The Spy Who Loved Me

BRISTOL was a new city for Jane Warren, but she knew all about it. Beside her on the third-class train seat was a bundle of closely written information about the area around the factory.

If one were organised, Jane felt, one could save considerable amounts of time, effort and money.

“Do you really need this?” her mother had said the night before, holding up a list of post office locations, grocers and phone boxes.

“Why waste time wandering the streets of a new city when you can prepare?” Jane replied.

“I know where to go for the necessities of life.”

Her mother smiled. “Twenty-four years of age and set in your ways!”

Jane’s accommodation was sorted already, so that wasn’t a worry. Not that Jane worried about much.

She planned, and planning removed uncertainty. This new job was the end result of months of filtering and lists.

A young woman with a degree had scope in her choice of career, even when she was expected to serve the War Effort.

Jane was going to work in engineering, assisting on the Beaufighter Type 156.

At the same time as helping our brave flyers she was going to get experience for after the war.

True, for now she was in Supplies – ordering and so on – but everyone started somewhere.

Among her papers was a diagram of her career progression, with branches and options.

The train stopped at Chippenham and Jane calculated the time until Bristol.

She never went anywhere without a timetable, and had the Bristol buses pretty much off-pat, too, after studying them on the train once it left Paddington.

The carriage was empty apart from her. A guard passed by in the corridor.

“We’re on time?” Jane called out. “Due at three minutes past one?”

The guard didn’t stop and Jane was annoyed. He looked flustered – he was probably one of those chaotic types. Jane could not abide chaotic people.

The train set off again, and then something odd happened. The guard came quickly back to the door of her carriage.

Jane was aware that he couldn’t see her, sitting up against the division as she was, but she could see him.

The train was just gaining speed as he opened the exterior door and jumped on to the track!

Jane jumped up, hurled herself to the window and watched him scramble back towards the platform.

“More chaotic than most!” she murmured. “Is he on the wrong train?”

Then another man came careering along the corridor, a tall, muscular type in a brown mackintosh and trilby.

He pushed past Jane, scarcely giving her a look. His expression was not flustered like the guard’s, but dogged – angry, even.

Jane tutted – he had yanked her red coat as he passed, and she had to check for smuts.

She sat down again in the carriage and took out her latest notebook. There was time to make a meal plan.

Her new lodgings had a gas ring and basin. A careful girl could mix and match with a loaf and eggs and some kind of veg so that nothing went rotten, as long as she had a plan.

Jane looked up just as the man in the mac spun himself into her carriage, his hand gripping the door as his body did a twohundred-and-seventydegree turn.

“Yes,” he said, and landed beside her so hard that she bounced on the seat.

“I beg your –”

But Jane had no time to finish her sentence because he had turned again, through ninety degrees this time (he did like to rotate, Jane just had time to think) and was kissing her.

Her back was jammed against the divide and her hands flailed around until he pinned them, with his hands, down on the seat.

Jane had been kissed before.

Neil, an actuarial student back in Croydon, was a young man with admirable organisational skills.

They had walked out.

But this kiss was very different. Jane felt as though she was being enveloped in the man, lifted up from the floor by a current of some sort.

It was extraordinary, and she was furious.

There was a scuffling behind her, out in the corridor – somebody pausing for a moment on the dusty floor.

She heard someone step briefly into the carriage as the cad who was kissing her released one of her hands and ran his own hand deep into her hair.

She’d had it in a French pleat. It was all a mess now, thanks to this dreadful man.

The steps went away, and after a final press of his lips on hers, he let her go.

Jane was surprised to find that she was, in fact, still seated. She had not levitated.

“How dare you?” she shouted, and his hand went over her mouth.

“Half a mo,” he said, glancing out into the corridor and then taking away his hand. “All right, you can talk.”

He sat lighting a cigarette as she complained. He offered her one from a smart silver case.

“No, thank you!” Jane said. “I need an explanation. And then I need the police.”

“Goodness, don’t call them,” he said. “Worst possible decision.”

He was Miles Eliot, and he was on somebody’s tail.

It took all the way from Chippenham to Bath for Jane to get sense out of him.

“Can I trust you?” he asked Jane, eyeing her from behind smoke.

“Can you trust me?” she spluttered.

He laughed. He was one of those men that her sister warned her against – ironic, wry, too goodlooking for their own good.

Kitty was disappointed that Jane had given Neil the heave-ho; she said they were peas in a pod, “masters of the ‘to-do’ list”.

“Fair enough,” the man said. “I can see you might have concerns.”

