Aileen smiled and faced the machine. ‘Right, I can explain how to do the job, which would take an age and bore the socks off you, or we can just get on with it. Here,’ she said, handing the headset to Elsie and pressing it to her ear. ‘Now, turn that dial on the left infinitesimally. Then listen. Then turn it infinitesimally. Then listen.’
Elsie turned the dial but could only hear a murmuring hiss. Long seconds passed and the hissing continued. It was like she was listening to a slow puncture. ‘What am I listening for?’ she asked.
Aileen held a finger to her lips. ‘Turn and listen.’
Then there was a sound, a fraction above the hissing. Muffled and distant, but it was there. Elsie sat up straight and pushed the headset closer to her ear. Instinctively, she turned the dial a little further and the sound took a firmer shape. Words. They were still unclear, like they were being grated and shredded before they reached her ear. Another twist of the dial and she caught something recognisable.
‘Kirchturm?’ Elsie muttered to Aileen.
‘Quick, write it down!’ Aileen exclaimed, thrusting a notepad and pencil at her. ‘Leave every other line blank,’ she added.
Kirchturm fünfhundertfünfzig. Then, nothing; only more hissing. Moments later, more words. ‘Ich habe Durst.’
‘What does that…?’ Elsie began, but Aileen cut across her.
‘Wait!’
Another voice, different now. ‘Taube zwei—Lucie Anton.’
Elsie hurriedly scribbled what she had heard, then waited.
‘Viktor,’ the original voice said.
Aileen picked up the paper. ‘That’s probably all you’ll get—your chap’s returning home. So, below the German, write the direct translation.’
Elsie obeyed. She re-read the paper several times but it made no sense. ‘Church tower five hundred and fifty,’ she read. ‘I’m thirsty. Dove two…’ Elsie shrugged. ‘Lucie Anton. Roger.’ Another shrug.
Aileen smiled patiently. ‘Most of the time the Luftwaffe pilots speak in code. Some of it is obvious—I’m thirsty means I’m low on fuel. Some of it’s less obvious—church tower means the pilot’s altitude. Dove two is the pilot’s name.’
‘Lucie Anton?’
‘It’s short for Landeanflug—return to base and land. You’ll pick them up pretty quickly. But, over there,’ Aileen said, turning and pointing to the wall behind them, ‘is a codebook that we’ve been putting together since we started.’
‘Oh, right,’ Elsie answered, glancing down the line at the other three WAAF women, all diligently turning, listening, scribing and translating. She felt a light sag of disappointment inside. Yes, it was a thousand times better than the suffocating stagnation that she had faced at Bramley Cottage, but it wasn’t quite what she had envisaged when she had signed the Official Secrets Act. Really, she was just going to be a bilingual secretary.
‘It does get more exciting,’ Aileen added. She drew up closer to Elsie, as if she were about to confide a terrific wartime secret. ‘It’s like a giant jigsaw puzzle, but one that’s constantly changing and adapting—it can get very exhilarating at times, especially when you know you’ve saved an airman’s life.’
Elsie nodded. ‘Shall I continue?’
‘Yes, do. I’ll sit with you this stint and we’ll see how you get on.’
The day continued in much the same way: listening, turning, scribing and translating until four fresh-faced WAAF girls arrived for the next shift. Once they were safely ensconced at the wireless sets, Elsie was formally introduced to the other women alongside whom she had been working. Snippets, questions and short exchanges had occurred throughout the day, but they had all been work-related and brief. ‘Blast, my pencil’s snapped—pass me another, would you?’ ‘Anyone have any inkling what this might mean?’ ‘I’ve just picked up your lovely Amsel eins—he’s headed home for the day.’
‘Girls, this is Elsie Finch,’ Aileen finally announced, as they packed up to leave. ‘This is Lottie, Pat and Susie.’ The girls, who were all around Elsie’s age, each smiled and greeted her in turn, then the five of them piled downstairs and out through the front door.
‘Do they always keep the blacks up in there?’ Elsie asked, shielding her eyes from the shockingly bright sun, following the dimness inside Maypole Cottage. She bent down with her eyes covered and fumbled for her bicycle.
‘Always,’ Aileen responded. ‘You’ll get used to it.’
It wasn’t even a particularly bright day and, if the weather that the Luftwaffe pilots had been reporting was heading this way, then it was soon going to get very much worse.
‘We usually go over to Annie’s tea van,’ Susie said to Elsie. ‘Do you fancy joining us?’
‘Susie meets her sweetheart there,’ Lottie chirped. ‘But Annie does do a nice cuppa and sandwich, too.’
‘That would be lovely,’ Elsie answered, following the line of girls as they mounted their bicycles and began riding down the street.
Annie’s tea van was parked up just outside the aerodrome gates. Loitering around it were a handful of airmen, smoking and laughing in a deep guffawing way that Elsie recognised from the evenings when Laurie’s acquaintances from the office had called around. It was a strange, showy kind of laughter. Not real, somehow.
The line of girls dismounted, one after the other, their bicycles falling haphazardly on the grass in front of the tea van. The dropping of the bicycles coincided with the petering out of the men’s laughter and conversation. Susie rushed over to a handsome blond pilot and kissed him on the lips.
‘Afternoon, ladies,’ another of the pilots admired, as the girls formed a queue at the open side of the tea van, from where a middle-aged woman—presumably Annie—was protruding.
‘Sergeant Hartwell,’ Lottie scorned, ‘I heard you up there today—you really need to keep this shut.’ She leaned over and placed her finger on his lips, receiving a whoop of delight from the other men. ‘Just
