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Somewhere over the Belgian Coast
May 17
Miles checked his bearings and glanced to his right. Not far off his wing Chris flew in perfect formation and, as he glanced over, he saw him turning his head and looking up behind them. Smart man, the Yank. He hadn’t stopped searching for enemy fighters since they crossed the North Sea.
“We’re only a few miles out.” Rob’s voice broke over the headset and Miles looked left to where Rob and Slippy were also in formation. “I’m going down to see if I can spot any of the blighters.”
“Red two and I will go a little further in,” Miles said. “If you see anything, let us know.”
“Righto.”
Miles watched as Rob and Slippy peeled off to begin a descent towards the water. They had been sent over to patrol the coast after a reconnaissance flight spotted German ships going towards Belgium at dawn. Their orders were to attack the ships if they found them, and they were more than willing and able to do so, if they could just find them. The problem was that they hadn’t seen anything since crossing the sea, bird or boat.
“We’re right over where Control said the ships would be,” Chris said a few moments later.
“Right. Let’s go fishing.” Miles glanced at him. “Keep a watch out for fighters. We’re in their back garden.”
“So they keep telling us, but I have yet to see one of the bastards. I think they’re all hiding from us. Probably heard the Spits of 66 Squadron were coming,” Chris retorted cheerfully.
Miles grinned and dropped the nose of his plane, moving down into a long stretch of clouds. When they exited through the mist, the waves of the North Sea were below them, glittering in the sun. He blinked and refocused, searching the water for any sign of the German navy.
“There!” Chris called suddenly at the same time that Miles spotted three long, dark shadows in the distance.
“I see them,” he said, his pulse leaping at the sight. “Let’s go say hello, shall we?”
They steered for the ships, closing the distance quickly. As they grew closer, Miles recognized the shapes and swallowed. Two were battleships and one looked to be a cruiser. They were definitely the ships that were spotted earlier. He glanced at his fuel gauge.
“Watch your fuel, Red Two,” he advised. “We have time for one or two passes. Make them count.”
“Roger that.”
Miles couldn’t ignore the surge of excitement that went through him as they increased speed and began to dive towards the ships. This was it. This would be his first battle engagement. This is what he’d been waiting for for months. He was finally going to do something to help the poor blokes on the ground. The blood pumped through his veins in anticipation as he focused on one of the destroyers through his gun sight, waiting for it to come into firing range.
“Fighters!” Chris yelled at the same time that machine gunfire erupted behind them.
Miles twisted his head around, searching for them, as he broke off his attack and banked to the left. The excitement turned to fear in an instant at the sight of two Messerschmitt Me 109s in perfect position behind them.
“Where the hell did they come from?” he yelled as he pulled his stick to the right to avoid another stream of bullets from the one behind him. “On your tail, Red Two!”
“I see him!”
Chris’ voice sounded breathless and Miles turned his plane again, trying to get away from the German fighter behind him. As he did, he saw Chris avoid a burst of bullets from his opponent, the sound of the machine guns from the 109 blasting through his shock. In that instant, the fear disappeared, and in its place was a strange feeling of determination mixed with focus. This was what they had trained for, and this was what this beautiful Spitfire was built to do. They just had to stay alive long enough to do their job.
“Two more incoming!” Chris cried a moment later.
Miles was still angling to try to get a shot at the writhing, twisting airplane before him when he saw another 109 shoot into his peripheral vision. He pulled up and rolled to the right just in time to avoid landing in the new fighters’ line of fire. The Spitfire responded instantly to every nuance on the stick, and Miles had never been happier for his machines instant response than he was at this moment as he watched a burst of bullets go past his canopy.
“That was bloody close,” he muttered, twisting his head around as he tried to see where the fighter had got to.
The dogfight had moved them out of sight of the ships and back up towards the clouds. Looking up and seeing the cover above, Miles was struck by sudden inspiration.
“Head for the clouds, Red Two! Use them as cover!”
He pulled back on the stick as he spoke and sped upwards, breaking into the clouds a moment later. Turning, he then dove down suddenly, catching both enemy fighters below him. Emerging from the clouds with one directly in his sight, Miles sucked in his breath. The shot would never get any better. He pressed the button on his control stick and the Browning guns mounted in his wings let loose with a stream of bullets, the vibrations going through the plane and clear through his hands and up his arms. He’d fired the guns before, multiple times, at targets, but this time was different. It was as if every nerve ending in his body was responding this time, making his palms damp and his heart race. He stared through the windshield as his bullets ripped into the back of the 109 before he banked, pulling back up towards the clouds. Looking back, he saw smoke start pouring from the airplane and it dropped into a dive towards the water.