His story was something about a British Nazi, a man whose aim was to infiltrate radio and newspapers all over the country.

“He’s a nasty little one-man band,” Eliot said. “We think he’s identified vulnerable employees of local and national outlets. He’s thoroughly organised.”

“Being organised gets results,” Jane remarked. He eyed her again.

“Not in my game. My game needs cunning and –” he lowered the cigarette “– unpredictability.

“I need to be popping up where and when chaps like Ffoulks-Roberts least expect me. But today I got word that he’s learned I’m on his tail.”

“The guard who jumped?” “One of ours. We have uniforms, and so on, somewhere back at base.”

“Somewhere? Don’t you know where?”

“I fly by the seat of my pants, as the Yanks say. If I need something I get it.”

“Some of us like to have a system.” Jane adjusted her jacket.

“Some of us also like to be asked before being kissed! Tell me about your Nazi.”

“He made a telephone call further up the line, and we know he got some information which startled him.” He fished a revolver out of his bag.

“My colleague in the guard uniform had a strong hunch that he had rumbled his nemesis – that’s me – being on the train.

“It’s a frustratingly empty train and I reckoned he’d identify me if he cared to stroll along the corridor.” “So you did . . . this?”

“It worked, as far as I can tell. I am just some bloke in love, as far as my prey is concerned. His hunter remains faceless.”

“He might have thought his hunter was me.”

Eliot laughed out loud. “You? With your pencil case, your British Railways schedule, and your egg sandwiches in greaseproof! Can I have one?”

“No. So this criminal is still on the train?”

“I think so.”

“You’re not doing that to me again.” Jane touched her lips, feeling the heat still on them.

“We’ll be at Bristol in a quarter of an hour. You should be all right. He’s now thinking his tip-off was wrong; he’s planning his next target in Bristol.” “Eighteen minutes.” “What?”

“We’ll be there in eighteen minutes. You’d think a spy would know the trains.”

He shrugged.

“You obviously don’t know spying. It’s not about dry data.”

“Maybe it should be. How long have you been on this man’s tail?”

“I’m nearly there. The thing is to catch him red-handed.”

“How long?”

He looked down. Jane observed the wave of his dark brown hair. He really was a dish. It was a pity he was such a twit.

“A few months.”

“It’s now February 1940. When did he pop up?”

Eliot muttered something. “I didn’t catch that.”

“In 1938. Late autumn – practically winter.”

It was Jane’s turn to laugh. Eliot looked upset.

“He knows I’m on to him, and he’d like to find out who I am and kill me. Put that on your list! I have to be terribly careful.”

“So you follow him about all day and all night?”

“Well, obviously not. I have to sleep; I have to have a bath and so on.” “Get a co-stalker, then.” His handsome narrow eyes narrowed some more.

“I hunt alone. I use my wits where others . . .” he looked at the seat beside Jane “. . . use a doubleentry account book, apparently.”

At last they arrived at Bristol. Eliot strode beside her along the platform and a pretty young woman watched them pass by.

Jane felt a frisson of pleasure that the girl thought this dish was hers.

Beyond the ticket barrier she saw a fat man holding up a cardboard sign that read Miss Warren.

Jane had asked for the sign – she could not abide waiting unnecessarily.

She had also asked the man – a Mr Stuart Fraser who was shortly to be her boss – for a description.

He was a lot fatter than he’d suggested in his letter.

Jane raised a hand to get Mr Fraser’s attention but Eliot seized her wrist, pulled her round and kissed her again. Her bag dropped to the floor with a thud.

“He’s got off the train! He’s looking our way!” Eliot hissed, his face buried in her collar.

He took her face in his hands and kissed her again, for ages. Behind Eliot’s back Jane saw Mr Fraser approach, pink in the face.

“Miss Warren!” he said indignantly.

She waved her hands in the air, trying to indicate that the kiss wasn’t voluntary, but she couldn’t speak, and Mr Fraser’s face suggested that he hadn’t got her message.

“The post is not for a married lady,” he said.

Jane flapped her hands some more.

“It’s not suitable for a lady who’s . . .” he turned pinker “. . . who’s engaged, either, or who’s the sort of young lady who –”

Eliot had dropped her again and was now scanning the station for his Nazi propagandist. Jane wanted to throttle him.

“Mr Fraser!” she cried, trying to keep desperation out of her voice. “Let me explain. This man is –”

“Your romantic affairs are not my concern,” Fraser interrupted, “except that you omitted to tell me about your, er, commitments in this regard. Entanglements.”

