Today would be different.
Louisa settled into a seat close to the wall, her back to the window, opened up her book before her and gave her usual order to the waitress: a mug of tea – milk, no sugar – two fried eggs, fried bread, a ham slice and fried potatoes. Apart from the occasional noise from the kitchen and a shouted order between Kay and the ambitiously titled Chef, there was little to distract and she set to revising ab initio and sub judice. When a shadow crossed her table, she assumed it was Kay about to put her plate of food down and she pushed her book to the side, only to realise that the man she had seen in the car yesterday and on the road today was now sitting down in the seat opposite. He removed his hat and undid the buttons of his suit jacket, looking steadily at her all the while as if he already knew her. She thought about protesting that the seat was taken, but she knew he’d know it was a lie. And besides, she was curious.
‘Hello, Mrs Sullivan,’ he said. ‘Sorry to disturb your lunch hour.’
She assessed his face. A long chin, straight nose and near-black eyes, his skin had the yellow tones of one that had been tanned for many years then faded in British winters. His voice was posh but soft, not domineering. A memory flashed up: the man in the pub in the trench coat.
‘Was it you at my wedding?’
He didn’t answer this. ‘I’m Iain, that’s all you need to know.’
Kay came over and put the plate down, giving Iain a quizzical glance, but as she was not one prone to much intellectual curiosity, she soon pushed off after he’d asked her for a cup of black coffee.
He gestured to her food. ‘Please, don’t let me stop you from eating. Do you mind?’ He pulled out a silver cigarette case and opened it without waiting for her answer.
Louisa picked up her knife and fork, only it seemed her appetite had deserted her completely. She tried a mouthful and gave up.
‘Could you let me know what this is about? Otherwise, I’d better get back to my classes.’
‘You’re not needed back for forty minutes. Your routine is predictable, apart from last night when you stopped off at the grocer’s on the way home. And you were surprised to find the butcher’s shut.’
That startled her. ‘You were following me?’
Again, Iain didn’t answer the question, instead continuing to smoke his cigarette. When the waitress brought his coffee, he put in three spoonfuls of sugar and said: ‘Too long spent in foreign climes has given me a sweet tooth.’ It was to be the only time he explained himself about anything. ‘Mrs Sullivan, are you aware that there are serious threats to the security of our country right now?’
This was an unexpected question.
‘No, I can’t say I am aware.’
‘You should be. A bright woman like you, don’t you read the newspapers?’
Louisa decided this was rhetorical.
He carried on. ‘Hitler’s Nazi Party has been in power for four months. In that time Herr Hitler has threatened to reject the Disarmament Conference, withdraw from the League of Nations and has publicly disavowed the Treaty of Versailles. He has opened a concentration camp for political prisoners, which appears to be a fairly loose term. They have also taken over Bavaria.’ All the while Iain spoke softly, yet she was in no doubt that he spoke with authority. ‘Be in no doubt: Germany is preparing for war.’
Louisa picked up her mug to take a sip of tea, but she was trembling and she thought she might drop it.
‘When a country is preparing for war, they will do their best to infiltrate the political systems of others around them. Perhaps to convert them to their cause and avert war, perhaps to pretend that they are for peace, perhaps to weaken their potential enemy’s armies. Whatever it is, we have to be on alert and guard ourselves against it.’
Louisa felt her legs shiver. Iain leaned a little towards her.
‘Mrs Sullivan, I fought in the last war. The last thing that I want is for any of our young men today to fight in another. Everything that we can do to avert this must be done. The question is: are you in?’
‘Am I in what?’
‘Are you willing to help our country avoid war?’
Louisa had been at a distance from the Great War. She’d been a young girl in London, at school, then working with her mother, a laundress. They’d worked for families who had lost sons, she’d seen their grief. There had been rations, and she knew Guy had lost a brother, but it was the officers she’d seen begging in the streets that was the most distressing. Wounded, sometimes blind, sometimes missing a limb, they’d sit with their pitiful signs asking politely for food and money as people rushed past them. Everyone wanted nothing more than to get back to normal, they hadn’t wanted to be reminded of the catastrophic error their country had made in getting involved in what, so she understood, began as hardly more than a minor skirmish in Austria. No, she didn’t want another war.
‘What exactly are you asking of me?’
Iain’s voice took on a brisker rhythm. ‘I believe you have been asked to accompany Lady Redesdale and her daughters on a cruise.’
She almost burst out laughing. ‘Yes, but what’s that got to do with anything?’
‘We need you to go on that cruise.’
We? Who was we?
‘The British government, Mrs Sullivan.’
She hadn’t even asked the question out loud.
‘We need you to keep a close eye on Mrs Guinness and her younger sister, Miss Unity Mitford. Take note of any unusual movements, any meetings they have, that sort of thing. The details will be forthcoming nearer the time.’
‘But that’s ridiculous. What on earth have they got to do with war?’
Iain signalled to Kay for the bill. ‘I’ll get this,’ he said, gesturing to Louisa’s uneaten lunch. ‘They are members of the British Union of Fascists. That’s not the whole explanation, but that will do for now. In the meantime, please accept the position and I will meet you again.’ He had said this almost as an aside, concentrating more on pulling a money clip out of his pocket and peeling off a pound note.
‘But I don’t want to work for them again. I’m training as—’
‘Yes, yes, we know. You can pick that up later. This is more important. Far more important, Mrs Sullivan.’ He got up and left the money on the table. ‘She can keep the change. I’ll see you in a few days’ time. Oh, and one thing – you cannot tell anyone about our meeting or your reasons for accepting the position, not even your husband. Especially not your husband. I’ll know if you do.’
Louisa remained in her chair for several minutes until she glanced at the clock on the wall and realised she needed to hurry back to her class. It felt ridiculous enough to question whether it had even happened, but the pound note was on the table and it definitely didn’t belong to her. That was that, then. She had a few days and then she’d meet Iain again, at some time and place of his choosing, no doubt. Could she do this? It would mean keeping a secret from Guy, something she’d never wanted to do. But this request – command? – was bigger than either of them. She was being asked to serve her country. If she was ever forced to lie to Guy, she would do so only if it was to protect him. Maybe she wasn’t the same kind of wife that their mothers had been, nor did she regret that, but she had to believe she could love him, yet still do the things she wanted to do. Because she had to admit this: she did want to do it.