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Chapter Text

March 31, 1940.

Siegfried Farnon raced along the twisting back roads at, for anyone else, a reckless speed. It was a moonless night, yet he drove without headlights. He knew every twist and turn of the Dales back roads. Even so, his palms sweated on the worn steering wheel. He wiped them on his trousers while he kept a keen lookout for wandering wildlife or escaped livestock ahead.

He also glanced repeatedly over his shoulder whenever sporadic flashes of brilliance on the southeastern horizon caught the edge of his vision or shone in his rear view mirror. Those intermittent bursts of fire accompanied by deep, foreboding rumbles seemed to warn of a brewing spring thunderstorm. It was no storm. It was the long awaited German breakout from occupied London.

Siegfried had to reach Skeldale House. Tonight, he would end Mrs Hall’s employment and send her on her way.

Then, after he knew she had listened to reason and actually gone, he would rendezvous with the others to decide whether to sabotage the advancing German forces or to let them go north unmolested to flank Scotland’s coastal defenses, take Edinburgh and Balmoral in order to capture or kill Edward VIII, King of England, Scotland, Wales and Great Britain’s vast, far flung colonies.

Neville Chamberlain’s ‘honorable peace’ had led inevitably to this night of destruction and terror across Yorkshire and also to Siegfried Farnon’s difficult decision to entertain the unthinkable idea of committing treason against his Sovereign in hopes of saving his country.

Eighteen months earlier, on September 30, 1938, Britain’s pact with Herr Hitler had been celebrated in London as Prime Minister Chamberlain's masterstroke of diplomacy. The residents of Skeldale House, worried as they had been over the possibility of a second bloody war, had breathed a collective sigh of relief as they gathered on tenterhooks in the kitchen to hear the BBC announce a peace pact with Germany. War had been averted.

Not everyone felt wholly reassured, however. Siegfried had serious private doubts. They niggled in his gut even as he had raised a glass to propose a toast Mr Chamberlain's success later that same evening at The Drovers.

In Parliament there were other doubters. Betting on general public discontent over the new King’s distasteful friendship with Herr Hitler and his dubious decision to wed Mrs Simpson, a twice divorced American socialite, without the blessing of the Archbishop of Canterbury or that of the Church of England, MP Winston Churchill had set in motion a vote of no confidence, arguing against Chamberlain’s naïve trust in Hitler, urging immediate preparations for war and calling upon the nation’s elected representatives to follow him to preserve British honor and her sacred duty to democratic freedoms, rather than a groveling for peace under a fascist foreign jackboot.

Siegfried had followed that news very closely. Churchill was a warrior, blooded in their Great War. Many viewed him as a hothead, a blunderer, even an old buffoon. As First Admiral and the chief architect of the Gallipoli campaign, Churchill had been responsible for a bloody debacle. He’d resigned his post in disgrace and turned his considerable energies toward politics.

Siegfried, who knew very well the vagaries of war and had seen other equally bloody debacles go unnoticed and unpunished, paid close attention to Churchill’s challenge. He was keenly disappointed, but not surprised, when King Edward VIII backed Chamberlain as Prime Minister. The challenge for Parliamentary leadership by that bombastic windmilltilter Churchill foundered, as a result of certain pressures, and the old war horse fled to America, home of his American mother. The niggling in Siegfried’s gut grew nearly unbearable.

Less than a year later, Winston Churchill had been proven right.

Ten months after its signing, on July 30, 1939 a lovely summer Sunday, Hitler broke the Munich treaty he’d signed with Chamberlain. It was war on England’s soil, the first since the Battle of Sedgemoor in Somerset in July 1685.

The invasion had been predictable to Siegfried Farnon’s cynical view. The mouth of the Thames at Southend-on-Sea lies 80 nautical miles from Calais, 60 miles by air. All the German Chancellor’s bloviated sweet talk about their two peoples being the superior race of humanity, promising shared peace and prosperity from stolen plunder, and brotherhood between Aryan cousins under a Greater Germany had made Siegfried exceedingly dubious. It reeked of lies, three day old fish dished up to any diplomat foolish or desperate enough to swallow it and accept Adolph Hitler's word of honor as a sacred oath.

The Munich Treaty gave Herr Hitler the Sudetenland. It also gave him time to prepare his next major campaign.

Siegfried Farnon, still plagued by aftershocks of his first war, had used that time to his own ends. In England’s interregnum of uncertain peace, while Hitler clamped down on conquered Moscow and the Baltic states, exploited the captured Caucasus and Carpathian oil fields and bled subjugated France and the northern countries of their wealth, workers and the means of waging war, Siegfried prepared for his second bloody war.

Without a word to anyone at Skeldale House, Siegfried began. His people would surely try to talk sense in the face of his apparent overreaction. It’s peace in our time, they might tell him. Be glad. Be grateful. Trust that all will be well.

Much as he hoped that optimism would prove out, Siegfried sensed the old frission of impending battle. It was a sixth sense that had got him through before and he could not ignore it, not with the others’ lives in his care, not with the fate of his country in the balance.

So, while he went off to work his daily farm lists, Siegfried carved out time to search for a suitable bolt hole. Hundreds of lead mines, modern and ancient, dotted the dales. No longer worked, these had potential as a refuge if war did come to Yorkshire.

Taking his cue from Mrs Hall’s second favorite author, Arthur Conan Doyle, Siegfried located a hand dug tunnel on a secluded hillside that led to a large central chamber. Side tunnels honeycombed the hill. Gradually, secretly, he transformed the abandoned mine into living quarters, setting up rude sleeping arrangements for himself, Tristan, James. Helen and the Aldersons. With a vast network of side tunnels, the place could shelter a hundred or more in an emergency.

He devised primitive means for cooking or brewing a pot of tea, he ran water from a reliable spring and he even managed to rig a miniature spring house to keep dairy and leftovers fresh for a time. A large copper kettle that swung over the crude fireplace would serve both to heat bathwater and as a kitchen sink. Planks across scattered stone blocks and a fire pit rounded out the kitchen. Rudimentary hygiene facilities - a hip bath, shallow bowl and mirror and, farther on, a bucket - were installed far down a branch of the tunnel system.

As a home, it was horrid - cold, dank and dark. The only light would come from a fire pit, candles or kerosene lanterns. There was no electricity, no luxury whatsoever. As a bolt hole, however, if was as nearly perfect as Siegfried could make it. Most essential, it was secret and nearly impossible to stumble across. No roads or paths ran nearby, just endless gorse interspersed with bilberry bushes and raspberry brambles, crisscrossed by wild animal paths. It was also very large. With the supplies Siegfried had stored in its secondary tunnels, several people could hold out for a year or longer in its dark, damp recesses. Finally it was nearly impregnable. The entrance was a tight squeeze down a low twisting shaft. Attackers would pass individually, doubled over by the low ceiling. The twists and turns would reduce any chance of a grenade reaching very far.

Fire or gas might pose a problem.

When the rudimentary aspects of his bolt hole were in place, Siegfried began pilfering Mrs Hall’s pantry contents and her other household supplies. He also ordered extra selections of key veterinary supplies that would serve for human care in times of extremis and, bit by bit equipped his bolt hole. He organized weapons, ammunition and chemical ingredients for explosives, anything he might need to conduct a guerilla style harassment against the Germans, Great Britain’s ally.

It hedged on treason, of course. King Edward supported an alliance with Herr Hitler. Planning to fight the King’s ally, was tantamount to betraying his Sovereign. Siegfried simply loved his country before his king, but that would not save his life if he was found out.

So, Siegfried Farnon kept his secret, his deepest secret save one, and Mrs Hall of all people must never learn either secret. He couldn’t risk losing her, not to war or to his highly inappropriate love.

There were close calls, of course. Audrey Hall was no fool. She was observant and had always been able to read him like a book.

One December late afternoon, Siegfried crept into Skeldale House only to be challenged as soon as he stepped into the kitchen.

“Siegfried Farnon!” Mrs Hall barked, “You look like you’ve barely survived the bloomin trenches!”

It was true enough. His boots were mud clotted and his trousers up to his pockets were smeared in sticky black muck. Plaster stuck to his hair and shirt cuffs and his bloody left hand was bound up in his filthy handkerchief, while his ear oozed blood into his shirt collar.

He had spent four arduous hours digging out the spring house for the kitchen cold storage. The job had been cold and messy. It had required that he first excavate several hundred feet of frosty black muck to redirect the spring water into an old blast hole to run it through the underlying rock and into the cavern ceiling near the kitchen fire pit. After winning that struggle, he had dug out a channel to carry the water away along the base of the tunnel wall, to spill it into a disused stub of tunnel that apparently had played out eons ago. That accounted for both colors of mud.

The plaster had been used to seal slate slabs he’d fitted into place to keep the inside of the spring house clean and dry. Digging in December’s icy grip had raised blisters on his hands and then, tired and rushed, he’d sliced his battered palm on a sharp edge of slate. To top off his day, he’d cracked his head on the entryway tunnel in his rush to complete the work and return home in time for supper.

So, when he crept into the kitchen, blue with cold and filthy far beyond his normal grime, Mrs Hall took note immediately. “What on earth have you been doing, Mr Farnon!” she demanded, aghast at the state of the man and his trousers. “It’s freezing out. Where did you find mud?”

Caught out, Siegfried blurted the first lie that came to mind. “I …erm …I had to climb down an old water well, Mrs Hall,” he invented, shame-faced. “One of Mr Dempsey’s grandchildren thought it was great fun to send the puppy up and down in the well water bucket. Well, the bucket came up empty. All this transpired while I was dealing with an incipient case of laminitis in their spoilt Welsh pony.”

“And no one else could manage the deed?” she asked, more gently, touched at the thought of him going into a dark, dangerous hole in order to save a hapless pup.

“Mr Dempsey is eighty-five, my dear, and his five sons are in Leeds at today’s cattle sale. The three grandchildren are aged six and younger. So …,” he shrugged.

“And is that plaster?” she asked, tracing her fingers through his hair to catch a bit of incriminating evidence.

“Yes,” he stammered. “Yes, it is. Mrs Dalby needed a bit of help with a highly inconvenient crack in her ceiling, right over the stove. Her sons are both too short.” Another bald-faced lie, but Mrs Hall just gazed at him a moment too long before muttering, “Daft beggar, Mrs Dalby weren’t even on your list!”

By then, however, Siegfried had toed off his disreputable boots, dropped his filthy trousers in the laundry and made his stocking footed escape, heading up for the comfort of a warm bath.

She watched him go,, fully aware he were up to summat. Later, after supper, Mrs Hall insisted on dosing him with one of her most unpalatable potions for his sins.

The pilfering was actually easier. Mrs Hall kept careful inventory of her pantry and cellar. When Mrs Hall missed a jar of preserves or pickled eggs, canned meat or so forth, Siegfried simply invented a family in need and her generous heart didn’t argue. She did take note of the frequency that good man were feeding the poor. Summat were up.

And so it went through early summer 1939. As Siegfried had feared, the Führer hadn’t honored that flimsy piece of paper any more than he’d honored Germany’s earlier peace agreement with Stalin. Come July, having defeated the Russians with the autumn of 1938 in a swift drive that conquered Moscow and the winter leveling of Saint Petersburg by air, the powerful Nazi war machine had turned against Europe’s last standing democracy – Great Britain.

January 1940

Operation Sea Lion had hit England six months ago in July of 1939. They’d struck with speed and ferocity that shocked London.

German invasion by sea and air had swiftly wiped out the largely ceremonial military forces in England’s capitol city. Cavalry comprised of horses groomed for parades had charged and died to the last man and mount at the bloody action on Tower Bridge. The London police force and a squad of Royal Marines had done better. They had held back German paratroopers for four hours at the London Bridge. The Royal Guard had fought hard but those lads had been wiped out in 40 minutes trying to hold the Westminster Bridge. Lesser crossings had been dynamited to stem the onslaught.

The defenders’ heroic tenacity, though brief, had delayed the invaders long enough for King Edward and the Royal family to slip away and race north by car to the relative safety of Scotland, taking up residence at Balmoral Castle, as much for the King’s protection from a betrayed English populace as from fear of capture by Hitler’s forces.

The German Navy and Air Force hadn’t stopped at London, of course. Primarily concerned with being cut off from their supplies and reinforcements, their main threat after taking London was the Royal Navy. They swept across the southern and eastern coasts, taking possession or flattening every port town and coastal village in their path. After London, the Haven ports of Ipswich, Harwich, and Felixstowe fell first. The Royal Navy ships in those harbours had been burned and sunk by their own crews rather than surrendering the war vessels to the enemy. The harbours at Berwick-upon-Tweed, Sunderland, Hartlepool, and Redcar were occupied immediately after, as were Brightlingsea, Rochford, Sheerness, Whitstable, Sandwich, Ramsgate, Dover, Folkestone and Rye Harbour. In less than two days, Newcastle, Hull and Scarborough were ablaze, as well, and their docks were under total German control.

The west of England and all of Wales and Scotland held firm. Royal Navy ships harbored in ports on the west coast made a run for it, seeking safe harbor in Canada. One ship, the Prince of Wales, carried the King’s younger brother, Bertie, Albert Frederick Arthur George Windsor, heir presumptive to the Edward VIII throne. Sailing with the Prince of Wales were the HMS Hood and HMS Repulse. The Repair, as she was fondly dubbed, carried a crew of 1,222, including engine stoker, Edward Hall, and ship’s captain, Bill Tennant.

Although the ships had sailed out of reach, the Luftwaffe firebombed Cardiff, Manchester and Liverpool, but the cities remained free. Siegfried felt Scotland was next. The Germans were certain to sweep inland and turn north to flank formidable Scottish coastal defenses and capture the north. If Scotland fell and the King was taken prisoner, it would then merely be a matter of mopping up in the west.

Darrowby lay directly in the Germans’ path from the occupied south to the border of Scotland. Darrowby and all of rural Yorkshire were, in Churchill’s words, Scotland’s soft underbelly.

So now, it was up to civilians of the north to fight, to hold back the Germans, to die or somehow survive, God willing, as free Britons. Men in their fifties and older, women, even youngsters, must do all in their power to hamper the German advance – blow bridges, block roads, place explosives and, when the time cane, snipe at the advance guard.

The people recruited to resist must simply hope that the second son of King George V, Bertie, might convince England’s former colonies to aid him, to save Great Britain, to remove his brother, King Edward VIII, fawning admirer of Adolf Hitler, and to take back England and Ireland from the Nazi juggernaut that gripped the rest of Europe.

Siegfried Farnon was willing to go farther in the effort to put Bertie on the throne of Great Britain by allowing the German forces to sweep North into Scotland unmolested, in hopes they would deal with King Edward and clear the path for Bertie to serve as their Fighting Monarch.

Over the next months, as German power entrenched across the southern reaches of Great Britain and took hold in neutral Ireland, Siegfried continued his usual veterinary services, supplementing his busy schedule with clandestine appointments to train and plan with others on the resistance, to add to the caches of food, arms and medical supplies in the hills, to evaluate the peaceful landscape with an experienced soldier’s eye and choose which passes would offer the best opportunities to hold off the invaders when the Germans finally came and to decide among his resistance fighters how to prepare to blow up bridges and close critical passes when the time came and to decide who among his oldest friends would have the job, assuming the farmers refused Siegfried’s secret plan to let the Gerries capture the king.

At first, there’d been only an occasional German presence in Yorkshire since last summer. Now and then a reconnaissance flight bearing the swastika passed overhead. Occasional lorries crammed with troops roared by, heading west. Then, in October, three months after London fell, the German presence was suddenly very present and deeply personal in Darrowby.

Notices appeared overnight in the village square. The German military invited volunteers to join the Waffen-SS.

Two days later, official letters arrived to inform residents of the mandatory draft of all British males age fifteen to thirty-eight. Apparently the earlier voluntary invitation had fallen short of the quotas required to suppress an entire conquered continent. On that bitter November evening, Skeldale House had been a grim place, it’s occupants fraught with worry over the recruitment letters and how best to proceed.

After their subdued supper of twice thinned soup and hard brown bread, Audrey had brewed a real pot of tea, rich and fragrant. Siegfried wondered if she hoped to forestall him crawling back down a bottle of whisky with her gift of real tea. The thought had crossed his mind repeatedly through that dour day. His housekeeper knew him far too well.

The young people gathered, taking seats around the kitchen table. James and Helen sat pale and holding hands. They’d wed in August 1938, six weeks before Great Britain signed the Munich peace treaty that let Germany annex the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia. Siegfried would have given half he owned to spare them this. Tristan slumped, avoiding eye contact with Siegfried, who’d have given all he owned to spare his brother.

Siegfried chose a seat beside Mrs Hall’s chair, rather than at the head of the table. He wanted to be close to her. So he waited and watched while she served out the tea and a pot of apple butter as a humble treat to enjoy on more slices of the heavy, otherwise tasteless bread.

When Mrs Hall sat, before Siegfried could offer the group his thoughts, James spoke. “I canna swear loyalty to a despot!” he growled in a thick burr that only emerged at times of intense emotion. “I’ll tek Helen beck home. We’ll cross the border tonight, go to my family, that is … if I can borrow the Vauxhall.”

Siegfried nodded and held his peace. James was his own man, a married man, responsible for his new bride. Whether to go or stay must be their decision. If the car could help, of course James could ‘borrow’ it.

It was Helen who spoke out against the plan. “What about our people here, James!” She hadn’t raised her voice, but the intensity of her opinion was clear. “Me Da and Jenny? The farm and animals. What about Siegfried and Aud ? Think of all they’ve done for you, James, for both of us! Is it doing right by all of them, if we just cut and run?”

“Helen …” Siegfried had begun, but James silenced him with a fierce glare such as Siegfried had never expected to see on his mild mannered junior partner’s handsome young face.

Audrey touched Siegfried’s forearm, as well, sealing his silence and making him yearn to hold her steadying hand. “It innt your place, Mr Farnon,” she murmured.

Their eyes met and Siegfried saw something shining there that gave him a glimmer of hope for better days in the midst of disaster. He let his lips quirk into something just short of a smile and replied, “Yes. Of course. We must each of us decide what’s best ourselves, including you, my dear Mrs Hall.”

She gave him ‘that look’ and shook her head, dismissing the very notion.

All the while, Tristan had been quiet, not looking directly at the others, just glancing up through his lashes as his family members grappled with impossible choices. He’d made his decision. He’d made it instantly, privately. He would agree to serve. He would sign any paper, swear any oath, do anything demanded of him lest the wrath of Greater Germany, the Third Reich crash down on those he held as dear as life. Any oath he swore or contract he signed was under coercion and not binding, morally or legally. Hitler broke his word and, in turn, deserved betrayal. Military sense of the matter, of course, would differ and he could be shot. So, Tristan would wait for his chance to truly hurt the German war effort. He would wait patiently and he would be smart, use the brains Siegfried insisted he possessed, if only he would try. This time Tris would try. He’d act only when he recognized his best chance of success and of coming through alive.

They discussed options all night, sipping endless cups of tea and talking. Siegfried, of course, would not go. The animals and farmers depended on him and that was his life’s byword. Mrs Hall said nowt, but Siegfried had known when she’d silently scolded him with her eyes. She’d stay.

It was James and Helen who needed to talk it through and through again.

Tris only listened and, more than once, Siegfried wondered what exactly his little brother had in mind.

By morning, there’d been no clear choice for Helen and James, but fate decided. The narrow window for escape mandatory military service had slammed shut. Pre-dawn hammering at Skeldale’s front door, armed German guards in the back yard, the rumble of heavy trucks suddenly pouring into the village square and the harsh bark of commands of their former allies, now occupiers, had rung throughout sleepy Darrowby.

There’d been no warning from the surrounding farms. Those farm families must have been rousted in the dark of night. Telephone wires had been cut, phone boxes guarded, and road blocks placed to prevent travel to nearby villages. The Germans were thorough to ensure they’d catch every Yorkshire village by surprise at break of day.

Audrey’s hand on his arm prevented Siegfried from doing anything foolish or futile when a furious fist pounded on his door. Knowing she was right, Siegfried bit back his protests as German soldiers shoved past him without permission, jostled Audrey and pointed weapons at Tristan and James. They hustled the pair outside into a crowd of agitated young men destined to become conscripts in the Waffen-SS.

The crowd seemed to include every young and middle aged man in the region. Mr Crabtree was there, Tom Chapman, Joe Mulligan, Joe Coney, both Henry lads and even Dave Kitson, despite his lame leg. Hugh Hulton and all of his stable staff, except the old stable master, were there. Merrick’s field hands and house staff hadn’t been spared. François, the indispensable right hand man to Mrs Pumphrey, stood among the crowd doing his best to reassure the footmen and stable lads, but looking utterly lost in his impeccable suit when Siegfried caught his eye.

Regardless of status, they all would go. Each would be forced to swear personal loyalty to Adolf Hitler and don that despicable grey uniform. Afterwards, who knew where these men might go, what might be their fate? What might become of Tristan and James?

Feeling like a bloody coward, Siegfried had watched his brother and his partner along with a hundred other young and middle aged men herded into trucks at gunpoint. Wives and sweethearts, mothers, children and older men, like him, did nothing to interfere. They watched in silent despair as younger men were chivvied like livestock into pens.

When all were crowded aboard, the trucks grumbled to life. Tail gates were slammed and locked. Then the flower of Darrowby’s youth were driven away, heading south to camps presumably somewhere outside of London. From there, after indoctrination that the Germans called training, no one could know what their loved ones might be forced to do in service of the bloody damned Huns. If Mrs Hall hadn’t taken hold of his clenched fist, Siegfried might have stepped in, a foolish and futile act of bravado to salve his damned soul.

Then, like an amputated limb, the young men of Skeldale House were gone, leaving only the phantom pain of their loss.

Weeks passed without news of the lads, not even a postcard. Rumors flew, however. Alice, the post lady, carried what seemed to be reliable word of mouth from postal workers in other Ridings. Men were held in vast training camps, she reported. Conditions were tolerable, but not up to British military standards. Food shortages in London meant those in camps were surely underfed. Shootings and hangings were rumored, but no names were known. Graves sprouted in ranks along the edges of the camps. The count of wooden crosses grew day after day.

