Ken Follett - Hornet Flight

He stopped in the lounge to watch the takeoff. Juel, Braun, and the detectives waited with him. Varde was standing nearby, trying hard to look as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. They watched while the four angry passengers boarded. The chocks were removed from the wheels by the ground crew and thrown on board, then the door was closed.

As the aircraft moved off its stand, Peter was struck by inspiration. “Stop the plane,” he said to Varde.

Juel said, “For God’s sake. .”

Varde looked as if he might cry. He turned to General Braun. “Sir, my passengers. .”

“Stop the plane!” Peter repeated.

Varde continued to look pleadingly at Braun. After a moment, Braun nodded. “Do as he says.”

Varde picked up a phone.

Juel said, “My God, Flemming, this had better be good.”

The aircraft rolled onto the runway, turned a full circle, and came back to its stand. The door opened, and the chocks were thrown down to the ground crew.

Peter led the rest of the detectives out onto the apron. The propellers slowed and stopped. Two men in overalls were wedging the chocks in front of the main wheels. Peter addressed one of them. “Hand me that chock.”

The man looked scared, but did as he was told.

Peter took the chock from him. It was a simple triangular block of wood about a foot high-dirty, heavy, and solid.

“And the other one,” Peter said.

Ducking under the fuselage, the mechanic picked up the other and handed it over.

It looked the same, but felt lighter. Turning it over in his hands, Peter found that one face was a sliding lid. He opened it. Inside was a package carefully wrapped in oilcloth.

Peter gave a sigh of profound satisfaction.

The mechanic turned and ran.

“Stop him!” Peter cried, but it was unnecessary. The man veered away from the men and tried to run past Tilde, no doubt imagining he could easily push her aside. She turned like a dancer, letting him pass, then stuck out a foot and tripped him. He went flying.

Dresler jumped on him, hauled him to his feet, and twisted his arm behind his back.

Peter nodded to Ellegard. “Arrest the other mechanic. He must have known what was going on.”

Peter turned his attention to the package. He unwrapped the oilcloth. Inside were two copies of Reality. He handed them to Juel.

Juel looked at the papers, then up at Peter.

Peter stared at him expectantly, saying nothing, waiting.

Juel said reluctantly, “Well done, Flemming.”

Peter smiled. “Just doing my job, sir.”

Juel turned away.

Peter said to his detectives, “Handcuff both mechanics and take them to headquarters for questioning.”

There was something else in the package. Peter pulled out a sheaf of papers clipped together. They were covered with typed characters in five-letter groups that made no sense. He stared at them in puzzlement for a moment. Then enlightenment dawned, and he realized this was a triumph greater than he had dreamed.

The papers he was holding bore a message in code.

Peter handed the papers to Braun. “I think we have uncovered a spy ring, General.”

Braun looked at the papers and paled. “My God, you’re right.”

“Perhaps the German military has a department that specializes in breaking enemy ciphers?”

“It certainly does.”

“Good,” said Peter.

Hermia Mount was about to get the sack.

This had never happened to her before. She was bright and conscientious, and her employers had always regarded her as a treasure, despite her sharp tongue. But her current boss, Herbert Woodie, was going to tell her she was fired, as soon as he worked up the courage.

Two Danes working for MI6 had been arrested at Kastrup aerodrome. They were now in custody and undoubtedly being interrogated. It was a bad blow to the Nightwatchmen network. Woodie was a peacetime MI6 man, a long-serving bureaucrat. He needed someone to blame, and Hermia was a suitable candidate.

Hermia understood this. She had worked for the British civil service for a decade, and she knew its ways. If Woodie were forced to accept that the blame lay with his department, he would pin it on the most junior person available. Woodie had never been comfortable working with a woman anyway, and he would be happy to see her replaced by a man.

At first Hermia was inclined to offer herself up as the sacrificial victim. She had never met the two aircraft mechanics-they had been recruited by Poul Kirke-but the network was her creation and she was responsible for the fate of the arrested men. She was as upset as if they had already died, and she did not want to go on.

After all, she thought, how much had she actually done to help the war effort? She was just accumulating information. None of it had ever been used. Men were risking their lives to send her photographs of Copenhagen harbor with nothing much happening. It seemed foolish.

But in fact she knew the importance of this laborious routine work. At some future date, a reconnaissance plane would photograph the harbor full of ships, and military planners would need to know whether this represented normal traffic or the sudden buildup of an invasion force-and at that point Hermia’s photographs would become crucial.

Furthermore, the visit of Digby Hoare had given an immediate urgency to her work. The Germans’ aircraft detection system could be the weapon that would win the war. The more she thought about it, the more likely it seemed that the key to the problem could lie in Denmark. The Danish west coast seemed the ideal location for a warning station designed to detect bombers approaching Germany.

And there was no one else in MI6 who had her ground-level knowledge of Denmark. She knew Poul Kirke personally and he trusted her. It could be disastrous if a stranger took over. She had to keep her job. And that meant outwitting her boss.

“This is bad news,” Woodie said sententiously as she stood in front of his desk.

His office was a bedroom in the old house of Bletchley Park. Flowered wallpaper and silk-shaded wall lights suggested it had been occupied by a lady before the war. Now it had filing cabinets instead of wardrobes full of dresses, and a steel map table where once there might have been a dressing table with spindly legs and a triple mirror. And instead of a glamorous woman in a priceless silk negligee, the room was occupied by a small, self-important man in a gray suit and glasses.

Hermia faked the appearance of calm. “There’s always danger when an operative is interrogated, of course,” she said. “However-” She thought of the two brave men being interrogated and tortured, and her breath caught in her throat for a moment. Then she recovered. “However, in this case I feel the risk is slight.”

Woodie grunted skeptically. “We may need to set up an inquiry.”

Her heart sank. An inquiry meant an investigator from outside the department. He would have to come up with a scapegoat, and she was the obvious choice. She began the defense she had prepared. “The two men arrested don’t have any secrets to betray,” she said. “They were ground crew at the aerodrome. One of the Nightwatchmen would give them papers to be smuggled out, and they would stow the contraband in a hollow wheel chock.” Even so, she knew, they might reveal apparently innocent details about how they were recruited and run, details which a clever spycatcher could use to track down other agents.

“Who passed them the papers?”

“Matthies Hertz, a lieutenant in the army. He’s gone into hiding. And the mechanics don’t know anyone else in the network.”

“So our tight security has limited the damage to the organization.”

Hermia guessed that Woodie was rehearsing a line he might speak to his superiors, and she forced herself to flatter him. “Exactly, sir, that’s a good way of putting it.”