“How’re you feeling, Bill, tired?”
“I’m OK.”
“We could stay at a hotel in Chichester for the night or I’ve got a staff car to take us up to London. We’ve booked you in at the Dorchester. Which do you prefer?”
“Let’s get up to London, shall we?”
In the car he asked Wallace how long he would be in London.
“I don’t know. SOE are only responsible for your transport, it all depends on what your OSS people want.”
“Do you know why I’ve been recalled?”
“No idea, my friend.” He smiled. “If we’re not told we don’t ask.” He paused. “Anyway, how are you getting on with Jim Parish, is he providing what you want?”
“He’s fine. Cool, calm and collected and very efficient.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
Malloy had an early breakfast in his room. Powdered egg from the States and two pieces of toast. The room waiter told him that there would be a fresh egg every second day during his stay at the hotel.
There was no call for him and he went for a walk up to Hyde Park Corner and along Oxford Street. He was shocked by the damage that the Luftwaffe had inflicted on the city but the people he spoke to, the news-vendor and a policeman, seemed to be taking it all as a payment towards victory. They certainly weren’t cowed and frightened as the French newspapers had said.
When he got back to the hotel the clerk gave him his room key and told him that his visitors were waiting for him in his room. He guessed that one of them would be Kelly but he had no idea who the other person would be.
Kelly was sitting on the edge of the unmade bed and standing by the window was Lieutenant Colonel Williams who he had last seen in Washington.
Williams smiled, “Glad to see you again, Bill. I’ve brought you some mail—it’s on the table there.” He looked at Malloy, “And how’re you making out over the water?”
Malloy shrugged. “I guess you’d better ask Colonel Kelly.”
Kelly just pointed to the armchair, waving for Malloy to sit down. Kelly was a Bostonian and not given to unnecessary pronouncements.
“The reason why I wanted to see you is that we’d like to move your operation up a gear. What you’ve done so far is much more than we expected. You’ve got a great network of informants but there’s no good getting information unless you can pass it back to us in time to act on it. I’ve arranged for two senior officers from General Eisenhower’s staff to join with us in trying to devise some way to process your intelligence in a matter of hours. They’re very impressed with what you’ve been sending back.” He paused and looked at his watch. “Let’s meet at our office in Grosvenor Square at 4 p.m. OK?”
“That’s OK by me.”
Kelly handed Malloy a brown envelope. “There’s pounds and dollars for your incidental expenses. Let me know if you need more.”
Malloy went slowly through his mail. Four letters from Kathy which he put to one side and the rest was like messages from another planet. A book-club subscription reminder, two offers of life-insurance, a mailing shot for an S and L, an alumnus letter from the university and a statement of his account from the bank. He tore them up and threw them into the waste-paper basket beside the bed, and wondered why Kathy had forwarded them when she could have dealt with them all herself.
He stood at the window looking down at the traffic on Park Lane and then across to the bare trees in Hyde Park. Despite the wind and the rain he could see two riders in the park. A man and a girl riding their horses down the sandy track of Rotten Row, dodging the branches as they swung in the wind. Then a squall covered the window with raindrops and he closed his eyes. For the first time in all the months he’d been away he wondered what the hell he was doing in a hotel room in London. He didn’t belong here, nor in France. And what was worse he didn’t belong in New York any longer. Each country had eaten up the one before. He was like some garden plant that people kept digging up to check that the roots were OK. And now there weren’t any roots left. He didn’t belong anywhere. But the others, Parish, Kelly and Williams, seemed to take it all in their stride. To them, what they were doing absorbed their lives, but what did he care about what trains in a foreign country were carrying German troops and supplies. The information he supplied was just one small piece in a giant jigsaw puzzle, and if it wasn’t there it wouldn’t be missed.
Kelly introduced the two officers from Eisenhower’s Staff, Rogers and Westphal, both wearing the single star of a brigadier-general. Wallace from SOE was there too and was introduced as an observer.
Williams looked around the table and then said, “Gentlemen, you’ve all seen the flow of material that has come from Captain Malloy. I understand you’ve already made good use of some of it. But I want us to consider how we can speed up the whole process. I’d like one of the planners to put Bill Malloy and the rest of us in the picture. Maybe you, Greg, could lay it out.”
Brigadier-General Rogers looked at Malloy, “I endorse what Colonel Williams has said about your material. But I must tell you that when the
