‘But where is Miss Smith? How did we get away?’
Her father frowned. ‘It was close, I don’t mind saying. We left it all pretty late this time, heh, Trenchard?’
‘Up to the wire, Commander. Once we got hold of you, Marina, I got a message to Jones to come and get us. Turns out they were already off the coast! We stole a dinghy and got away before the guards could stop us.’
‘I’ll be speaking to Jones about that later.’ Her father frowned at Jones.
‘When I heard that patrol come thundering down that tunnel, though, Commander –’ Trenchard rolled his eyes – ‘Marina in the water, you shouting your head off, Miss Smith screaming in triumph . . . I did think we’d blown it.’
‘Miss Smith has a pair of lungs on her, it’s true.’
‘Oh, she screamed fit to burst all right when I called my friends over to see her. She’d wanted them all locked up when you were found, sir. As if! I knew they’d be needed and had them positioned near the jetty.’ He gave an ear-splitting whistle. ‘Here they are!’
The dogs – Marina’s dogs – all tumbled into the cabin in a confusion of wagging tails, fur and tongues.
‘Miss Smith is a woman of many talents,’ Trenchard explained over their yowling and panting and excited barks. ‘She’s an excellent spy. A luminous mind as well as charming and brave.’
‘Why, Trenchard, I think you’re sweet on her!’ The Commander laughed.
‘I might have lost my heart, it’s true, if she weren’t so damnably cruel. But how can an Englishman, even one whose veins are half-filled with Mordavian blood, love a woman who doesn’t like dogs? Doesn’t make sense! She was going to send these rascals to the firing line with your father! But, then, it turns out that dogs don’t like her very much, either. And once Paddy got close, he showed her. With his teeth!’
‘She did scream, rather,’ Commander Denham commented.
‘And dropped her pistol. She could hand out the pain, but couldn’t take it.’
‘And that gave us time to get you out of the water,’
Commander Denham said, smiling fondly at Marina.
‘I tried to stay in the water,’ Marina whispered. ‘But my body wouldn’t sink.’
Her father looked away, his expression pained.
Trenchard looked puzzled. ‘Still feeling a bit odd?’ he asked her. ‘An icy sea is no place for a young girl!’
Could Marina tell them of what she had experienced beneath the water? Could she find the words? ‘The sonar sank to the Drowned Sea,’ she whispered.
‘Er, you might say that.’ Trenchard looked perplexed. ‘Wherever it went, it won’t be coming back. So that’s mission accomplished, Commander.’
‘We can get past the Mordavian battleships?’ Marina asked.
‘They don’t seem so brave now that they’ve heard their transmitter is no more. And of course, there are eight of our boats coming to meet us. Although I doubt we’ll need any help. I think we’ll just have a grand escort back to Portsmouth.’
‘What will happen to Miss Smith?’
Her father frowned. ‘There is no Miss Smith, Marina. She is a Mordavian agent and spy, and married to the man in charge of the Mordavian navy. I think her husband will not be pleased with her. She promised him a transmitter that would win the war. He will hold her responsible for its loss.’
‘It’s probably safe to say that her life won’t be all cherries and chocolate cake,’ Trenchard added. ‘Her husband is a cruel man. No idea why she took up with him, actually.’
What could Marina say? Miss Smith had said that she had wanted to choose her own life and not accept the narrow world she was offered. But her choices, while her own, were not right. Could there have been some other life that meant she could have been clever and brave but kind as well?
‘So, I’d like to say that it’s mission complete, Commander!’
‘Indeed,’ her father agreed.
‘We’re going home.’ Marina let this thought sink in.
‘We’ll be in Portsmouth before the week is out. And then, young lady . . .’ Her father gave her a stern look. ‘No more gallivanting for you.’
32
Scratched arm, torn blouse. Marina looked down through branches dripping in golden leaves.
‘Why so slow?’ she called out.
‘Give us a chance!’ Owen’s face, streaked with dirt, appeared below her.
‘And still I’m last!’ Edward gasped. He looked from Marina to Owen suspiciously. ‘Did you cheat?’
‘How is it possible to cheat?’ Marina laughed. ‘Unless you think that I used that pair of wings I have hidden in my pocket!’
‘Wouldn’t put it past you,’ Edward muttered. ‘I always said they would have burned you at the stake.’
‘You’re just a bad loser,’ she said.
Marina reached and plucked some leaves for her Art in Nature class that afternoon. She would be making some sketches, and tomorrow she would start carving them in stone. Her weeks at this new school in the forest had awakened a passion for sculpture. ‘Who could have known?’ her father had remarked in his last letter. ‘And is it true that Jones is allowed to crack codes and play puzzles all the time he’s not outside?’
It was true. The headmaster was of the firm belief that young people should find the things that interested them and pursue them with as much energy as they could muster. His view was that it was easy enough for young people to follow their interests; nothing could stop them. But try and force them to sit still all day and learn Latin if their hearts weren’t in it, and that spirit of curiosity and delight in application would be crushed. He set them interesting homework. ‘Time Travel is Impossible. Discuss.’ ‘Time Travel is Possible. Discuss.’ However, he was sensible enough to mind that the pupils in his care were thoughtful, kind and polite. He hated untidiness. He insisted that all of his pupils could do sums in their heads. He was fond of spelling tests, but they were the sorts of tests where you had to find the interesting
