Princess Elizabeth's Spy (12 page)

Maggie had another nightmare.

This time, she was out walking the grounds hand in hand with Lilibet, the sky a greenish gray that threatened thunderstorms. A large falcon flew overhead, almost a pterodactyl, huge, with skeletal wings. He swooped down and grabbed the princess by the back of her coat.

Maggie felt the girl’s small hand ripped from hers and began crying as the bird flew higher and higher, taking her away to what Maggie knew was a horrible fate.

Her own screaming woke her up. It was still dark. She was trembling, drenched in cold sweat, heart thumping, limbs cramping. She lay there for a few minutes, gasping for breath, blinking away the images of the dream.

Finally, her heart slowed and she was able to see the shadows in her room for what they were—just shadows, and not terrible birds of prey with sharp talons and beaks. She rubbed her eyes, hard, pinpoints of light breaking through.
Pull yourself together, Hope,
she scolded.

She was able to go back to sleep, but woke up tired and disoriented. At least it was her day off. After completing her daily morning exercise regime, learned at Camp Spook—push-ups, sit-ups, leg lifts, and jumping jacks—preparing her lesson plans for the Princess, and lunch, Maggie put on her wool coat and hat and went to the police station.

It was raining, a cold, damp drizzle that showed no sign of letting up, and a stiff wind blew her large black umbrella inside out, showing its inner spine like a skeleton for a brief moment before she was able to right it. Finally, she reached the red-brick station. “I’d like to speak with Detective Wilson, please,” she said to the older sandy-haired man in uniform behind the wooden counter as she began to feel the warmth from the coal heater in the corner. “It’s in regard to the Lily Howell case.”

“Just a moment, Miss.”

Maggie looked around the station. There were the usual posters in primary colors:
National Service Needs You, ARP Auxiliary Firemen Needed,
and
Dig for Victory!

Detective Wilson appeared. “Ah, hello, there. It’s Miss, ah, Hope, isn’t it?”

“It is, Detective Wilson.”

“Miss Hope, please follow me.”

In Detective Wilson’s tidy office, Maggie took a seat in front of his desk, noting he had no personal photos there, just a wilting aspidistra. “I’ve remembered something that Lady Lily mentioned,” she began.

“Yes?”

“She was … with child.” Maggie would have liked to have used the proper medical term—
pregnant
—but it was considered impolite.

Detective Wilson looked up and smiled. “We know.”

“How …?”

“Autopsy.”

I’m an idiot—obviously they would know.
“Of course.”

“How did you know?”

“She told me, the night I met her.”

“She would have had to. Someone only three months along wouldn’t be showing.”

“Any idea whom the father might be?”

“No, I’m afraid not,” Maggie said. “I’ve asked around—apparently, she was a ‘popular girl.’ “

“I had an interesting telephone call—from a Mr. Frain. You know him?”

“Yes,” Maggie said.
Frain’s made contact, of course.
She tried to see where the conversation was heading.

“He mentioned the complications in the case and that MI-Five had a … particular interest. And we should help
you
as much as possible.” He cleared his throat. “And we, the local police, request the same from you.”

“Of course, sir,” Maggie said. She realized some toes had been stepped on in establishing the jurisdiction of MI-5 and the local police. “We’re all on the same side, after all.”

Maggie walked to Windsor and Eton Central Station, to get the train to Slough. It was raining harder, nearly sleeting—but it was Thursday, the day she was supposed to meet her father for dinner. She waited under the eaves of the arched glass roof in the cold for the train.

At Slough, Maggie walked until she found Bell’s Tavern. She was early, so she had some tea.

She waited.

The clock ticked on, until the heavy black hands reached six, Maggie and her father’s agreed-on meeting time.

She waited.
Of course he might be late. Doesn’t mean he forgot our dinner, just that something came up.

Then she ordered and ate some squash-apple soup and bread and margarine.

She waited. The clock’s hands went to seven.

Then a cider. The clock’s hands reached eight.

Finally, close to nine, the waitress came over. “Will that be all, love?”

Maggie looked up at the clock, which now read 8:10. “Yes. I’m done.” She pulled out her purse to get her wallet to pay the bill, tears threatening to flood her eyes. “I’m really, truly, absolutely done.”

On the way to the Slough train station in the dark, Maggie saw three men stagger out of one of the pubs. They walked toward her, pushing one another and laughing, until they blocked her way.

