Evans smiled. Thornhill was good. But not that good. After all, he had never had to contend with the Gestapo or the SS.

  He realised with a start that he had pasted the bill upside down. It was not all that surprising, he thought. Maybach was there. Less than fifty yards away, in that house. His mission was nearing its close. With a slight frown he daubed the poster with a large V made of paste. As some had done on walls and houses in the Channel Islands, and who, in Maybach's hands, had paid dearly for it.

  The children's hospital at Eutin was exactly as Marriott remembered it. He left Heinz with the car and walked past the wards, his mouth quite dry at the prospect of seeing her again.

  He was reminded of his thoughts at Penny's wedding, his sense of not belonging there any more. Here it felt vaguely like home, familiar, so that when he had arrived at the barracks he had found himself seeking out faces, waving and greeting those who were still awaiting leave, and did not know what to expect when they got there.

  There were several visitors crammed amongst the lines of cots, and then he saw her standing beside the one where he had seen the child, Bernadette. Her sister-in-law was speaking to one of the nuns, her gestures animated, her face quite flushed.

  The girl looked up and saw him, her hand going briefly to her throat as if she had caught her breath.

  Marriott squeezed himself past two women who were staring down at a sleeping child and reached across the cot to take her hand.

  'I heard you were here. I couldn't wait, so I came right over.'

  She searched his face with dark steady eyes. 'But you are only back an hour or so since?' She smiled suddenly. Like sunlight breaking through a hill-mist. 'It is good to see you.'

  Around them other people jostled and apologised to one another as they found their way to the various cots, some clutching small gifts, toys and picture-books. Marriott wondered who visited those other children in the silent wards, with their pain and their fears.

  'I got you a present when I was in Flensburg.' He gripped her hand and held it on the side of the cot. 'I'll get it later.' He looked at the empty cot. 'Where's Bernadette?'

  She watched him, her eyes troubled. 'We are taking her home today.'

  'She's quite recovered?' It was so hard to speak, impossible to avoid the press of visitors, the occasional cries and laughter from the sick and injured children.

  'Almost.' She gave the little shrug. 'They need the cot, so –'

  She did not take her hand away and Marriott somehow knew she did not care what people thought, even if they had noticed.

  There was something wrong. He could sense it between them. And yet it felt at a distance, like a threat.

  He asked, 'How is Leisl? She looks excited.'

  He felt the hand tighten under his grip. 'What is it, Ursula? Has something happened?'

  Once more, the use of her name made her stare at him. She seemed unable to make up her mind. As if she was withholding something.

  'I thought of you very much.'

  He replied, 'I've still got the rose. It was a lovely thing to do.'

  She reached up and held his hand between hers and said huskily, 'There was a man, who came to Eutin on his way home.' Now that she had begun she could not stop. 'A soldier – Ivan had held him prisoner for a year.' She shook her head despairingly. 'Like a skeleton. I did not recognise him and yet he used to be a carpenter here. Poor man. What a welcome. His wife went off with another when she thought he had been killed at the front.'

  Marriott waited. It was all too common in war. A girl he had grown up with at home had gone off with a Yank when they had reported her young husband missing in Singapore. That too had been a mistake, and he would likely be on his way back to England right now. Except that in his case the other man had gone, and there was a baby instead.

  But there was more to come, and he asked gently, 'Will you tell me, Ursula? Maybe I can help.'

  She lifted her chin and tried to compose herself. 'This soldier told us that he saw Lothar, my brother, in the prison camp. He is alive. Sick but alive!' She could not keep it up and whispered, 'He is being sent to a work-camp on the Baltic. But he is sick. It might kill him.'

  Marriott forced his way around the cot and put his arms around her. For a few more moments they were both oblivious of the curious stares, a few children standing in the cots to watch. Even the nuns who had been chattering excitedly while they examined the parcel of coffee, soap and chocolate which Marriott had brought for them gathered together like crows to peer at them.

  Marriott felt her sobbing quietly against his jacket, her tears soaking through his shirt. He held her tightly, protectively, not wanting to release her. Ever.

  You've just about had enough, haven't you? Aloud he said, 'When you're ready, Heinz will drive you all home.'

  She prised herself away and took his handkerchief without answering.

  He said, 'Even the Russians can't hold everyone prisoner.'

  She looked up at him. 'Ja. ]a. I know. But a winter would kill him. The soldier said –'

  He took her arm as two nuns carried the child from another room. A third nun began to strip the cot without even glancing at them.