Before he could feel anything other than relief, bullets tore past him again. Twisting his head around, he found two 109s on his tail. Stifling a curse, he wrenched back on the stick and twisted out of the range of the closest one. Glancing at his fuel gauge, he let out a curse.
“Fuel, Red Two!”
The expletive that came through the headset echoed his own and Miles swiveled around, looking for Chris. All he could see were the two German fighters on his tail. Where the hell was he?
And then there he was, shooting out of the clouds hard on the tail of the third 109. Miles saw the burst of ammunition from Chris’ Spit, but they didn’t seem to have any effect on the vicious little fighter before him.
“Get up above the clouds, Red Two. We’ll have to outrun them. Get as high and as fast as you can!”
Miles barked the instructions as he proceeded to do just that, pulling up into the clouds then continuing to climb past twenty thousand feet. He was approaching thirty thousand when Chris joined him. He looked over and nodded, relief going through him at the Yank’s cheerful thumbs up. A burst of fire from the 109s behind him made him wince and he turned his nose for home, opening the throttle. They’d been told that Me 109s were no match for a Spitfire’s speed at these altitudes. It was time find out if Fighter Command had got it right.
He and Chris sped towards home, hopping in and out of cloud cover whenever possible to help them evade the enemy fire. As they did, Miles kept looking back, watching the distance between them grow.
“Goddamn, it’s true!” Chris crowed a few moments later. “They can’t keep up!”
“We’re not out of it yet, Yank,” Miles retorted. “Keep moving!”
But after another minute or two, the remaining 109s fell back and then disappeared, turning for home. With his heart pounding and sweat pouring down his face, Miles looked over at Chris flying next to him. They’d done it. They’d survived their first encounter with the Jerries, and neither of them had been hit.
As they crossed the North Sea for home, the strangest feeling of elation mixed with numbness stole over him, and Miles lifted his hand to wipe the sweat off his face. Realizing that it was shaking, he shook it, trying to stop the tremors. Not only had he survived his first air battle, but he’d actually hit one of the blighters! He had his first kill, but it didn’t feel anything like what he’d expected. He didn’t feel anything. He just felt numb.
And jolly happy to be alive and heading home.
Amiens, France
Josephine carried a tray laden with coffee, mugs, bread and cheese across the large garden to the old shed at the bottom. Early morning sun washed the gentle slope with bright, hopeful light and she inhaled deeply, enjoying the scent of lavender as she went. It was a new day, fresh and calm for the moment. Birds were chirping and there seemed to be no indication of the weapons and tanks of war that were tearing through northern France towards the coast.
They had arrived in Amiens late the night before, going to the only house where they knew they would be assured of a welcome. Matilde was a matronly woman, and André’s second cousin by marriage. She liked to say that she was nothing but a woman trying to keep her young cousin out of trouble, but whenever any of them came through Amiens, they were always welcomed with open arms. They were housed, fed, fussed over, and then rearmed with every weapon and ammunition that they could possibly want. Matilde was much more than a housewife and cousin, and Josephine didn’t think she would ever cease to be amused by the dichotomy of a very French farmer’s wife handing out semi-automatic rifles as if they were ice cream cones. Where she obtained them, no one knew or dared ask. They simply took them with gratefulness, leaving what payment they could afford behind.
When they all showed up on her doorstep after ten o’clock last night, she had taken one look at the group and had her husband usher all of them out to the shed. A few moments later, she arrived with mounds of blankets, pillows, and a bottle of wine. Then, without any further ado, she’d taken Josephine firmly by the arm and led her back to the house. No single woman was sharing her shed with five men, and that was that. Josephine wasn’t about to argue. A comfortable bed in Matilde’s tiny extra bedroom was infinitely preferable to a stone floor.
“Let me take that for you!”
A voice called behind her, causing her to turn around, balancing the laden tray carefully in her hands. Finn was hurrying towards her from the direction of the woods that bordered the property on the left.
“Good morning!” she called with a smile. “You’re up early.”
“I always am,” he said, joining her and reaching out to take the heavy tray. “The others should be awake now. Marc was getting up when I left.”
Josephine moved ahead of him to knock on the shed door. It opened a moment later and Marc looked out, his face brightening at the sight of the tray.
“Good! Coffee!” he exclaimed, opening the door wide to allow Finn room to maneuver the large tray. “Come in and join the argument, Josephine.”