“And what do we have here?” the tall one sniggered.

Maggie clamped her pocketbook under her arm and tried to walk abound them.

“Not so fast, love,” one with a beard said. “Fancy a drink?”

“No, thank you,” Maggie replied. They circled around her. “Let me pass!”

“Wot? Need to go home to your boyfriend?” the short one said. “I could be your boyfriend. Give us a kiss,” he slurred as he staggered toward her.

Maggie looked around. The main street of Slough was deserted. “I said no.”

The tall one got up right in front of her, much too close, his breath foul and smelling of gin. “Why don’t you pick one of us, love?” He reached out to stroke her cheek. “Or we’ll pick for you.”

Maggie kneed him between the legs, hearing him howl and his friends laugh, then sidestepped and ran, as fast as she could, to the train station. “Bitch!” they called after her.

Trembling, Maggie called Hugh at his office from a public pay phone on the train platform. “Of course I can meet you,” he said.

An hour later, Maggie stepped off the train and exited the Windsor station, taking High Street to Peascod Street. The blackout curtains were drawn at Boswell’s Books, but when Maggie rapped at the door, Mr. Higgins answered. “What you’re looking for is in the back, miss.”

Maggie went through the stacks to the back room, used for bookkeeping and storage. Hugh was there, sitting at a small round table. He stood up. “Hello.” Then, “You look a bit pale. Is everything all right?”

Maggie didn’t look at him.

He sat back down.

She took off her coat and her sweater, then rolled up her shirtsleeves.

“Get up,” she said.

“Beg pardon?”

“Get up.”

He did.

“Help me move the table and the chairs out of the way.”

Together, in silence, they cleared the room.

“Are you all right?” Hugh said finally.

“At Camp Spook, my downfall was the physical,” she said, ignoring his question. “So, every morning and night, I’ve been doing exercises. Sit-ups, push-ups, jumping jacks, jackknives … You name it. I’ve started running too, before dawn, so no one can see. I’ve been practicing shooting with clay pigeons. But one thing I can’t do is practice any martial-arts skills.”

She walked to the center of the room. “That’s what I need you for.”

“What?” Hugh was, confused.

“Come on, you’ve had the same training I had, probably more and better.”

“Maggie …” He looked positively horrified. “I—I can’t.”

“Afraid a girl’s going to beat you up?” Maggie walked up to him and began poking him. They were not gentle pokes.

“Ouch!” Hugh said.

“Come on, you deskbound fop!”

He saw the desperation in her eyes. “All right,” he said. “It’s been a while for you.” He took off his jacket. “Let’s go back to the basics.”

Maggie took a wide-legged stance and glared.

Hugh loosened his tie. “Your aim is to get your opponent off-balance. Once off-balance, you can use his weight to throw him down.” He gestured to Maggie. “Pretend you’re just walking along the street.”

She walked past him. He reached out to grab her. She threw her arm across him and flipped him to the ground.

“Ouch,” Hugh said. He moved his appendages to see if anything was broken.

Maggie paced back and forth in front of him. “Get up.”

He did. “Now pretend I’m coming at you again.” He came behind her in a choke hold and she bent over and, with a grunt, flipped him over. He hit the floor again with a loud bang.

“Ooof,” he said, blinking against the pain.

Archibald Higgins knocked at the door. “Everything all right in there?”

“Just fine, Mr. Higgins,” Maggie replied, breathing hard. “Never better.”

“All right, then.” The door clicked closed.

“Again,” Maggie demanded.

Hugh rose to his feet. He rolled up his shirtsleeves. He came at her from the front, going for her neck. She grabbed his arm and twisted it, causing him to bend over and groan in pain.

She let go.

He came at her again, this time trying to kick her. She grabbed his leg and rotated; he fell onto his stomach.

He got up, breathing hard, sweat breaking out on his temples, and came at her again, both hands reaching out to choke her. They wrestled together for what felt like an eternity, before Maggie managed to fall deliberately under him, bringing him down with her. Their lips were almost touching.

Then, with a foot to his midsection, she managed to kick-flip him over.

They both lay on the ground, trying to catch their breath.

Finally, Maggie got up and stood over Hugh. “Are you all right?” she said, extending a hand. He took it and allowed her to help him up.

“I’ll live,” he said. “You?”

