The Codebreaker Girls

by Ellie Curzon

Genres: Spy Thrillers

Synopsis

1944. Rosie Sinclair is proud to be doing her bit for the war effort as a driver at Cottisbourne Park - the secret heart of Britain's fight against Germany, where a team of codebreakers are battling to save the country. But when she's given a mission to drive Major-General 'Bluff' Kingsley-Flynn down to Cottisbourne, Rosie finds herself on the frontline of a new battle - to uncover a possible spy at the Park who is jeopardising their work, and to resist her own attraction to the dashing Bluff himself. . . As the threat to her fellow codebreaker girls grows ever stronger, Rosie realises her country needs her more than ever. Can she save the day without losing her heart?

Release date: September 2, 2021

Publisher: Orion Publishing Group

Print pages: 320

Sample

An early morning mist still lay over the fields as Rosie drove into the village. She couldn’t dawdle, not with the long drive to London ahead. Overnight, bombs had fallen on the railway lines out of the city and no trains could get through.

She pulled up at the one pump that stood outside Cottisbourne’s petrol station. She wasn’t surprised that her polished, stately Humber was the only vehicle there.

‘Rosie!’ Nancy hurtled out of the little building, her plait streaming behind her. She closed her small hand around the handle of the petrol pump and asked, ‘Am I filling her up?’

Rosie admired Nancy’s enthusiasm. The girl was only ten, but insisted on helping her grandparents at the petrol station. Life in Cottisbourne must be quiet for her after the bustle of London, but Nancy made the best of her evacuation. She already knew the village better than Rosie ever had, from the church spire to the huts of Cottisbourne Park to the RAF base from which Spitfires headed into the cloudless sky. Nancy would make a good spy one day, if she kept her skill for being in the right place at the right time.

Rosie cranked down the window to speak to her. ‘Yes, please, Nancy! I’ve got a long drive ahead of me.’

‘Where you off to?’ Nancy appeared at the window and held out her hand for the keys. ‘Tea with Mr Churchill?’

Rosie placed the keys in Nancy’s palm, then she drew off her Mechanised Transport Corps cap and put it on Nancy’s head at a jaunty angle before she needed to ask.

‘Sadly, Mr Churchill’s busy today! I’m going to be bringing a very important man to Cottisbourne.’ Rosie arched her eyebrow and stage-whispered, ‘A major-general, no less!’

‘A major-general,’ Nancy repeated. She skipped away to the rear of the car and called, ‘I hope he don’t mind ghosts!’

What on earth?

‘Ghosts?’ Rosie leaned out of the window. ‘I’m sure a major-general won’t be scared of ghosts. If they exist! I’m not sure they do, you know.’

‘You reckon?’ Nancy cocked her head to one side before she declared with unshakeable confidence, ‘Cottisbourne Park’s got a ghost or two. I’ve heard them.’

‘Have you?’ Rosie kept an open mind, even though she’d never seen a ghost. ‘You heard them, rather than saw them? So it wasn’t someone running about with a sheet over their head?’

‘In the barn where Prof Hale found that old French motor,’ she replied. ‘The one with all the junk and the rats’ nest. There’s all sorts of funny noises behind the walls and it definitely ain’t the rats.’

Rosie knew the barn well, an exhausted old farm building full of junk courtesy of the family that had once lived at Cottisbourne Park. That old French motor was a Citroën Type A, over twenty years old, and Professor Hale let Rosie tinker with it in her spare time.

‘I can’t say I’ve ever heard any funny noises in the barn.’ Rosie frowned, trying to recall if she’d ever heard anything beside the wind blowing through the gaps in the broken window panes. That’s probably it. ‘It might just be the wind, you know. And besides, there’s all sorts of funny noises in the countryside that you’d never hear back in London.’

‘And that’s the truth!’ Nancy laughed. ‘You have a listen next time you’re in there. You’ll hear them!’

‘Right, I’ll do that, Nancy!’ Rosie hid the laughter in her voice. She wasn’t in the business of mocking children. It was much better to let them imagine whatever they wanted to than limit them with mockery. ‘I hope the ghosts like mending cars. I could do with them giving me a hand!’

