A Time of Secrets (46 page)

Ross put back his head and laughed.

I said, slowly and carefully, ‘De Groot used a German word to describe Mary. He called her
liebling
. It means darling.’

‘It’d be a Dutch word, surely.’

‘No, I checked. It’s German. The Dutch equivalent is
lieveling
.’

Ross laughed again.

‘You can’t mean you really think that de Groot’s a German spy because he mispronounced a word. You’ve been listening to too many of those serials on the wireless.’

‘That was the first thing that made me wonder. It’s not only that,’ I argued. ‘The more I’ve been thinking about him, the more I realise that there were many things about him that made me suspicious. Put together they all add up.’

‘What else?’ asked Ross.

‘He’s always asking questions. He asked me several times about Eric’s mission. At a party I heard him practically interrogating Mary about how she came to work for APLO.’ I paused. ‘Actually, I think he may have befriended her to get information. She’s rather indiscreet.’

Ross raised an eyebrow.

‘There’s more,’ I said. ‘The tenth of July was the day that Dolly had her bridge party. And it was the day that Perth sent the warning about Destro. Mary was upset because of Faye and Jim Pope.’

Ross looked up to examine the ceiling. ‘Is there a point to this?’

I flushed. ‘Of course there is. I took Mary up to my room at lunchtime to talk things over and I vividly recall seeing Sam de Groot coming out of Lance Cole’s office. He seemed flustered and I thought it was because he’d seen Mary.’ I hesitated, then said slowly, ‘Dolly said that she left the transmission on Cole’s desk because he was out. What if Sam took it before Cole saw it? It would explain why Cole didn’t act on it.’

Ross shook his head. ‘Cole didn’t act on the transmission because he was a fool. He didn’t want to believe it because he had so much riding on the success of Destro.’

I ignored him. ‘And it’s odd that Sam de Groot was Cole’s alibi for the night that Violet was attacked. Would they really spend all night working together?’

‘Maybe they were trying out Tuck’s lifestyle,’ Ross said derisively, and I blushed again.

‘There’s more,’ I said. ‘I went to see Lieutenant Commander Boon this morning. It’s awfully strange how Sam came to be in APLO.’

Ross’s expression was no longer scornful. ‘What do you mean?’ he asked.

‘Lieutenant Commander Boon was very helpful. Did you know Sam de Groot was the coast watcher who saved your friend Tom Lagrange when he escaped from the Japanese in September last year?’

Ross nodded. ‘De Groot found him, nursed him and arranged for a pick-up. The Japanese were breathing down his neck and so he asked to be evacuated with Tom.’

‘The records from Dutch New Guinea are scant. Importantly, there’s no photograph of Alexander de Groot on file anywhere from before he arrived in Australia. No one in the Netherlands East Indies Forces Intelligence Service in Melbourne had ever met him. According to Lieutenant Commander Boon, de Groot was famously reclusive, even before he was a coast watcher. A loner with few friends, who was abrasive and actively disliked. That simply doesn’t sound like the Sam de Groot we know. He’s quiet, but also affable, friendly –’

Ross’s look was disparaging. ‘Perhaps he likes Australians, hates his countrymen. This is fantasy, Stella. It’s not helping Eric.’

I rubbed my lips together while I thought about how to explain. ‘What if the Japanese captured the real de Groot just before they captured Captain Lagrange, and decided to use Captain Lagrange to get the false de Groot – a German spy working for the Japanese – into Australia? Maybe Captain Lagrange was tricked into thinking that he’d escaped from the Japanese and been rescued by Sam de Groot, but it was all a ruse. You said that de Groot asked to be evacuated back to Australia with Captain Lagrange and he was drafted into intelligence work once he was in Australia. If that was the Japanese plan, then it worked brilliantly.’

Ross shook his head. ‘It’s impossible to learn to speak Dutch like a native. If anything he’d have to be a rogue Dutchman.’

‘Not necessarily. The Germans held north-eastern New Guinea as a territory until Australia took it off them during the Great War. Sam’s what? Thirty-odd years old? He could have been born in German New Guinea and lived there until he was ten or so. His parents may have moved to Dutch New Guinea when Australia took over the German territories. He would have learned Dutch when he was a child, but he’d still be a German.’