Those weeks were filled with far too many calls for the sole veterinarian in the region. Mr Pandhi had wisely taken his family away to India. Without James or even Tristan to lend a hand, Siegfried took the full strain, attending day or night, often one work day running straight into the next, unless and until Audrey put her foot down, disconnected the telephone and sent her employer to bed.

Mrs Hall began to manage some of the simple cases for pet owners. She might not feel able to clip a budgie’s beak, but she could worm a cat or a dog and clean and wrap an injured paw. Audrey found it a comfort to help the pets and their owners. Love, she knew, was where you found it and these dear creatures loved and were loved. It were her honor to tend to them, if it were in her power. If not, she made a note for Mr Farnon to find a moment to drop by one home or another.

As spring arrived, cold and wet, Alice whispered the news that at last British military units had established a defensive line running from just south of York through the South Pennines, all the way to Preston. A mixed force of Marines, Airmen, Infantry, cooks, mechanics, medics and stranded Sailors, previously scattered in disarray after London fell, had formed up and dug in where the terrain was favorable for defense.

Siegfried drove pell-mell out of the high the dales, certain that the rumored British defensive line was being hit by heavy artillery, a sure sign there’d soon be a push of Gerry infantry north toward Scotland, by way of Darrowby.

Grim, but grateful that he had managed all possible arrangements, Siegfried sped through the last night of March 1940 like a man possessed. York had fallen and the sound of thunder told him the Germans were in Brawton, perhaps closer. It was time for his final critical moves in preparing to either stop the German Army’s bid to capture the King, or let them pass through to take the King of England, Scotland and Wales captive.

First, however, he had to reach Skeldale House and fire Mrs Hall. Only then, when he knew she was driving north into Scotland with boat tickets to Halifax, could he meet with the others to propose his preferred traitorous plan.

For months Siegfried had pondered this choice. He had known in his very bones that Herr Hitler would break any bargain with Prime Minister Chamberlain and betray King Edward’s misplaced friendship. Anticipating this reversal, Siegfried had had quiet chats with many others, men and women on the farms who he knew well and who trusted him: Richard Alderson, Dick and Mary Rudd, Mr Sharpe, Mr Dinsdale, the Chapmans and scores of other stoic Yorkshire farmers. They were all the sort who would fight and could keep their mouths firmly shut. Each swore a solemn oath to never betray their dangerous cause, a shared cause to rid England of the Nazis.

Siegfried had only discussed the fighting. He’d had never mentioned his deeper hope. He wouldn’t, not until the time was right. He believed the best future for Great Britain lay in letting their fascist King be taken by the Nazis and, with luck, to be replaced by his brother, an officer in the Royal Navy. That would put a warrior king on Great Britain’s throne.

The one person he hadn’t confided in was Mrs Hall. Much as he needed that good woman’s wisdom and skills, Siegfried could not bring himself to involve her. Instead, he bought tickets to get her across Scotland by train and boat passage to Halifax, Canada, where she’d be safe. She would drive herself to Scotland tonight and, by tomorrow, should be bound for Halifax and a reunion with her beloved son, Edward Hall, serving on The Repulse.

As Siegfried flew into the backyard, he could see her framed in the back doorway. He climbed out and went to her, pulling boat tickets out of his coat pocket and the keys to his Rover.

“Mr Farnon,” Mrs Hall cried out, “the Constable rang us. We’re about to be overrun by the fighting!”

Siegfried stepped close to her and pressed the keys and the tickets against her hand saying, “There’s no time to pack, my dear. Take the Rover. These tickets are for a ship that leaves in two days for Halifax. I want you gone from here. Go, be with your son.” He emptied his wallet, “It’s fifty pounds for petrolatum and food. Go now, Audrey. Quickly.”

“What about you?” she demanded, refusing the offer, her arms crossed defensively.

“I am no longer your employer or ... um ... or concern, Mrs Hall," he replied. “I am terminating your employment. I am closing the practice and no longer require your services. I do need to know you are safe. Please. Time is short!"

Audrey took the keys, tickets and money and followed Siegfried to the Rover. Her brave smile lifted his heart for a moment, but then she was gone.

Chapter Text

Audrey Hall drove through the dying night. It were nearly dawn and she dashed hot tears away as she drove. She weren’t surprised. It were typical of that daft beggar to send her off, to leave himself all alone to face the coming danger, to let himself trust that she’d do as she were told, when he surely knew better.

The sounds of a battle were getting louder and she prayed for Mr Farnon’s safety and hoped fervently for the protection of his home. Her Saint Nick still stood on his little shelf, a protective totem Audrey had accidentally left behind in her rush. Now, the thought of her bit of protection still standing there looking out for Mr Farnon gave her a warm feeling that made her tears flow even harder.

“Daft old man,” she sobbed, wiping tears on her sleeve.

The drive to Grace Chapman’s were long and winding. Audrey managed it in jig time, fully aware of all that needed doing. Grace and her sisters were good people and, with them on their way, Audrey felt certain they’d convince Annie to see reason, too.

After months of ugly rumors out of London and other cities, it seemed true that the Nazis were segregating people by skin color. Like the southern Americans, they held grossly unfair views about people who looked different, seeming to view people as no better than breeding stock and eliminating those deemed inferior from the herd. When she had accepted Mr Farnon’s offer of first class tickets and a near fortune in pounds, well … she’d ached to go to Edward, naturally. Then, she’d remembered the Chapmans.

Audrey honked the horn loud and long as she pulled into the farmyard, bringing Grace from the barn at a trot.

“Don’t argue,” Audrey called out as she climbed from the low slung car. “Here’s money and a First Class boat ticket to Halifax, Canada. If you exchange it, Grace, you’ll be able to get your whole family away. The Nazis are in Darrowby by now. Before it’s too late, get your sisters and go collect Annie. Bert will look after things, unless he decides to leave, too.”

Grace stared wide-eyed at the money and the precious boat ticket. Then she breathed, “God bless you, Audrey Hall!” and sprinted to the house. In moments the entire family emerged, waving and crying, to climb into the flatbed truck and roar off to gather their parents and flee.

Audrey sat for a long moment, alone on the peaceful farm. She admired the Chapmans and nursed her own bittersweet regrets. Mr Farnon knew how she longed for her son. That dear good man had given her the kindest gift, a bribe really. He knew it were a nearly irresistible offer to be reunited with Edward.

Mr Farnon meant well and Audrey blessed him for it. Yes, and loved him, that daft good man.

On the night before Tris and James were conscripted, all those months ago, Mr Farnon had said they must each decide. He’d forgotten that bit of truth, typical of him, but he were right and she had decided. Others were at far greater risk. She could weather the coming storm and, God willing, her Edward would come home to her. Some glorious day they’d be together when peace returned.

After a long moment of watching dawn break over the rolling fields, Audrey went to look after the stock. She hauled water and fed the cows and chickens. She would stop by the neighbors to say the Chapman family had gone and ask them to look after the farm and livestock.

Then, Audrey Hall tidied her hairpins and went to ask for a job.

The sun were shining when Audrey pulled into Pumphrey Manor. No one answered the bell or her knock in the door, so after a long wait she entered the vast manor house uninvited.

“Mrs Pumphrey?” Audrey called out. “Hello?”

At that, Tricki-Woo waddled up and grumbled, then trotted off. When she only watched, the little dog came back and yipped, then started off again.

“Summat’s wrong, innit?” Audrey said in a hushed, urgent tone.

Tricki-Woo trotted off through the too quiet corridors. After following the little dog up the winding staircase that led to private spaces in the manor, the pair stopped. Tricki-Woo sat whimpering at a bedroom door.

Audrey rapped gently on the door.

“Mrs Pumphrey?” She called through the door. “It’s Mrs Hall, Mrs Pumphrey. May I come in?”

There was a weak response that sounded like a whimper. Alarmed, Audrey stepped inside.

She had never expected the sight that greeted her. Mrs Pumphrey was huddled in her blankets, blinking at her. The elegant, iron willed matriarch weren't herself. Her normally perfect hair were tangled. She looked pale and heartbroken, thoroughly lost.

"I will make tea," Audrey stated.

After several minutes, she returned with a tray that held tea, milk and sugar, cups, saucers and a plate of sandwiches. She set the tray across Mrs Pumphrey’s lap, relieved to see the grand old lady had attempted to make herself presentable.

Mrs Pumphrey served out the tea and they sipped in silence. “You are wondering where my staff has gone," she said, "but are too polite to ask. The maids, cook and the rest of my female staff have all gone home. Without hired men and sons, their parents need them to work the land. The city girls were nervous and they bolted, as well."

Audrey said nowt for a moment, but asked, "How long have you been on your own, Mrs Pumphrey?"

Chapter Text

“I let them down, Mrs Hall,” Mrs Pumphrey stated with the slightest of quavers beneath her precise diction. “Those men are my people, mine to care for, to protect and help and I let the Nazis take them.” Her teacup clattered uncharacteristically as she set it back on its saucer. "I cannot blame the others on my staff for leaving. I don't deserve them."

The grand lady rested against a mountain of goose down pillows with ornate lemon lace edging and, yet, she looked less than grand. The setting was sumptuous in a practical, understated way with heavy silver curtains and a pale yellow carpet so deep that Audrey hesitated to walk on it. The lady herself, however, were clearly not herself. Her usually perfect hair was still mussed and, without lipstick or powder, her face showed her age and her deep sorrow. Mrs Pumphrey's iron will had clearly been dented by the unprecedented events that had sent her entire female staff scurrying off home to their families after the male staff had been abruptly conscripted.

Only the old stable master, Ralph Johns, remained to care for the livestock.

“It innt me place to say,” Audrey replied, “but I must say summat. You dinnt fail. Nowt you nor any one of us coulda stopped what happened. The blame lies with … well ... with other people, Mrs Pumphrey. Important people. Men more powerful than Mr Farnon, or even a grand lady like yourself.”

Audrey had nearly named poor old Prime Minister Chamberlain, but it were wrong to speak ill of the dead and he'd done his best. She could not bring herself to speak her innermost thoughts about the King, either, the man who’d trusted and admired a monster. King Edward had been so wrong, but he were just a mortal man, despite being her Sovereign. Only God were perfect.

Mrs Pumphrey sipped her tea and, to Audrey’s relief, took a bite of sandwich. “I am grateful for your kindness, Mrs Hall,” she said. “I must disagree. The privileges I enjoy," she gazed out her gleaming windows over the greening fields. "Such privileges demand equal responsibility. Responsibility does not end if duty is inconvenient or hazardous or even impossible. I simply must find a way to serve our people in this terrible time, Mrs Hall." After a long awkward pause, she said gently, "I know your young men were taken, both Mr Herriot and young Mr Farnon. I am so sorry.”

Audrey shook her head and sighed, “In truth, it might have been even worse. I were afraid Mr Farnon would try summat daft, but thank the Lord he just watched, stiff and pale with fury. It were horrible. He hasn't been right since. No word, of course, only rumors. I tell meself they’re both strong and smart young men. I hope they’re together. I think of them that way when I pray.”

“Is your son, Edward, safe and well?” Mrs Pumphrey asked.

“I did have a short letter. It were four months ago," Audrey smiled. “His ship, The Repulse, were refitting in Liverpool when it all started here. Mr Farnon reassured me that Edward sailed with the fleet. Edward might be safe in Halifax, but ... I won’t know for sure, I s’pose, not till things quiet down.”

“They also serve who only stand and wait,” the older lady intoned gently, patting Audrey’s rough hand with her own velvet touch.

“Aye. Goes for you too,” Audrey offered with a sassy wink, earning a shocked chuckle and Mrs Pumphrey’s first genuine smile since Audrey had convinced her to have a cuppa and summat to eat.

“May I ask how you happened to stop by?” Mrs Pumphrey asked. “Grateful as I am for your company, I hadn’t expected visitors to look in with all that’s happened.”

“Mr Farnon has shuttered his veterinary practice, temporarily. He’s … erm ... he's very busy with summat else. Summat important, Mrs Pumphrey. So, I’m at loose ends.”

Mrs Pumphrey’s eyes lit up and, before Audrey could ask, she declared, “You are hired, Audrey! Thank goodness Mr Farnon has other important matters to attend to because I desperately need a majordomo!”

“Until François returns,” Audrey amended.

Mrs Pumphrey nodded solemnly, “Just so.” She dabbed at a tear and echoed, "until François returns." She sipped her tea and, after setting it aside, added, "Do tell Uncle Farnon to be careful ... with his 'something important,' Mrs Hall. We really cannot cope without him, can we?"

Audrey breathed, "Too true."

“Where’ve you been!” Helen snapped as Siegfried entered the abandoned textile mill. Full morning sunlight angled through the rank of dirty windows two storeys high. It was clearly well past dawn.

“Thought you’d been taken by the buggers,” Richard Alderson grumbled. “Thought we’d be next.”

Robbie Benson countered, “I knew you’d be along, Mr Farnon, never let us keep you from a lambing. The animal always comes first, eh?”

Siegfried shrugged, unwilling to explain what kept him. Talking Audrey into going off to safety in Canada took time and, just now, he couldn't let himself dwell on her having left him, probably forever.

Instead of answering Helen or Richard, he tackled the subject that weighed nearly as heavily on his troubled mind. “I know we organized to resist the invasion,” he began, stuffing his hands deep into his trouser pockets as he paced the dusty milling floor, flanked by huge weaving and spinning machinery that stood silently ominous, a reminder in iron of how drastically times could change. “We planned to stop their push into Scotland," Siegfried stated.

“It’s why we’re here,” Mrs Dobson said.

“I ask you all to hear me out," he said quietly. "If, as a group, we decide to blow the tracks and the railroad bridge, I’ll go along with our original plan. If we change our minds, I alone will be responsible if it comes back to haunt me. Agreed?”

A nervous shiver went through the group.

“Not until I know what in hell you’re talking about!” Richard barked.

“Let the Germans capture King Edward,” Siegfried replied, meeting Richard’s gaze defiantly.
“Let the train get through. If Edward is captured, he cannot rule. Bertie is next in line. We’d have a ruler in absentia, but in a position to seek help to kick the bloody Huns out of Great Britain. That lad is a warrior. He's what England needs.”

Robbie Benson countered, “But we’d lose Edinburgh and God knows what else!”

“Time’s short,” Siegfried replied. “Let’s vote. All in favor of letting the Germans through?”

“Hold on,” Richard demanded. “Why would our King be replaced? He might be welcomed as Herr Hitler’s guest. Hitler could use him to recruit allies in the middle east of Asia. They’re bosom buddies.”

Helen added, “And why do you take responsibility? It’s treason, isn’t it? You could be shot!”

“The King escaped from London, Richard,” Siegfried replied “That tells me that Edward knows his bosom buddy Herr Hitler is likely not his best buddy.” He turned to Helen and said, “This was my idea. None of you are doing anything wrong.” Then he looked at his watch and said, “If the trains are running, it’s due in half an hour. That’s barely time to get in position. We have to decide, now.”

Phyllis Dalby pointed out, “There won’t be any train from York, Siegfried. They put paid to the Coastal Line.”

“True,” Siegfried snapped, “but there’s the cross country line from the west, Mrs Dalby.”

“There’ll be plenty of our people on that train,” Phyllis added. "They're shooting civilian hostages for what happened in York. That could be our people next."

Helen said, “Phyllis, we lost our people In London, in York and Brawton. It’s war.”

Richard interrupted, “Mrs Dalby knows, Helen. Her friend Tom probably won’t be coming home, not as dark as he is. So, go softly, lass.”

Helen blushed and murmured, “Sorry, Phyllis. Of course. I am terrified for James. It must be utter hell for the Chapman family.”

Siegfried interrupted, “All true, ladies, but do we go or not?”

“Not,” Richard said.

“Not,” Phyllis echoed.

“Since it can’t be unanimous,” Richard stated, “that’s it. We defend our own and let Scotland deal with the Gerries.” He glared at Siegfried and growled, “You aren’t in this alone, Siegfried Farnon. We’re all or none and don’t you forget it, you daft bastard.”

Oval Office of The Whitehouse, Washington DC, September 1938.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt sipped his martini and shook his head. “Winston,” he drawled, his voice warm and cordial, “I understand your position, my friend, but I am in a fight for my political life. I don’t exaggerate. That young aerial hero, Lindbergh, is leading an effective charge against my reelection and the Industrial giants are backing him and my challenger, Wendell Wilkie, to the hilt. The fascism that has brought Europe to her knees threatens here, as well.”

Churchill sipped his whisky and nodded before be replied. “America has long enjoyed the conceit that she represents 'A Shining City on a Hill', a bright light of freedom to lift the world, Mr President,” Churchill growled affably. “I merely suggest, my friend, that now is the moment for her to prove that vainglorious claim. Those principles thatt your countrymen so loudly espouse to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are rooted in our Magna Carte, Franklin. Your very legal foundations and language are British. Your mother country needs her children to come home, to save her from despoliation and despair. This time, Mr President, war cannot wait on American hesitation.”

Richard Carmody sat perfectly still and watched the pair of political giants, fascinated. The interaction seemed open and filled with goodwill, on the surface. Both men remained relaxed and smiling. They posed like old friends reunited. He sensed an undercurrent, however, like the highly charged atmosphere of a chess match between world class masters of the game. The stakes were beyond comprehension in this match. The fate of the free world hung in the balance.

“Japan has risen from her ancient slumbers,” Churchill grumbled on. “Since the Great War, she has turned her young men from a peaceful fishing fleet to a formidable modern navy. Every peasant son serves in her army. Their young people embrace fanaticism, Mr President. The danger is imminent!"

The men glared at one another. The air fairly crackled.

"Franklin," Churchill sighed, beginning again and lowering his oratory to a modest plea. "Singapore is threatened, Malaysia, Hong Kong and even Australia. You must ask yourself, my old friend, how long before the yellow devils turn their navy east toward Hawaii and then Alaska, Canada and even your entire west coast! We must act decisively, together!” He entwined his fingers to form a double fist, “To quote the wisdom of your Founding Father, Benjamin Franklin, 'If we do not hang together, we shall surely hang separately'!”

Richard held his breath. This was classic Churchillian brinksmanship. Wilkie had carried the Republican nomination, despite not actually running in the GOP primary, by positioning himself as an interventionist. The official GOP primary candidates, Taft and Dewey, both ran variations of isolationist campaigns. A former Democrat and shrewd political opponent, Wilkie had instead spoken out on the need to help Great Britain, short of sending troops to fight in Europe. FDR had pledged no direct U.S. involvement. His former democratic ally had FDR in a tight political corner and Churchill hoped to capitalize on the president’s problem by offering him a way out.

Having poured over the history of the Great War, Richard grasped the essentials of the political climate in both America and his country. Few adults could forget Germany’s last attempt at empire building. It had cost Great Britain and her colonies 880,000 deaths, more than one and a half million injured, over two percent of the total population killed. America, entering the conflict relatively late in the war, lost 116,000 men and two hundred thousand wounded, a tenth of one percent of the total population killed. The numbers, while horrific, hardly did full justice to the depth of the trauma among the peoples of those nations. Mechanized warfare with efficient new modes of mass killing – from rapid fire machine guns to deadly chlorine gas attacks – stunned and revolted those who might have once viewed war as something glorious and even honorable.

At a prearranged signal from Mr Churchill, Richard Carmody coughed slightly, causing the two great men to turn his way.

"Do you have something you would like to add, Mr Carmody?" President Roosevelt asked.

Churchill nodded slightly.

Richard took a deep breath and said, “Yes, Mr President. Thank you, sir. With the forced resignation of Prime Minister Yoni, the pro-British and pro-American stance of Emperor Hirohito has lost sway. Under the Tripartite Pact, Germany and Japan are allied and the Japanese Army's military faction is in ascendancy,” he stated. “If Japan could be forced to move against the United States sooner rather than after the November election, Mr President, it would allow you shift focus from your prior campaign pledges to a war footing without seeming to be indecisive. Your pivot to this stance would align with Mr Wilkie's popular support for Great Britain, neutralizing his advantage, freeing you to support Great Britain in its struggle against Japan’s ally, Germany.”

The President squinted over his eyeglasses and demanded brusquely, “And how exactly would Japan be inspired to such a rash act, young man?”

Richard stated simply, “Japan is a tinderbox. The Army leadership is aggressively pursuing military actions in Russia and Manchuria. Japan gets more than eighty percent of her oil from the United States. Cut off the Japanese Army's oil supply from your western oil fields, Mr President, and the forces they have committed to battlefields will be in serious risk of annihilation on several fronts. Japan’s navy is against war with the United States, but if oil is denied their fleet they will have no choice but to attack America's territory of Hawaii, a significant harbor for projecting US navel power into the realm Japan hopes to subjugate in its bid for an empire.”

Churchill harumphed, but FDR's eyes lit up and he nodded, "Their oil!" as if it was his own idea.

After spending long hours in the fields with lambing, Siegfried drove back through the dark hills to hide the Vauxhall. Helen had offered to take over noting appointments for the daily farm lists. It wasn’t ideal, far from it. Farmers would have to get word to Heston Grange without the convenience of telephoning. Still, if that was their worst worry with German infantry swarming the countryside, they could count themselves blessed.

Siegfried agreed to drop by each dawn for breakfast and the lists. Helen also demanded he bring along his laundry. Of that he was deeply grateful. She had hugged him when they parted, tears in her eyes, saying, "You did good, sending Aud away, Siegfried. You did the right thing and I'm so proud of you."

That had been hours ago. After dealing with the last of his farm calls on the last lists Mrs Hall would ever organize, he hiked cross country to the abandoned lead mine. He was tired, wet and wishing he was going home to an excellent meal and an evening before the fire in the company of that fine woman, his dear friend, his beloved Mrs Hall.

It was not to be. His sense of duty had required him to betray his King. Now, others knew of his traitorous thoughts. He'd taken no action, not yet, but in his heart he had wished Edward would lose the throne. That was betrayal enough, particularlyat times of war. So, Siegfried’s sense of self preservation required him to hide away in a miserable hole, a place no one knew about. Too tired to bother with food, Siegfried collapsed onto his improvised bed and fell asleep, hungry and alone, wishing for a better world.