‘That’s what I’m here for.’ Nancy appeared at Rosie’s open window. She gave a neat salute and said, ‘She’s full up and ready to go. Tell Mr Churchill I said hello, Rosie!’

Rosie took back her cap and put it on. ‘I will indeed say hello to the PM. You be good!’ She tweaked Nancy’s cheek.

Good? She’d be creeping through the secret places of the village in no time.

‘I’m off ghost hunting,’ she assured Rosie. ‘Safe drive, Rosie!’

Rosie tooted as she pulled away, not strictly MTC rules, but it always made Nancy smile. And Rosie carried Nancy’s smile with her as she headed out of the village towards the main road and onwards to London.

The drive up to London didn’t take too long. The Humber Snipe purred as Rosie sped along the nearly empty roads. Apart from the occasional military staff cars she passed, it was easy to forget there was a war on while driving in the countryside.

But as soon as London’s outskirts swallowed her, signs of the war were everywhere. Far too often, like a missing tooth in a smile, a row of houses would be interrupted by a gaping hole where a bomb had fallen. Forlorn wallpaper flapped in the spring breeze, and mantelpieces hung over empty space where floors had once been. Soot marked the brickwork where fires had blazed, and broken, blackened rafters stuck out like snapped ribs.

The wreckage from the Blitz still surrounded them, and for the past few months, the bombs had started to fall again. Not in the number they had before, but any bomb that fell was one bomb too many.

People walked along the pavements, unbowed but tired. Who could get a proper night’s sleep when the sky threatened to open and unleash hell?

Rosie drove up through south London, past Waterloo station and over Westminster Bridge. By some miracle, the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben were still standing, but only just, after suffering repeated attacks.

She turned and headed up Whitehall, where the government buildings were banked up with sandbags and the windows criss-crossed with tape. There was bomb damage here too, the white stone pitted and worn.

As Rosie passed the entrance to Downing Street, she couldn’t resist saying, ‘Good morning, Mr Churchill! Nancy says hello.’

Moments later, she arrived at Horse Guards Parade’s entrance. There were no soldiers mounted on horses outside the gates today, no tourists standing about with Box Brownies to take their snaps.

Rosie stopped at the gate and wound down her window to speak to the guard.

‘Good morning! I’m here to collect Major-General Sir Kingsley-Flynn.’

She could only say his name with great effort. Hale had kept referring to the major-general as Bluff, and that was now all she could think of. Wouldn’t do to say that at the gate.

‘You’re expected,’ the guard replied. ‘Go straight through. I’ll telephone the major-general’s office to let him know you’ve arrived. Your name, Miss?’

‘I’m Driver Sinclair,’ Rosie said, proud that she had a rank. Not a very lofty rank, but even so, she had a uniform and a job to do. ‘Thank you!’

Rosie drove slowly through the gates. The courtyard was empty and she carried on under the arch and out onto the parade ground. Bombs had even scourged this place, leaving pockmarks on the grey stone.

She felt a pang of excitement. Driving onto Horse Guards Parade? How many people were ever allowed to do that? But she hid her grin, trying her best to look serious, as she piloted the car towards the main building which looked more like a grand mansion than an army headquarters. She brought the car to a halt, then climbed out.

Her heart was hammering. She couldn’t fight off the feeling that she was intruding and that at any moment a red-faced guard would appear and shout at her to go. She drew on her experience from the stage and told herself to pretend to be brave, because it would make her look brave, and headed towards the building. As she approached, the door opened with some force and a man strode out, followed closely by another, who scurried after him with a case in each hand.

Major-General Sir Kingsley-Flynn – Bluff – looked just as important as he’d sounded. He wore the most immaculate uniform Rosie had ever seen, and his height and his broad shoulders made him seem more formidable than ever.

Rosie was just thinking to herself that his moustache was particularly impressive, of a type that few men could carry off, when she remembered to snap him a salute.