I reached across the desk and took hold of his hand, squeezing it hard. ‘Nick, I know this is all wild surmise, but it’s still worth considering. We have to do something.’

He looked at my hand holding his. Embarrassed, I snatched my hand away and sat down opposite him.

Ross lit a cigarette. ‘Let’s consider what we have against de Groot,’ he said, in an oddly careful voice. ‘De Groot referred to Mary Massey by a German word. He asks a lot of questions. His identity has never been fully established, but on the other hand, no one has ever even contemplated disputing it because he’s done nothing to bring it into question. He was working with Cole and was often in and out of his office. You saw him coming out of Cole’s office on a day an important message was delivered, and never acted upon.’

Put like that, it all sounded very slight.

‘He’s Eric’s height and build,’ I said, with some desperation. ‘And it’s strange that he was Cole’s alibi for the axe attack on Violet.’

Ross looked at me. His eyes seemed very dark, more brown than green; I couldn’t see the golden lights in them, or the hint of red.

‘It’s not enough, Stella.’

‘If you won’t help me, I’ll look into it myself,’ I said.

‘You don’t understand. It’s not enough
yet
. We need more evidence.’

I smiled. ‘Thanks, Nick.’

He reached his arms above him in a stretch; his body was as lean and hard as Eric’s. He’d undergone the same tough training that Eric had undergone. I’d wrongly assumed that Nick Ross was a soft officer who’d messed up his chance at fieldwork and now sat behind a desk, far removed from the blood and bravery and terror of the war. In reality, he was a highly trained fighter, tough and analytical, who agonised over decisions that affected men’s lives and used his particular skills in the best way he could. I wondered if everyone apart from his close friends underestimated Nick Ross.

‘Sam de Groot’s lodgings are in a boarding house in St Kilda,’ he said. ‘It’s been requisitioned by the army for the duration and they’ve filled it with non-commissioned officers who work in intelligence.’

‘Is there any way we could search his digs?’ I asked.

As he leaned back in his chair and thought about it I was struck again by how attractive he was. Since our talk in Dolly’s room three days ago it was as if Ross had allowed the barriers between us to fall. The tricks he used for protection – sarcasm, flirtation, coldness, anger – were still there, but muted, now I had been admitted to his inner sanctum.

Dolly had said he was crazy about me, but I found that hard to believe. I knew he liked me; in fact, I strongly suspected that I was the only female friend he had. But he had never behaved romantically towards me. Not really. A few stolen kisses, a couple of drunken propositions and groping me that night in Dolly’s bed meant nothing to a man like Nick Ross. He’d always try his luck with a woman, even one he saw as a friend, because he used sex as a weapon; it gave him power. Anyway, all that had been before our talk, before we accepted that we were friends. Surely Dolly was wrong about his feelings for me.

‘They won’t let us simply waltz in there and search de Groot’s belongings,’ he said, after a short silence. ‘And I don’t see him keeping a transmitter in that place anyway. Too dangerous. If he is a spy, then he’s cool-headed and very smart. He must keep it somewhere secret.’

‘Would he keep it here? At Goodwood, I mean?’ I said slowly. ‘Any transmissions he made would be masked by our own. In many ways it would be the perfect place.’

‘It’d be damned cheeky,’ said Ross. He threw me a boyish smile. ‘Let’s look.’

Goodwood was set in half an acre of grounds. The old stables at the back housed the radio transmitters and you got to them along a path from the kitchen through the overgrown back garden. The problem was how to conduct a search without de Groot seeing us and working out what we were doing.

‘Yes, just get him out of here for an hour or so.’ Ross had telephoned Rob Sinclair. ‘I don’t care. Whatever you can think of.’ He hung up the receiver. ‘Rob’ll get him out of our way,’ he said.

‘What’ll we say we’re looking for in the garden?’ I asked.

Ross considered this for a few seconds. ‘You saw an injured kitten come into the garden and are worried about it. So we’re looking for it.’