“We’re not married,” Eliot said lightly, “or engaged.”

Mr Fraser stared. Eliot wasn’t paying attention. He had moved to stand behind Jane, snaking his arms tightly round her waist so he could (apparently) hide. Jane wriggled but he only held tighter.

“What?” Fraser’s face fell. “She doesn’t even like me,” Eliot said. “All this was for a short-term purpose.” Fraser exhaled.

“I think, Miss Warren, that it will be easiest and

least embarrassing for all concerned if we end our professional relationship here.

“The company has standards. I will do the necessary paperwork and I wish you well on your return journey.”

“No, Mr Fraser!” Jane reached out to him but he had already turned away and melted into the crowd. “He’s gone,” Eliot said. “Yes, you fool, he has,” Jane said, close to tears. He looked at her.

“I meant FfoulksRoberts,” he said. “All clear. Are you all right?”

Jane raged and stamped and Eliot apologised, though he did gently point out that his mission was more pressing than hers.

“My mission is fighter aeroplanes!” Jane said. “At least it was. I hate you.” “What was the post?” “Supplies, for now.”

‘Well, there you are – not as urgent – but it’s rotten and I’m sorry. Think of this as different war work.” “I hate you.”

“I could buy you tea before I set off after Ffoulks. I get expenses, though I never remember to keep receipts.”

“Tea,” she said with a withering look. “How wonderful.”

There was no train back for an hour so she agreed to be bought tea and cake. On the way back, Jane would consult her career plan and form a fresh path.

Over tea she observed that he was unsurprisingly fixated on heroics.

“I come from a military family,” he said. “Father regards me as feeble because I went into radio after Oxford – that was before the war.”

“I love the wireless.”

“My father says it’s for sissies.”

“Now you catch Nazis?” He smiled.

“Yes, I’ve got free rein to find a way to record Ffoulks-Roberts recruiting.

“He’s good, which means that he picks targets with care, having researched them exhaustively, and so far he hasn’t had a failure.

“We believe there are three working their way up British organisations, to plant false information.” “Arrest them, then.”

“No can do, not until we have something solid. It would discredit the whole project. No, I have to nab my man with evidence.”

“So you research his targets? You’re prepared?”

“Heavens, I don’t do that side – libraries and all that microfiche! I’m a field man.”

He found Jane’s approach to life hilarious, but Jane was proud of it.

“At university I saved a

We play a manic tug-of-war

With all his puppy toys;

He growls – he thinks so fearsomely – A squeaky little noise!

But finally, he’s quite tired out And flops down in a heap Then, like all baby creatures, Is instantly asleep! shilling a week, on average, by simple planning.” She stroked the red coat draped on her chair. “That’s how I bought this.”

“Lovely,” he said, but he was looking at her, rather than the coat.

She stopped talking, and for a moment found herself looking into his eyes.

She hadn’t noticed them before because, for much of their acquaintance, he had been kissing her.

“I find that if you keep shoes polished,” she added quickly, “and make a note to take them to the cobblers every eighteen months strictly, you can save . . .”

She stopped.

“Your methods are new to me,” he said.

“They took me a long way,” Jane said, “until a spy with more gung-ho than common sense kissed me on a train, and put a spanner in the works.”

“That kiss, though.”

There was a long silence. Jane waved to the waitress. “More tea?” Eliot said. She shook her head, confused.

“No, I’ve had enough.” “You’ll be off home, then.” He leaned over the table and his eyes shone darkly. “Look, I’m sorry.

“If I could I’d suggest you drop my name in your job search. But I can’t. Secret.”

Eileen Hay.

It was not Jane’s day. A Tannoy announcement said a bomb in the west of London had put a temporary halt on trains. Jane slumped in her seat.

“It won’t be long,” he said. “Sit it out. I’ll buy you supper.”

“But don’t you have to start after your prey, with your collar turned up?” He sat up.

“You have a skewed view of my work.”

“It sounds like the flicks. I bet you’ve always wanted to be an actor! William Powell in those ‘Thin Man’ films.”

“They’re comedies.”

She laughed bitterly.

“You take yourself seriously, don’t you?”

“You know me so well,” he said sardonically.

“Don’t I just?”

His hand lay an inch from hers on the table. Jane had a strange feeling that at any moment she might touch it.

“Where’s he heading next?” she said, to break the tension.

“Who?”

“Good heavens! Your criminal.”

“Not sure. I’ll ask around.”

“Where might he recruit in Bristol?”

“How would I know? I tend to start in bars, with men like him.”