Maggie’s eyes were hot and red. She sniffled. “I’m fine.”

Hugh led her over to the table. They both sat down on it.

“You’re obviously not,” he said. “And I don’t think it’s anything physical.”

There was a long silence, then, “I went to Slough today. I was supposed to have dinner with my father. And he forgot. I waited for hours!” She sniffled again. Hugh handed her a handkerchief, which she took and wiped her eyes with. “And then some, some
men
hassled me.”

Hugh looked concerned. “Are you all right?”

“Fine,” Maggie said. “I made a run for it. And, on top of everything, Lily’s
dead.
It could just as easily have been Lilibet! But—my father—and I haven’t even seen him since I bumped into him, by accident, at the office.… He never even asked me about John! And then—and then, I was stood up by my own father.” She blew her nose, making a loud and unladylike snuffling sound.

“Maggie …” Hugh made a few awkward pats to her shoulder. “Maggie, listen to me. You have a job to do. You can’t let your relationship—or non-relationship—with your father affect you. You can’t let a bunch of buffoons affect you. You can’t let what happened to John affect you. And you can’t let your fear, and your anger, and your sorrow—” Hugh broke off suddenly.

“I know.” Maggie reached out and took Hugh’s hand. It was large and warm. “Thank you. I’m all right now.”

After a few moments, she let go of his hand. “I have some official business,” he said.

Maggie swiped at her eyes again. “Of course.”

“We want you to get the King’s file on Lily Howell.”

“If MI-Five wanted Lily Howell’s file, surely Frain could just ask the King for it. Unless you think …” Maggie considered. “The King? You think the
King
had something to do with Lily Howell’s murder?”

“It’s possible,” Hugh said. “Or it’s possible there are some things in Lily’s file the Royals would want to remove, before showing it to us.”

“And let’s just suppose for a moment I was to get caught by all those Coldstream Guards who protect the king. Would MI-Five stand up for me? Or let me hang?”

“But you won’t get caught. We’ll make sure of it.” His forehead creased. “What’s in those files might shed some light on what’s been happening at the castle.”

“I’ll need clay to make imprints of the keys—those files are bound to be locked,” she said.

“Your wish is my command.” Hugh slipped off the table and went to his jacket, pulling out a wrapped pad of soft brown clay from the inside pocket. He handed it to her. “Get the imprints, and then we’ll make you the keys.” He bent down to the briefcase again, rummaging.

“And I’ll need a—”

Hugh handed her a small camera.

“Ha!” Maggie said, pleased, as she accepted it.

Then he handed her a felted handbag. “Not really my style,” she remarked, turning it in her hands and looking at it from all angles.

“There’s a false bottom. For hiding the camera.”

“Fantastic.” Feeling better, she rolled down her sleeves and gathered her things to leave, placing the clay and camera in the purse’s false bottom. As she did, she made a mental note to photograph Louisa’s files as well.

“By the way,” Hugh said. “You’re not bad. At fighting, that is.”

“Well, I—” Maggie was momentarily flustered.

“For what it’s worth, I think you could have held your own in France,” Hugh said.

“That means a lot to me, Hugh,” she replied. Then she left.

At Maumbrey Cottage, his home at Bletchley, Edmund Hope went to the large wooden desk, picked up the telephone receiver, and dialed. “Margaret wanted to have dinner with me,” he said into the telephone receiver.

On the other end of the line, Peter Frain said, “We know.”

Static crackled and spluttered over the line.

“I knew she was going to ask me questions about her mother.”

“And what did you say?”

“Nothing,” Edmund replied. “I didn’t meet her.” He didn’t mention he’d been there, at the pub in Slough, and that he’d stared at her through the plate-glass windows in the dark and cold, before finally leaving. The answers his daughter wanted from him—they just weren’t anything he could or would tell her. Even if it meant disappointing her. Even if it meant losing her again.

“Good,” Frain said. “Let’s keep it that way.”

Monday morning was Princess Elizabeth’s first maths lesson.

It was not going well.

“But Crawfie’s
already
taught me how to add, subtract, multiply, and divide,” Lilibet said earnestly in the nursery, warmed by orange and indigo flames crackling behind the brass fender. “And we’ve gone over decimals and fractions. I really don’t know what more there is.” A few of the corgis were napping in front of the fender on their needlepoint pillows, snoring. Dookie snorted and opened his black eyes for a moment, then went back to sleep.