Then the nightmares came.

Audrey had looked after Mrs Pumphrey and Tricki-Woo. The grand lady had been looking after herself, until loneliness and misplaced guilt had overwhelmed her. Now, with Audrey as her majordomo, Mrs Pumphrey was regaining her equilibrium. She had dressed and let Audrey help arrange her hair, before walking down to the stables to introduce her Mrs Hall to Mr Johns, the stable master and only other person on the vast estate.

Audrey spent her day cleaning and served Mrs Pumphrey a simple dinner and cold supper. Like Mr Farnon, her new employer insisted that Audrey join her for meals.

"I realize it is unorthodox," she had declared, "but it is just you and me, Mrs Hall. So please, do sit and keep me company. Tricki-Woo does his best but, frankly, our conversations are rather one-sided. Indulge me."

Over supper, Mrs Pumphrey asked whether Audrey had parted with Mr Farnon on good terms, saying, "One mustn't take Mr Farnon's tempermental fits to heart. He is a passionate devil, but his furies come from the best of intentions!"

Audrey could only nod. Too overwhelmed by the truth of it to reply.

Mrs Pumphrey heard the full story, having prompted Mrs Hall for more and more of the details, clearly hungry for conversation. After they'd spent a few hours lingering over first their meal, then sherry, sharing news and worries, she insisted that Audrey must sort through the various abandoned belongings in the servants' quarters for whatever Audrey might use by way of clothing or sundries.

Finally, after washing and drying the supper dishes and tidying the rooms they'd used (most of the Manor were closed off), Audrey retired to her spacious new room with a borrowed book. The room were bright and airy, the mattress a dream and the sheets of sumptuous Egyptian cotton. It were a significant step up from her modest digs at Skeldale House, but she were homesick and couldn't stop thinking about Mr Farnon. It were lambing season and it were war. That man would not let himself ignore a creature in need, wet weather, war or no war. So, she felt sure he had spent hours drenched in the cold spring rains, bringing new life into a stormy world. When he were done, she mused, had he'd crawled straight into his blankets? Were he safe, warm and asleep, wherever he lay down his dear head?

Audrey threw back her covers and knelt to pray for Mr Farnon, Edward, James, Helen, Tristan and Mrs Pumphrey. As she snuggled back under her heavy quilt, she promised herself that she would find Mr Farnon to make sure he were doing alright on his own.

Chapter Text

June 1938, somewhere east of London.

James Herriot slouched in the corner of the rattling rail car to rest against the walls. Tristan stood over him in the crowded box car to give James room. Since being forced into service as Waffen SS-Anwärter Englander, the official designation for British conscripts in training as assault troops and military occupation police, James and Tristan had grown closer than brothers.

Their first nightmarish days and nights as conscripts had brought cold showers by way of a fire hose in the frosty assembly yard, heads shaved and delousing. Clothing was issued. Beatings followed, as well as a barrage of constant shouting in language most couldn't comprehend and far worse for some of the men of Darrowby and the surrounding farms. Tom Chapman had been singled out immediately and Tom had simply disappeared. Dave Kitson hadn’t survived that first day. When the bloody Huns understood Kitson was permanently lame, the Unterleutnant had ordered him to run. As he obeyed, the brute shot him.

James had lost it when he saw the Unterleutnant take aim at Dave Kitson. Realizing the Unterleutnant was about to commit murder, James had thrown himself on the man, causing the first shot to go wild. No one stopped his second try.

James took a severe beating for his ill considered courage. When the guards finally tired of beating him, Tristan had claimed James and had taken it on himself to keep James going through the grueling three months of physical training and indoctrination. Men who dropped out didn't eat and soon wasted away.

Nights, Tris did what he could to help James. It wasn't much. He tended to his fevers and kept him quiet during bouts of delirium. Days were the worst. Tristan practically carried James through the mandatory hikes and covered for him during calisthenics, buying off the wrath of the Unterleutnant by groveling and offering to do menial labors, like cleaning his boots, scrubbing his clothes, shoveling out the latrines and anything else to win favor.

By the time they’d sworn the mandatory loyalty oath to Adolph Hitler, James knew where he was, but he still hurt. Cracked ribs, concussion and a broken elbow couldn't mend overnight and certainly not while doing days of endless calisthenics and forced marches, no matter how much Tristan helped.

After all that, finally being crowded into a cattle car was a welcome change, as long as a man didn't mind sleeping standing upright, squeezed from every side. James needed actual rest, however, so Tristan shielded him from the crush of other men’s bodies, letting James rest in a corner sitting between the walls, as the boxcar swayed and jolted, heading east past London and beyond, apparently destined for a ship to carry them across the channel to serve in Nazi occupied Europe.

Tristan balanced against the shudder and sway of the boxcar as they clattered through the night, not knowing where they’d go and wondering, dreading what they’d have to do if they were to stay alive.

2 o'clock in the morning, September 15, 1938
Washington DC.

Richard Carmody walked down Pennsylvania Avenue to his hotel. It was late. It was actually already tomorrow and he was physically and mentally tired. Yesterday had been the most exhausting and stressful day of his life. Mr Churchill was very pleased with him, however, and had been characteristically effusive in congratulating his performance in the Oval Office. That great man had even generously included Richard in a raucus after dinner party with drinks and swirling conversation about the plight of democracy and the importance of defending Great Britain, regardless of King Edward's previous friendship with Herr Hitler, 'that Narzi Bastard!'

While her husband held court, Mrs Churchill had kindly introduced Richard to several American friends of her own, describing Richard as a brilliant young strategic thinker. He, of course, had disproved his brilliance almost immediately, tongue-tied and stumbling over his words, while blushing at the unaccustomed attention of a bevy of tittering young ladies. He soon slunk off to peruse a stack of books and reports. This festive version of hell had all taken place within sight of the Whitehouse, in a far more luxurious hotel suit than his own shabby single room with shared toilet facilities down a dim and musty smelling corridor.

Still, Mrs Churchill’s staff had quartered Richard on Constitution Avenue in a nondescript hotel conveniently near the Washington zoo. Challenge calls of cheetahs and baboons had lulled him to sleep each night to dream of a different life.

The alcohol had gone straight to Richard’s head. He didn't enjoy the evening among still more strangers, nor did he like the sensation of inebriation. Furthermore, his entire paltry wardrobe of corduroy and wool was entirely unsuitable, both in fashion and density to the swamp-like conditions in which he found himself mired, both physically and metaphorically.

September 1938 in Washington DC was steamy, hot and unbearably humid even late at night. As a lad reared entirely in boarding schools set in remote, climactically harsh locations where land and staff were cheap, such as the northern reaches of coastal Wales and mountainous Scotland, Richard gasped in the sultry night air, too heavy to provide adequate oxygen. Still, exercise felt better without a ship's deck rising and falling, rolling side to side, to and frow, to and frow, under his uncertain steps and he hoped to clear his head. He might even take a turn through the zoo, if the night watchman was inattentive.

In an ideal world, Richard would never have visited America. He wasn't meant to hob nob with powerful strangers. He'd never hoped for this future of intrigue and politics among those exalted creatures who decided the fate of nations. People were an uncomfortable mystery to him, powerful people even more so. His humble dream had been to spend his life among animals, horses in particular, as a veterinarian. Sadly, it was not to be.

Someone of his intelligence, his mother had insisted, should not waste his talents, or his father’s money, learning to spay dogs and cats or birth farm animals. He should do so much more for the world.

Richard suspected it was family prestige that his career choice was meant to aid, rather than the world at large, but he craved their love. So, he’d studied logic and theology at Cambridge with an eye toward joining the Foreign Service as an intelligence officer.

Having bowed to his biological parents' pressures, Richard abandoned his plans of becoming a veterinarian.

For a while he won his parents' attention and approval. They’d seemed mildly pleased when he landed a job in London in the Foreign Service. They had talked about him to friends and relatives in positive terms. It had made his sacrifice almost seem worthwhile. As a newly employed member of the Foreign Service, his First in Theology had earned him his choice of placement. He’d chosen a posting on the staff of MP Winston Churchill. He approved of Churchill’s political stance of economic liberalism and was intrigued by Churchill’s belief in imperial expansion. To Richard that smacked of opportunities for exotic travel.

After their first meeting, he found it personally gratifying to serve another eccentric and a man who accepted him for his abilities and seemed content to overlook his oddities. Mrs Clementine Churchill was a kind lady who clearly doted on her husband, and who treated Richard and the rest of her husband’s staff with consideration.

Richard had been swept along in the Churchills' wake, like a leaf caught by a big wind. The Churchills divided their time between London and,Chartwell, a country house in Kent, with twenty acres of gardens a young man might wander in and fifty-seven wilder acres of estate land, ideal for birding when Mr Churchill didn't need him.

Hitching his future to a falling star, rather than a reliable up and coming Tory MP put an end to any regular contact from Richard’s family. His parents lost interest in him and continued their world travel, largely overlooking the fall of Europe and the plight of Great Britain and rather appreciating the fact that the trains ran on time and their travel documents allowed them to travel nonstop from Calais through to the middle east under the well ordered regime of Herr Hitler.

Richard didn’t mind their absence, not really. It had been always this way for him, from his first tearful departure for boarding school at age five. His tears had dried and he’d discovered the joy of learning. He directed his passion to the world of ideas and allowed himself the excitement of learning about the subjects denied him professionally.

What truly excited Richard about his assignment with MP Churchill was the chance to travel. Even while in London, just to please himself, as a pastime, Richard had continued to make an informal, focused study of the sciences, particularly natural history and chemistry. Travel in his free time took him to visit all the fascinating environs of Great Britain by way of it's well developed train system and shank's pony to seek out new birds and other creatures.

As a result, Richard had made the unexpected acquaintance of an actual veterinarian by the unforgettable name of Siegfried Farnon. They’d both been enjoying a spot of bird watching one brilliant Sunday afternoon in Yorkshire, where Mr Farnon had his practice. Mr Farnon had paused at a likely spot after delivering a breach foal in the high lonesome hills. Richard had made his escape on foot to this greener venue than even the London gardens.

A single Latin phrase, some passing joke about ‘chasing the wind’ as the stranger's hat had flown away to land at Richard’s feet, had cemented a solid friendship, a rarity for both men. Richard Carmody rarely hit it off immediately with anyone and Siegfried Farnon’s odds of running into another avid birdwatcher fluent in Latin, much less one able to manage a wry joke in that ancient tongue, were vanishingly small.

That had been a memorable day for many reasons. The two amateur birders had managed two first sightings on that eventful afternoon in the hills and marshes. Mr Farnon had insisted on driving Richard to other likely spots in the most breathtaking vehicle at speeds that filled him with a heady mixture of terror and awe. Before his new friend drove him to the train station in Brawton, they’d spent two hours discussing flight patterns and erratics overs a pleasant pub supper before parting.

Mr Farnon had waited on the platform, waving as the train pulled away. Not even Richard’s parents had ever waved him off. They ’d maintained a friendship by regular correspondence ever after, with Mr Farnon describing the cases he found unusual and Richard replying with questions and additional ideas, based on his extensive informal reading.

Then, one day, Herr Hitler broke the Munich Treaty and invaded England, Mr Farnon’s letters abruptly stopped.

Recalling Siegfried Farnon’s open and friendly nature and his shared fascination with the natural world, Richard fretted to read that Brawton, where they’d last been together, was being overrun, following a heroic battle at York. That battle was celebrated and deeply moving for vast numbers of far flung Britians living in their home country’s various colonies, or former colonies, as in the case of Richard Carmody, who resided in Washington DC, the capitol and seat of power of the United States of America.

The question, Richard asked himself, was what a self respecting Englishman could do about Hitler. He discussed the question with Mr Churchill, who thought he might have some ideas.

Richard Carmody had already been at sea last January, assigned as an analyst to Winston Churchill’s entourage. They'd set sail long before the Nazi invasion of England. Upon losing his bid to take the Prime Minister post from Chamberlain, Mr Churchill had wisely decided to go abroad while he could. Churchill foresaw a bleak future for his country under Chamberlain’s policies of appeasement. He decided to do his bit from the colonies, rather than die uselessly at his post.

Of course, Winston hadn’t traveled directly to meet with the American President. Instead, they traveled to New York City. On the evening after Chamberlain’s agreement to the Munich Treaty, he had broadcast his fears for the future of the free world directly to the American people. Meanwhile the wheels of politics, informal diplomacy and social or family connections paved the way for an invitation to dine at the Whitehouse from Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt.

The stirring New York broadcast had been only his first call to arms, an attempt to wake up the complacent American people to the shared threat of Nazi expansion across Europe and, potentially, the entire world.

Richard had been privileged to sit with the radio engineer and hear words he'd crafted delivered with passion and empathy by the greatest modern day orator.

'All the world wishes for peace and security. Have we gained it by the sacrifice of the Czechoslovak Republic? Here was the model democratic State of Central Europe, a country where minorities were treated better than anywhere else. It has been deserted, destroyed and devoured. It is now being digested. The question which is of interest to a lot of ordinary people, common people, is whether this destruction of the Czechoslovak Republic will bring upon the world a blessing or a curse. We must all hope it will bring a blessing; that after we have averted our gaze for a while from the process of subjugation and liquidation, everyone will breathe more freely; that a load will be taken off our chests; we shall be able to say to ourselves: "Well, that's out of the way, anyhow. Now let's get on with our regular daily life." But are these hopes well founded or are we merely making the best of what we had not the force and virtue to stop? That is the question that the English-speaking peoples in all their lands must ask themselves to-day. Is this the end, or is there more to come? There is another question which arises out of this. Can peace, goodwill, and confidence be built upon submission to wrong-doing backed by force? One may put this question in the largest form. Has any benefit or progress ever been achieved by the human race by submission to organized and calculated violence? As we look back over the long story of the nations we must see that, on the contrary, their glory has been founded upon the spirit of resistance to tyranny and injustice...'

Strolling through the deserted zoo on the repressive evening after Winston Churchill’s monumental first meeting with President Roosevelt, Richard remembered how proud he'd been at that broadcast months earlier, how the prescient words had made him thrill.

Now, he felt depressed and, frankly, hopeless. America had listened politely, while Germany conquered Poland, The Baltic countries, France, Belgium, the Low countries and then invaded his home.

He felt suddenly homesick and wondered if he could ever go home. He missed his cherished spot in the natural history stacks of London library and the heady scent of thousands books waiting to open his mind to new facts and fresh ideas. He missed the gardens he'd wandered, of the birds he'd sought out, tough year round natives, exotic seasonal visitors from Africa, the Arctic, China or the remote reaches of the Americas. He missed his friend, fellow birder Siegfried Farnon, whose frequent, fascinating correspondence had so abruptly stopped that tragic Spring of 1938 and Richard worried. Did Mr Farnon still wander those green, rolling hills helping the farmers and stealing away on a quiet afternoon to scan the trees and skies for feathered anomalies and well loved familiar friends? Richard hoped so, with all his heart he hoped so.

Chapter Text

October 1940
Heston Grange, Yorkshire.

Richard Alderson rubbed a weathered hand across his bristled jaw as he grumbled, “Heard nowt, Siegfried. Maggie keeps her ears peeled, Alice at the post and Janie at the telegraph office have nowt. If the bloody King of England had been captured or killed,” he hissed in a lower register, as if the walls might hear, “you’d think summat about it would leak out!”

Helen poured more tea for Siegfried and her father, then filled her own cup and sat to eat her breakfast. She smiled to see Siegfried devouring her cooking without complaint and she mused, 'How things have changed for the worse for you, poor sod!'.

Siegfried Farnon had been Lord of his domain. A bit of a dandy, though he'd argue that point, the gentleman veterinary were respected throughout the region, feared by some and pampered at home. Yes, Tristan had done his best to prick that inflated ego, but Tristan were gone.

So were James.

Helen blinked back tears and remembered how Aud had spoiled those three men. With her lovely meals, tidy house and brusque control of all things under Skeldale’s roof, including the daft beggar hunched over his breakfast plate, Siegfried hadn’t seemed to realize how truly spoilt he'd been in her care. With Aud off in Halifax, he were sure to know it, now. There were little doubt of that, as he inhaled her cooking at another man's breakfast table and needing a haircut, a wash and a trim.

A feeling of summat dark hung about him. He clearly missed Mrs Hall. So did Helen, knowing she'd been spoilt, too. It were almost like having her mum back, living in a house made home by the hard work and loving ways of a good woman. But, it were deeper than just missing her. Siegfried’s very nature had gone odd, like the light inside had gone out, a light that had once made that irascible devil charming and, in his best moments, great fun. Now he seemed like a mere shadow of himself, drawn in and somber, far too quiet.

"I'm glad you've got your rat," Helen stated. Two sets of puzzled eyes fixed her gaze, but she said nowt more. It weren’t her place.

Siegfried didn’t pause in eating to reply to either Alderson. He was intent on emptying his plate and getting on with his day. Helen’s cooking had not improved, but she was keeping him fed. He was always hungry and very grateful for her care. He had stopped in at Heston Grange at dawn, as usual, for his list of the day’s farm calls, to share the Aldersons' breakfast table and to check on any substantive rumors concerning the fate of King Edward.

As usual, Helen served him up a heaping plate of burnt toast, bacon both limp in the middle and blackened at the ends, and runny eggs, with endless cups of tea and unsweetened porridge to follow. It was far from Mrs Hall’s magnificent morning fare but, compared to heating canned food over a fire pit and eating alone in a shadowy mine fifty feet underground, being fed by Helen Herriot was a welcome gustatorial challenge, and an essential time-saver.

Frankly, Siegfried had not taken into account the time and effort required to look after himself. He simply couldn't manage it, not while doing his vital work. There were too many who needed him and not enough of him to go around these days. Mr Pandhi had gone, of course, and James and Tristan were God-only-knew where. The farmers who hadn't been conscripted were either too young, too old or too small (many farms now run by women and girls) to manhandled fractious beasts and everyone was desperately short handed. All in all, that meant Siegfried’s workdays were longer and harder to manage than ever.

He'd done it before, of course, working on his own as a young man just home from the war, but that was two decades past and every farmer had farmhands in those days. He wasn't twenty something anymore, or even thirty something. He was well into his forties and a work load that normally kept three professional veterinarians on the run (plus Tristan) was a killer to handle solo. So, having Helen feed him twice a day and slip a bite for lunch into his bag, to eat while he traveled between farms, was another essential kindness and a great help.

Jess bumped his leg as he ate and Siegfried rubbed the dog’s silky ruff with his left hand, while continuing to shovel in eggs with his right. He had hated to part with the loving companion at his knee. His nights could be desperately lonely. Jess had seen Siegfried through the worst nights of his marriage and what came after. She was attuned to his moods and always appeared when needed, but it was the responsible decision and in her best interest. If something happened to him, Jess would be alone in that secret bolt hole facing a slow death. So, Siegfried had asked the Aldersons to take Jess in, to young Jenny's squeals of delight.

Jess wasn’t the only Skeldale creature to relocate to Heston Grange. Vonolel now sulked in their barn through Siegfried’s busy workdays, only perking up when Siegfried stopped in to collect him for their evening together and leaving him in the Aldersons safe care after breakfast the next morning.

Vonolel was his sole companion nights in the bolt hole, a much-needed second rapidly beating heart snuggled against Siegfried’s chest. It tempted Siegfried to take his rat along on his daily rounds, but it wouldn't do. Farm dogs, barn cats and farm wives all posed a mortal danger to any rat. It would have to suffice to collect the little creature at the end of each workday to brighten his lonely nights with cuddles and conversation by the fire. They would turn in together and Siegfried would talk about his day, about his worries and how he wished Mrs Hall might still be in his life. Vonolel listened as he explored Siegfried’s nightshirt and burrowed through his bedding. He had to go into his cage, however, when it was time to sleep. There’d likely be other rats or even snakes living somewhere in the recesses of that abandoned mine and eager to gobble up a tame rat, innocent of wild ways.

In return for their generosity, the Aldersons received full use of the Vauxhall, free veterinary care for their animals, and all of Siegfried’s petrol coupons – the Constable winked at the requirement that individuals collect their precious coupons in person. All involved knew the Aldersons were doing Siegfried a huge favor that could never be truly compensated, but they all behaved as if it were simply business.

Helen brushed off Siegfried’s earnest thanks as being part of her duty to the Practice until James were back home. Helen, of course, was receiving half of every farthing Siegfried brought in, minus expenses, per Siegfried’s partnership agreement with James. The original agreement had provided a sixty-forty split, after expenses, in Siegfried’s favor as senior partner.

Siegfried had amended that split to fifty-fifty on the day Germany invaded Poland, with the expectation that war might take Helen's husband away, perhaps to never return. He had, after all, given his word to care for his junior partner’s wife. Though he never voiced the unlucky thought, he intended that promise to apply for the rest of his days, if the worst should happen. Neither man had conceived of what might actually happen, but with James a German conscript, Siegfried was as good as his word and well pleased to see Helen Herriot profit from his agreement with James and his own hard graft.

Besides Jess and Vonolel, a third beast was presently eating his daily ration of oats in the Alderson barn, while little Jenny fussed over him, currying his shiny coat and brushing his thick, coarse mane and tail to remove burrs and snarls. Each daybreak, while Siegfried wolfed eggs and bacon in the Alderson family kitchen, his horse, River, ate his ration of oats and his fill of alfalfa hay in the Alderson barn.

A horse had become a necessity to continuing Siegfried’s veterinary services, as German forces became omnipresent. Ever since Darrowby became a village on their supply route to the German fighting forces holding Edinburgh under siege and advancing through Scotland, the German presence had increase in Darrowby and the surrounding dales.

The military in Scotland had held back the invading German forces to a bloody month-long standstill, but eventually Edinburgh was engulfed and surrounded. Now, the city was under siege. Rumor was that the Scotsmen were using hit and run tactics, rather than head on fighting against the far more numerous Germans. Fighting was fierce, but sporadic along the logistics chain.

