Chapter 24
That evening Hannah couldn’t wait for dinner to be over so she could show the letter to Lizzie. Up in the attic, the door locked, Hannah removed it from her shoe and unfolded the paper before passing it to Lizzie.
‘Ingrid is just as clever as one might expect a technical analyst of her calibre to be,’ Lizzie said after she pored over the paper.
‘I didn’t read it properly yet,’ Hannah said. ‘It looked like personal correspondence.’
‘We need to ask her for actual copies of secret documents, but this is a promising start.’
Lizzie sat next to Hannah on the bed, and they read the letter, which was written in German, silently:
Ursula,
How are you managing in these challenging times? I hope you and the family are well. I wish we could see each other, but I can’t get away from work to visit you at this time. Perhaps I will be able to in the summer.
I must visit mother as a priority, as her health has deteriorated further.
Father says the medicine is more powerful than any she’s had before, but it’s new and the results are still unclear.
Father was warned that if it doesn’t agree with her, it could cause terrible unforeseen side effects and permanent damage, which worries me a great deal and keeps me awake at night.
Peenemünde is cold this time of year, as you know, but needs must. If you can try to visit her soon too, I’m certain it will do her good.
Thinking of you always,
Your sister
‘That must be the location of the weapons test site,’ Hannah whispered when their eyes met. ‘Peenemünde is a fishing village on the Baltic coast.’
Lizzie sprang off the bed and paced the room. ‘This is critical information. I must get it to Bern immediately.’
She folded the letter and hid it in her concealed pocket in her raincoat. When choosing her wardrobe and accessories for the mission, she’d specifically requested that a hidden pocket be sewn into her coat again. It had saved her life on the last mission and proved as useful as a weapon.
Lizzie met Hildegard the next day for a walk in the Tiergarten after her morning volunteering at the orphanage.
She had instantly taken a liking to the tall Swiss woman, and they had shared several intriguing conversations since their initial meeting.
Lizzie confided in Hildegard how hard life was now she was a war widow, and Hildegard told Lizzie that the war couldn’t be over soon enough for her liking.
After several other telling whispered exchanges, Lizzie concluded Hildegard didn’t approve of the Nazi regime.
Just how much was something she planned to find out today.
They rambled through a network of paths in the park, the sun faintly glimmering through the clouds and the wind rushing off the lake. ‘I’m looking forward to summer,’ Hildegard said.
‘Me too,’ Lizzie agreed.
They chatted about Hildegard’s children, and she said they missed their father terribly. ‘We haven’t seen him for more than a year. It seems like another life before he was conscripted.’
‘It must have been even harder to see him leave, when he might have been exempt because of the business,’ Lizzie said.
Hildegard glanced over her shoulder, but there was no one within earshot. ‘Those bastards don’t care about us. They only care about their power-hungry regime,’ she said. Then she looked at Lizzie, alarm on her face. ‘Forgive my ungrateful tongue; I’m just upset about Wolfgang, that’s all.’
Lizzie touched her elbow. ‘Believe me, I understand how you feel. If it weren’t for this war, I would be with my husband in Alsace. I only came to Berlin because I couldn’t stand the loneliness and life without him at home.’
Lizzie felt bad that she must deceive this decent woman and pretend to be experiencing the hardships of a widow who was desperately missing her husband, but diluting her cover story could spell disaster.
Hildegard looped her arm through Lizzie’s. ‘Let’s speed up a bit, shall we? It’s so cold today, I swear I can feel it in my bones. And I must get back to the office soon. My manager is leaving for Switzerland again this evening, and we have a briefing planned.’
They continued walking and neared the lake where the ducks cruised across the water as though they hadn’t a care in the world.
Lizzie wondered how to broach what she wanted to ask Hildegard.
It was dangerous to risk even mentioning defying the Reich, but there was no way to turn a promising contact into a collaborator without biting the bullet at some point.
The letter from Ingrid was hidden in Lizzie’s pocket, and she was determined to find a way to deliver it soon.
She took a deep breath and turned to face her new friend as they walked.
‘I realise this is an unusual request, but I hope you will understand and might agree to help me.’
Hildegard’s eyes sparkled with curiosity. ‘Go on. I will certainly help you in any way I can. Us women must stick together more than ever at times like these.’
Lizzie cleared her throat. ‘There is a letter I need delivered to a friend in Bern. As your man is going there, I thought I would ask if you might trust him to leave it at his hotel reception and my friend would pick it up. He wouldn’t have to go out of his way at all.’
A heavy silence fell between them, and Lizzie cursed inwardly. She’d gone too far too soon. Jack always told her to trust her gut, which is what she had done, but perhaps her gut moved a little too fast on this occasion.
Lizzie stayed quiet whilst she waited for Hildegard to speak. Eventually, she said, ‘This isn’t just any old letter, is it?’
‘Let’s just say it’s a personal letter from a woman writing to her sister in Switzerland. It only talks of their mother’s poor health, so even if someone opens the letter, there is nothing to raise alarm or get your man in trouble.’
‘I see,’ she said, releasing a heavy sigh. ‘I want to help, but I can’t risk my employee’s safety. It wouldn’t be fair.’ She stopped walking and looked Lizzie in the eyes.
Disappointment clouded Lizzie’s face, but she said, ‘I understand and shouldn’t have asked. I’ll find another way to get the letter to my friend.’
Hildegard looped her arm through Lizzie’s again, and they continued walking. ‘Don’t apologise. I have prayed for a way to help end this war. Is that the kind of thing we are talking about?’
Relief spiralled through Lizzie. Her gut never failed her.
Lizzie told her the little she could.
After a quiet moment, Hildegard replied.
‘I tell you what. I will go myself. I travel to Bern when we have a sensitive negotiation, or sometimes just when I want to visit home, so there’s nothing strange about it.
My manager will be happy to return to his family instead of being stuck on the night train to Switzerland. ’
Lizzie squeezed Hildegard’s arm. ‘I can’t thank you enough, really. This is so good of you. Will your children be taken care of?’
‘Yes, my mother-in-law is only too happy to have them to herself. She misses her son too, and the children distract her from her fears.’
Back at the boarding house, Lizzie fizzed with a sense of victory.
Things were finally moving. Hildegard would place the letter in an envelope marked Ursula and make a call to a phone number in Bern.
She would leave a message for Ursula to pick up the letter at the hotel desk.
The plan was simple and unremarkable. That night Lizzie was so excited at the thought of the first piece of intelligence from Ingrid travelling on its way to Bern, she couldn’t fall asleep, and she lay there wide awake for hours listening to the hum of aircraft in the distance and thinking about Jack.
She knew he would be relieved when the SOE heard from Bern that the mission was underway.
With no access to a radio set to transmit to London, this was the first sign she could send him to confirm she had arrived safely and was operating successfully in Berlin.
She hoped he would sleep better when he heard, and it would be one less thing for him to worry about. It was a relief that she couldn’t tell him the news about Henry yet. Sometimes ignorance was bliss, and there was nothing he could do, anyway.
It seemed Hildegard might be the key to unlocking the Swiss border.
If the trip went smoothly and she wasn’t spooked, Lizzie would try to convince her to act as their regular courier.
She must trust her instincts. There were no guarantees, but the woman was smart and direct. And she was Swiss, not German born.
Besides, if Lizzie had miscalculated, the Gestapo would already be at the door.