  At the door she exclaimed, 'I'm so selfish! The news of my brother is good, yes? Yet here I am spoiling your return! Come, you can tell me all about the wedding – I think it was a very grand affair!'

  She was acting, and Marriott had the feeling it was not for the first time.

  Grand affair? He thought of the little church hall, Chris the lodger, and the wing-commander who had lost his brother in the North Sea. Penny would soon be in Canada with her Jack. She was doing the right thing. There were too many who were preparing to pick up where they had left off before they had joined up. They ought to be thinking of a future, not the past.

  While they waited by the car Marriott handed her the little parcel. 'It's perfume.' He hesitated. 'If it's not right for you –'

  She opened it, slowly, prolonging it, and held the little cut-glass bottle to the light. 'It is so beautiful!'

  Marriott watched her, drinking in every moment, each reaction. Like a child again.

  She said, 'I will wear it for you.' She spoke so firmly that Marriott impetuously gripped her arm.

  Heinz, who lounged against the car, his arms folded, missed none of it. On that last drive down from Flensburg Marriott had told him to stop at a big NAAFI shop in Schleswig. He had come out eventually with that same parcel and a huge bag.

  When Heinz had dropped the lieutenant at the barracks he had been astonished when he had handed him the large bag and had said awkwardly, 'For the family.' Then he had walked away, embarrassed perhaps by his own kindness. The bag had been filled with cream cakes and custard tarts of the sort apparently very popular with the Tommies.

  A toy for little Friedl, chocolate too. It had been like Christmas three months early. Like one his daughter had never seen in her life. Now as he watched the dark-eyed girl and the grave young lieutenant he thought he knew why, even with all against them, fate had guided them together.

  And later that evening, when Heinz returned to the ancient Gasthaus, he knew he was not mistaken.

  Marriott stood by the door and looked at the sky. It was already much cooler. She was probably thinking about her brother. Found alive, and yet still beyond reach.

  He said, 'I have to go to Hamburg tomorrow, to the harbour.' He took her very gently and pulled her against him. He could feel the tension in her body, like fear.

  Into her hair he said, 'I will never harm you, Ursula. I promise.'

  She raised her face slightly and he caught the scent of the new perfume on her skin.

  'I know. Do not be angry. It is only that I do not understand –'

  He kissed her very carefully on the cheek and held his mouth there. Then very slowly she moved her head until their lips touched. He felt her trembling. Afraid of love? Or fearful of what it would do? Then he walked to the courtyard and called, 'I shall see you soon!'

  She raised her hand and watched him as he climbed into the little car. He wants me and I know that I want him. It has never happened; it must never happen.

  But her thoughts mocked her and she was ashamed at the way she felt. At the same time she knew she could not wait until she saw him again.

  17

  Victims

  Marriott clung to the bridge wing and squinted through icy sleet which within an hour had reduced visibility to a few yards. Beside him, the Herkules's skipper, Kapitän Horst Krieger, peered up with alarm as the shadow of the New York's listing hulk crept out of the gloom like a reef.

  For once Marriott felt that his knowledge of Kiel was a match for the German's, especially in its present state. It was strange not to have Heinz with him, but he had left Flensburg with the car after Herkules had received orders to make for Kiel.

  Another ship to be towed out and dumped perhaps? Marriott shivered. He could scarcely believe that any sea could change so quickly. There was a bite in the air which took his breath away, and with the blinding sleet all around them it seemed like evening instead of noon.

  Krieger remarked, 'Plenty of wrecks, eh, Herr Leutnant?'

  Not as many as there were when 801 arrived, Marriott thought. He said, 'We should be up to the jetty soon.' A green wreck-buoy winked out of the downpour, its bell clanging mournfully, as if for the dead.

  Maybe they would stay here for a while? He would see Ursula as soon as he could get free from his duties. Duties? He grimaced into the stinging sleet. He felt more like a scavenger and scrap-dealer rolled into one.

  He thought of the walk they had shared before Herkules had carried him out into the Baltic again. Along the beach of the Plöner See, through the dark green woods where they had found an old track and bridle-path, a reminder of better times when there had been horses here.

  Once, when they had crossed a small stream, he had held her hand in case she slipped. He had not released it, even when two forestry workers had gone past.

  She had not mentioned her brother again, even when he had pressed her. At first he had thought she was too worried to talk about him, but later had the feeling she knew more than she had told him.

  A lamp blinked through the sleet and Marriott saw the end of the pier taking shape off the starboard bow. It probably seemed like matchless navigation to the crew who huddled in the bows with lines and fenders. Marriott was just thankful they had reached the bay before the skies had fallen on them, or they had been forced to make the final approach in the dead of night.