“Argument?” She followed Finn into the shed, glancing at Marc quizzically. “I left you alone for six hours, and you’re already arguing?”
“With good reason,” Luc told her, rolling up a map that was spread out on a makeshift table put together with boards and stacked bricks. “Put that down here, Finn. It should hold it.”
“What good reason?”
“Marc thinks that it’s too dangerous for us to remain together,” André told her from the shadows where he was leaning against the back wall, his arms crossed over his chest. “He thinks it’s better for us all to go our separate ways.”
“That’s not exactly what he said,” Luc said, shooting André an exasperated look. “It’s not about going our separate ways. It’s about making us less of a target.”
“Yes. Working separately.”
“Why would we do that?” Josephine asked, looking from Luc to Marc. “We’ve been assigned to work as a team. Have you received new orders?”
“No, and that’s the problem,” Mathieu said, pouring the strong, black coffee into a mug. “We’re not getting any orders at all. Everything is in chaos.”
“But Paris—”
“Is also in chaos,” Marc said, taking the coffee pot from Mathieu. “The German armies are rolling through France with virtually no opposition. Paris will fall. When it does, the Deuxième Bureau will cease to exist. We will have nowhere to send our intelligence. No one to give us orders.”
“So you want to quit?” she demanded, aghast.
“No! Not quit.” he said forcefully, turning to face her with a chunk of bread in one hand and coffee in the other. “I will never quit! But for us to stay together is suicide. When the Germans come—”
“When the Germans come!” André exclaimed, cutting him off. “You keep saying that as if it’s inevitable! France still has a chance.”
“What chance? No one wants us to win this war more than me, but we must face the facts. We are outmatched, with both men and artillery, and we have been outmaneuvered. Holland has surrendered, they’ve taken Brussels, and Antwerp will be next. Belgium will surrender soon. They will have no choice. That leaves us with only England, and all the English troops are trapped in Belgium along with our own.” Luc shook his head. “We must accept that France is next, André. To refuse to do so is foolish and dangerous.”
“If we fight—”
“But that’s just it, isn’t it?” Marc asked quietly. “We’re not fighting. Our soldiers are laying down their weapons and surrendering without ever firing a shot.”
“What?!” Josephine gasped, her face paling.
Luc laid a hand on her shoulder. “We weren’t going to tell you,” he said gently. “That’s how they rolled right through Sedan. Our army isn’t defending us. The ones in the weaker positions along the eastern border aren’t trained. They’re surrendering rather than fight.”
Josephine stared at him, then looked at the somber faces of the others. “Why weren’t you going to tell me?”
“Because your father is a general. We knew it would upset you.”
“Yes, and my father is fighting in Belgium!” Josephine rubbed her face, shaking her head. “I can’t believe it. How do you know that soldiers are choosing to surrender?”
“Pierre witnessed it outside Sedan,” Marc said reluctantly. “He sent a warning message to all of us to prepare for a rapid advancement of Nazi troops.”
Silence fell as the men ate their breakfast, and Josephine tried to wrap her mind around this new nightmare. It didn’t seem possible that the French soldiers would simply surrender, and yet she believed the report from Pierre without question. He had never been anything but blunt, sometimes embarrassingly so. If the soldiers were simply surrendering rather than run the risk of fighting, she supposed it was because they were so inexperienced. All the strong units had been sent into Belgium. If the weaker units were faced with the German Panzer divisions, they may very well be unequipped to handle it.
“If our own soldiers will not fight, then France will fall,” she finally said, breaking the silence. “Marc is right. How can it not?”
“And if France falls, we cannot all be together. The Germans must never know who we are or what we can do.”
“You want us to separate so that we don’t all get caught,” she said slowly, “but then what?”
“We continue. In secret.”
“And what do we do with whatever information we collect?” André asked. “There will be no one to give it to.”
“That’s not necessarily true,” Josephine said thoughtfully. “England will never give in, not with their new prime minister. Churchill is a bull. He will continue to fight until there is nothing left. And if they mean to continue the fight alone, they will need all the information they can get.”
“And how will we get it to them?” Mathieu demanded.
“We already have a few contacts,” Marc told him. “While you and André were in Belgium retrieving our friend here, I met one of them. She’ll do.”
“She?” Mathieu began, then caught sight of the steely look in Josephine’s eyes. He grinned ruefully. “Not that women aren’t capable,” he said appeasingly. “But an Englishwoman? Are you serious?”
