“Rodney, before you do that, ring the Kolstadts, will you? Have them send Jian here. She’ll have to come here until we can arrange something to get her out of the country.”
His assistant glanced at him sharply, then nodded and left the office. Daniel sat back in his chair with a frown. He would be very surprised if she came. She was probably making her own arrangements to get out of Norway. There could be no doubt that she knew of the invasion. Those guns at the battery had alerted half the city already. She had proven in November that she was able to escape tight situations, but she had had help from their embassies then. There was nothing he could do to help her now. As soon as the Germans entered the city, all of his power would be useless.
He got up and strode across the office to the door. Before he began sorting through his files and destroying anything that absolutely could not fall into German hands, he had to send a message to Buckley. While he had no doubt that London was being flooded with messages, Bill needed to know exactly what was going on. He would alert him to the status of the invasion, then return to get his office in order.
Shaking his head, he moved down the long corridor towards the telegraph and radio room. That last warning claiming that an invasion on Norway and Denmark was scheduled for the 9th had turned out to be the one that was correct. They had all disregarded it, along with all the others.
And now they were out of time.
London
6am
Bill scanned the decoded and typed message, his lips tightening imperceptibly. So it had begun. The Germans were invading Norway and Evelyn was caught right in the middle of it. Her communication was very much to the point. The Germans were outside Oslo and she was going north. His brows creased into a frown. Why she thought the Swedish border was in doubt was another question for another day. All that mattered was that she wasn’t in Oslo now.
“When did this come in?” he asked the young man who had handed him the message when he strode into the radio room.
“Just after one in the morning, sir.”
“So two in the morning there,” Bill murmured. “Very well. Listen for another communication. This is critical. If they contact again, I want to know immediately. And add that radio to the list of contact sources. I want to make sure their messages get through. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
He nodded and left the small room, striding down the long corridor towards the stairs. He had been awoken by the telephone ringing at the ungodly hour of four in the morning. Within an hour of the call, he was on his way to the building on Broadway as a gray dawn broke over the city. Marguerite had watched him get dressed, her face creased in concern. She hadn’t asked what was happening. She didn’t need to. She knew she would find out soon enough on the wireless.
Bill started up the stairs. He had known Hitler would move soon. They all had. That it was Norway shouldn’t have been a surprise, but he was conscious of a stunned feeling nonetheless. Somehow, they had all managed to convince themselves that Norway would remain safe, whether through neutrality or through England’s protection. Instead, Hitler had beat them to the punch.
His lips thinned as he approached the top of the stairs, pulling out his identification for the guard on duty. If Chamberlain hadn’t pussy-footed around with whether or not to mine the Norwegian waters, they may have been able to avoid this. But he and his war cabinet were a bunch of imbeciles, and now Norway was paying the price. It was absolutely inexcusable.
Bill held out his identification and the guard examined it, then nodded and stepped out of the way so that he could proceed to his office halfway down the hall. If he were to be honest with himself, he supposed it wasn’t entirely Chamberlain’s fault. They had certainly had enough warnings regarding a German offensive on Norway, but they had all ignored them. For one reason or another, every warning had been deemed not credible. But none of that would have mattered if Chamberlain’s cabinet had moved decisively from the very beginning, instead of hoping for peace. For that was all they had done. They had remained indecisive and inactive, all the while hoping that Hitler would just sit down and go away like a good little corporal.
Bill snorted as he unlocked his office door and went inside. As if Herr Hitler had ever had any intention of doing anything other than exactly what he was doing: spreading out and claiming more and more living space for his bloody Third Reich. He closed the door and took off his coat, hanging it on the coat rack. Hooking his hat on the knob above his coat, he turned to go to his desk.
Evelyn was moving north and, if she could stay ahead of the landing troops, they had a shot at extracting her. He had to contact Jasper. He was sure he would be able to arrange something, but until he heard from her again and had a better idea of her location, they wouldn’t be able to make any definite plans. All he could do was wait.
And pray.
Just as he was reaching for the phone to call Jasper, his office door flew open and Wesley Fitch, his intrepid assistant, burst in out of breath, his jacket askew and his hair falling into his eyes.
“Denmark has surrendered without a fight!” he exclaimed. “They’ve accepted Hitler’s terms, and his protection.”
“And so it begins,” Bill said, sitting back. “What of Norway?”
“They refused in no uncertain terms, apparently,” Wesley told him. “Minister Koht told the German ambassador that they would not submit. What army they have will fight.”
“Thank God for that!” Bill got