‘Good morning, sir,’ she said. ‘I’m your driver today, down to Sussex.’

Rosie had never met a major-general before and she had never seen such a whipcrack of a salute before either. He could’ve had someone’s eye out with it.

‘Driver Sinclair, good morning!’ Bluff replied with a brisk, no-nonsense bark. ‘Let’s load the luggage and be on our way, what?’

‘Of course, sir.’ Rosie opened the rear door for him. She’d given the car a good sweeping out the evening before, and she was proud it was fit for a major-general. ‘It should be a quiet drive down.’

‘Let’s hope it stays that way.’ Bluff took off his cap and climbed into the Humber. He peered around Rosie and said to the young man who was carrying his bags, ‘Thank you, Private. Once my bags are stowed, that’ll be all.’

Rosie went round to the back of the car and opened the boot for the private. She glanced at him as he lifted the suitcase into the car, wondering if she could read anything in his manner or expression that would tell her just how formidable the major-general was. Would he thunder at her if she jolted him by going over a bump in the road?

But how terrifying could he be? After all, Hale had said the major-general was an old friend, and Hale was such a good egg that she couldn’t imagine him being friends with someone who wasn’t. Hale had chatted so amicably about the man and Bluff wasn’t exactly a nickname to fill anyone with fear.

The young man gave nothing away though. He put the cases into the boot without a word before leaving Rosie with a polite nod. That was that then. Just Rosie and the major-general.

She got back into the car, and pulled away in an arc across the parade ground, heading back under the archway towards Whitehall.

Rosie wished she could ask the major-general where all the horses had got to. They must’ve been taken to the countryside, but Rosie’s MTC training had hammered home the rule that drivers were not to engage in chatter and tittle-tattle with their important passengers.

Instead, Rosie glanced quickly up at the major-general in the rearview mirror.

Bluff. Hale’s old friend Bluff.

He wasn’t looking at her, but instead was scanning the contents of a letter that he held. His expression was grave and after a moment he glanced up towards Rosie’s reflection, then back down to the page.

Rosie wondered, not for the first time that day, what on earth a man of the major-general’s importance would be doing at Cottisbourne Park. She knew it was a signals station, and she knew that from the sheds in the Park’s grounds, they were eavesdropping on the Nazis. She knew it was highly sensitive, urgently secretive work. A great many important people had sat just where Bluff was sitting at that moment, and yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was up.

The tide of the war was turning, after all. What if the outlook wasn’t as hopeful as Rosie had thought?

‘How long have you been at Cottisbourne Park?’ Bluff asked, catching Rosie by surprise. It wasn’t very often that her illustrious passengers made conversation.

‘Since forty-one,’ Rosie replied. ‘Nearly three years now. Have you visited before?’ She cringed inside at her question, but she was curious to know, certain she would have noticed a man like Bluff at the Park.

‘My work has taken me to many places,’ he replied, ‘but not to Cottisbourne Park until today. Professor Hale and I are old friends.’

‘Oh, yes, he told me.’ Rosie smiled. ‘I’m very fortunate to work for Professor Hale. I’ve always thought he’s a nice chap.’

Nice chap?

Rosie cringed again.

‘A splendid chap,’ Bluff assured her. He was younger than Professor Hale though. Young for a major-general, certainly. He must’ve had quite the career to earn the crossed sword and baton already. ‘So, Driver Sinclair, what do I need to know about Cottisbourne Park that nobody else will tell me?’

Rosie couldn’t restrain her chuckle. ‘Well, no one will tell you about the Citroën Type A I have the pleasure to be doing up in the barn. And I doubt they’ll tell you how seriously certain people take the chess club. I’m not sure they’ll tell you about the panto I help to put on each year, but I’m sure you’ll hear about the dances. They’re legendary!’

Dances. As if a major-general would come to one of our dances in the old ballroom with the creaky floor.

‘Dances, eh?’ He chuckled at the very thought of it. ‘Anybody I need to look out for?’

