Page 48 of The Paris Agent
“There are few precedents for any of this, Eloise,” Turner said, and suddenly he seemed almost as tired as I was. He dropped his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. “It’s not uncommon for the Germans to figure out who our agents really are if they are arrested and now, we have someone on the inside sharing personal details so...who knows what comes next.”
“But you can’t seriously suspect a double agent at the verytopof the organization,” I said. He looked right at me, stricken as he nodded.
“That’s exactly what I’m saying. Who else knows your real name? The details of your family? Those files are secure—only the highest echelons of the SOE can access them.”
“But Mr. Booth would never,” I said fiercely. “And Miss Elwood? Not a chance! And my God, if it’s Colonel Maxwell, we’re all doomed. It makes no sense, sir.”
“You’re just going to have to trust me when I say that I know for certain someone has divulged your identity and I am certain that there is a double agent. You must not breathe awordof this to any of them—not Elwood, not Booth, not Maxwell.”
“But Elwood had Hughie for days after my mother died,” I whispered. “If you don’t trust her, why leave him with her?”
“It is an exceedingly difficult situation to understand, let alone to explain to you without putting you in still more danger. Maybe this person found themselves in an impossible situation,” he said wearily. “And Eloise, you are just unlucky enough to have been sent to Normandy—the most contentious commune in France. Some bastard German was utterly determined to know who you were and our double agent possibly had no choice but to give you away, perhaps not even realizing your family would be exposed too. Every agent who goes into occupied territory gambles with their life, butthismission always put you at an extra level of risk.”
“You make it sound like the double agent is powerless but there is alwaysthe choice to do the right thing. The betrayal is unforgivable,” I said furiously. “Unimaginable! They should hang! Tell me you’re close to exposing them.”
“Itisunforgivable. But it’s also no surprise to any of us that these Germans are utterly ruthless. And please trust me when I tell you that I am handling this the best way I can,” he said firmly, then softer, “Please believe me when I tell you I am doing my absolute best.”
“I do, sir,” I whispered. My eyes were burning with unshed tears, but I hated anyone to see me cry. I turned away from him to stare out the window. “I need to see my son, Mr. Turner. Please take me to him.”
“I don’t think you’ll retire from the SOE—not until the war is finished. And if there is any possibility that I’m right about that, I strongly suggest you leave your boy where he is.”
I closed my eyes. I imagined a future where I collected Hughie and took him back to our flat. We grieved my mother together. We established a normal life again—visits to the library, the park, the grocery store. Perhaps, if the Allies won the war, I would eventually come to terms with my decision to step back from the SOE. I’d unwrap that parcel of Giles’s belongings. I’d learn to live with the reality that my husband’s death was unfair and unjust and that was just the way it was.
But if the Allies lost? Britain would fall one day. My son would grow up in a world where Nazi hatred reigned supreme. And I would have to live with the knowledge that I didn’t do everything in my power to make the world a better place for him.
My heart sank. As exhausted as I was, as unthinkable as it was, I realized that I would return to France if the SOE did indeed ask me to. Maybe this time not for Giles, but for Hughie himself.
“I will need to meet this woman,” I said. “I need to see where he’s living. If you want me to entrust my son to her, I’ll need to know who she is.”
“It should be very apparent to you now that in the field, anything can happen. If you return to France and you’re captured, you will take with you the details of every surviving shred of the Normandy networks with you in your mind. You can only be sure that your interrogation would be especially fierce—you cannot predict how you’ll cope with that. If you genuinely have no idea where Hugh is, that is one less vulnerability they can use again you.” To my frustration, a tear slipped from my eye, onto my cheek. I brushed it away impatiently. Turner sighed gently and dropped his voice. “I’ll arrange for you to see him from a distance. Without his carer seeing your face, withouthimseeing you because that would be unsettling, you’ll see that I’m right—he’s perfectly safe and content.”
“So only you will know where he is.”
“That’s right.”
“And if something happens to me in France?”
“He’ll be well cared for with this woman and her family.”
“How canI go back to France, knowing there is a traitor in Baker Street?”
“You have to trust me when I tell you that there is one bad apple but the rest of our team are exemplary,” he said heavily.
“And if something happens to you while I’m gone? What happens to my son?”
“The moment I resolve the situation with the double agent,” he said, “I’ll be sure to update your file with the precise detail of where he is.”
“How did you find this woman?” I asked Turner the next day. We were sitting in his car on one side of a stretch of parklands opposite an historic convent. I was holding binoculars. Turner was tapping the steering wheel.
“Through a trusted friend,” he said.
I didn’t sleep a wink the previous night after he dropped me to my flat, in such a state of shock that at first, I collapsed in a heap on the sofa. After a while, I became cognizant of the smell in the flat. Food was rotting, laundry needed attention. I cleaned for hours, busying my hands while my mind adjusted to my new reality. Later, I lay for a while in Hughie’s little bed, curled up in a ball. Then I moved to my mother’s bed, still unmade, and I rested my head on a spare pillow, so I could lay and stare at the imprint from her head on her own pillow. I wept for the years when I resented her, and for those beautiful, unexpected years when we were close.
Turner told me he’d arranged a quiet, respectful graveside service at Sidcup Cemetery. My neighbors attended and so did he. He prepaid her headstone but said it didn’t feel right for him to decide upon the inscription. Instead, he left it to me to contact the stonemason upon my return.
Mixed in with all of that grief and concern and shock was a thread of disbelief: a double agent in our ranks? Somewhere near the top of the agency? I was grateful that Turner, at least, could be trusted. Otherwise, I wasn’t sure how I could even consider a return to the field. Agents were beyond vulnerable in occupied territory—entirely dependent on Baker Street to guide our decisions to keep us safe. I asked him to promise me that if I went back, he would keep a hand in my mission. He told me that he was already doing everything he could for all agents in the field. “They’re as safe as they can be,” he assured me. “And you will be too.”
“Here they come,” Turner said now, pointing.