Locally, road blocks, identity paper inspections, curfews and other restrictions on civilian movements grew ever more intrusive in the dales. At first the restrictions were random and relatively unobtrusive. Over the weeks, however, more reserve troops, mostly old men and near children of the Hitler Youth, had arrived and been billetted in homes in Darrowby, Brawton, Wellslydale and elsewhere, assigned to clamp down any opposition in the logistically vital region. Now, the enemy check points were ubiquitous and firmly in place.

This heightened level of enemy scrutiny had forced Siegfried to alter his professional approach. Rather than rattling along in the Vauxhall, he’d reverted to how he’d practiced veterinary work for four difficult years in the Great War, astride a horse.

It had been Siegfried’s life-long, wholly impractical dream to actually own his own horse. He’d been reared with horses, of course, had learned to ride before he could tie his shoes. He’d had free use of his father’s mixed breed mare, Millie, through his early years. After veterinary college and certification, he’d joined the British Cavalry to expand his equine knowledge and experience. When war suddenly came, the veterinary services were consolidated and Siegfried found himself reassigned to the AVC. He had known and loved a dozen military mounts through his years in that horse-killing war. Those tragedies had left him ambivalent about freely giving his heart to another of those magnificent beasts. He loved horses, but couldn't get memories out of his guilty heart of those innocent, trusting, noble beasts that he'd seen killed or, God forgive him, had personally destroyed.

After having been in charge of the lives and fates of two hundred men and boys, as well as countless draft animals and officers’ mounts, Siegfried returned to peacetime England unable to imagine voluntarily seeking responsibility for any living thing, not ever again. Certainly not a horse. Not even a family. If he hadn’t married Evelyn before the war, he'd have remained a bachelor.

It had been a wonder and a testament to Evelyn’s strength and love for him that she hadn’t left Siegfried for a man emotionally capable of giving her the house full of children she deserved. Skeldale had been purchased pre-war with an eye toward filling its rooms with little Farnons. It was not to be. Siegfried returned from war a changed man.

This horse, however, had needed and captivated Siegfried from their first moments together. River, a smoky black racing stallion from Ireland, clearly was not of standard thoroughbred stock. He was too short and compact. Next to a lanky thoroughbred, River looked more pony than horse! The showy white feathers on his fetlocks told of a workhorse or two somewhere in his Irish lineage. His wide, intelligent eyes and short back indicated a solid dose of Arab blood, as well. Marvel that he was, River was swift as any Arabian and powerful as a draft horse. Under saddle, with a rider aboard that he trusted, River was fearless. A black Pegasus, he would easily clear any obstacle that Siegfried set him to, flying over stone walls, plank fences, wire or water obstacles as if he truly possessed wings.

His one flaw was that River was unridable, except by Siegfried Farnon.

Siegfried had met River on the morning of River’s last chance. Recently arrived over the water from Ireland, the horse had thrown or injured a handful of grooms. On their first meeting, he dumped Siegfried, as well.

Siegfried didn’t believe claims that the horse was vicious. No horse is inherently vicious, it comes from fear. As prey animals, a horse's instinct is to react to danger by fleeing. If cornered a horse might strike out. Siegfried calculated that some terror during the crossing had traumatized this exceptional animal. So, using every trick and skill he could muster, he gently reassured the horse that all was well and tried again to ride River, only to be thrown. He tried again, and again. And yet again, until Seabright-Sanders ordered Siegfried to stop before he was seriously injured or broke his fool neck.

The next morning, Siegfried returned, purportedly to put River down, but determined to hold Seabright-Sanders to account for his cruel, unnecessary decision to destroy a troubled potentially extraordinary horse. Confronted with Siegfried’s demand that he stay and witness River’s death, Seabright-Sanders backed down. He allowed Siegfried to continue to rehabilitate the horse, as long as he didn’t charge for his visits.

After many weeks of slowly building the shattered trust between River and a rider, Siegfried had enjoyed the ride of his life, a long, glorious gallop bareback across open hillsides, challenging the horse to carry him over stone walls, wooden fences and even a racing mountain stream, before reluctantly turning River for home, blowing hard and obviously having enjoyed their run.

Then, London fell before a sudden German invasion and their world changed.

River had continued to live, unridable but grudgingly cared for by an owner too intimidated by the local veterinary to do the economically advantageous thing. He’d tried repeatedly to sell River, but word had gotten round. No one wanted a horse that would not be ridden. When Germany invaded England, horse racing was suspended. Everyone had too much else to worry about to care about gambling and horse racing.

So, when the Germans got seriously inconvenient about local security, Siegfried offered Seabright-Sanders a quarter of what that man had paid for the horse, if River’s tack was tossed into the bargain as well. Glad to be shed of a useless horse, Seabright-Sanders agreed and Siegfried Farnon’s life improved immeasurably. Avoiding road blocks, he rode River through farm fields and woodlands, rarely even needing to cross a road. He carried his equipment and medications in a set of battered military saddlebags from his service days and found himself actually enjoying the simple process of doing his job again from the back of a horse.

Having cleaned his plate and drained his third cup of tea, Siegfried leaned back and said to the room, "Maybe I was wrong to think they'd eliminate Edward."

"Spilt milk," Helen scoffed.

"The question now," Richard rumbled, "is do we try to fight the buggers or keep laying low? Personally, I wouldn't mind blowing up a bridge or two just as a message to those arrogant pricks."

"And get innocent folk punished for it," Helen snapped.

"When we act, Richard," Siegfried stated carefully, "it has to make a real difference, a difference that surpasses the value of our neighbors' lives. So, we have to be patient. We listen for news of the King’s fate and we wait. When we know something worthwhile, we act."

"Who's to say when losing our own is worthwhile?" Helen asked.

Siegfried just shook his head and admitted, "I don't know, Helen, maybe when it replaces our fascist King Edward with a leader we can follow in good faith, a leader such as his brother, Bertie."

Siegfried scanned Helen’s pages of appointments as River walked along a deer trail leading through woods behind Heston Grange, snatching a bit of succulent as they ambled along. Today’s list included a visit to the nearby Hulton estate to float teeth on six of their young studs. Old McDowell the, stable master, wasn’t keen on wrestling stallions. So, although it was merely normal maintenance among horsemen, it was a well paying vet call. Then there were the Barker’s call to come treat a milk cow out at Grace Chapman’s place. That struck Siegfried as odd and he mused it over as he guided River toward the Hulton property. Afternoon calls were lighter, for once, and he thought he might ride out to a wooded waterhole for a bath. The hip bath proving a poor substitute for the Skeldale House tub and he was beginning to feel uncomfortably odoriferous.

He rubbed his beard. He needed a trim and his hair was curling down against his shirt collar.

"No doubt about it," he chatted to the horse, making the sensitive black ears twitch as his words, "without Mrs Hall to keep after me, River, I'm going rapidly to seed, but by now she's safe. So, if I'm a bit scruffy, so bloody what!"

River snorted and tossed his head, as if to agree, making Siegfried chuckled and urge him into an easy canter as the Hulton stables came into sight.

Chapter Text

River slowed from an easy canter to a dancing walk, snorting and tossing his head as Siegfried pulled up and dismounted. He looped River's reins over a convenient post and ran his hand along the horse's sweated neck, receiving a moist nuzzle of hot breath in his hair.

To Siegfried's mild surprise, Mr McDowell had illustrious company. Jock Daniels, Seabright-Sanders' stable master, and Mrs Pumphrey’s stable master, Ralph Johns, stood in an animated cluster deep in conversation. From their sour expressions and grumbled greeting as they turned at his arrival, the men were obviously upset.

The three were old friends and friendly competitors, so alike that they might have been brothers, except one was a Scotsman, one Irish and the other a Yorkshireman. Each sported a mop of white curls, white chin stubble and the same leather leggings that Siegfried favored. Unlike Siegfried, however, the three were each as bow legged as an English bulldog. The only difference among them was their height, accent and girth.

What's the problem, gentlemen?" Siegfried asked the trio.

"Gerry bastards are stealing horses! That's what!" Jock spat, his Irish up.

"Found em helping themselves to our herd early this morning. Heard a ruckus in the stables and found half our horses in the yard. Helping themselves they were, the bloody thieves, without a by-your-leave! No warning. No payment, but a slip of paper."

"Same," McDowell grumbled. "So, I've naught for you to do here, Mr Farnon. I'd have telephoned, but the Aldersons got no connection, do they!"

"Took brood mares, studs, yearlings, the lot," Mr Johns added. "Requisitioning, the young feller called it. Mrs Pumphrey tried to stop him, her ladyship and your friend, your Mrs Hall, but all those good ladies got for their protests were orders and pushed around. Shameful, weren’t it! A lad in short pants treating grown ladies that rough."

Siegfried heard the words. For a brief moment he wanted to laugh out loud. Mrs Hall wasn't at Pumphrey Manor. She'd gone to Canada. He'd paid her way to meet her son, Edward, the person who meant everything to her. But his sensation of giddy disbelief turned to icy fear and, almost as quickly, to a bone cold certainty that Audrey Hall had sent the Chapmans away in her stead. That was why the neighboring farmer was calling for the Chapman’s milk cow. The Chapmans had gone. Audrey had stayed!

Fear transformed to mindless rage. It boiled up and Siegfried saw bloody red.

"Excuse me," he rasped and bolted to collect River's reins, flung himself into the saddle and thundered off, leaving the old stable masters gazing after.

"That veterinary can ride," Mr McDowell stated, to which the others solemnly agreed.

"Aye."

Audrey hustled through her work. After their daybreak confrontation with a pack of Germans who'd come looking for horses, she were ready to try to relax and get through the rest of her day. An afternoon walk in October sunshine with Tricki-Woo seemed like a good way to banish the sight of Mrs Pumphrey being barked at by an pumped up little monster who couldn't have been more than fifteen, but was backed up by three grey haired armed soldaten, who at least seemed grossly uncomfortable in the situation.

She'd done her best to interpret the child's orders and to reason with him, but it had done nowt. Mrs Pumphrey's horses were gone, down to the last fat little dappled Shetland cart pony.

Afterward, Audrey had explained to furious Mrs Pumphrey that, sad as it was and wrong, it meant the Germans must be running low on equipment or petrol. Requisitioning civilian horses was actually a good sign. There must still be resistance in Scotland, western England and Wales. The Germans had sent mere boys and old men. That showed they were running short of fighting age males, as well.

That reasoning, and a large very early brandy, had reestablished her employer's usual poise and equilibrium, although that high handed youngster in his child-size Nazi uniform still rankled for both women.

Audrey walked Tricki-Woo every day. It did her good to get out of the mansion and spend time under the cold blue skies. With no need to pop out to the shoppes or to do her bit in the Women’s Institute and with the ever present threat of encountering Germans (They seemed to be lurking behind every bush), she didn't get out much, except to stroll the vast estate grounds.

As much as Audrey were glad for the work and enjoyed Mrs Pumphrey, she weren’t too keen on Pumphrey Manor. The subtle perfection of the grand mansion reminded her of past posh houses she’d worked in, ignored and underpaid, a fixture as invisible as the furniture, before disaster turned into a blessing and brought her to Skeldale House, to Siegfried Farnon’s door. There, she'd become summat more. She'd found herself a home and she'd been truly happy with the madcap owner.

Furthermore, naked figures of Greek men and scantily clad maidens were scattered about Pumphrey Mano in the most unexpected places. Bumping into naked male statues everywhere she turned dinnt help when Audrey were trying very hard not to think about Mr Farnon. The sight of a beautiful male body reminded how very much she missed Siegfried Farnon. His particular charms had always been firmly tucked away under layers of tweed and immaculate manners of a true gentleman, unless of course he were in a snit. Even when he handed her his trousers, there'd been a clear line of proprietry drawn. So she barely peeked and so she scolded herself for doing so when a night alone seemed to go on for weeks, just knowing he were so close, there in the bedroom next to hers.

He’d sent her away. Fired her! Yes, she knew it were his way of caring, trying to keep her safe by letting their life together crumble, but how she wished he still needed her. In her darker moments, she wondered if she weren’t like those half dozen of would-be assistants who hadn’t lasted a day under his withering scowl.

No it weren’t like that, Audrey scolded herself as she took up Tricki-Woo’s dog lead and gave a little whistle. His majesty came as a run, his nails clicking on the marble floor. It made Audrey smile. The little dog were, despite all this grandeur, just a dog. She loved him for his simple heart in the midst of too much … too much everything.

Mrs Pumphrey took a break each day after her midday meal, when the dishes were done and her employer were napping or reading a book, Audrey and the little dog at her side took a nice long stroll through the once perfectly manicured lawns and gardens. They weren’t so tidy now, of course. The grass were too high and the roses were overgrown, dried blooms clinging to the bramble whips as the autumn wind tossed them about.

It struck Audrey that the estate, in it’s shabby condition, were like her life. There had been the years of youth and hope, a lovely summer of joy and bounty, then the dying away of those treasured joys into wistful memories. The boys taken away, no word from Edward and then she had to leave Skeldale. Mr Farnon had sent her away! Fired by that mad, dear man who owned it, daft beggar. Now, only memories remained of a lovely bountiful summer long past, like the desiccated rose blooms rattling in the wind, she clung to them. It were all she had, just memories.

Audrey wiped a sudden tear, telling herself angrily that she wouldn’t cry today. Not today. It had been six months of tears and she had to stop wishing. Yes, she might send word she were here, but she dinnt want him to confront her, demand why she’d stayed, why she’d defied him and risked her life to keep house for another. She yearned to see him, but if she did, he’d demand answers she couldn’t give – that she needed to be close by, that she couldn’t put an ocean between them, that she would never leave him, not ever. Staying near were worth any cost, because he were her life.

Then, Tricki-Woo barked and Audrey saw him. A lone rider on the horizon, riding fast. Audrey’s heart began to gallop and she wanted to hide ... hide or fly to meet him. Her feet wouldn’t move.

It were Siegfried.

Siegfried pulled River up sharply and the horse reared. Audrey’s eyes widened and she took a step back, alarmed by the flashing hooves high overhead.

"What are you doing here!" he demanded, shouting from his agitated mount. "I told you to go!"

Audrey had seen Siegfried Farnon angry too many times to count, but never so fierce and not once directed at her. His face were deadly pale with hectic red spots of fury on his cheeks. His dark eyes burned like embers. Worse, he were haggard, thinner than she'd ever seen him and more unkempt. His matted hair tumbled down to tangle in his wild beard. He looked unhinged, dangerous, like the very devil on a frothing black horse come straight from hell.

Audrey began to tremble, but fought her fear and demanded, "Who are you to tell me where to go, Siegfried Farnon, or where to stay! You fired me. You sent me on me way. I am not your employee and I am not your blooming wife! So I'll fetch the lady who pays me wages, if Mrs Pumphrey is available to speak to you Mr Farnon! And I'll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head if we ever speak again!"

Then, feeling ill, her head reeling at the shock that they might never again speak or laugh and the idea that she could not secretly hope for owt more from him, Audrey fled.

Siegfried watched her go. Her shoulders back and spine ramrod stiff. Suddenly he realized he'd been unforgivably boorish. He had raged at Audrey. He had been so afraid of losing her that he'd shattered his cherished friendship with a woman who meant more than his own miserable life. His fury that her generosity had sacrificed her best chance at a far better, safe life had overspilled into rage at her. She'd done it to save others. He'd known, but knowing did nothing to calm his rage. It only made him need her more than ever, that courageous woman he could not live without. Crazed at the shocking news that Audrey Hall was still in occupied Yorkshire and that she'd actually argued with Germans, he had foolishly alienated the great love of his life, probably for keeps.

Mortified, Siegfried wheeled River and thundered off across the dying field of unharvested oats, while Audrey leaned beside yet another Greek statue, this one of half naked Pan, the grotesque Goat God of Wanton Lust, playing his twin flutes and prancing about on ridiculous cloven hooves. She dinnt look up, but she could feel the statue's stony smirk mocking her loveless fate.

Tristan wandered along the harbor, gazing across the Adriatic and wishing he were home. He'd had no letters, had sent none. It wasn'tallowed, orf course. He wondered constantly what was happening in Darrowby. He could easily imagine Siegfried losing his temper with the wrong German and being shot. The thought haunted him. He worried about Mrs Hall and Helen. Had Helen gone back to Heston Grange? He hoped so, but that would leave Mrs Hall alone with Siegfried, not easy to navigate. His brother was difficult at any time. In the midst of war, he'd be utterly impossible.

"Herr Unterleutnant," James had crossed the cobblestone square and he snapped a salute. "All is in order in the village," he reported.

"Stop that, Jim," Tris grumbled. "It's just us here, after all. The Gerries pulled out a week ago to focus on protecting the submarine base at Kotor. Word is there'sbeen sabotage." He grinned.

James relaxed, glanced around, and hissed, "They left informers. We'd be idiots not to keep to the rules."

Tristan nodded and said, "You're right, of course. It just makes my skin crawl when you do that, Pal. You know how I loath responsibility."

Tristan had used his purposefully manufactured friendship with their initial Unterleutnant, the murderous bastard who'd shot Mr Kitson in cold blood and had Jim beaten nearly to death. By cultivating influence with that vicious scum, Tris had managed to keep Jim alive through their first three months and with him when they were assigned to their foreign posts. After endless boxcar travel, they'd finally arrived a month ago and marched up the Adriatic coast, billetting in village houses under the hostile glare of the rightful inhabitants. Two weeks ago, they were sent up from Kotor to a village named Dobrota, an ancient fortified settlement on a picturesque Adriatic bay.

A couple of miles from Kotor and the Nazi unterseeboot base, Dobrota was relatively unimportant and eerily quiet. The Orthodox inhabitants had been terrified into submission by the Italian invasion. The Catholics of the village were currently in ascendancy, but hated the Germans as much as their Orthodox neighbors. Tensions traditionally ran high between the competing religions, but for the moment, they'd redirected their hatred toward the Nazis and their allies, the Italians, and the twelve miserable British conscripts patrolling the little hamlet under Tristan’s command.

Most of the resistance attacks took place in Kotor, aimed at the submarine facilities, but Tris was responsible for security in Dobrota. His commanding officer had made it clear. He was not to be bothered with inconvenient matters not day or night. He'd found a willing Italian woman and was thoroughly enjoying personally occupying that bit of Italy.

Siegfried rode hard for a couple of miles, but reason finally surfaced. River slowed to a shambling walk and stopped, dropping his shaggy head to graze. Siegfried dismounted. "I'm sorry," he rasped to the sweating horse. "I'm so sorry." He offered River a drink from his hat and then slumped on a rock and dropped his head in his hands, shaking all over from the momentous, irreconcilable gulf he'd blasted between himself and the woman he had secretly loved for years.

Part of his heart understood that she'd done right. By the time the German forces had entered Brawton, rumors warned that anyone not obviously Caucasian and of sound mind and body could immediately disappear. The Chapmans had already lost Tom. Knowing that family was in danger, Audrey had sacrificed her best chance to be with Edward in order to save their lives. Siegfried respected that, he truly did.

Another, selfish part of his heart raged at her for failing to comprehend how vital her life and safety were to him. As River snuffled his hair with his velvet muzzle, Siegfried stood and leaned against the solid shoulder, burying his face in River's rough mane. He stroked the horse, saying, "She couldn’t know, could she? I never told her, did I?"

Chapter Text

Richard Alderson glared across the table at Siegfried. It was late. They were drunk. Jenny and Helen had gone up to bed hours before. Jess lay with Jenny's new puppy, Scruff, in a basket by the stove. The two men had been sipping Richard’s sloe gin for far too long. Sipping and conspiring. It was a night to reconsider treason.

In the flickering candlelight, Richard Alderson looked fierce and Siegfried saw shades of Helen’s ferocity in his sharply angled face. “Now you want to blow it,” Richard snarled. “After we decided to let the bastards through to Scotland and they’re crawling all over us, billeted in peoples' homes. Now! This is why some folks think you're batshit crazy, Siegfried Farnon.”

Siegfried felt his own temper rise, but he was a guest and he needed Richard’s help. He sipped the gin and shook his head. “You don’t think I know, Richard? I know.“ He drained the glass and slammed his fist on the table, making the candle stick and his host jump.

“I had hoped the Nazis would drag King Edward out of Balmoral Castle," he spat, "down Edinburgh’s Royal Mile in chains and introduce him to The Maiden at Grassmarket! We have had no word that's happened, my friend. German troops talk freely in front of Maggie at The Drovers. She’s heard nothing about the King. Not ... a ... word."

"Bollocks! The Maiden hasn't parted heads from shoulders since 1716," Richard grumbled, "and Grassmarket hasn't seen a hanging for over a century. Apparently, Herr Hitler has weighed the value of our King’s friendship, or at least is tolerating him, until our whole damned island falls."

"A man may dream," Siegfried muttered sullenly, then added, "Listen! I heard today that they are requisitioning horses from the large stables. They are running low on petrol, Richard. Sending mere boys and grandfathers? They're running out of men! They’re over-extended. Now’s the time to cut off all resupplies. Now!"

Richard grimaced. “Won’t be easy with them everywhere. Even lads of thirteen have eyes ... and guns. I don’t relish shooting a lad who’s never even shaved.”

Siegfried shook his head. If he added anything more, Richard might see through his explanation for deciding to fight back. It was Audrey, of course. He could endure as long as he knew she was safe. Now, every bone and sinew stiffened with the mad urge to drive the Huns into the sea, cost to himself or anyone else be damned. Audrey Hall could not be on the same island with Nazis, lads, grandfathers or the bloody damned King himself. They had to be dealt with. He would deal with them or die trying.

Tonight.

Washington DC, Emergency Joint Session of Congress.
October 7, 1940.

Richard followed close on Mrs Churchill’s heels through the crowd of well dressed dignitaries. Only the cream of Washington were allowed to observe from the Visitors' gallery. The ladies glittered in a rainbow of satin and gems. The men shone soberly in brilliant white shirts and midnight black suits.

Richard noticed his own attire best reflected in that of the humble Press corps crouching along the walls far below. He wished he'd invested his meager wages in a decent suit, rather than splurging on another book on equine science. Still, it was a very good book with excellent plates.

