Chapter 6
Jack drove Lizzie to the airfield, as he had so many times before. The car bounced along the dark country road as they approached RAF Tempsford, each mile bringing them closer to the separation they both dreaded.
Jack held the steering wheel lightly with one hand, and Lizzie’s cold hand in the other. ‘Don’t take any unnecessary risks, Seagrove,’ he said. His tone was caught between that of her commanding officer giving her last words of wisdom and her fiancé who couldn’t bear to say goodbye.
Lizzie had already clicked into mission mode, but her heart ached for Jack, and she wished she didn’t have to leave him at this worst of times.
His large hand cocooned hers as they neared the airfield, and she squeezed it, trying to comfort him.
‘Will you be alright? I don’t like leaving you now,’ she said, her voice barely a whisper.
Jack stayed silent for a few seconds and then turned towards her, his handsome face in shadow before he said with bravado. ‘I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me, darling. Henry will be back before we know it.’
Lizzie knew her fiancé was far from fine. He’d been spending a lot of time with his mother, and in caring for her, he was overriding his own pain, but she glimpsed the rawness of it in his eyes every day. Lizzie hurt for him, for his poor mother, and for Hannah.
Hannah didn’t know that her fiancé was missing in action.
Lizzie feared that the war widow cover they had created so meticulously for her had become a painful truth, in some twisted new version of reality.
As much as none of them wanted to say the words out loud, Lizzie knew the chances were high that Hannah would never see her beloved Henry again.
Hannah and Henry had meant to marry years earlier, but the war had ripped them apart and both had answered the call to arms. Hannah was active in her own Resistance movement against the Nazis, and Henry had joined the RAF immediately.
Dearest Hannah. Had she not lost enough already?
Last Lizzie heard, she had received no news of her family since before the war, and as horrifying accounts of extermination camps rippled through Europe, it seemed more and more likely that something terrible had happened to them since they were arrested and taken away for supposed resettlement.
Lizzie wondered if there was a term for a woman whose fiancé was killed fighting for his country.
It seemed unfair that the tragedy was only recognised if they were married.
The emotion swirled in her chest as the feelings became too much to process.
Heaviness weighed on her as she realised, she would have to be the one to break the news to Hannah.
Instead of a joyful reunion with her dear friend and sister-in-arms, she would have to tell her about Henry.
And as for Jack, she wished she could share some of the burden of his pain, but now she wouldn’t be here to comfort him.
It was vicious timing, but there was nothing she could do.
The Berlin source was desperate to get intelligence to the Allies about the German weapon development, and the few contacts they had in Berlin weren’t up to the task.
The threat was too great to delay, but even Val had cast them a sorrowful look during their final briefing.
‘I don’t approve of how you two kept your engagement from me, but it’s bad timing you must go in now, Seagrove,’ she said. ‘If there were something I could do, I would, but this is the hand we’ve been dealt, and we must play it.’
In the car, Jack promised he would post Lizzie’s handwritten postcard to her parents, saying she had arrived safely in Birmingham.
The barrier rose after the guard checked Jack’s papers, and later they shared an obligatory cup of tea whilst the pilot and his crew made their final preparations for the flight.
Lizzie’s eyes strayed to the forbidding shape of the Halifax bomber in the field as she warmed her hands on the enamel mug. ‘I’ve only ever flown in on a Lysander before. That aircraft is huge.’
‘Yes, it’s a beauty. Four Rolls-Royce Merlin engines and a seven-man crew.’
‘I feel a bit out of my depth going in on that,’ she said, her voice a whisper.
Jack raised his head and looked into her eyes. ‘Remember who you are, Lizzie Beaumont. Your cover name is Anna Weber, but you are the same formidable agent who carried out many hair-raising operations in occupied territory. That’s why X Section headhunted you specifically.’
Lizzie was grateful to Jack for his rousing speech. Sometimes she needed reminding of what she had achieved, and he always knew exactly what to say and how to say it.
‘Thank you,’ she mouthed.
‘You were terrified when you first parachuted in, and now that just seems normal to you,’ he remarked.
Lizzie laughed at the absurdity of it. ‘That’s true. If you’d told me then that one day in the not-too-distant future, I’d wish I was dropping into occupied France in a Lysander, I’d have thought you had lost your mind!’
Once inside the secret airfield, Jack stopped the car beneath the shade of the trees, and they had held each other tightly in the darkness and whispered sweet words of love.
Lizzie could still feel the touch of his kiss on her lips, and she knew she would cherish the memory when she was deep in the evil heart of Hitler’s Third Reich and longed for him.
‘Do you think Hannah has reached Lyon?’ she asked, changing the subject to steady herself for their parting, which would come in the next few minutes.
‘I’d guess she’s well on her way, if not already there.’
They had agreed she would take the longer route via Lyon and Strasbourg, rather than going through Paris to Berlin. There was a lower risk of her being recognised that way, and Strasbourg was the ideal location for them to rendezvous and travel to Berlin together.
Lizzie nodded and placed her empty mug on the makeshift table.
The sergeant entered and told them that the crew was ready for departure.
Lizzie and Jack touched hands briefly, still forbidden to show public displays of affection.
His touch lingered on her hand, and her lower lip quivered as she drank in his face one last time before boarding the Halifax bomber.
She turned to give him a brief wave, and then the belly of the aircraft swallowed her silhouette.
The engines roared, and soon they lifted into the moonlit night and thundered their way through the sky towards the border of Germany.
There was no turning back now.