Rosie shook her head. ‘They’re a quiet bunch at Cottisbourne Park. Heads down, pencils scratching away. Everyone’s very friendly! We’re all working towards the same thing, aren’t we?’

‘One would certainly hope so,’ was the major-general’s reply before he fell silent again.

The silence made Rosie uncomfortable. She swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. She kept her attention on the road ahead, driving slowly around the holes in the tarmac blasted by the bombing.

Were there people who weren’t working towards the same thing? Who could possibly support the wreckage they were faced with, poor old London and every other city and major town blown to bits but limping on?

‘We’re a happy family at Cottisbourne Park,’ Rosie said. ‘I do enjoy working there. It’s like a little village.’

‘The best of the best,’ Bluff replied.

That was certainly the reputation of the codebreakers of Cottisbourne Park, where the best brains, logisticians and linguists had been assembled to crack the codes that came out of Europe at a rate of knots. Rosie probably shouldn’t know as much as she did, but they really were a family, united by their signatures on the Official Secrets Act, and now and then, people talked.

‘They’re certainly that,’ Rosie said with pride. ‘I’m honoured to work there. I must say, I feel rather dim surrounded by so many geniuses!’

‘Genius can be overrated.’ Was it Rosie’s imagination, or was there a hint of a smile in the major-general’s tone? ‘And they certainly don’t have much time for soldiers.’

Rosie glanced up at him in the mirror again. ‘You’ll be very welcome at the Park. But … well, I’ve seen other soldiers get short shrift!’

He quirked one eyebrow and told her, ‘Just let them try, Driver Sinclair, just let them try.’

Rosie tried not to laugh. Who indeed would dare to disrespect a stately man like Major-General Sir Kingsley-Flynn? Then again, she could think of some. While there were plenty of humble geniuses at the Park, there were one or two people she could think of who walked to their sheds at the start of each shift with a certain swagger.

‘I bet you’d give them short-shrift!’ she remarked.

Though what business could a major-general in the Household Cavalry have at Cottisbourne Park anyway? He didn’t strike Rosie as a codebreaker and she’d met enough of them. There was something about the codebreakers, whether they were bookish and shy or confident and brash, that she had started to recognise. She didn’t see it in Major-General Sir Kingsley-Flynn.

He was a man of action. He was like a coiled spring.

Rosie drove past another bombsite, a huge space with a water-logged crater at its centre. It looked as if it had once been a factory. But they would soon be in the suburbs, then out into the countryside once more.

‘Where are all the horses?’ Rosie asked him, the question out before she could stop it. ‘The ones who were at Horse Guards?’

‘Having a darn sight better time of it than the chaps who used to ride them,’ he replied. ‘We’ll see them back again one day, Driver Sinclair, of that I have no doubt.’

She liked the confidence in his voice, the certainty that life would go back to normal. Sometimes it felt as if it never could. She realised then that she’d needed to hear a man like Bluff say so.

And she was pleased that the horses were safe.

‘Whitehall looks …’ Rosie sighed. ‘Well, I hadn’t been up to London for a while. It looks so strange with all those sandbags everywhere. And no horses outside Horse Guards. Just think, Churchill was only around the corner!’

‘And in a devil of a bad mood,’ Bluff confided with just a trace of humour. ‘I’m looking forward to breathing some fresh air again. Oh, to be in Sussex when the sun is shining!’

Had he had Churchill’s ear over breakfast? Rosie didn’t dare ask.

‘There was a lovely mist this morning. Very picturesque,’ Rosie told him warmly. She was fond of her adopted home. She’d travelled through often enough in her past, but she’d never thought she’d stay there for as long as she had. ‘Sussex must be waiting for you and is ready to put on a show!’

She met his gaze in the mirror again and this time, Rosie had no doubt that the major-general was smiling.

Rosie drove through the village, then out into the lanes and up the drive to Cottisbourne Park. It still had something of its grandeur, the lime tree-lined driveway much unchanged, she imagined, from times gone by. She almost had to swerve as Joe Fleet rode towards her on his ancient bicycle. He raised his hand in apology and cycled on. Across the lawn, she saw the huddled shape of Dr James Brett, sitting on a picnic blanket. His head was bowed, his attention fixed solely on the book in his hand.