A shudder of anticipation coursed through the crowd below and a hush fell over the entire chamber. It was time.

A man marched down the center aisle, declaring like a town crier, "MR SPEAKER! The President of the United States!"

Everyone rose as President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was wheeled into the chambers. He mounted the rostrum on the arm of a strong young Marine in magnificent formal dress uniform. The President stood tall, gripping the podium.

Everyone held their breath, waiting.

"Yesterday," he began firmly, "October 6th, 1940, a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.
The United States was at peace with that Nation and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in conversation with its Government and its Emperor looking toward the maintenance of peace in the Pacific. Indeed, one hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced bombing in the American Island of Oahu, the Japanese Ambassador to the United States and his colleague delivered to our Secretary of State a formal reply to a recent American message. And while this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hint of war or of armed attack.
It will be recorded that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was deliberately planned many days or even weeks ago. During the intervening time the Japanese Government has deliberately sought to deceive the United States by false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace.
The attack yesterday on the Hawaiian Islands has caused severe damage to American naval and military forces. I regret to tell you that very many American lives have been lost. In addition American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and Honolulu.
Yesterday the Japanese Government also launched an attack against Malaya.
Last night Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong.
Last night Japanese forces attacked Guam.
Last night Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands.
Last night the Japanese attacked Wake Island.
And this morning the Japanese attacked Midway Island.
Japan has, therefore, undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific area. The facts of yesterday and today speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our Nation.
As Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense.
But always will our whole Nation remember the character of the onslaught against us.
No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.
I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.
Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger.
With confidence in our armed forces with the unbounding determination of our people we will gain the inevitable triumph so help us God.
I ask that the Congress declare that, since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, October 6th, 1940, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."

Roosevelt set aside his notes and stood waiting through the silence.

Then, in a sudden roar of thunderous cheering, the assembly below erupted into applause. Men leapt to their feet, both sides of the assembly rose in a spontaneous ovation, the likes of which Richard had never seen.

Richard sat in the gallery of the House of Representatives and, while those around him cheered and stood, clapping wildly, an icy chill of fear ran down his spine. It was his idea, his words that had led the world to this moment. Japan had no choice but to lash out, denied of oil supplies she needed to pursue existing military campaigns in China and Russia. Her reaction was inevitable.

President Roosevelt knew it. Mr Churchill knew it, too. American soldiers and sailors had died horribly. Warships had sunk. Civilians had died, as well, when Japan swept across the Pacific Ocean in a sneak attack that those who'd orchestrated it knew was inevitable.

While Mr Churchill chortled and glowed contentedly, Richard thought he might be ill and pushed his way out through the cheering thong to stumble into the quiet, humid night wishing he'd defied his mother's ambitions and become a veterinarian, innocent of the heartless machinations of great leaders of great powers.

Then he threw up in the shrubbery and staggered across the city to lay sleepless, listening to the screams of the cheetah and the answering roar of the baboons.

Siegfried said his goodnight to Richard and made his unsteady way to the Alderson barn. River nickered, waking the barn cat, who rubbed against Siegfried’s ankles. "We have a job of work tonight, old son," he slurred to the horse.

If those horses from Hulton's, Seabright-Sanders' and Mrs Pumphrey’s stables were going up to the front in Scotland, it wouldn't be before morning. Siegfried had to blow the train tracks before dawn, before the regular night train carrying reinforcements from the west passed through. Otherwise, the best horseflesh in Britain would be reduced to carnage.

Siegfried saddled River in the dark, led him into the night and when they were well away from the house, mounted and urged the horse into a swift canter, heading across the October fields for the abandoned textile mill where they'd stashed supplies of explosives.

The original plan had been to destroy the Darrowby railroad bridge as well as tracks on a tight curve far north of town. It wasn’t possible to set explosive charges on the bridge. Darrowby was too well guarded. That blind curve to the north, however, was just another length of rail.

Siegfried would set the charges there, set the improvised timer to ten minutes and ride like hell to be clear before time ran out.

No one would be punished for sabotage on a length of rail line ten miles from any village or town.

That was Siegfried Farnon’s plan. He felt absolutely certain he could pull it off flawlessly and save those horses, denying the Nazis fighting in Scotland reinforcements, as well. Then again, Siegfried had been drinking quite a lot of Richard Alderson's notorious sloe gin.

Chapter Text

Siegfried heaved the heavy saddlebags over his shoulders and scrambled down a steep wooded slope above the train tracks ten or twelve miles north of Darrowby. The weight on his shoulder and the effects of Richard’s sloe gin had him off balance. The darkness was complete. It was long past moonset. Every step he risked breaking his fool neck.

Siegfried had sobered enough to understand this was crazy. He'd planned to recruit Richard to help, but the sloe gin that had liberated Siegfried from all rational fears had put Richard Alderson peacefully to sleep. So, he’d snuffed the candle stub and left Alderson snoring with his head cradled in his arms at the kitchen table, and he’d gone about his sabotage alone.

York had put paid to trains from the south, but the western lines still ran, passing through Darrowby, over the Darrowby River rail bridge and then, thirty minutes later, rounding this sharp curve. Trains built up speed through this section, having achieved the crest over the narrow Darrowby Valley. The group had studied the routine of their unwelcome guests. If the Gerries had one weakness, it was obsessive punctuality. Their trains were as predictable as sunrise, which Siegfried guessed was due in about two hours.

The contraption Siegfried carried was heavy, but simple enough – a timer rigged from a reliable bedroom clock controlled it. The clock hands were firmly attached by wires to a battery. The wires would touch and complete a circuit when the minute hand met the hour hand. That circuit would generate heat in a bare section of the wire via resistance. The bare section of wire was embedded in a thin wax layer that separated two highly reactive chemicals. When resistance heated the wire, the wax melted and those chemicals mixed in a strongly exothermic reaction causing a small primary explosion violent enough to detonate forty pounds of an otherwise unreactive mixture of materials so common around the region as to be untraceable. The resulting secondary explosion would blow apart the rails, theoretically ... if all went as planned.

The problem at this point wasn’t electrical or even chemical. It was energy and time. The problem was how to single handedly get everything prepared and the device in place before the next troop train from the west passed through Darrowby at 4 o’clock in the morning, due to reach the blind curve at 4:45 on the dot. If Siegfried missed wrecking that train, it would be too late to reverse the damage. The next train would carry hundreds of horses and that slaughter would be horrific, soul-killing to a man who’d been responsible once before for inexcusable violence to trusting innocents.

Before 4:30, Siegfried had to remove rail spikes and position the explosive, set the timer and escape. Rail ties are held firmly in place by four long spikes hammered into each rail collar, sixteen spikes to each section of parallel rails. Sixteen spikes had to be removed, thirty-two would be far better. Then, when the train wheel hit the loose rails, already misaligned by the homemade explosive, the much greater force of the moving train would vastly increase destruction. The locomotive would tip into the stream fifteen or twenty yards below, dragging cars full of fresh German troops and war materiel behind it. With luck, ammunition and fuel would be among the materiel. It would explode, completing the job with conflagration.

All this must be accomplished alone in the dark, however, and time was short. He regretted the hours he had wasted drinking himself stupid over his behavior to Audrey. He must put her out of his mind for the next little while. If he survived tonight, tomorrow he could worry over how to make amends.

While Siegfried sweated and cursed stubborn iron spikes driven deep into the rail bed, Audrey Hall lay awake between crisp sheets thinking about the wild man who’d been unpardonably vile that afternoon. At the time, she’d been afraid, actually afraid of him. It weren’t how she’d ever before felt around that man. He had always been respectful and usually very gentle with her. Today’s fury had showed summat she’d never thought possible.

Raw passion.

As Audrey lay awake, thinking, it occurred to her that Siegfried Farnon had also been afraid. He’d been coldly furious, true, and he’d directed his fury at her, but behind his fury were fear for her. It weren’t that she’d disobeyed his order to go to Canada. It went so much deeper that that. He'd been furious that she had put herself in danger when he’d thought he’d got her safely away and believed she were far off across an ocean with her son, happy and safe. Instead she’d stayed where there were Germans everywhere.

Understanding that Siegfried had raged at her because he were afraid for her safety hit Audrey with a sudden insight that she’d never dared face head on. Siegfried Farnon dinnt just care about her. He weren’t only her best friend and protector. He loved her, truly loved her as a man loves a woman, with a love so deep and pure that he had tried to send her away, rather than have her near, sharing his danger.

The very idea of Siegfried Farnon feeling that way drove all hope of sleep away. Audrey got out of her bed. Pulled on a borrowed robe and slippers. She couldn’t possibly sleep, not now. Visions of Siegfried, unkempt, far too thin and wild eyed on his frantic horse suddenly tore at her heart. No one was looking after him. He were alone, doing God only knew what. She had no doubt it were dangerous. That were why Skeldale were shuttered and his practice closed.

Siegfried were fighting back and he had cut all ties between them simply to protect her.

Audrey held back her tears. She had cried herself out. Now, she needed to think what she might do, how to find him, how to help him or stop him from getting himself killed. She needed a cuppa and a clear head.

Siegfried had barely finished removing the spikes when he heard a train whistle. It was too close! Apparently the bloody Gerries were early for once.

Siegfried hurriedly jammed the explosive device under the rails and set the clock for one minute. It wouldn’t be enough time to get clear, but it had to go off before the train passed. He sprinted up the mountainside, dragging himself up the steep slope by grabbing at brush and boulders as he scrambled away while the seconds ticked by.

Instinct warned him time was up and, just as he realized it was a train from the north, the wrong direction, the device activated, blowing the rail bed in all directions. The second, far larger explosion knocked him flat. A flying rail collar grazed his shoulder as Siegfried landed beside an outcrop.

Siegfried hugged the outcropping and watched the locomotive enter the curve. For a sickening moment, the train carried on, as if it might pass unscathed. Then, in a slowly agonizing death, the steam engine shuddered and it began to tip. Steam burst in a cloud and men jumped from the engine as metal screamed under tremendous pressure of a two hundred and fifty tonne locomotive tilting, dragging a series of rail cars off the twisted rails.

It couldn't have been more than five seconds, but it seemed endless as the engine leapt off the tracks, disappeared into the gully and crashed, spewing roiling steam and flinging embers into the brushy forest. Fire was suddenly racing up the mountainside below in hungry flames. Cars followed more swiftly, crashing and splintering, catching fire or suddenly exploding in a plume of oily flame and thick black smoke as fuel cannisters burst and exploded.

In the firelight, a single man staggered through the smoke and steam.

"Hello there!" he called out in English. "I am here! If you've come to free me, I am down here! I say! Is anyone there? I am Edward, Duke of Windsor. Please show yourselves. Please do hurry! I am not entirely certain that those German chappies are all dead!"

"Up here!" Siegfried shouted. "You'll have to climb, Your Royal Highness. Unfortunately, I think my shoulder is broken!"

Chapter Text

“Mrs Hall?”

Audrey startled at Mrs Pumphrey’s unexpected voice from the darkness. “Oh!” she exclaimed, jumping up. “Oh! Mrs Pumphrey! I couldn’t sleep, ma’am. Fancy a cuppa?”

Mrs Pumphrey entered the vast, shadowy kitchen, barely lit by a candle stub. She replied with a tentative smile, “Doesn’t such formality strike you as a touch out of place, Mrs Hall? There are just the two of us here, after all. You and me," she sighed, "single women together, standing our ground against the forces of Herr Hitler's Nazi Regime. I suggest we might be forgiven if we let outdated social conventions slip and admit we are friends. If you agree, I hope you will feel free to call me Marjorie. Please.”

Audrey blushed, but smiled back, offered her hand and said, “It’s Audrey then.”

The two shook hands. It was a touch foolish, being so formal, while both were in nightclothes and hairnets, but it was also meaningful. They had sealed a partnership as friends, if not precisely equals.

Without asking 'Marjorie's' permission, Audrey put the kettle on and poured a second cup from the teapot. They sat together, sipping in contemplative silence for a long moment after an eventful day, before Marjorie spoke.

“I saw you and Tricki-Woo walking out again this afternoon," she said. "Tricki does so enjoy his walks with you. I appreciate your giving him a bit of fresh air and freedom." She paused and contemplated her teacup rather than plunge directly into the next delicate subject. “... And I saw your walk interrupted by a rather surprising visitor," she ventured. "If you don’t mind my asking, was that gentleman on the dark horse who I think it was, Audrey?”

“It were Siegfried Farnon,” Audrey confirmed looking deep into her empty cup. “Mr Farnon. He must 'ave caught wind I were here. It came as a shock, I s'pose. Poor man thought he’d shipped me off to safety in Halifax, Canada. He gave me a one-way ticket, first-class! Then, in the next breath, fired me. He presented me the keys to his beloved Rover, daft beggar. Told me to abandon it in Scotland. Wanted me to go to me Edward, who serves on The Repulse, out of Halifax. It were so kind, Marjorie, and Mr Farnon weren’t pleased with me for staying … not pleased at all. Frankly, he were furious to learn I dinnt go. It bothers me, after he'd been so generous. Thinking of him so upset. Well, thinking of him made sleep impossible.”

“Ah,” the older lady admitted, noticing a wistfulness in Audrey that went far beyond friendship. “I feared as much. To be honest, it has cost me sleep, as well. I did recognize Uncle Farnon’s bellows and it occurred to me that his situation must be very difficult, all on his own. Listen, Audrey, he depends on you. If he needs your services, you must go. Skeldale House is your true home and that man really did not seem himself. He needs you, I think, far more than I do.”

Audrey shook her head. Before she could object, however, Tricki-Woo growled and barked as the doorbell rang.

“It’s not even dawn,” Marjorie murmured. “That must be Mr Johns. If those soldiers are back, they had better be returning my horses, not coming for the swine or the sheep, as well!”

Before either woman could move to answer the doorbell, however, a stranger's voice echoed from the front hallway. “I do beg your pardon! My companion is in need of assistance and I am quite useless! Is anyone here ? We need help! We need a doctor!”

Audrey ran to help as the stranger half dragged Siegfried through the front hallway. He were bleeding and rambling on about saving the horses. His long curls were matted across his eyes. His shirt and coat were blood soaked. If not for her experience in the Great War, Audrey might have panicked at the sight, but her training held.

"We need to lie him flat so I can see what all's wrong," she stated. "Do you know what happened?"

The slight strawberry blond stranger replied, "I found him like this. There was a train wreck. I was spared. Perhaps he was aboard, as well ... or might he have caused it?"

Neither woman replied, but the idea sent a shock of understanding through Audrey’s heart. She began to tremble at the audacity of Siegfried taking on the Germans who now ruled almost every bit of their daily lives. That was why he had tried to send her off, why he dinnt need the Rover, why he let the Practice go, why he'd been in a rage to find her still in Yorkshire. Siegfried dinnt expect to survive. He had been saying his goodbye to her, doing all he could to ensure her future happiness and her safety, without admitting his foolhardy plan.

Marjorie saw Audrey go very pale and she took charge. She led the way and together the three of them got Siegfried upstairs and onto a bed.

Marjorie had immediately recognized the stranger. She had attended the Silver Jubilee of George V in May 1935 and knew this unexpected gentleman to be the eldest son of George V, King Edward VIII. Discretely, after they'd settled Uncle Farnon on the bed, she escorted the King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India back downstairs to her kitchen, leaving Audrey to care for Uncle Farnon, something Marjorie imagined that good woman had dealt with a great many times over their years together at Skeldale House.

When they were alone, Marjorie said, "Your Royal Majesty, I am Mrs Marjorie Pumphrey. I have no doubt the Germans are looking for you even now. You are safe here. Mrs Hall and I are discrete and we are alone, except for my stable master. Mr Johns lives over the stables and he need not know of your presence. I promise to do all in my power to keep you safe and offer any assistance you require. May I offer you a cup of tea, something to eat? Or would you prefer to bathe and rest?

So, you know me," Edward sighed. "Do you also know that I abdicated my throne on the day Herr Hitler betrayed our friendship and violated the Munich Treaty, Mrs Pumphrey?"

"No," she sighed. "I did not know, your Royal Highness. Information has been held back from us, along with any news of the war. I doubt any of your subjects know about your decision."

"I thought as much, but it makes no difference. I am, in fact, no longer your King. My brother and heir to the title must be informed. I must get word to him. All else is of very little importance. If Bertie dies at sea, fighting the Germans, the state of the United Kingdom's monarchy becomes clouded. Does the Crown pass to Bertie’s ten year old daughter, Elizabeth, if her Father was never actually crowned? Or does it fall on our sister, Mary, to lead, a woman who has never produced offsping to carry on the line after her death?"

Marjorie nodded and suggested, "Deep questions. They may never arise. We need to contact your brother. In the meantime, a cup of tea can't hurt, Your Majesty, and we need to think very carefully about our next moves to achieve that vital goal of ensuring prompt and proper succession."

After a moment, Marjorie asked, "If this is impertinent, forgive me. Was your wife also on that train. Should we try to locate her?"

"Mrs Pumphrey, I prefer not to discuss my marriage. It too is ended. She was not on the train. The last I had word, she returned to New York City.

"I see," Marjorie breathed. "I am sorry."

While Mrs Pumphrey took charge of the Duke of Windsor down in the kitchen, Audrey dealt with Siegfried’s injuries. It broke her heart to see how he'd reverted to the man she'd first encountered years before, and worse. His beard were overgrown and shaggy and his hair far too long. Buttons were missing from his torn shirt cuff. Fraying told her it had been torn for some time without mending. He'd lost three stone at least.

Doing her best to preserve his dignity, Audrey set about cleaning him up. She cut away the rest of his wrecked shirt and ragged winter coat saw immediately that summat had dislocated his right shoulder. She braced her foot against the bed and her knee against his ribs, gripped his elbow and, with a sharp, straight jerk, reset the joint. Then she cleaned and stitched his wounds. Luckily, Siegfried’s shoulder were only dislocated. It were bruised, swollen and a deep slice ran from his armpit to the shoulder cap, but at least nowt were broken. She'd treated his wound with a dusting of sulfa powder from his saddlebags and a series of neat catgut stitches, then she cleaned the rest of him up as best she could and bound his head, shoulder and upper arm in strips of heavy cotton torn from a set of pristine pillowcases that were worth more than she cared to imagine.

As Audrey tended to Siegfried, he seemed only vaguely aware of what was happening and kept chuddering on about horses. That single thought were foremost in his addled mind as he groaned and sweated under her determined care. He mumbled over and over, "Stop the horses from going north. The tracks are out. Stop the horses from going to Scotland!"

Audrey sat for a few minutes, watching over Siegfried. He were still yammering on about ‘saving our horses’, but otherwise seemed still enough to leave for a bit. So she slipped away to change her nightclothes for summat decent.

After Audrey changed, she joined Marjorie and the disheveled stranger in the kitchen. The man were filthy, but his clothing were top drawer, obviously bespoke. He were pale and exhausted, his reddish blond hair marked with soot and streaks of grey. It were wild. Faint stubble shone on his sooty cheeks. As she entered, she introduced herself by stating firmly, "I am Audrey Hall."

The stranger stood and took her hand, bowing slightly and saying, "Edward, Duke of Windsor, Mrs Hall. Pleased to make your acquaintance."

Audrey shared a disbelieving glance with Marjorie, who nodded, causing Audrey to curtsy and stammer, "I beg pardon your Royal Majesty if I seemed forward or disrespectful just now!"

"Not at all, Mrs Hall," the Duke replied lifting her trembling hand as a signal to rise.

Marjorie interrupted, "The Duke has kindly asked that we dispense with formalities. In fact, he has relinquished the Crown and is eager to inform his heir to the title, his younger brother, Prince Albert. The Duke and I both feel it might help to keep him safe from our German occupiers if no one else learns his true identity, Audrey. Apparently, Mr Farnon rescued our guest. Herr Hitler had intended to use him to force surrender of Scotland and Wales. So, he must know, but no one else. Now, please join us for some tea and conspiracy. We need to fortify ourselves if we are to hatch a successful plan for getting word to our future king, who even now is serving beside your son in Halifax."

Audrey gathered her wits enough to mention, "Mr Farnon is most worried about our horses being shipped to Scotland on this morning’s train," she stated.

At that, Marjorie excused herself and telephoned the stables to instruct Mr Johns to immediately telephone the Constable 'anonymously' to stop that train. It seemed certain, however, that the troop train that punctually passed the curve at 4:45 each morning had already met it's fiery fate, since the sun was already rising, spilling bloody red rays over the dales, a sure sign of a coming storm.

As they sipped and talked, it became clear that Edward Windsor was not entirely convinced that he had, in fact, been intentionally rescued. "It seemed very strange that my only assistance was a lone man whom I eventually found collapsed in dark woods!" he stated. "My savior needed saving himself!"

He continued, "I helped your friend, Mr Farnon, up an impossibly steep slope to find only a single horse. If it had been an actual rescue, it was very poorly planned. Where was the second horse? I am a skilled equestrian. I attempted to mount that horse, planning to pull Mr Farnon up behind. The horse, however, refused to be mounted. It danced away and even threatened me with teeth and hooves."

"That was when your friend seemed to rally. He said, and I quote, 'You may be King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, a kingdom upon which the sun never sets, but your royal arse will never set upon that horse. River only allows me to ride, Your Royal Majesty.'"

The Duke barked out a harsh laugh of disbelief and added, "Well! He alone could ride the beast? It seemed nonsensical, like something magical, something out of a fairytale not a rescue! It proved true, however, leaving my royal arse acting as groom and leading the insolent horse, now perfectly meek, through the night with an equally insolent commoner astride!"

"Eventually," Edward ended his tale, "I caught sight of a dim light and followed it to this fine estate to find two charming ladies in nightclothes staring at me across a dim hallway!”

October 1940,
Bombay. India.

