Boy's Cinema (1939-40)

He removed his helmet and the heavy waterproof coat, dropped them on a window-seat, and sat down to devour bread-and-butter, ham, and cheese—and he spread the butter thickly upon the bread. She stared at him aghast when she returned to the room. "Are you mad, wearing that uniform here?" she cried. "If I am to be shot." he rephed, "it will be as an officer, not as a spy." "Being a civilian,' she retorted icily, "I have no such defences " "I beg your pardon," he said, carving himself some more ham. "This food! The English are a long time feeling the pinch! How did you get on to the island? " "A demure look and a faked passport," she told him. " My name is Anne Burnett —please call me that in future." He repeated the name to memorise it. "I had no idea a Secret Agent's job was such a comfortable profession," he said, "It has its uncomfortable moments. School opens the day after to-morrow." " Oh." She brought in the coffee, and the coffee was good. They smoked cigarettes with it and talked. He had studied her as intently as she had studied him. She was not at all sure she liked him, but he was beginning to admire her looks as much as her poise. "In our country," he said abruptly " the girls no longer wear silk stockings." She rose immediately from her chair. "I think I'd better show you your room," she said in an icy voice. "It's upstairs." "I haven't been told what I'm to do here," he remarked without moving. "You'll be told to-morrow." That made him move. "Not to-morrow," he rapped, bounding to his feet. "Now!" "What are your orders?" she asked stiffly. "Your orders, Captain Hardt?" He gritted his teeth, frowning at her. "To report for duty to Fraulein Thiel," he recited slowly. "To obey all her orders." " Exactly! " She flung out a hand with an imperious gesture. " Now pick up your motor-bike and go to bed." "Do I take it to bed with me?" he inquired mockingly. Please yourself. There's a nice park- ing-place by the wash-stand." She went ahead of him, carrying a lamp, and he struggled up the stairs with the motor-cycle. She opened the door of a bed-room with a sloping ceiling, and he brushed past her with the machine and deposited it beside a very ordinary wash- stand. She put the lamp on a chest of drawers and went out and closed the door. " Hi, hi, hi!" he cried, as he heard a key being turned. "Why are you locking me in?" ' "A woman comes to clean the house in the mornings," she called back. "I can lock my own door." " I think this is safer." She removed the key and went off with it to the stairs. Captain Hardt shrugged his shoulders and began to undress. The bed was comfortable, and he slept so soundly that it was past eight o'clock in the morning when he wakened. The sun was shining in a sky flecked with little white clouds. He was in shirt and collar, trousers and socks, and was fastening his tie in front of a circular mirror when there came a knock at the door and a voice inquired: "May I come in?" "Yes, come in," he responded. The door was unlocked and opened and the girl entered. "Your breakfast is in my room," she said, as she began to strip the bed. "There's a beautiful view from my win- dow. " "Listen, Miss Burnett," he snapped, "I didn't come here for a holiday. I have more important things to do than to ad- mire the view." October 21st, 1039. BOY'S CINEMA "All right," she said, and something in her tone sent him out across the landing into the bed-room on the other side of it. He raised a cover on a small table set for breakfast and sniffed appreciatively at eggs and bacon—and then he looked to- wards the window. His brown eyes widened and he dived back into the room he had left to get his binoculars. He picked up the empty case from the chest of drawers. The girl had taken out the binoculars and she gave them to him without a word. She followed him to the other room, and she stood beside him at the window while he held the glasses to his eyes. The ships of the British Grand Fleet were anchored off the coast, an im- posing spectacle in the morning sunlight. " Well," he said, lowering the binoculars, "what's the plan?" "To sink fifteen of those capital ships," she answered. "How?" " He'll tell you." She pointed to a young fellow in the uniform of a naval lieutenant who was sauntering along the road above the shore. " Who is he? " Hardt trained the glasses upon the approaching figure. "A British naval officer with a grudge against the Service. He was in command of a destroyer, but a year ago he lost it in a collision." "How?" "A wrong order. He'd been drinking." " Huh! A traitor and a drunkard! Quite an ornament to the British Navy! Where did this happen?" "Off Cyprus." "H.M.S. Connaught," he said. "Feb- ruary sixteenth." She looked at him in surprise. "Then you know?" " Of