My look was incredulous. ‘No one will believe that Lieutenant Nick Ross would spend time looking for an injured kitten.’

He tried to hide a smile. ‘They’ll all assume I’m trying to ingratiate myself with you.’

I thought that this was annoying, but probably true.

*

De Groot left Goodwood just after lunch. He turned left at the gate and headed along Toorak Road in the direction of Punt Road. I suspected he’d been asked to interpret for a prisoner at Cranleigh. We went into action as soon as he had gone.

‘It’ll be in a waterproofed timber case,’ said Ross. ‘So look for anything resembling a small crate.’

A couple of soldiers, the guards from the morning shift, were in the kitchen, drinking cups of tea. Ross explained about the kitten and I was fairly sure that he winked at them. The guards exchanged looks and smirked in reply. I gazed at Ross with an adoring expression.

‘It’s so kind of you, Lieutenant Ross,’ I said.

‘No need to overdo it,’ he murmured as we left the kitchen.

We began our search. Ross took the left side and the back of the stables. I poked around the damp garden, calling ‘kitty, kitty’ occasionally, for verisimilitude. We met up fifteen minutes later.

‘No luck,’ I said. ‘Just oodles of snails.’ I glanced up. ‘And I think it’s going to rain.’

‘It’s Melbourne in August,’ he said. ‘Of course it’s going to rain. I didn’t see anything resembling a kitten either. Let’s try the front.’

No kittens that looked like small crates were located in the front garden, either. It did rain, though, and we were soaked through by the time we came in.

‘De Groot shares an office with Sweeting, doesn’t he?’ said Ross, rubbing his hand over his wet face. ‘I’ll search it when Sweeting’s at afternoon tea. You keep him there as long as possible.’

Corporal Sweeting, who shared de Groot’s office, was a grizzled Great War veteran. His main joy outside of work was growing camellias. I kept him in the kitchen for as long as I could, practically flirting with the poor man while Faye and Mary looked on in amazement.

‘Nothing,’ said Ross, when we met up in his office. ‘Look, Stella, let’s leave it for the time being. I’ll discuss it all with Rob tomorrow. Why don’t we go out to dinner tonight, try to forget all this misery.’

I knew that nothing more could be done, but disappointment was like a sour taste that nothing could shift.

‘Thanks, but I’d rather just go home.’

‘Do you want me to sleep in Dolly’s room tonight? I don’t like you being there alone.’

‘No. Thanks for the offer, but Cole’s gone now. And anyway, Lawrie Smith is staying in Violet’s flat. He’s just across the hall. I’ll be fine.’

Forty-two

M
rs Campbell was waiting in her doorway when I opened the doors into Avoca’s lobby that evening.

‘Come in for a nice cup of tea, Stella dear. You look done in.’

She ushered me to the couch and fussed around me. ‘I’ve hardly seen you in the last weeks,’ she said. ‘Isn’t it dreadful about Lieutenant Cole? My stepchildren are very worried about it – and the attack on poor Violet, of course. So Peggy is coming by in an hour or so to take me back to her house for a nice visit.’

I wasn’t surprised that her family didn’t want her alone in the flat after what had happened. ‘Are you going to be away for long?’

She gave a slight shrug. ‘Peggy is very determined that I’ll stay with her until they find the axe-attacker.’ Her smile was resigned. ‘I’ll miss my wee flat. But a change is as good as a holiday, they say.’

Mrs Campbell went into the kitchen to put on the kettle and I pulled a small white bundle out of my satchel. A large white handkerchief, with the initials N.T.R. embroidered in one corner, was wrapped around a small silver snuffbox and a spoon with a barley twist handle, topped by a thistle. I reached up and placed them on a shelf of Mrs Campbell’s display cabinet, towards the back where they weren’t very obvious. I folded Ross’s handkerchief and put it away.

A few minutes later Mrs Campbell and I were drinking tea out of delicate china cups.

‘Heard any elves dancing around lately?’ I asked, with a smile.

‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘I’m not ga-ga, not yet. I know very well the barn cats drank the milk my mother put out.’