George Pandhi sipped his mint julep and perused The Hindustan Times. It was fascinating to read Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi's latest letter to Adolph Hitler. One had to admire the courage of the Mahātmā, the great soul who stood for peace, naked except for his humble dhoti (a loincloth) and shawl, both of khadi, homespun cloth. George leaned forward to set aside his drink and focus much more closely on the letter. Mr Gandhi was stating his case much more boldly than his earlier supplications to Herr Hitler, a Colossus bestriding the whole of Europe and gnawing away at Great Britain.

Since the March 23, 1940 Lahore Resolution, the Mahātmā had greatly increased the tempo of his ‘Quit India’ movement as a counter force to the Muslim demands for a separate state. Such a state would undermine Indian cohesion and potentially further undermine India’s assistance to Great Britain in her darkest hour.

“Astonishing!” George muttered, his eyes racing down the column of script. “Joyce! Florence!” he called, “Come, come at once and hear this!”

The ladies trotted onto the terrace overlooking a flower garden overflowing with roses and the sweet fragrance of Rajnigandha and Kalapani. They were worried, concerned by the urgency of his tone. None of the Pandhi ladies felt truly at home in George’s exotic homeland.

“I shall translate the best bits of Mahātmā Gandhi’s latest letter to Hitler!” George said. “Come! Sit! It is quite marvelous!” He shook the newspaper as his wife and daughter sat, waiting.

“Here!” George exclaimed. “He still greets Hitler as a friend, but he writes it out clearly at last! I will translate his words.”

‘I hope you will have the time and desire to know how a good portion of humanity who have been living under the influence of that doctrine of universal friendship view your action. We have no doubt about your bravery or devotion to your fatherland, nor do we believe that you are the monster described by your opponents. But your own writings and pronouncements and those of your friends and admirers leave no room for doubt that many of your acts are monstrous and unbecoming of human dignity, especially in the estimation of men like me who believe in universal friendliness. Such are your humiliation of Czechoslovakia, the rape of Poland and the swallowing of Denmark, France, and much of England.
I am aware that your view of life regards such spoliations as virtuous acts. But we have been taught from childhood to regard them as acts degrading humanity. Hence we cannot possibly wish success to your arms.
But ours is a unique position. We resist British Imperialism no less than Nazism. If there is a difference, it is in degree. One-fifth of the human race has been brought under the British heel by means that will not bear scrutiny. Our resistance to it does not mean harm to the British people. We seek to convert them, not to defeat them on the battle-field. Ours is an unarmed revolt against the British rule. But whether we convert them or not, we are determined to make their rule impossible by non-violent non-co-operation.
It is a method in its nature indefensible. It is based on the knowledge that no spoliator can compass his end without a certain degree of co-operation, willing or compulsory, of the victim. Our rulers may have our land and bodies but not our souls. They can have the former only by complete destruction of every Indian-man, woman and child.

"He makes a particularly fine point here, I believe!" George crowed.

That all may not rise to that degree of heroism and that a fair amount of frightfulness can bend the back of revolt is true but the argument would be beside the point. For, if a fair number of men and women be found in India who would be prepared without any ill will against the spoliators to lay down their lives rather than bend the knee to them, they would have shown the way to freedom from the tyranny of violence.
I ask you to believe me when I say that you will find an unexpected number of such men and women in India. They have been having that training for the past 20 years. We have been trying for the past half a century to throw off the British rule. The movement of independence has been never so strong as now. The most powerful political organization, I mean the Indian National Congress, is trying to achieve this end. We have attained a very fair measure of success through nonviolent effort. We were groping for the right means to combat the most organized violence in the world which the British power represents.

"George," Joyce interrupted, "we are British." But, George was too caught up in pride and fervor to stop.

You have challenged it. It remains to be seen which is the better organized, the German or the British. We know what the British heel means for us and the non-European races of the world. But we would never wish to end the British rule with German aid.
We have found in non-violence a force which, if organized, can without doubt match itself against a combination of all the most violent forces in the world. In nonviolent technique, as I have said, there is no such thing as defeat. It is all ‘do or die’ without killing or hurting. It can be used practically without money and obviously without the aid of science of destruction which you have brought to such perfection.
It is a marvel to me that you do not see that it is nobody’s monopoly. If not the British, some other power will certainly improve upon your method and beat you with your own weapon. You are leaving no legacy to your people of which they would feel proud. They cannot take pride in a recital of cruel deed, however skillfully planned. I, therefore, appeal to you in the name of humanity to stop the war…’

George beamed triumphantly from one face to the other. Both his ladies seemed upset, rather than joining in his elation at the stirring words of the venerable leader of India's nonviolent resistance.

“What?” George demanded. “Don’t you see? We shall not join with German hegemony.”

Joyce shook her head and sighed, “George, dear,” she stated, “our King Edward already has joined with Germany. England is lost. We are saved by the grace of God, but we can never go home.”

Audrey sat beside Siegfried’s bed. He were still mumbling orders about horses. His fever had spiked. She wrung out a cloth and wiped his face, thinking his mop of curls should go, if only to reduce his discomfort. There might have been a time when she would have done it. Before, when they were friends and maybe summat more than friends. Now, she could only sit and watch over him and wonder what might be between them when he finally came to his senses.

Chapter Text

The doorbell chimed. It was very early, but Marjorie Pumphrey was awake, arranging breakfast for her household. She suspected Audrey had stayed at Uncle Farnon’s bedside all night and was loath to depend on her friend for preparing the tea, eggs and toast.

Marjorie went quickly to the door, hoping there’d be no repeated ringing to wake the whole house. “Yes?” she asked coldly of the tall grey haired Feldwebel who stood, cap in hand at her door.

The soldier clicked his boot heels sharply and bowed. Then, to her shock, he spoke in accented English. “I have brought back your horses, Frau Pumphrey. Please accept my personal apologies for what occurred yesterday. I am unable to interfere with orders, but … aber … aber ich.” The man blinked impatiently at his lapse into German.

Marjorie smiled a bit and said, “I understand.” She paused, but the man’s expression of shame and hope made her do something she’d never believed possible. She asked his name.

“Feldwebel,” she asked more softly. “What is your name?”

“Johann Alten,” he replied, looking very surprised and pleased. “I meant to add that you are a fine lady and we should never have treated you with such disrespect.” It spilled out in a rush, surprising them both.

The man fumbled with his cap and Marjorie found herself saying, “Would you care to come in for a cup of tea, Herr Alten? I appreciate your bringing back the horses and your kind apology.”

As they sat sipping tea, Marjorie’s curiosity grew. This man had excellent manners, spoke English very well and seemed quite a decent sort. “What did you do before, in civilian life, Herr Alten,” she asked.

He smiled and stated, “I taught English literature and history at the University of Baden-Baden, Frau Pumphrey. I was conscripted into the Volkssturm last year. It was compulsory service. The alternative was less … less honorable. I do regret that decision now, but at the time I had no way of seeing the future.”

“I see,” Marjorie nodded. “Now, I must say sorry, but ask that we end our little chat. I hear rustling upstairs and I need to get breakfast ready. This door is quicker to the stables and …” She paused before touching his arm, “… and thank you for your civilized and polite apology. Please don’t let those admirable impulses get you into trouble, Feldwebel Alten.”

As the Feldwebel walked back to the stables, it occurred to him that Frau Pumphrey had not been in the least surprised that her horses were being returned. It made him wonder who might be the houseguest she hadn’t wanted him to encounter? Why was one horse already stabled in her barns and why had the saddle been black with blood? Sergeant Alten had not mentioned these observations to his comrades and he considered very carefully whether his honor as a gentleman might outweigh his duty to the Volkssturm.

Siegfried opened his eyes and frowned. His head swam and he was burning up, but even in his fevered state, he realized he was in a stranger’s bedroom. A cool cloth on his forehead brought a sigh. It came out as a soft groan. “Where …?” he croaked.

“Hush,” Audrey warned in a hiss. “There’s a troop of Germans out in the yard. Not a sound, do you hear?”

Siegfried nodded, trusting her and blessing the Fates for placing them alone together so he might say sorry for his unforgivable behavior. “I am so sorry, Audrey,” he breathed in barely a whisper.

“Hush,” she hissed again and left him to go peer through the curtains. “I think they have finished, Siegfried. Yes, they're going. Do you suppose River was in the stable? I am going to go see whether the Duke left any sign of your fool adventure.”

Then, without giving him a sign of forgiveness, she was gone, leaving him to worry.

As Audrey hurried down to the kitchen, her heart hammered. Siegfried had called her 'Audrey' again. He'd been out of his head with fever and had apologized countless times through his fever dreams, but now he'd come back to summat like sensible and still he apologized and used her Christian name. The possibilities made Audrey feel feverish, as well, and hopeful and foolish, when there were far more pressing issues needed fixing - like whether Siegfried and the bloomin Duke of Windsor were about to be captured or worse!

Chapter Text

Audrey put on her coat and hustled out through snow showers to the stables. It was windy and flakes were falling thick and fast. She tucked her chin down and pulled her coat tight, leaning into the building storm.

Mr Johns were busy settling horses into their proper standing stalls and box stalls in the cozy stable. The warm interior smelled of fresh hay, horses and oiled leather, a pleasant contrast to the icy wind blowing outside and rattling the heavy stable doors.

Several young fillies, frolicking in the central corridor of the main stable, seemed very pleased to be home. Audrey were just pleased to be out of the bloomin wind! It did occur to her that escaping on horseback with this first big winter storm blowing in were a miserable prospect.

“G'morning, Mrs Hall," Mr Johns grunted aimiably. "We got some of Hulton’s beasts and some of Seabright-Sanders' mixed in with our herd,” he huffed. “Before I sends them on home, I might let Hulton’s top stud, old Destiny there, get over on a few of our ready mares." He winked. "No offense, missus." He led a tall bay mare into the box stall with Destiny, who nickered eagerly and snuffled the mare. Mr Johns chuckled, then added, "There's no sign of our dappled Shetland, though. He's a favorite of Mrs Pumphrey. Prob'ly over at another stable. Thought the Gerries were supposed to be efficient, the thieving beggars!”

“Can I lend a hand?" Audrey offered the harried old man. She knew almost nothing about horses, but she had held a halter lead now and then for Siegfried. Horses seemed mostly to behave like larger versions of dogs.

“Naw, lass,” Johns chuckled. “It’s me job and I need to look every one of em over and set them aright.”

“Did the Germans say anything, Mr Johns?” she asked.

"Nowt I could ken,” he replied, leading a huge draft horse from one standing stall into another. “It did give me a fright when the Sergeant took a hard look at that dark one on the end.” He motioned toward River. “I paid the matter no heed. Played it cool, but that tall old fellow took his time poking around. Wish I’d thought to tidy up that bloody saddle, but he didn’t seem to take any special notice of it.”

Audrey stopped by River to offer him her hand. He seemed friendly, so she patted his shoulder and he snuffled her hair. She took a look at the saddle hanging nearby. Blood on the leather was obvious. She'd managed Siegfried’s injuries without feeling faint, but this morning the sight of his dried blood made her feel sick.

Turning away from the sight, she said, "Please clean that blood up before we leave, Mr Johns. Don't want the Gerries taking a second look at Mr Farnon." Then Audrey bid Mr Johns a good day and hurried back to the mansion.

Marjorie was serving breakfast to Duke Edward and had a tray on the sideboard, ready for her to take up to Siegfried.

Audrey ignored it and said rather abruptly, "There were Germans in the stable, Marjorie. They had to have seen Siegfried’s horse and the blood on his saddle."

"The Feldwebel stopped up to inform me," Marjorie replied, pouring a cup for Audrey and offering it to her. "Herr Alten seemed a very decent sort. If he noticed anything untoward, I believe he will keep it to himself."

"I can't risk it. Siegfried and Duke Edward need a new place to lay low," Audrey stated. "If the Germans are hoping to use Duke Edward to force a surrender, they'll come back with everything they've got. I doubt the German in charge missed the signs of summat going on here or that Feldwebel Alten will stay mum. I'll get Siegfried fed and dressed. You two need to make ready and please get four horses kitted out, three with saddles and one for carrying essentials."

"Why not a car or a wagon?" Marjorie protested, thinking of Uncle Farnon’s injuries.

"We need to hide somewhere that is inaccessible," Audrey replied, drinking down a quick cuppa without sitting. "We need to stay in place until the excitement of the train wreck dies down, then head for Liverpool or Scotland. Marjorie, if they believe you've got the Duke hidden away here, those soldiers will turn the place upside down. They'll search every farmstead, as well. Either come along or, when we've gone, make yourself scarce! Tell Mr Johns to move every horse, sheep and cow to another estate. If they arrive before he's finished, he should just open the barns and drop the pasture gates. He won't want to be caught and questioned."

Impressed by her urgency, Marjorie and Duke Edward abandoned the remains of breakfast and prepared to flee the estate. Marjorie went into the storage rooms for the things she'd kept from her son and husband. Both men needed coats, clean clothing and more. They needed those things more than she needed reminders of the people she had lost, still loved and would never forget.

Audrey carried the tray upstairs and ordered Siegfried about, as well. "Eat fast," she snapped. "It's not safe here. We're leaving. Tell me where you can hide without involving anyone else in this mess until you are well enough to travel?"

Siegfried gave up trying to eat with his left hand, drained his teacup, and said, "I have a bolt hole ready. We need to warn the Aldersons."

Audrey eyed the full bowl of porridge and sat on his bedside, swiftly filling the spoon and holding it before Siegfried’s tightly closed mouth. At her glare, he began to protest, but she were quicker and shoveled the food into him despite his grumbles and protests. The bowl were soon empty.

Marjorie rapped on the bedroom door. "I've brought a few of Charles's and Roger's old things for Uncle Farnon, Audrey. I am not going to accompany you. I might slow you down. I shall take Tricki and Mr Johns and go elsewhere. I have telephoned the Hulton estate to deal with our animals, Uncle Farnon. So, there's nothing to worry you on that account. Mr Johns, Tricki and I are leaving immediately. I shall take the Rover to remove that bit of evidence."

"Would you stop by Heston Grange, Mrs Pumphrey?" Siegfried asked, as Audrey wiped a bit of porridge from his beard. "Tell them 'the red roofed shed on the south side of the Dobson place. Twelve hundred steps directly toward the dead oak. Then right turn straight through the gorse'."

"Yes! Of course, I will tell them precisely, Uncle Farnon." She turned to Audrey and wrapped her in a heartfelt hug before adding, "Good luck to you both, until we meet again in happier times."

Audrey wiped a sudden rush of tears and turned to Siegfried who'd managed to swing his bare legs over the edge of the bed. "Tell me the truth," she said. "Can you walk? Ride? If not, we'll need a different plan.

Siegfried paused, biting back a lie. "If those are narcotics," he finally said, "give me a half dose. Bring the rest and plenty of bandages. Don't forget my saddlebags, please, and ..., " he paused for an awkward moment, "... and I realize it is an extreme imposition, but I need your help to dress."

Audrey had seen most of Siegfried Farnon at one time or another in their years together, but never all at once. The effect as she lifted his night shirt over his head were summat better than she had imagined. The man had lost weight and his ribs showed along his trim physique. He had clearly defined shoulder muscles that brought a flush of heat to her cheeks.

Watching, Siegfried apologized. "I do not wish to embarrass you," he stammered, turning red as well. "I were a nurse," Audrey snapped, but they both knew that weren't the point.

October 24, 1940,
Whitehouse Residence Dining room,
Washington DC.

Franklin Roosevelt frowned across the glittering dinner table at his guests. The tenor of the dinner conversation contrasted sharply with the shining candlelight, sumptuous menu items and gleaming gold rimmed plates and platters and heavy silverware. "Mr Wilkie is closing the gap, Winston!" Roosevelt declared, punctuating his statement with thrusts of his fork. "I may not be the man that England should be courting, Winston!"

Churchill huffed and harumphed, "Nonsense, Mr President! I know politics and I know horse races. You are the horse to bet on. You are the man to break with tradition and you are the man to win a third term leading this noble nation through our next great challenge. You shall do so, Mr President, because it must be so, or all of Western Civilization, including Democracy, is lost to the fascist hordes!"

Richard focused on his plate and resisted his urge to point out that Mr Churchill’s reasoning was grossly flawed. Simply because something was necessary, it did not guarantee it would come to pass. Mr Wilkie's polling numbers showed the challenger rapidly closing the gap in the popular vote and gaining speed, based on his slogan, 'FDR spells War' .

On October 8th, the Gallop Poll had reported FDR with a solid lead at 50 percent, while Mr Wilkie lagged behind at 41 percent of the projected popular vote, a solid estimate well outside the margin of error. In less than three weeks, Wilkie's ramped up newspaper advertisements and his nonstop series of whistle stops had cut FDR's lead to 47.7 versus Wilkie's jump to 44.2 percent, now within the statistical margin of error. At that rate of change, Wilkie might have the popular votes to beat FDR on election day.

"Polls only tell you what the people are thinking, Franklin," Mrs Roosevelt stated firmly. "Mr Wilkie undermined his most effective thrust against you when he supported your decision to establish a national draft. He is a patriot and I admire him for it, but that was a definite political misstep. It will cost him the election."

"Still, I worry about the upper Midwest, Eleanor," Roosevelt grumbled. "Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Michigan? Each of those states lean heavily toward isolationism, particularly among voters of German and Irish descent. Our German American voters do not want a second war with Germany. Our Irish Americans simply hope the British will go to hell."

Franklin grinned a challenge at Winston, who laughed and put on a brave front to that depressing truth.

"The electoral college determines who will become the next president," Mrs Churchill leaned close to explain to Richard, adeptly changing the subject. "Not the popular vote."

"Correct!" Mrs Roosevelt agreed, sensing her British guests' discomfort. "You shall carry the electoral college as long as you win Texas, California and Pennsylvania. Your support is much stronger than Mr Wilkie's in the swing states of New England, as well as New Jersey, North Carolina and across the South. Mr Wilkie might very well make it a horse race in a few Midwest states," she smiled at the Churchills. "He might even claim electors in a handful of the less populated western states, but those sparsely populated states deliver very few electoral college votes. They are simply irrelevant in the greater game. The popular vote is not at the heart of a Presidential election. Besides, you've led the people through hard times before, Franklin. The People know that and the People will remember."

Audrey snuggled tight against Siegfried’s back, holding him upright in the saddle. He'd passed out again and slumped heavily in her embrace, a dead weight. Her arms ached, but she would gladly hold him forever, no matter how it hurt.

Duke Edward rode ahead, leading River by his reins and following Audrey’s directions. They were searching for a shepherd’s shed on the southern slopes of the Dobson farm. Audrey knew the shed. There, they would find food, water and shelter for the horses.

The wind screamed down from the north, however, spewing a misery of icy snow over Yorkshire. It was difficult to see and Audrey had to shout directions over the howling storm. Still, it were safer than following the roads. German identity checks were at every crossroad. There were roaming patrols, as well. Siegfried had been right to insist that they stay off the roads and go through fields and woods, though it meant that Audrey had to constantly search for landmarks to guide them across the wintry fields.

Finally, they found the little stone shed with it's bright red metal roof. From there, they had planned to stable the horses and walk. How, she did not know. Siegfried were getting worse, not better, and the arctic wind weren't doing any of them any good at all.

The Duke dismounted and led his horse into the shed. "Stay in the saddle, Mrs Hall!" he called over his shoulder. Then he disappeared into the shed. Long minutes passed before he reappeared. "Wake him," he ordered. "Siegfried has to tell us how we find our way from here!" After some prompting, and a capful of whisky poured down his throat, Siegfried roused enough to explain to Duke Edward how to find the bolt hole. It lay about twelve hundred yards from the shed on a bee line toward a massive dead oak tree that stood alone on a prominent knob on the farthest horizon.

Audrey and Siegfried stayed mounted and Edward walked, leading River and a second horse loaded with their essentials, and counting out his paces.

Audrey weren’t ashamed to pray for deliverance on that long trek. Snowfall had become heavier and the wind whipped it into near white-out. If they lost their way in the back country in such foul weather, they would freeze to death. Siegfried were getting heavier as he slipped into summat she feared were deeper than sleep. It scared Audrey and she pleaded for the Lord to keep him strong. It took another anxious half hour, but somehow Siegfried knew the way and he suddenly rasped, "Here!" There were no sign of anything different to Audrey's eyes, but he half fell off the horse and plunged into the gorse thicket. "Follow me," he ordered. "Watch your heads. It's a low tunnel ahead."

Audrey followed Siegfried into the dense gorse, only to emerge into a tunnel through the brush. He'd chopped a pathway through, invisible from outside. It led directly to a dark hole, the mouth of a tunnel. After the blinding white of the storm, the absolute lack of light ahead felt claustrophobic and deeply menacing. It were only absolute faith in Siegfried that let Audrey follow him down that narrow channel into the depths of the earth. Duke Edward had tied the horses and brought up the rear.

Audrey bumped into Siegfried when he suddenly stopped. A match flared and he lit a flickering candle stuck into the tunnel wall. "Welcome to our new home," he laughed and a moment later, slumped against the wall.

"Have you been living here?" she asked, crouching to touch his forehead. He were burning up. "Bed! Now!" Audrey ordered, but before they could explore the question further, the Duke reappeared.

"I'm taking the horses back to the shed," he said. "Can't leave them out in the teeth of this storm. Besides, they're a dead giveaway that we're here."

Just then, however, a scrambling sound, barking and voices foretold of still more arrivals.

"Hello!" Richard Alderson roared as he unbent from the low tunnel. "I followed your tracks, Siegfried! Mrs Pumphrey told me you'd leave horses in Dobson's south shed. It dinnt take an Indian scout to suss out where you'd gone from there!"

Helen and Jenny emerged next. Then Jess and Scruff burst into the cavern, racing from one human to the next for cuddles and reassurance.

"Get off," Audrey ordered as Jess wormed her entire wet and muddy body onto Siegfried’s lap.

Richard turned to Duke Edward and squinted. "I guess Siegfried changed his mind about you," Richard chuckled and ducked his head, removing his cap and pulling his forelock. "Richard Alderson, your Royal Highness," he said. "Me daughters, Mrs Helen Herriot and Jenny Alderson."

The Duke of Windsor shook hands all around and then said, "I am pleased to make your acquaintance. You have fine daughters, Mr Alderson. I should mention that I am not your King. I abdicated my throne many months ago."

