“It’s over a hundred miles, and their top speed is around five knots, probably less with this weather shift.”
“At least twenty hours, then.”
“I’d guess nearer twenty-four,” he said. “Which gives us time to get you fed, cleaned up, and ready for battle again.”
“Do battle again? How do I get to Barra in time?”
“I’ll take you.”
She glanced at the map. “It’s an island, and I see no airfield.”
“That’s because there isn’t one.”
“Then—”
“Believe in your little brother. I’ll get you to Castlebay long before they arrive. You’ll be sitting there waiting for them.”
* * *
Fed, bathed, and wearing clean clothes, thanks to Dafydd, Caitrin had decided to enlist support, which is why she was in the tiny Kinmory police station, standing across the counter from PC Hardy, a horizontal man who filled most of the available space on his side.
“You want to use my telephone to call Winston Churchill?” he said, repeating her request as though she had just asked him how to build an exact model of Edinburgh Castle from porridge.
“Yes.”
“May I ask why, Miss?”
“Yes, you may.”
“You do understand there’s a war on, consequently telephone use is highly restricted to urgent matters of state security, and Winston Churchill’s a very busy man?”
“He’ll accept my call.”
“It’s also expensive to call London.”
“Reverse the charges. Tell them Caitrin Colline is calling about Operation Cat.”
PC Hardy produced a pencil, and Caitrin, barely containing her irritation, prayed he wouldn’t lick the point.
He licked the point and said, “Would you kindly spell your name for me, miss?”
“C-a-i-t-r-i-n C-o-l-l-i-n-e.”
“C-a-i-t-r-i-n C-o-l-l-i-n-e,” he repeated. “And it’s Operation. . . ?”
“C-a-t. Cat.”
“C-a-t. Cat.”
He wrote down each letter with the greatest of care, picked up the telephone receiver, and turned his back to Caitrin so she could not hear him. He spoke quietly, listened, replaced the receiver, and said, ”They’ll call back as soon as the connection is made. You can wait in here, if you like. It’ll be more comfortable.”
PC Hardy came from behind the counter and opened a door. Caitrin hesitated, but a hard push sent her stumbling into the room. He closed and locked the door behind her before she could react.
“Let me out!” she shouted.
PC Hardy went behind the counter, picked up the bulletin he had recently received, and read it again. “It says here you’re wanted and should be held for inquiries, Miss Colline. They’ll be sending a man up from Glasgow once they know I have you detained.”
Caitrin pounded on the door. “It’ll be too late by then. Let me out, let me talk to them.”
“Sorry, can’t do that. Explicit orders. Keep her isolated, the bulletin says,” Hardy called back. “She is well trained in unarmed combat. Extreme caution is advised.”
Caitrin groaned. “Will you at least call my brother, Flight Lieutenant Colline, at the station? If I don’t come back, he’ll be worried to death. Please, if nothing else, do that for me.”
PC Hardy rolled the pencil in his fingers and considered her request. He cherished order in his life. For PC Hardy, everything there had its precise time and place, especially since the station was also his home. Should he, or should he not? Plenty of time to consider the question while he had a wee dram or three.
24
Caitrin was angry. PC Hardy hadn’t fooled her; she had underestimated him and in doing so fooled herself. The room was windowless; the lock was old and could not be picked; the door hinge pins were countersunk, covered in decades of paint, and would resist removal. Although her escape options were few, she needed only one.
She could take a leg off the bed that was pushed in one corner, call out she needed to go to the lavatory, and disable Hardy the instant he opened the door. First, though, she would remove the light bulb so the room would be dark when he entered. But PC Hardy was a big man, forewarned about her fighting skills, and in such a small room there was no guarantee of winning. Another 512 rule: Never fight a big man in a small space. Also, he was just a man doing his duty, and she did not want to hurt him.
Perhaps she could start a fire and blow smoke under the door. That assumed Hardy was in the office to notice it. Or she could short-circuit the electrical system to blow all the fuses and then . . .
She heard the station’s front door open and several men enter—only men would make so much noise—followed by much foot stamping and complaints about the cold. She put her ear to the door.
“I’m Flight Lieutenant Dafydd Colline,” a man said in a puzzling accent that came from somewhere deep in the Yorkshire dales. “Caitrin Colline’s brother.”
“And I’m Archibald, her other brother,” another man said, and that baffled her too because she had no brother Archibald. Most certainly not one who spoke with such an upper class, syllable-perfect voice.