“She doesn’t sound like an Englishwoman,” Luc said. “In fact, I thought she was French.”
“I think she is,” Josephine said. “I don’t know where Bill found her, but I’d swear she’s from Paris.”
“Or at least has spent a lot of time there,” Luc agreed.
“All right. So we have a possible outlet for any information we manage to gather,” André said with a shrug. “But how will we communicate? You’re the only one with a radio. If we split up and go our separate ways, we won’t know where anyone is, let alone be able to contact them. The whole idea is absurd.”
Before Marc could answer, his radio came alive in the corner and he set his coffee cup down.
“It’s early,” he muttered, going to the corner of the shed. “This can’t be good.”
“What are your thoughts on our predicament?” Luc asked Finn, who had been sitting quietly throughout the entire conversation.
“It’s not really my place to say, is it?” he asked with a shrug. “I’m being sent to Calais.”
“Yes, but you must have an opinion?”
“I think Marc is correct. Right now your best hope for remaining free and undetected by the Nazis is to separate and establish normal lives away from each other.” Finn looked at them grimly. “They will be looking for any members of the Allied network. They have already begun in Belgium. They won’t tolerate any remnant that could form into a resistance. I think you must shift from thinking of yourselves as working for your government to thinking of yourselves as part of a resistance.”
Josephine swallowed and glanced over at Marc in the corner, hunched over his radio with his headset over his ears.
“Then perhaps this is the best thing to do. If we separate, we still have a chance.”
“And we lose the safety we have with each other’s support.”
“Better that than lose our freedom and lives,” Luc muttered. “And we will find each other again. I have no doubt of that.”
“Neither do I,” André replied. “My fear is that it will be too late when we do.”
“Josephine!” Marc called. “Come.”
Josephine turned around in surprise and went over to him. “What is it?”
“A message for you.”
“Me?”
“From London.”
He took off his headset and handed it to her, getting up. “They are sending it through now.”
Josephine set the headset on her head and reached for the pencil and notepad next to the radio. She tore off a piece of paper and bent over it, scribbling down the code as it came through. Marc moved away to give her privacy, but as he joined the others, she was conscious of five sets of eyes watching her. A flash of amusement went through her. They were as bad as children, curious beyond belief.
A few moments later, she removed the headset and set about deciphering the message. When Marc had sent the message yesterday to confirm that Finn was to go to Calais, they hadn’t received an answer. Now they were, and then some. The message was a long one, much longer than she was used to from Bill. With the others talking in low voices behind her, Josephine finished going through the message and sat back to read it. After reading it twice, she looked up to find all five pairs of eyes watching her again.
“Finn, you’re not going to Calais,” she said, getting up. “You’re going to Paris.”
“Paris!” André exclaimed. “Are they insane? Most of Paris is fleeing the city!”
“He’s to join an old friend of mine there.” She looked at Finn. “They’ll get you out of France.”
“Old friend?” Marc asked, raising his eyebrow. “What old friend?”
“The one you met last week. I think your words were, ‘She’ll do.’”
“She’s still in Paris?” Luc asked, surprised.
Josephine shrugged. “I don’t know, but these are the instructions.”
André was watching her face and his eyes narrowed suddenly. “What else?”
“Pardon?”
“What else is in the instructions?”
Josephine swallowed. “He warns that the Germans are not going to Paris, but are racing for the coast to cut off the Allied troops.”
“If that’s true, they’ll come through Amiens,” Mathieu said in alarm. “We can’t stay here.”
“No,” Marc agreed, nodding brusquely. “We will have to move. I think it best if we part ways now. It’s not worth the risk of someone remembering us. There are six of us. We are too conspicuous now.”
“I’ll take Finn to Paris,” Josephine said, pulling out a lighter and setting the edge of her paper against the flame. “I’ll help them get out of France, and then I will head for Marseilles. I have an old friend there. I can stay with her until I get myself situated.”
“Marseilles?” André looked at her with a frown. “How will you get there?”
“I’ll find a way.” She summoned a smile for him. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be there waiting for the rest of you.”
“We’ll come,” Marc said, laying a hand on her arm. “We will finish this.”
She met his eyes and nodded, swallowing. “I know.”
“When do I have to be in Paris?” Finn asked.
“Tomorrow. Which means we need to leave as soon as possible.” Josephine turned for the door. “I’ll tell Matilde I’m leaving. André, I’ll leave you to tell her about the rest of you. I’m not explaining any of this.”
“Josephine?”
“Yes?”
“Leave some guns for us. We’ll need them as well.”