"When the Gerries invaded!?" Jenny demanded.The Duke nodded, "Yes. When I saw how very blind I had been to the truth of Herr Hitler's intentions. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have horses to attend to, Mr Alderson, ladies."

Richard watched him go and muttered, "Not what I'd expected. I better go along, King or no King, don't want that poor bugger to freeze to death on Dobson's farm. Gerries would give the Dobson family no end of grief."

Then Richard handed Audrey a small cage with Vonolel inside, quivering from cold and excitement, before he turned to follow Edward Windsor back into the storm.

Carefully, Audrey reached into the cage and lifted the trembling rat out, placing him against Siegfried’s burning neck. "Here's a little friend to keep us comp'ny," she murmured, winning a ghost of a smile from Siegfried, before his eyes fluttered shut.

Then Audrey took charge. "Helen," she said, "we need a fire and that lantern lit. Jenny, please take the dogs and a candle and find where Mr Farnon has his bedding. When the men return, we'll get this poor beggar to bed. In the meantime, we all need a cuppa and warming up."

By the time Richard and the Duke returned from settling the horses, Jenny had discovered where Siegfried had made his bedroom. With Audrey directing, the two men hauled Siegfried into the alcove he'd carved out as a nook for his bedding. Then, Audrey tucked a clean sheet and blanket over him. She let Vonolel out of his cage to keep Siegfried company and left them together, hoping he might truly rest while she explored.

Helen and Jenny were rummaging for ingredients for a meal, while Richard taught Duke Edward how to split kindling for the cook fire.

Their new home were just a dank cavern cut under a lonely hillside. The cavern were mysterious and intimidating. Shadowy side tunnels seemed certain to lead to the netherworld, but there were a kitchen area complete with a fire ring, cold storage, an oven of sorts and even a place to do the washing up. She were impressed and a touch relieved. It were clear that Siegfried Farnon had thought things through very thoroughly.

Audrey turned her gaze upward. Shadows danced overhead. She could see where he'd reinforced the high ceiling and walls with bits of planks, plaster and netting to keep rocks from crashing down from above. Audrey dinnt want to imagine how Siegfried had got up there to work. The very thought made her shiver.

So, she explored the main cavern. He’d cut multiple shelves and roomy storage alcoves into its walls and improved the living space with rough built furniture of a sort. Mr Siegfried Farnon were a well educated gentleman with refined tastes and many admirable qualities, but he obviously weren’t skilled in carpentry. That made Audrey smile at the thought of Siegfried trying.

She gazed about, overwhelmed at the thought of him here alone all those months. Her tears trickled down. This dank dark hole had been Mr Farnon’s home, while she'd lived in luxury at Pumphrey Manor. It dinnt seem right. It weren’t fair, him not even having a decent armchair to let him put up his feet and puff his pipe before a crackling fire come nightfall.

Fed up with her moping and mooning, Audrey dried her tears on the edge of her pinny and decided to keep a positive attitude. Yes, the kerosene lamp cast bizarre shadows against the rough walls of the cavern, but the lamp light were buttery yellow and it did give the impression of warmth, if no actual heat.

She smiled a bit. It were clear that Mr Farnon had tried very hard to make this abandoned lead mine more than a miserable hole. Rallying and feeling more optimistic, Audrey got on with close inspection of her new kitchen.

That dear man had arranged a complete kitchen area with a gas cooking ring, an open fireplace formed of rubble and a hollow stone cairn fitted with wire racks to approximate an oven. That odd oven proudly sported a flat slate hearth.

Someone had even carved out an ingenious cold cellar by directing a thin stream of seep water through a chamber formed of five slate slabs. The cool water would work like a spring house to keep food fresh for days, letting Audrey offer milk for their tea, butter and even eggs for breakfast and for baking.

A vast copper pot, nearly large enough for rendering fat from a whole pig, hung from a sturdy iron swivel arm fixed into the cavern stone, close enough to swing over the open fireplace. Audrey swung it back and forth and liked the way it could be moved over the flames or stored back against the wall, out of the way. The pot were too huge for stew, unless she were feeding an army, but could even serve as an oven of sorts. It would do nicely as both her kitchen sink and laundry.

A table had been fashioned by laying six smooth planks across massive stone blocks. The blocks had obviously been cut from the native rock and abandoned, possibly by the original diggers of this hand hewn cavern. The planks looked like they’d been salvaged from the floor of a corn crib, but the wood had been planed smooth, oiled and rubbed till it shone.

There were half a dozen mismatched wooden chairs set around the table. Audrey knew them from her visits with farm wives through the years. One had lived by the stove at Heston Grange where Richard Alderson had tied his boots. Another were from the Chapman’s place. More often than not it had held Annie’s darning basket. The vicarage had given up a third chair from the school room where the children studied their catechism. Three others had always hung in the rafters of the Skeldale attic, gathering cobwebs.

Then Audrey saw summat that stopped her in her tracks. Her mother's set of chicken salt and pepper shakers graced the improvised table. Finding them here ... now ... Well, it made Audrey wonder. Had he taken them in an impulse, as a memento? Had he known they were very special to her and saved them? Had he meant to give them to her with those tickets to Canada, but forgot?

Whatever the reason, now they were here ... and so was she ... and so was he.

With a blush and a shake of her head, Audrey pulled her dreams from the clouds and went exploring.

As she explored the side tunnels, she came across more sleeping quarters, as well as sanitary facilities, storage spaces, pantry shelves cut into the cavern walls. The shelves held scores of books and game boxes carefully wrapped in waxed paper to keep them dry in the dank hole. There were rank after rank of canned goods, food she'd missed and had been told went to the needy!

There were an old fashioned hip bath in a space that would serve as their lavatory. It were demurely tucked behind a bright floral curtain of heavy canvas far down a narrow side tunnel. That copper pot in the kitchen area were big enough to heat plenty of water for a luxurious soak. Beside the hip bath, there were a makeshift sink, just a shallow pan and a tin pitcher to hold water. Soap rested in a hammered copper tray on a handy block of stone. Candles were set into shallow whitewashed nooks carved into the walls and a box of matches rested on another hand dug shelf. Overall, the lav were functional and the effect were charming, for all it's grab-bag nature.

On the farthest side of the curtain, there were a second curtain about fifteen feet along the tunnel. Behind that curtain stood a makeshift toilet. It were no more than a bucket fitted with a plank toilet seat and a porcelain lid. The sight of it made Audrey shudder. She had used far worse during the Great War, still ... she decided to look elsewhere for summat to lift her spirits.

Sleeping areas were tucked away down other tunnel branches that angled off the main cavern. Each sleeping space - she couldn’t quite view them as bedrooms - had a roomy alcove cut out of the wall to hold the bedding and a small table contrived of stone near at hand to hold any available comforts, such as a candle, a book or a cuppa. The space were made private by curtains hung on either side of the tunnel. The bedding consisted of a large Lancaster sheepskin over a thick bed of fresh straw to cushion the rock and Mr Farnon had whitewashed the overhead arch to brighten up each nook. And there were her sheets, blankets and pillows that had gone missing from Skeldale House!

"Daft apeth had me thinking I were addlepated!" she muttered, touched by his care for whomever might need a safe hold.

As Audrey completed her inspection, she realized there were no broom, no rugs, no mop or scrub bucket. There weren't fine furniture to dust and polish, no framed photographs or figurines to brighten. Out of all those possibilities to bring comfort and cleanliness, many of them essential to Audrey’s way of thinking, Siegfried Farnon had only nicked her two tiny porcelain hens, one holding pepper, the other salt.

She stood at the table, reached over to tap the salt hen, thoughtfully.

Had he known they were all she possessed from her childhood home. She had no memory of sharing that personal bit of her history, but somehow he must have known they were treasured.

Audrey swiped away a single tear. “Well Jess,” she sighed, stroking the dog’s warm fur, “at least there’ll be no dusting, scrubbing and no rugs to beat.”

Jess snuggled close, wagging her tail and burying her silky muzzle into Audrey’s cold palms.

"Let’s check on Mr Farnon, Jess," she said to the dog, missing a knowing smile shared between Helen and Jenny.

Chapter Text

While the others were busily settling in, Siegfried lay in a haze. Normally his bed nook was too chilly. Tonight, it was a furnace. He felt like he was suffocating. His chest was tight and his nightshirt sweat-drenched. He felt the same unreasonable terror he'd known in the trenches, of being buried alive.

A man of the Dales, to be right Siegfried Farnon’s world required wide skies and hills rolling away as far as his eye could see. It meant fresh air.

He closed his eyes against the oppressive darkness and said his childhood prayers like a mantra, over and over until he drifted into something like sleep.

When he woke, someone had lit the candle. Or had it always been shining there? He was only certain of Vonolel‘s presence, everything else felt unreal, mutable. He knew the sensation of that warm little body pressed against his neck and the press of tiny feet as the inquisitive rat nosed under the buttons of his shirt, forever searching, always curious, as if memorizing every part of him. Vonolel encountered the tightly wrapped bandages imobilizing his shoulder and upper arm against his side. The frustrated rat squeaked a protest.

Vonolel‘s expression of frustration at his usual interrupted nightly inspection made Siegfried chuckle. He instantly regretted it. It hurt to breathe. Laughing was far worse. Every part of him ached, in fact. 'So strange,' he thought, 'that even my hair hurts and my toes.'

He was thirsty but unwilling to move or call out. In fact, he wasn't quite clear as to whether he was still entirely alone and those impressions of a long cold ride across a wintery landscape were merely shreds of a waking dream. Audrey’s arms had been wrapped tight around him in that dreamy winter world. She had come with him to his hermit hole, like a princess granting her favor to a humble mole. The stuff of fairytales. It was a sweet dream, he decided, far too sweet to be real. After his outrageous behavior, Audrey may well have given him up as a lost cause. She might never speak to him, much less ride entwined together through an endless winter storm.

Siegfried’s mind whirled in a feverish spiral of regret and possible words to beg Audrey’s forgiveness. Lines from Shakespeare's sonnets, scraps of Shelly, Dickinson and Browning spun around and around in a flowery tangle, confused with bits of reality from Gilbert and Sullivan's Nightmare Song.

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? ...'
For your brain is on fire and the bedclothes conspire of your usual slumber to plunder you:

Hither, hither, hither. Love its boon has sent. If I die and wither, I shall die content! ...
First your counterpane goes, and uncovers your toes, and your sheet slips demurely from under you ...

Withstands until the sweet assault, Their chivalry consumes, While he, victorious, tilts away to vanquish other blooms ...
And you're hot, and you're cross, and you tumble and toss till there's nothing 'twixt you and the ticking...

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight...
Well, you get some repose in the form of a doze, with hot eyeballs and head ever aching.
But your slumbering teems with such horrible dreams that you’d very much better be waking!

Siegfried woke with a jerk, realizing it was impossible. He could never explain his unforgivable behavior without telling Audrey Hall his deepest secret. No words were adequate to ask her to forgive his vile tantrum without also revealing the tenderest of reasons behind his mad rant.

But then, a new presence blocked the flickering candle's glow. Siegfried’s heart leapt. He could smell her. He wasn't dreaming. Siegfried tried to speak, but his teeth were chattering and words wouldn’t form. When a cool cloth pressed against his eyes, he reached up and gripped the dear strong hand holding the cloth.

“Sorry,” he stammered.

“Hush, you daft man,” she scolded in a tone that sounded strangely like 'I love you'.

The cool cloth moved down to his burning neck and her fingers deftly unbuttoned his shirt. Tiny claws crawled farther down his body as the shirt opened. Her calming coolness spread over his fiery skin. It hurt and yet it was absolution, a blessed relief.

Caught up in feverish relief and gratitude, he let a tear escape.

“Sorry,” he whispered again, murmuring it against her hair as she leaned close, checking her work.

Audrey said gently, “Hush now, d'you hear! You are safe. I am safe. Everyone is safe,” as she wrung out the cloth and wiped his sweaty curls off his hot brow. “You did good,” she murmured. “Those horses are home and safe. The Aldersons are here. We're settling into your lovely bolt hole. Now I want you to rest. Drink this," she pressed water to his dry lips. "Later, you can have broth.”

Obediently, Siegfried closed his eyes and let her take charge. The cool sweetness of the wet cloth was his salvation. Her soft murmurs, a benediction.

Audrey continued to squeeze cool water over Siegfried’s body. The candlelight made the rivulets appear as shimmering gold as they trickled down his torso, his belly to pool lower. She wiped down his bare thighs and his calves. Then she wrung the cool water through again and wiped his flushed face, his neck and chest. It were a ritual of love, an adoration of his body revealed to her, and of simple care for a man in need. She continued until his skin cooled and he stopped mumbling his feverish apology.

When she were sure Siegfried were asleep, Audrey scooped up Vonolel, who'd been snuggling Siegfried’s feet, and slipped the treasured rat into her pocket. There’d been a time when she’d avoided even thinking about that creature on her employer's desk, but she were doing things today she’d never imagined. Cuddling a rat. Hiding from Germans with bloomin royalty in tow. Making her home in a hole in the ground and happy to be here, as long as she were with the daft beggar who'd gripped her hand and kept murmuring, “Sorry,” as he drifted off.

Marjorie Pumphrey sat besides Mr Johns as they sped through the storm. It hurt to abandon her home, but she had responsibilities far beyond those walls. Neither Audrey nor Uncle Farnon had guessed at her true reason for parting company with them. The Duke of Windsor, of course, had known. Duke Edward was the reason.

During their early morning chat over breakfast, Edward of Windsor had prompted a conversation of Marjorie’s keen sorrow and frustration at being unable to protect her people. He too had been raised to believe in duty, reared by men and women who felt duty above all else to Britain, to the land and to the people of the United Kingdom and her far flung colonies.

The Duke of Windsor had listened and empathized. Having failed in his far greater duty, Edward admired the gracious lady’s fervent need to set things right and her frustration at feeling impotent to do so. He felt ashamed to be in her presence, having been played like a shallow fool by those who had only viewed his friendship and love as a means to further domination of the free world.

Recognizing a shared aspiration, the dethroned King offered the good lady of Pumphrey Manor a chance to change their future. It was a slim chance, fraught with danger, but a chance.

Now she was his emissary, entrusted with a message and his ducal ring as proof of the sender’s identity. She must find a way to deliver it to the one man who might save their people and the Western world from absolute fascist domination.

As Mr Johns, bred and born in Ireland, navigated the back roads toward Cardiff, Wales, Marjorie fingered the Royal ring under her left glove. Mr Johns had family in Ireland, people who lived by fishing the North Sea. He had papers, as well, to get them through any German checkpoints.

Before they left Yorkshire, however, Marjorie would stop in Leeds to visit Feldwebel Alten. She needed transit papers to ensure her own safe passage. She hoped to obtain them from Feldwebel Alten, a decent, civilized gentleman to whom she’d offered a cup of tea and shared a bit of human understanding.

She hoped that bit of humanity was enough.

"D'you think this is wise?" Mr Johns grunted. "Goin to a Gerry for a favor."

"My other choice is to become your wife, so I can travel under your protection," Marjorie replied cooly, ending the conversation.

Chapter Text

Churchill’s rooms,
Pennsylvania Avenue,
Washington DC.

"I apologize, Mr Churchill," Richard stated, "but I must resign. I appreciate that you've given me your trust. There are others I feel an urgent need to check on and help, if possible."

"I thought you were estranged from your parents," the great man grumbled from behind his desk in the office of the Churchills' five room hotel suite.

"I am, nearly," Richard admitted, "but there are friends ... one friend in particular. I haven't heard from him in ages. I am desperately worried."

"Not a young lady, then?" Winston chuckled. "I noted you fleeing from my wife's young friends." In a more serious tone, he added, "Last night, the United States of America declared war against Japan, Mr Carmody. Do understand what that means?"

Churchill stood and walked to the window that looked toward the Whitehouse. His thin white legs stuck out from the hem of his bathrobe. Richard averted his gaze. "When their Congress voted to support President Roosevelt’s declaration of war with Japan," Churchill went on, "it automatically brought Germany into conflict with these United States due to interlocking treaties."

Richard nodded. Of course, he knew all this, but Mr Churchill wanted to tell him, so he listened and wondered what Mr Churchill might be getting at.

"Confirmation of a declaration of war by Germany came through by telegraph early this morning, after you left the party. So, Germany is at war with the US of A. That, my boy, puts the USA on the side of Great Britain, just where we'd hoped she'd be. You did that, Richard."

Churchill beamed at Richard and sighed, "You did your country a magnificent service, Mr Carmody. Your work has changed the fate of nations! Few men can claim as much. Frankly, I need you here. I also fear for you, Richard. You will be entering enemy held territory, coming from an enemy nation. Do you really expect to be of greater service there, than at my side, here, prodding America to do right?"

Richard blushed and twisted his lips, trying not to offend. He could not possibly explain the shame he felt for his role in forcing Japan to attack. He'd lain awake all night, listening to the animals in the nearby zoo roar and snarl. He was struck by the fact that mankind seemed hardly above such primitive urges. It was an ugly reality, one Richard wished he could separate himself from, without hurting Mr Churchill, who'd been so kind.

"It's a point of honor, Sir." He spoke those words quietly but the impact was profound.

Churchill pulled out an overlarge kerchief and mopped his eyes. "Ah!" he rumbled, "a point of honor! Then there's nothing for it, but to go forth! I shall send you as my emissary by way of free Scotland. From there, you must find your own way into England to your friend. If you see or hear anything of particular importance, I'd hope to hear from you. Godspeed, my boy. Godspeed."

Richard thanked Mr Churchill and he would have gone immediately, but there were barriers to overcome. Mr Churchill sent him to be briefed by the American military on the plans to liberate Great Britain by way of a pincher movement through western Scotland and Wales. They provided Richard with a thick packet of Top Secret documents to be delivered to the men leading the fight to hold back the Germans.

Next, Richard was sent to the British Embassy for another briefing on the techniques for clandestine operations. He listened carefully to detailed descriptions of how to send and receive information. His head was spinning by the time someone asked if he knew Morse code.

"No," he said, his head pounding from too much liquor, too little sleep and far too much detailed lecture on vital issues.

"It doesn't matter," a slender young red-haired woman declared from the corner. He'd assumed she was a secretary. "I know all this," she stated, "and I rated second in my class for telegraphy."

"Mr Carmody," the trainer announced, "Meet your future wife, Miss Willis."

Feldwebel Alten looked up from his paperwork when his aide rapped on his door.

"Yes?" he asked. He was uncharacteristically curt with the lad. He had spent the morning struggling with his conscience, a matter of a gentleman's honor versus a soldier's duty and had decided he must, in fact, report the blood stained saddle and the unaccounted for horse at Pumphrey Manor.

"Eine englische Dame, die Sie sehen möchte, Feldwebel."

"In English, please!" Alten stated. The lad needed to learn the local language. They all did, if there was to be any chance of peace through mutual understanding in the future.

"An English ... lady ... you... see ... wishing?"

Alten closed his file and tossed aside his pen. He nodded and said, "Show the lady in." His mood brightened to see Mrs Pumphrey enter. She seemed hesitant and that made him want to put her at ease.

Alten stood and smiled. "May I offer you tea, Mrs Pumphrey? I feel I owe you a cup."

At that she smiled in a most charming manner. "That is very kind, Feldwebel Alten," she replied, "but I have urgent family business and I need to travel post haste to occupied Ireland. My papers do not include travel permits. I rarely leave the estate. Now, I must. I wonder if you could help me understand what is required and which department I should contact."

"Please, Mrs Pumphrey," Alten smiled, "I would be pleased if you might call me Fredrik."

The lady blushed and Alten feared he'd overstepped. The English were so proper. It was easy to misstep. Then, with a small smile, she offered her hand and said, "Fredrik, I am Marjorie to my friends."

They sat and Fredrik ordered tea and slices of crumb cake. They sipped their tea, making small talk about the weather, until he said, "Is your travel in any way connected to the blood I observed on a saddle in your stable. It was quite fresh, Marjorie."

Her expression never changed. This lady's mettle impressed Fredrik.

"In fact," she said truthfully, "it does. A dear friend has asked me to convey the family inheritance to his brother. My friend was aboard a train that somehow ran off the tracks on a sharp curve recently. Our very good friend went to his assistance and was injured in the rescue. It was his blood on that saddle. As the only local veterinarian, he was returning from a late night emergency call and went to offer help." She took a bite of cake and murmured, "This is very good, Fredrik!"

Fredrik Alten felt he was playing checkers against a chess master. He appreciated the way Marjorie Pumphrey skirted the lies with judicious truth. He, however, needed to be quite direct. "Your veterinary sabotaged the train, Marjorie. There were railroad spikes scattered everywhere. He pulled the spikes and set off an explosive device. He knew we have a regular troop train heading north every morning. He did it, I believe, to stop a later train load of local horses scheduled to go north that morning. We surprised him with an unscheduled special on its way to London carrying the King of the United Kingdom. That is who has asked that you carry word to his brother, nicht wahr?"

Marjorie Pumphrey sipped her tea before saying, "You are very well informed, Fredrik. More informed than I hoped. Shall we revert to calling each other Feldwebel Alten and Mrs Pumphrey?"

"No, Marjorie," Fredrik Alten said. "I have a much better idea. In fact, I think we can help each other ... if you will trust me."

Three hours later, Mr Johns was driving the Rover through a snow squall toward Cardiff. They'd been granted the precious transit permits allowing them to travel to occupied Ireland. The Germans would allow them to enter no-man's land, based on those permits. As British subjects, the Welsh were likely to allow them to cross through the defensive lines, as well.

As he drove, the old stable master glanced at Mrs Pumphrey. "Did you make a deal, then?" he asked.

"I did " Marjorie replied, stroking Tricki-Woo. "The Feldwebel wanted a letter delivered to Mister Churchill. I promised to do so."

"What's it say, the letter!" Mr Johns asked.

"I have not read it, Mr Johns," Marjorie chuckled, "but I doubt the Feldwebel is suing for peace."