Maggie smiled. “A
bit
more.”

“But it’s not as if I’ll have to do my own books,” Lilibet said, parroting what she must have heard Crawfie say.

“No,” Maggie rejoined, “but you may want to keep an eye on those books when you’re Queen.” She let Lilibet think about it. “Just a suggestion, of course.”

“Oh,” Lilibet said, considering. “Perhaps you’re right.”

“Actually,” Maggie said, sitting down next to the girl, “I thought we might do something different today. It’s math, but it doesn’t really have to do with numbers at all. And it does have to do with a queen. Two queens. And how math saved Queen Elizabeth’s crown.”

“Really?” At this, Lilibet perked up.

“Really.” And Maggie began to relate the story of how, when Mary, Queen of Scots, was on trial for treason, accused of trying to assassinate the Protestant Queen Elizabeth, and facing a death sentence, she’d used code to communicate with her fellow Catholics. “You see, Mary had actually authorized the plot to murder Queen Elizabeth. But all of her messages were written in cipher. In order to prove her guilt, Queen Elizabeth would have to break the cipher.”

Lilibet’s eyes were huge. “Yes?”

“Well, luckily, she had on her side a brilliant mathematician, Sir Francis Walsingham, her principal secretary. Walsingham was an expert at breaking codes and ciphers.”

“But what does this have to do with maths?”

“We’re getting there!” Maggie said, pleased that she now had her young charge’s interest. “Mary’s letters to her supporters were in cipher—and it would take maths, some pretty sophisticated maths, to break the code.” She got up, went to her bookcase, and pulled out a book about Mary, Queen of Scots, in which she’d bookmarked of one of Anthony Babington’s messages to Mary, written in code. “What do you make of this?” Maggie asked.

“It’s … gibberish. Those aren’t even real numbers or letters.” She sighed in exasperation. “It doesn’t make sense.”

“Ah, but if you know maths, it just might. Not only was it a secret message about the assassination of Queen Elizabeth, written in code, but it, like their other messages, was smuggled in and out of prison through beer-barrel stoppers. Queen Mary’s servants would retrieve the messages from the beer-barrels and place messages back into the hollow of the stopper.”

“But how did they figure it out?”

“Sir Francis, Queen Elizabeth’s Royal Spy Master, intercepted all of the messages between Queen Mary and Anthony Babington. Each message was copied by the Spy Master and then sent on to its destination intact. Then Sir Francis decoded each message, using the frequency analysis—the frequency of common characters—until a readable text was found. The rest of the message was guessed at by the message context until the entire cipher was understood.”

“What’s—what did you say? ‘Frequency analysis’?”

“Well, think about the alphabet. What are some letters that are used most frequently in words?”

Lilibet considered for a moment. “E, of course. And some of the other vowels.”

“Yes!” Maggie exclaimed, gratified. “And what are some letters that aren’t used very much?”

“Well, Zed, of course. And
X.
And
Q.
”

“And
Q
always is followed by a—”

“U!”
the Princess exclaimed.

“What Queen Elizabeth’s code breaker did was figure out which symbols Queen Mary used that appeared with the same frequency as letters of the alphabet. He proposed values for the symbols that appeared most often. By figuring out the symbol used most frequently, he could deduce it was an
e.
And so on. Using math and common sense, he was able to break the code.”

“Goodness,” Lilibet said. “It probably saved Queen Elizabeth’s life.”

“It did. And cost Queen Mary hers. Now—I have an idea for something fun to do.”

The princess looked wary. “What is it?”

“Well, how would you and Princess Margaret like to have your own ultra-secret code to communicate in? That no one, not even Crawfie or Alah, could read?”

“Oh, yes, yes,
please,
Maggie.”

“Then let’s get started, shall we?”

It took a while, but Lilibet created a cipher. Like Queen Mary’s code, it wasn’t just a simple monoalphabetic substitution and code words. Maggie had a decoder, a giveaway from a long-ago jar of Ovaltine. It might have been a toy intended for children, but it was a descendant of the cipher disk, developed in the fifteenth century by Leon Battista Alberti. The center wheel had a circle of numbers, which turned to match a stationary outer circle of letters.

Maggie gave it to Lilibet, who took it with a sort of awe, twisting the dial this way and that.