The mellow stone facade of the large house appeared up ahead, its leaded windows twinkling in the bright spring light, the wisteria starting to blossom on the vines that wreathed the building.

And there, right outside the front door, was an ambulance.

Rosie slowed as she reached the top of the drive.

‘Oh, heavens, someone must’ve been taken ill,’ she said.

‘Nothing serious, I hope,’ her passenger said breezily. ‘I really am looking forward to seeing our Professor Hale again, Driver Sinclair. He speaks very highly of you.’

‘Does he? How very kind of him!’ Rosie craned her neck, trying to make out the figure in the doorway. But it didn’t look like Professor Hale’s secretary, Jean Fenning. ‘I’ll drop you here and take you in. I am sorry, sir, there doesn’t appear to be anyone waiting for you. Must be to do with the ambulance, I’m afraid.’

‘I wasn’t expecting a … what the devil?’

In the grand doorway Rosie could now clearly see the figure half-turned towards the house, one hand raised and his finger jabbing at something or someone unseen. It looked like Professor Swann, but Professor Swann wouldn’t look so unkempt, his shirt dirty and his hands …

It isn’t dirt.

A stone of dread dropped into Rosie’s stomach at the realisation that the furious figure in the doorway was Professor Charles Swann of St Vincent’s College, Cambridge. And Professor Swann’s elegant hands and Savile Row shirt were red with fresh blood.

‘Professor Swann’s been injured!’ Rosie pulled up with more of a swerve than she’d have liked. But at that moment, all thoughts of smooth driving for the benefit of her distinguished passenger had fled. She was a cog in the machine that was Cottisbourne Park, and everyone who worked there was her extended family. Rosie pushed open the car door and hurried towards the house. ‘Professor Swann, what’s happened?’

Charles turned to look at her, his expression momentarily bewildered. Then he blinked, set his chin into its familiar imperious tilt and said, ‘There’s been an incident, Miss Sinclair. I … An accident, perhaps?’

Rosie tried not to purse her lips too much at hearing Charles refer to her once again as Miss.

She saw movement in the shadowy entrance hall behind him. Someone hurrying off. Wasn’t that Dr Zalewski?

‘An accident? You must’ve cut yourself very badly.’ Rosie wondered where the ambulance’s medical team could have got to, when Charles was stood there so bloodied without their help. ‘I’ve got first aid training, Professor. Let me look.’

‘No!’ Charles held up his hand and shook his head. ‘The medics are attending, Miss Sinclair. It’s no place for a girl.’

‘Is it a place for a major-general?’ Bluff asked, earning a rather narrow look from the professor, his composure seemingly returned. ‘Perhaps you’d care to tell me where I can find your director, Professor?’

Charles shot Rosie a glance then nodded. ‘We’d better speak privately,’ he told Bluff.

Rosie didn’t take offence. So many conversations went on here that she wasn’t party to. It was all part of life at Cottisbourne Park.

‘I’ll take your things to your room, sir,’ Rosie told him, as she retreated. ‘Professor Hale’s secretary will show you up later, I’m sure.’

‘Thank you, Driver Sinclair,’ he replied. ‘And thank you for a very pleasant journey.’

Rosie saluted. ‘Don’t mention it, sir!’ Then she turned on her heel and went back outside.

As she took the suitcase from the boot, Rosie couldn’t help but look over at the abandoned ambulance. She’d driven them in London at the start of the war, and she couldn’t look at them now without being reminded of the bell clattering as the sirens moaned, the sobs of the injured, and the iron scent of blood.

How could there have been an accident at Cottisbourne Park? It was a haven. No place for blood and ambulances.

She headed back to the house, the major-general’s suitcase in her hand.

Then Rosie heard wheels on the gravel, and turned to see Caroline, Charles’ sister, riding up on her bicycle.

Oh, heck. I’ll have to tell her.

