“Just charity. A B2, was it? Oh well,” Control observed with apparent relief, “they wouldn’t get far with that, would they?”
“Are you going home tonight?” Smiley asked impatiently.
“I thought you might give me a bed here,” Control suggested. “Such a fag always traipsing home. It’s the people. . . . They seem to get worse every day.”
Leiser sat at the table, the taste of the White Ladies still in his mouth. He stared at the luminous dial of his watch, the suitcase open in front of him. It was eleven eighteen; the second hand struggled jerkily toward twelve. He began tapping, JAJ, JAJ—you can remember that, Fred, my name’s Jack Johnson, see?—he switched over to receive, and there was Johnson’s reply, steady as a rock.
Take your time, Johnson had said, don’t rush your fences. We’ll be listening all night, there are plenty more schedules. By the beam of a small flashlight he counted the encoded groups. There were thirty-eight. Putting out the flashlight he tapped a three and an eight; numerals were easy but long. His mind was very clear. He could hear Jack’s gentle repetitions all the time: You’re too quick on your shorts, Fred, a dot is one-third of a dash, see? That’s longer than you think. Don’t rush the gaps, Fred; five dots between each word, three dots between each letter. Fore-arm horizontal, in a straight line with the key lever; elbow just clear of the body. It’s like knife fighting, he thought with a little smile, and began keying. Fingers loose, Fred, relax, wrist clear of the table. He tapped out the first two groups, slurring a little on the gaps, but not as much as he usually did. Now came the third group: put in the safety signal. He tapped an S, cancelled it and tapped the next ten groups, glancing now and then at the dial of his watch. After two and a half minutes he went off the air, groped for the small capsule which contained the crystal, discovered with the tips of his fingers the twin sockets of the housing, inserted it, and then stage by stage followed the tuning procedure, moving the dials, playing the flashlight on the crescent window to watch the black tongue tremble across it.
He tapped out the second call sign, PRE, PRE, switched quickly to receive and there was Johnson again, QRK 4, your signal readable. For the second time he began transmitting, his hand moving slowly but methodically as his eye followed the meaningless letters, until with a nod of satisfaction he heard Johnson’s reply: Signal received. QRU: I have nothing for you.
When they had finished, Leiser insisted on a short walk. It was bitterly cold. They followed Walton Street as far as the main gates of Worcester, thence by way of Banbury Road once more to the respectable sanctuary of their dark North Oxford house.
Sixteen
Takeoff
It was the same wind. The wind that had tugged at Taylor’s frozen body and drove the rain against the blackened walls of Blackfriars Road, the wind that flailed the grass of Port Meadow, now ran headlong against the shutters of the farmhouse.
The farmhouse smelled of cats. There were no carpets. The floors were of stone: nothing would dry them. Johnson lit the tiled oven in the hall as soon as they arrived but the damp still lay on the flagstones, collecting in the cracks like a tired army. They never saw a cat all the time they were there, but they smelled them in every room. Johnson left corned beef on the doorstep: it was gone in ten minutes.
The house was built on one floor with a high granary roof of brick, and it lay against a small coppice beneath a vast Flemish sky, a long, rectangular building with cattle sheds on the sheltered side. It was two miles north of Lubeck. Leclerc had said they were not to enter the town.
A ladder led to the loft, and there Johnson installed his wireless, stretching the aerial between the beams, then through a skylight to an elm tree beside the road. He wore rubber-soled shoes in the house, brown ones of military issue, and a blazer with a squadron crest. Gorton had had food delivered from the Naafi in Celle. It covered the kitchen floor in old cardboard boxes, with an invoice marked Mr. Gorton’s party. There were two bottles of gin and three of whisky. They had two bedrooms; Gorton had sent army cots, two to each room, and reading lights with standard green shades. Haldane was very angry about the beds. “He must have told every damned department in the area,” he complained. “Cheap whisky, Naafi food, army cots. I suppose we shall find he requisitioned the house next. God, what a way to mount an operation.”