  He knew the skipper was watching him as he moved to the wheelhouse voicepipe. 'Voile Kraft zurück! Ruder mitschiffs!' He sensed the grizzled skipper nod, with relief or approval he did not know.

  Marriott felt the power rising to take the way off the tug's forward thrust and saw vague figures moving along the jetty towards them.

  'Machine stopp! Langsam fahrt voraus!'

  He wondered how his stilted German sounded now to the tug's crew. He had learned the basic commands by listening and watching. At first, the seamen had stared at the bridge with astonishment, but now they seemed to accept it, as they did the only British officer on board.

  'Machine stopp! Klar zum Ankern!'

  At the jangle of the telegraph again the powerful engine gave a shudder and fell silent even as the lines snaked ashore, and the bulky tug nudged purposefully against her big rope fenders. He turned and faced the other man. Krieger nodded and said, 'Good, Herr Leutnant! I prefer you to me that time!'

  They both laughed and Marriott felt his voice shake as he gave the last order to ring off the main engine.

  'Maschinen abstellen!'

  He saw the bridge light up to some frail, watery sunshine, as, like a solid fence, the sleet moved away across the wrecks and the swirling grey water. Krieger's lined features lost their smile as he stared hard at the pier.

  He exclaimed, 'Herr Meikle!'

  Marriott saw the long bonnet of a staff car parked near one of the new cranes, then Commander Meikle as he stepped on to the wet stones. He turned up the collar of his raincoat before walking to the edge to watch the sailors passing up the heavier mooring ropes.

  Meikle seemed to come to a decision, and as the brow was hauled across and secured, he walked very carefully on the wet treads towards the Herkules's bulwark.

  The tug's boatswain bellowed, 'Besatzung stillgestanden!' then saluted smartly as Meikle stepped down from the brow.

  He returned Marriott's salute and commented, 'They don't forget, do they? To us she is a useful tug. To them, still a unit of the Kriegsmarine!'

  Marriott guided him into the small cabin abaft the wheelhouse and watched as the commander removed his cap and patted his iron-grey hair.

  'I had to be in the yard anyway. Heard you were arriving, so I thought I might offer you a lift.' He eyed him shrewdly. 'From the weather reports it seems unlikely we shall have many more operations in the Baltic this year.'

  A larger vessel surged abeam and the tug rocked heavily in her wash. Meikle swallowed. 'I cannot imagine what anyone finds enjoyable about serving in small ships!' He retrieved his cap. 'If you're ready, Marriott?'

  Marriott followed him on deck again. Meikle had been as near to being sick as any one he had seen. It was almost unnerving to discover he had human weaknesses like everybody else.

  Meikle watched as Marriott and the skipper solemnly shook hands before they parted.

  He remarked, 'You do form the oddest relationships, Marriott.' The bite was back again.

  They got into a smart staff Humber, while a Royal Marine driver bustled around with Marriott's small bag, opened and shut doors with the zeal of a Mayfair chauffeur.

  Meikle sat back and stared out of the window as they picked their way along the dockyard road.

  'Thought it would save time to have this talk.' He turned suddenly and said, 'You have been seeing quite a lot of Fräulein Geghin of late?'

  Marriott said nothing. He knew by now there was no point. So that was what it was about. A reprimand, or a warning.

  Meikle said calmly, 'She asked to have a meeting with me, as a matter of fact. About her brother – the one in Russian hands.' This time he did pause.

  Marriott replied, 'Yes, she told me about him, sir. It's still not known where he is.'

  Meikle tapped the marine sharply on the shoulder. 'Stop the car!' He wound down the window and beckoned to a petty officer who was walking with some seamen along the road. Several of them were smoking.

  'You! You know the regulations, PO!' He did not raise his voice, but the petty officer was gaping as if he had just hurled a string of obscenities at him. 'March those men! You're not a sloppy civilian just yet!'

  The car lurched forward and Meikle said in an almost matter-of-fact tone, 'Fräulein Geghin's brother is in Swinemünde. She came to tell me that she had received some definite news from another former POW.'

  Marriott looked at him questioningly. 'She asked your help to get him out, sir?'

  'No.' He saw his surprise. 'She pleaded with me to make certain you were not sent to Swinemünde. She was afraid you would do something impetuous to release him.' He gave a thin smile. 'She obviously understands you pretty well.'

  Marriott glanced away. 'Protecting me?'

  'Yes.' His tone sharpened. 'Would you have done something?'