‘Is it true?’ Caroline leapt from her bicycle, the wheels still spinning as it fell onto the gravel. She dashed up the steps, her face white as she took Rosie’s arm and asked again, ‘Is it? Tommy’s at the gate and he said … Professor Hale?’ And her face crumpled at the name, tears welling in her eyes.

A cold finger of fear ran down Rosie’s spine. She dropped the suitcase.

Not Hale. Please not Professor Hale.

‘Professor Hale? Caroline, what is it? What about Professor Hale?’

‘He shot himself!’ The words fell into themselves in a panicked babble. ‘Tommy says he’s dead!’

‘Shot himself?’ Had she heard Caroline properly? But she had, hadn’t she? She’d said Hale was dead. She’d said he’d shot himself. ‘How? Why would he? I saw him this morning. He was drinking a cup of tea at his desk. He … he …’ Rosie shook her head. ‘It must be someone else. It can’t be Professor Hale!’

It was a horrible mistake, Rosie told herself as a sleek black car drove up the driveway at the sort of speed Professor Hale always took a very dim view of. It barely seemed to have stopped before the doors opened and three men climbed out, each as soberly dressed as the other in dark suits and hats. Rosie had seen men like these before, when they arrived for their monthly briefings with Professor Hale. Whenever they left, he would always tell her with a mischievous smile, those fellows drink a lot of tea for chaps who don’t officially exist.

Their sudden arrival made Rosie shiver, and it seemed to drag Dr Brett from his reverie too. He closed his book and stood, pausing only to gather up his rug before he hurried across the lawn towards the huts and out of sight.

Maybe something had happened to Hale after all. But he couldn’t be dead. He simply couldn’t be.

They didn’t seem to notice Rosie and Caroline as they made for the door.

‘It can’t be Professor Hale. It can’t be. It can’t,’ Rosie whispered under her breath, but her sense of dread was unrelenting. It was a small relief when she saw her friends Sarah and Maggie approaching arm-in-arm around the corner of the building.

They both looked stunned. News had travelled across the Park already, then.

Sarah pulled her cardigan tightly around her. ‘I just can’t believe it. You’ve heard about Professor Hale? It just doesn’t feel real. He is Cottisbourne Park. What’ll we do?’

At her side, Maggie blew her nose into an embroidered handkerchief. She drew to a halt at the sight of the new arrivals and lowered her gaze to the ground, blinking back tears.

Caroline stepped mutely aside as the men entered the building, finally offering the women a nod as they did. Only then did one of them stop and ask, ‘There’s a storage barn on the estate. Where will we find it?’

‘It’s all right, Driver Sinclair.’ Major-General Sir Kingsley-Flynn strode into the foyer. He greeted the men with a nod. ‘Follow me, gentlemen.’

‘The barn?’ Rosie watched the men go. The barn she’d spent so much time in working on the car. She’d joked with Professor Hale, told him she’d take him for a spin in the Citroën just as soon as it was road-worthy again. ‘Caroline, your brother … I saw him just now. Covered in blood.’

Sarah and Maggie blinked in surprise at that.

‘Oh, heck,’ Sarah murmured. She exchanged a glance with Maggie, then the two women hurried to join their friends. At the door Maggie craned round to look into the now empty foyer.

‘What an awful thing,’ she murmured.

Would Charles have shot someone? Would he shoot Hale? Rosie had heard him crowing once, declaring that he’d be a darn sight better than Hale as director of the place, but surely he wouldn’t have shot him?

‘Charles?’ Caroline shook her head. ‘What are you …Rosie, no! You mustn’t say that! Charles would never … how could you!’

‘He was covered in blood!’ Rosie insisted. ‘You didn’t see him! Oh, God, he must’ve been there when it happened!’

Maybe Hale wasn’t dead. Rosie wanted to hold onto that tiny sliver of hope for as long as she could.

‘What the bloody hell are you saying?’ Charles called as he stalked along the corridor from which Bluff had appeared. ‘How dare you tell the Sprat I’m mixed up with this? You’ve got some nerve for a jumped-up bloody cab driver, miss. . .