course—Commander Ashington." "Lieutenant Ashington," she corrected. " He was dismissed his ship." "Where did you meet him?" "At Leith, a month ago." "And found that he had a price?" " Rather a high one," she nodded. "Paid by whom?" " Your country—and mine." "Well," he said with an air of distaste, " I suppose we shall have to meet." "Come down when you've had your breakfast." she said, and went out from the room. THE SCHEMERS LIEUTENANT ASHINGTON was in the living-room with the girl when Hardt descended the stairs and looked in at the doorway. He was in a chair near the fire, and he was holding the girl's hand. Hardt scowled and walked in at the door. "I'm Captain Hardt," he announced curtly. Ashington rose to his feet, surveyed the tall officer in uniform, and said in a drawl- ing voice: "Suppose we sit down and get better acquainted? " He took a half-filled glass from a table and sat down again. " Give him a drink," he said to the girl. " Loosen him up a bit." "I would rather get to business," said Hardt. "Drink when you can, in this job. that's my motto." Ashington drank from the glass. Hardt shrugged and sat down at the table in the middle of the room. "May we confine our thoughts to the work before us?" he asked impatiently. "All alike, you foreigners," complained Ashington. "One-track minds. All right, draw the curtains, get the charts, and then let's go." The girl spread charts upon the table— after she had drawn the curtains—and he put a hand upon the one that was upper- most. "Here we are in a nutshell," he said. "Witii the Channel Fleet sitting on your doorstep, and the Grand Fleet here in Scapa Flow, watching every move you make, you haven't a chance of getting into the Irish Channel and starving us out." Every Tuesday "I know that," said Hardt. "What's your plan?" Ashington swept the top chart aside and moved a finger across the second one. "Two cruiser squadrons will shortly be sailing on a sweep down to the south'ard and sou'-westward " "I know that, too. It's part of the routine." " Yes." Ashington reached for his glass and drained it, a curious expression in his rather bleary gi-ey eyes. "But wouldn't you give your eye-teeth to know just when and where? " "You have that?" Hardt could not suppress his eagerness. "I have everything but the actual time of sailing—and I'll get you that, don't worry." "What squadrons?" "First and third." " And the course? " "Here it is. The pencil line—east of Swona." Hardt stood up to trace the course with the wrong end of his own pencil. "Then if our submarine's rendezvous is in " "Sandwick Bay," Ashington interposed. "In Sandwick Bay, we could bag the lot." " Exactly. But they may alter the course at the last moment. I shall find out if they do." "From whom?" " My brother. He's flag captain." "He, too, huh?" said Hardt contemptu- ously. "Great Scott, no!" exclaimed Lieu- tenant Ashington. " It's a case of brotherly trust." " You'll get the date? " " I'll get it." Hardt put away the pencil and rubbed his prominent chin. "It would be the biggest smash of the war," he muttered, looking at the girl who had been listening closely. Ashington poured himself another drink. "Therv—er—we understand each other," he said, and raised the glass. "To our next meeting." "To our next meeting," returned Hardt. The glass was emptied, and the girl handed the lieutenant his cap and great- coat. "Mind you behave yourself," he said to her, as he put them on, and she was escorting him from the room when Hardt stopped him. " Mr. Ashington," he said. " what is youi* ship?" "The old Warspite." was the reply. "I imagine she will not be going with the squadron?" " She's laid up for repairs—as usual." "Pity," murmured Hardt. That eyening, he sat on one of the chil- dren's desks in the big school-room while she rehearsed a lesson for the morrow with the aid of a long pointer and a map on the wall. The lesson was to be about Britain, and he told her smilingly that she almost persuaded him to become a British subject. "But I don't know what to say next." said she, putting down the pointer. "You can teach the children far more important things." he told her, deserting the desk and standing close in front of her. "How to get on an island guarded like Gibraltar—how to twist a British and an enemy naval officer round your little finger—and a lot of other things never learned in school." "Doesn't all this belong to an evening school for grown-ups? " she challenged. "It is evening," he replied, "and I am grown up. Tell me, what became of the real Miss Burnett?" She asked him if he knew the story of Little Red Riding Hood. "Uhuh," he nodded. "It had a happy ending." "That's where her story is different." " She met with an accident? " "Yes," she sighed, "an accident." "Were you present?" She evaded the question.