a success. And it will be a success because of people like you, working day in, day out, often throughout the night. Everyone in this room will be an important cog in the wheel that takes us to victory.’
You could hear a pin drop – the swell of patriotism was all-pervading.
Half an hour later the room was abuzz with activity. There was a huge pinboard detailing the various categories of supplies, which ranged from sewing kits and bikes to grenades and guns, and where exactly they were to be dropped. Looking down at his watch, Toby left his sergeant, who had been transferred down south with him, in charge. He spoke with a broad Scottish accent and was a natural-born leader.
Walking out of the ops room, Toby headed along the corridor and into the deputy group commander’s room. As soon as he walked through the door, he was greeted by a lower-ranking officer who quickly introduced himself as Officer Kayle and took him over to a huge operational map covering the back wall of the office.
‘One inch equates to ten miles,’ he explained. ‘As you can see, topographical features such as elevations, rivers and forests are clearly marked out.’ He tapped the map with a long wooden ruler. ‘Any areas where Special Operations flights are prohibited are clearly indicated.’ Another tap.
‘Anything from London?’ Toby asked. He’d been informed on arrival that the base was to expect communications via a scrambler phone direct from Air Operations headquarters in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), an American intelligence agency based in London.
‘Yes, sir.’ Officer Kayle stood up straight. ‘S2 has just been given a list of approved targets.’ Toby knew S2 to mean the intelligence officer based on-site.
‘Good stuff,’ Toby said as Officer Kayle took him over to a nearby desk and showed him the list of target drops, which were designated by names and numbers – everything was coded: ‘Joes’ were agents and ‘nickels’ referred to bundles of propaganda leaflets.
Toby saw that there were a series of planned drops over Caen, in northern France. It was where Peter’s unit of men were presently positioned. Talk about being in the middle of a nest of vipers. Toby often wished he could have been an undercover operative like Peter, but his French, although good, was not good enough. Looking at what was planned over the next few months, and the danger that men like Peter, working alongside the Resistance, would undoubtedly encounter, he had to admit that he was glad to be on this side of the water.