The Berlin Agent (John Cook #2)

25

I took a detour on the way home, to Newick. I owed Eric a visit, and I had a feeling he’d be the man to talk to about strange voices in the woods.

Eric was in his nan’s back garden, shirtsleeves rolled up, jacket hung over the edge of his wheelbarrow, a pack of cigarettes bulging from the breast pocket of his waistcoat. A hot morning to be weeding, but it needed doing. I thought of Mrs Leckie, whose days of pulling up strawberry runners were over.

Eric saw me coming, but kept at his work. He had a bed of lettuce coming along nicely. Enough to feed a battalion, if you could get the battalion to eat salad.

Eric was a young man. If I had to guess I’d have put his age at nineteen or twenty, but he’d already developed a reputation as being a man you could turn to if you wanted something found. If you needed another chicken for your coop, Eric could find you one. If your wife needed a few yards of material for a new dress, Eric could find it. And if you noticed that your barn was missing something you thought you’d put there for safe keeping, it was likely Eric had found it on behalf of someone else. He had a good heart, and he helped more than he hindered, so he was generally a welcome sight. And I knew something about Eric that nobody else did. He’d agreed to be part of my Auxiliary Unit, opting to put himself in harm’s way the day the invasion started. Practically begged me to let him join, even though he knew the predicted life expectancy was going to be counted in weeks, once the Nazis rolled through.

He straightened up as I approached. We’d established that since our unit was outside the regular military there would be no saluting, no nonsense about rank. But he came to -attention nonetheless.

‘I’ve got an interesting question,’ I said, keeping my voice low. We were at least a couple of hundred yards from the nearest neighbour, but better safe than sorry.

‘Go on,’ Eric said.

‘You haven’t heard any German voices, have you? When you’re out on your travels?’

As well as being a procurer of rationed goods, Eric was a poacher. He spent a lot of time in the woods, on both sides of other people’s fences, and I assumed he knew of other people who were in the same line of work.

He shook his head.

‘What’s going on?’ he asked. One thing I’d learnt about Eric, despite the illegalities of the way he made a living, he had a strong sense of duty. Wanted to do his bit. He’d been the first in line to sign up the day we declared war, but they’d kept him out because of an old injury. Working with me, preparing for the invasion, had whetted his appetite to get stuck in.

‘There’s a Nazi spy hiding out nearby. I think he’s trying to send radio signals back home.’

‘Nothing on our wireless,’ Eric said, looking back up -towards the house where his nan would be sitting by the receiver all day, hopping between the BBC and illegal -stations coming from Europe. A BBC-only diet was a bit much for most people. Only so many brass band performances a -person can listen to. The foreign stations got the latest music from America. You had to listen to a bit of propaganda -between the performances but I doubted Eric’s nan was going to be convinced Hitler was doing the right thing by a smooth-talking radio announcer.

‘Not just on the wireless,’ I said. ‘You might hear them coming out of nowhere when you’re out in the woods or the fields. Long fences seem to bring them in.’

‘Voices, or Morse code?’ Eric asked.

‘Voices. In German,’ I said. ‘Probably encoded.’

Eric looked around at his own fences. He had quite a collection. Lots of things to keep in, and people to keep out. Eric was clearly a believer in the saying that good fences make good neighbours.

‘Do you think it’s him?’ he asked, after a while.

‘Cyril’s gone,’ I said. ‘And the voice I heard didn’t sound like him.’

The previous month, another member of our unit had disappeared under suspicious circumstances. Took most of our weapons. Cyril was an expert on radio signals. I hadn’t thought he had any love for the Germans, but I’d misjudged him. He’d been through every day of the Great War, from signing-up to armistice. Probably saw enough war for a lifetime.

‘I saw a parachute come down on the Forest,’ I said. ‘There was a broken radio. Maybe the parachutist’s met up with someone with another set.’

‘I’ll check Cyril’s place again,’ Eric said. ‘Then I’ll ask around. See if anyone’s been hearing anything.’

‘Good man.’

Eric blushed. A good lad, trying to do his bit. I was glad to have him in my corner.

‘When are we going to meet up again?’ he asked. ‘You know...’

‘Let’s get this thing with the parachutist squared away,’ I said. ‘No point in us training for the invasion if it’s -already started.’