“The decoder—really a cipher disk—can be used in one of two ways,” Maggie said. “The code can be a consistent monoalphabetic substitution for the entire cipher—or the disks can be moved periodically throughout the cipher, making it polyalphabetic.”

“What?” Lilibet said, knitting her brows.

“Hmmmm …” Maggie remembered her young charge was only fourteen. “The sender and the person receiving the messages would need to agree on a cipher key setting. The entire message is then encoded according to this key. You also could use a character to mean ‘end of word,’ although this makes the code less secure.…”

Lilibet looked concerned.

“Oh, come on, we’ll make one up and then you’ll see how fun it is,” Maggie said.

After a bit of thinking and moving the rings, Lilibet dipped her pen in a bottle of Parker Quink Black and wrote her first note, in code, to Margaret. The code was set for the 1 to indicate the start of the alphabet, set at
E,
for Elizabeth. “+” was to indicate the end of a word.

And so, “Meet me in the garden” became “9 1 1 16 + 9 1 + 5 10 + 16 4 1 + 3 23 14 26 1 10”—and by twisting the dial, and remembering the
E
setting, Lilibet could get to the correct letters to spell out the message.

“May I go and show Margaret, Maggie? Please? It will make her laugh, and she loves to laugh so much.”

“Of course,” Maggie said. “We’re done for the day. And be sure to teach her how the code works, so she can write back to you.”

“Maybe I could use the code when I write to—” the Princess began. Then she stopped herself.

“Write to …?” Maggie prodded.

“Well,” Lilibet said, blush staining her cheeks, “there’s this boy we all know. His name is Philip.”

“Oh?” Maggie said. Her lips twitched as she realized Lilibet had a crush.

“He’s a bit older than I am, and in the Royal Navy. But we’ve been writing to each other. Mummy and Daddy know, of course.” Her face creased with concern. “It’s all very proper.”

“I’m sure it is. And this Philip—he writes back?”

“He does!” Lilibet exclaimed. “Funny, witty letters with little sketches and doodles. He’s about to be made midshipman!” she said proudly.

“Well, he must be quite a good sailor, then.”

Lilibet’s blue eyes were large. “Oh, he is—he’s the best sailor the Royal Navy has,” she said. Maggie could see how deep the Princess’s feelings were for this young man. Then she started. “Do you have someone special, Maggie?”

Maggie was momentarily flustered. The Princess sensed her discomfort instantly. “It’s all right if you don’t want to talk about it. I shouldn’t have asked. Oh, now you’ll think I’m terribly rude.”

Maggie laughed. “Of course not. It’s just hard to talk about. But I do have someone special.”
I did,
Maggie thought.
No, still do.

Lilibet leaned in. “What’s his name?”

“John. John Sterling. He used to be head private secretary to Mr. Churchill—we worked with each other at Number Ten Downing Street last summer.”

“And you fell in love?”

“Well, at first we didn’t. I didn’t even like him much—or so I thought. And I thought he couldn’t stand me. We used to bicker all the time.”

“Ah …” Lilibet sighed.

“But, you know—” Now it was Maggie’s turn to blush. “Eventually, we came to admit our, er, high regard for each other.”

“ ‘High regard’?”

“We, you know, we were in love.”

“Were?”

Freudian slip, Maggie?
“He joined the Royal Air Force. I didn’t support him—I wanted him to stay at Number Ten.…” Tears filled her eyes, and Lilibet searched in her pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, which she handed to Maggie.

“It’s clean,” the younger girl said. She waited until Maggie wiped at her eyes and nose and could go on.

“He asked me to marry him.”

“What did you say?”

“I said no.”

“What? I thought you said you were in love with him?”

“I was—I am—I was just so angry he was joining the Air Force. It was stupid,” Maggie said, wiping her face and then blowing her nose. “I was stupid. I
am
stupid. And then his plane was shot down over Germany. And there’s been no news of him. So he could be dead. Maybe. But I refuse to give up hope that he’s still alive.”

Lilibet took in this piece of information and digested the enormity of it. “You’re not stupid,” she said, patting Maggie’s arm. “You just wanted him to be safe. Just like I want Philip to be safe.”

Maggie gave a wan smile. “Yes.”

“And they’ll both come back to us, you’ll see.”

“Is that a royal command, Your Highness?”

“It is.”

“Well, then—I’d better obey, then, mustn’t I?”