The miles ticked by with neither speaking. Marjorie watched the wintry landscape speed by. Mr Johns turned the Rover's heater on full blast. The soft top was not the ideal vehicle for a winter trip, particularly heading west toward the front lines.

Marjorie had spoken the literal truth. She had not read the letter. She did, however, know what Feldwebel Alten had written, at least the gist of it. Discontent was rampant among the professional military. Even Volkssturm recruits, like Fredrik Alten, were disgusted by the subjugation of one country after the next. The use of child soldiers, brainwashed into fanatics. The purges of Generals who opposed Hitler, the disappearance of innocents viewed as inferior, the internal cutthroat competition between the several security organizations, it all had every sensible person on edge and disheartened.

Fredrik had opened his heart to her. Marjorie did not understand why, exactly. Perhaps it was finding a person willing to behave as polite society would expect, perhaps there was more. No man had looked at her the way Fredrik Alten had, not for decades. From the first, his expression told ber he actually saw her and liked what he saw.

He spoke of the terrible violence against civilians, the deprivation and cruelty. The Russians had fought like wild things, but lacked the technology to hold off the anschluss. They fell back and back, until Moscow was in sight and must have watched in horror as their ancient city was obliterated.

"It has to stop," he'd said. "You are carrying vital information for your cause, please if you love your country as I love mine, carry this letter to Churchill, and when you meet your friend's brother tell him we are not all savages. We needed to pull Germany out of a crushing economic depression. Hitler promised that and we believed him. War was not the way. It must end."

"But you are winning the war," Marjorie had replied, astonished.

"Can you imagine what peace under Hitler will be?" Fredrik asked. His dark look sent a tremor of fear through her.

"No," she said, "I cannot, Fredrik," and took up his letter and the transit passes, before she bolted.

Siegfried sat up. It hurt, but for the first time since his foolish attempt at sabotage, his head was clear. Feeling every hour of his age, he carefully swung his legs out of the alcove that served as his bed. When he felt steady, he stood and his stomach growled.

He was ravenous.

"You're up!" Audrey stated as she swept through the privacy curtain. "How do you feel?"

Siegfried’s stomach grumbled again, making him blush and her chuckle. "Well, there's porridge and I'll have eggs and toast in a tick, courtesy the Alderson flock."

She turned to go, but Siegfried caught her arm, "Wait," he said. "Please. I must tell you how ashamed and sorry I am for my outburst, Audrey. I had no right to speak to you that way. Can you ever forgive me? Please."

Audrey smiled and patted his hand. He gripped her fingers as she said, "Accepted and forgiven, as long as it's your last apology. You've been saying 'sorry' for hours, you daft beggar. Now, do you need help to dress, or shall I cook your eggs?"

Siegfried nodded and murmured, "I do need help and I am very grateful, my dear. If I made you unhappy, it breaks my heart. I can'tbear to lose you, Audrey."

Audrey’s heart hammered a mad tattoo while she leaned close to help. "Your dressing needs changing," she muttered. "It will hurt, but I can fashion a sling, after we get your shirt on."

She patted his hand and said, "Sit tight. I'll be back." Moments later she returned with her arm loaded with bandages, cotton wool and a bottle of disinfectant. Siegfried sat and Audrey leaned into his alcove to help him out of his nightshirt. He dragged his blanket over his lap and tried to ignore her proximity.

Her breath was warm and sweet on his bare skin, however, as she removed the straps binding his right arm to his chest.

Siegfried moaned. It hurt and Audrey ordered, "Lay back. It'll take the weight off."

Siegfried laid flat and held his breath as she leaned over him to examine the stitches and check for infection. Her hair was loose and fell across his neck and chest.

"All is well enough," she murmured, her lips close to his cheek. Then she applied disinfectant, causing a low curse of protest, and added a thick layer of cotton wool, before binding his shoulder and saying, "That should feel better. I think the sling will wait until we get your shirt on."

It were tricky not to embarrass the poor man while still managing to get his trousers up and his shirt over his injured shoulder.

Siegfried insisted on doing as much as possible, rather than risk Audrey noticing the inconvenient and inappropriate reaction he'd had to her being so close while he was nearly naked.

While he fiddled with his fly and buttons, she said, "I'm off to cook your breakfast. Helen says you like burnt toast and runny eggs!" Her laughter rang down the tunnel, making Siegfried think there might be a chance at more than her forgiveness.

Two minutes later, Richard Alderson appeared, grinning. "I was sent to give you a hand with them buttons.

Mr Bosworth patrolled the streets of Darrowby. He was not an official of any sort, but he felt it wise for someone, aside from the German invaders, to look after things. The soldiers sometimes drank too much. Local girls might be bothered, or there could be fisticuffs between a drunken soldier and some old farmer. Better to have himself or the Constable step in than the Germans.

He walked by Skeldale House. It was shuttered tight.

He saw no sign that anyone had bothered the place. When the veterinary came home, Mr Bosworth hoped he could tell the man that he had kept things all correct.

The church bell chimed the hour and Mr Bosworth turned to bicycle home. It was nearly curfew hour. He couldn't do his duty if the Germans had him locked up.

Something caught his eye on the front stoop. He glanced about and scooped it up. It was a letter addressed to Mrs Hall, the housekeeper. Last he'd heard, she was working out at the estate. Now rumor was that they'd flown the coop. Mr Bosworth tucked the letter into his pocket for safe keeping.

Chapter Text

"I do not fully understand," Richard Carmody stated, staring at the young woman. The British trainer had left them alone, 'To get acquainted!' He'd smirked as he departed with a wink. The woman, Lieutenant Robbie Willis, stood very straight and was at least two inches taller than Richard. She wore a British uniform with insignia that Richard did not recognize. It was a white rose nestled within a red rose.

Richard peered closer at her lapel and read the motto under the enigmatic emblem. "Manui Dat Cognitio Vires," he recited thoughtfully. "Knowledge Strengthens the Arm?" he translated with a puzzled half smile. Willis was tall, but clearly far too slender to possess any significant strength, he silently mused.

Lieutenant Willis gazed back into Mr Carmody's brown eyes. He was an odd one, but something about him was enticing. Strangely, she felt the urge to smooth his hank of brown hair back out of his piercing gaze. She imagined his hair would be quite soft.

Thinking herself daft, Robbie Willis just laughed and quibbed, "I suggest you think of me as your strong right arm based on what I know, Mr Carmody, rather than on brute strength. That boar of a trainer makes his sad little jibes because the old boys upstairs refuse to send him into the field. If it were about brute force, he'd go on these little jobs of mine. He hasn't. He'd stand out in a crowd, the lumbering lump, whereas this is my third assignment. It is all about knowledge, you see, and about my ability to put what I see and hear to good use. That, and blending in. Now, to be very clear, we won't actually behave as man and wife, Mr Carmody."

The relief on his face made her chuckle and add, "So, don't look so relieved. It simply states that we are husband and wife here in your paper work." She handed him orders and Richard saw there was, in fact, a marriage certificate among the various transit orders. The names on the document matched the fake identity papers, ration coupons and what-not. "Mr and Mrs Warrick," he read aloud. "Martin and Millie Warrick, to be precise."

"It simplifies dealing with the rooms and such," Robbie sighed, taking his arm, batting her pretty emerald green eyes and cooing at him, "Darling Martin!" as she pretended to swoon.

Alarmed at her antics, Richard swallowed hard and had to struggle not to squeak out his question. "We are sharing rooms?" He was unskilled at socializing and knew it. He could count the number of times he'd exchanged more than six words with an attractive young woman. He had never imagined himself being alone with one ... of them ... in a rented room. This woman was very pretty and also quite intimidating. The thought of sharing a bedroom with such an unprecedented creature had his head in a whirl and his stomach tying itself into nervous knots.

"Think of it as a job, day and night," Willis replied. "We're stuck with each other, until this mission to deliver you safely behind enemy lines is accomplished. Two lads of service age going about as civilians would attract suspicion. A man and his wife seems normal, mundane. We'll blend into any crowd, Mr Martin Warrick. Now, our airplane to Scotland is wheels up in twenty minutes and I've got an American jeep waiting. Those Yanks really know how to churn out the stuff! Shoddy junk, but they keep it coming and, in a war, quantity will win over quality every time, bless them."

Maybe it was his lack of sleep, his pounding hangover or the way Lieutenant Willis sped them through the Canadian airbase, barely missing other careening vehicles and pedestrians. Whatever the reason, Richard found himself unable to focus as Willis chattered on and on about where they would go, how they'd manage and her many skills guaranteed to make their joint mission a success. Richard understood it was vital mission information and that Robbie Willis had her own, far more important reasons for taking charge of him. He must try to absorb what she said. Instead, he was fully distracted by her animated expressions as she talked, lost in her flashing smile and the brilliant green of her sparkling intelligent eyes.

Richard feared he was lost and, strangely, he couldn’t seem to care.

François crouched low in a winter swelled ditch in the region just outside of Calais. He pulled his once-fine wool coat tighter and stuck his icy hands deeper into the threadbare sleeves. Killjoy huddled at his side. They were soaked and hungry, but they were free and François intended to do anything, absolutely anything to ensure they'd stay free.

Three days ago, they had fled their assigned transit post. He and several hundred other conscripts had been stalled for two days on a Brittany railroad platform waiting for a train that did not arrive. The destination was widely rumored to be eastern Poland.

German guards had let slip that there had been an uprising in the Warsaw Jewish ghetto. Seven thousand armed Jews there were fighting the Germans. Others were hiding in underground bunkers. All were refusing to board trains to the east as forced foreign workers.

It occurred to François that the Yorkshire populace should have done the same.

Without the Polish Jews as forced labor, essential war materiel was not being produced on schedule. So other conscripts were being moved east to fill the gap, while the Warsaw Jews held out for fairer terms and assurances of safety. Rumors of villages being wiped out in pogroms had the Warsaw ghetto elders on their guard.

It had been bitterly cold at the train platform and, unsurprisingly, the Germans in charge had been lured into an office with offers of hot coffee. The French railroad men knew how to give their countrymen a fair chance and, at a wink from the local conductor, François had grabbed it.

There had been two dozen others, at least, who had also run into the twilight. Many were probably dead. François had heard the sound of dogs and a scattering of shots, but he kept running, dragging a young footman named Jimmy Killjoy along. Jimmy was only a lad of thirteen, but tall for his age, so the Germans had refused to believe his age and taken him. The lad was the last of the Pumphrey Manor staff to accompany François. Others had been assigned elsewhere, a few had died. Three grooms had been executed. The butler was determined to get Killjoy home. It was a matter of duty to Mrs Pumphrey and of his personal honor.

François had grabbed a lucky chance with no clear plan. He decided to go to the home of a distant relative, a second cousin lived in a village not too far from Calais.

François hadn't seen the man since they were teenagers. They had never been close. His cousin had scoffed at François' ambition to become a butler, whereas his lofty goal in life was to design and make gentleman's hats for sale in Paris.

Family news was that the lad had never sold a single hat. He'd become a miller and married a local woman, a miller's daughter ten years his senior. Still, they were family and François fervently hoped that blood ties stood for something.

As darkness fell, François woke Killjoy and led the trembling boy across wintry fields and along hedgerows, keeping watch for German patrols as they crept through the night, hungry, wet and cold.

Audrey found the kitchen area remarkably efficient. The cave were dim and shadowy, but the table were mere steps from the fire ring and oven. So, she could cook and clean-up in far less time. The constant fire had gradually warmed the surrounding rock walls and they'd begun to radiate heat, particularly in the kitchen. It gave a golden light that turned the kitchen a buttery hue and gave her a sense of coziness that weren't there at first, when the bolt hole were largely uninhabited.

Now it were full of people and their hubbub helped fill the cavernous space with life, laughter, bickering and all the usual foolishness human beings get up to when they haven't enough to keep them busy.

Richard Alderson had taken to whittling and Duke Edward was captivated by his skill. Those two made an unlikely pair. Richard were a stoic, but had a sense of humor lurking behind his silence. The Duke were suave and talkative, if a bit unworldly. He seemed like a foreigner suddenly dropped into their midst and, in a way, perhaps he were. For whatever reason, Richard had taken a liking to the man and felt free to tell him what needed doing and how to go about it.

Together, the men made themselves useful, splitting wood, shaving kindling for fire starting, exploring the side tunnels and trekking out twice daily to the shed to tend the horses, check in at Heston Grange and bring summat back for the pot, usually small game, such as rabbits or grouse taken during their outings, or fresh eggs, root vegetables, milk and a chicken for the pot.

At the moment, Audrey were busy making broth from a brace of grouse she'd roasted for their supper. She'd separated the meat from the bones and was boiling the bones with carrots and onion to make Siegfried’s meal. The dogs would happily gobble up the boiled vegetables.

Siegfried were improving. His fever had broke and she'd removed the chest wrapping. His right arm now hung in a sling. Audrey could see that it hurt, but it also lightened his mood to be fully dressed and to have limited use of his right hand, at least. Now he were simply in need of rest.

At the moment, however, Siegfried were restless. He wandered around the main cavern, simply taking in the presence of the others. Jess followed at his heels and Scruff followed Jess. It formed a little parade of sorts and it made Audrey smile and murmur, "Ridiculous man!"

Siegfried paused in his circuit. The dank, miserable cave had been transformed by the presence of his people. Plus one. He stood amazed with Jess leaning into his left hand and he watched them all busy with one thing or another.

Audrey was chopping veg in the kitchen. She felt his gaze and smiled at him before returning to her bustling about, as if she'd always lived in a cave.

Helen and Jenny were washing clothing in the copper kettle. They'd strung lines overhead and any manner of clothing dripped there while the sisters rubbed his blood stained shirt on a scrub board, laughing together.

Meanwhile Richard appeared to be teaching the former King of Great Britain how to whittle a wooden chain from a single long stick of alder. It struck Siegfried as bizarre. There sat the man they'd hoped would be killed. The man who might have prevented this massive cock-up, whom Siegfried had blamed for all the hardship and heartbreak.

Siegfried himself had privately pondered how he might get close enough to assassinate that gentleman laughing in good natured camaraderie with another would-be assassin.

Yet, somehow the Germans failed to do the job and Siegfried had freed that royal ass, the first King of Great Britain to voluntarily renounce his crown. Richard II had been deposed in 1399, forced out by Henry Bolingbroke. James II had fled in 1688, forever clinging to the fiction that he was the rightful ruler, but never able to regain the throne.

That man sitting with Richard by a cheery fire was the man who had made peace with Hitler, the man responsible for the loss of three quarters of the island to German invaders, the man whose failure in judgment had caused Tristan and James to be taken away by force, along with every other able bodied man from the region.

Was he a fool? Was he evil? Was he a traitor to his kingdom? Did he truly deserve to die for his sins? Perhaps, but Siegfried felt Audrey’s eyes on him. It was as if she read his thoughts. He saw her shake her head, as if to say 'It innt for us to judge. Leave it in God's hands.'

Siegfried felt his anguish melt away. Trusting Audrey’s greater wisdom in matters of morality and charity, he approached the pair of men and, when they turned to him, he stuck out his hand to Edward Windsor and stated, "I admit that I spent many a night contemplating how to kill you, your Royal Highness. I apologize if I've misjudged you."

"In your place," the Duke replied, looking up. "It would have been my duty to do much the same, Mr Farnon. I understand from your friends that you love our country. I cannot fault your loyalty to our home, Mr Farnon. Furthermore, I owe you a debt I cannot repay. I am forever grateful for your freeing me."

"It was by mistake," Siegfried admitted. "I'd only intended to prevent our horses being shipped to the fighting. I admit, however, it is one of my most successful mistakes of so very many in a long lifetime of egregious errors."

Charmed, the Duke of Windsor stood, offered his hand and stated quite formally, causing the others to pause, stand and watch as Siegfried accepted the Duke's offered hand.

"The Germans hoped to use me as a pawn, Mr Farnon," Duke Edward said. "Although I had renounced my throne, they persisted in claiming I ruled the Kingdom. They intended to use me to force surrender of the remaining forces holding out in Scotland and Wales. Herr Hitler, it seems, grows tired of us. He is eager to turn his forces against the oil rich Middle East and North Africa, to break faith with his chums in Egypt, Iran and the Arab tribes, just as he broke faith with me.. Then, I believe he will loose his terrible war machine on India and China, betraying Japan. You, Sir, prevented that final play to subjugate Great Britain from coming to fruition. Your 'mistake' , as you call it, saved your country and it gave us a fighting chance, slim though it may seem."

Siegfried broke the handshake and looked away, embarrassed by the lavish, undeserved praise. All he'd managed, in his mind, was saving the finest British horse flesh from war and crippling himself in the process.

He caught Audrey smiling at him, clearly pleased to see the men reconcile."We aren't here to hide away like vermin, your Royal Highness," Siegfried said softly. "Richard’s for blowing up a few bridges and generally raising hell with Gerry's supplies and reinforcements. So am I. What do you say? Shall we attack behind the lines? Shall we fight back and take back what is ours? Will you lead us, Sire?"

That evening, Marjorie and Mr Johns passed through the German lines without incident. Feldwebel Alten had provided the necessary authorization and no guard thought to question the paperwork.

They drove through no-man's land while artillery fire shattered the night. Mr Johns navigated the roadless waste of bomb craters and dragons teeth with skill, easing the Rover through endless tracts of rutted mud and around debris unrecognizable as former homes, towns or farm buildings.

At last, they reached the other side, only to discover that the Welsh civilian defense posed an entirely different problem.

Chapter Text

"You may very well be the German Kaiser's second cousin," the Maer Etholedig of Llangollen chirupped in his lilting accent. "Don't make no never-mind here, my dear lady. A letter of passage from a Feldwebel is just a tad less impressive on this side of things, if you take my meaning."

"Indeed I do Mister Maer," Marjorie agreed, holding her temper, "but we are merely attempting to drive through to Cardiff to hire a boat to continue on to occupied Ireland, you see. Your men are welcome to accompany us, if you doubt our intentions."

"Ah! It's Cardiff you're wanting, is it?" the little man mused. "Well, makes no never-mind at all. As for sending one of us north men along, we need every warm body holding the barricades, my dear lady! Women, men and boys, leaving only our littlest maids at home to milk, feed the stock and cook. Not one of us is free for your 'lah-dee-dah' lark to swan off down to Cardiff. If it were possible, I'd be first to volunteer, but it ain't."

"But we're all citizens of Great Britain, on the same side as you," she all but pleaded.

"Ah, well, you're certainly British," he stated, sagely wagging his curly head and staring at the Rover, "but I cannot agree we be on exactly the same side. Can I? In truth, your English king made peace with Germany and then the scamp skeddaddled off to hide in Scotland! Left us sons of Uther Pendragon to fend for ourselves! Am I misinformed?!"

At that, even Marjorie Pumphrey was stumped. The mayor of Llangollen was right, as far as it went, but she had sworn secrecy. She could not explain that she'd been sent by that very 'scamp' to make his brother their next King and hope Bertie could organize colonial forces to liberate England from the invaders.

Mr Johns piped up, however. "How far to Lleyn?" he asked. "We can catch a boat across easier there than Cardiff, Mrs Pumphrey. It's closer."

"Noaw, there's an idea, there is! See, my son's wife's cousin, Willem is from near by Lleyn and poor lad hasn't seen my cousin's niece in two months, and her with child. Give our lonesome Willem a ride and a bit of money for getting back here and I'll guarantee your passage.

Marjorie offered her hand and said, "Thank you Maer ... I didn't catch your family name, sir?"

"Evans, Evan Evans, my good lady," he beamed and shook hands with Mrs Pumphrey and then with Mr Johns. "Willem Evans!" he shouted into the night. "Send word to 'come at the run.' He's a lucky man, going home to visit pretty Janey with these fine English folk in their fine green machine, muddy as it is."

"Bloody hell!" Lieutenant Willis huffed as the aeroplane bounded and dipped in the violent storm.

A tinny voice with a Canadian drawl came hissing over the intercom system, "Diverting to Wales, Millie," the pilot announced. "We'll take our first chance to land, it's getting too wild. Sorry, kid!"

"What's wrong?" Richard demanded. He had traveled to North America by ship. This was his first trip on an aeroplane.

"Weather!" the Lieutenant snapped. "Diverting South into bloody Wales, instead of Scotland. Sorry, Martin. We'll have to play it by ear getting you to your friends." She winked and Richard felt a hot blush tint his cheeks.

The flight had been terrifying. First, he was well aware of the principles of aerodynamic flight. Even so, the impressive size of the massive B-17 did make him doubt the machine could actually achieve flight. The roar of it's mighty engines as it sped faster and faster down the runway made him fear for his young life, but it suddenly lifted off and proved him wrong to doubt American technology. Second, winter storms brewing to the North had flung turbulence spiraling down from polar regions to buffet the plane, causing Richard’s stomach to drop and squirm, as he clutched tight to his hard metal and canvas seat.

Lieutenant Willis patted his hand and said, "Don't worry Martin. These things hardly ever crash into the sea." She gave wicked chuckle and squeezed his hand tighter. It occurred to Richard that the young lady might be just as terrified as he was. So, he squeezed her hand tighter, saying, "Don't worry, Millie. If we do crash into the North Sea, we're sure to die on impact." That earned Richard a hearty laugh and a brilliant smile as Lieutenant Willis tossed her red curls in brave defiance.

Siegfried had stopped his wandering, enjoyed his bowl of broth and returned to his bed, as ordered by Mrs Hall. After months of preparation of this sanctuary, while running between endless farm calls, he was beyond tired. More than that, he was relieved and, in a funny way, he was content. He felt secure for the first time in months, as if he could finally relax knowing Audrey Hall was near, looking after him and tending to those under his care.

He'd crawled into his alcove and discovered a fresh sheepskin. His had been soaked by sweat and the cooling water Mrs Hall had applied. The woman never missed a chance to set things in order. He snuggled into the wooly comfort and dragged his freshly aired blankets up to his chin. The tunnels were unheated and damp. It felt so good to snuggle into clean bedding

A moment passed and Siegfried was already drifting to sleep when someone scratched at his privacy curtain.

Richard Alderson poked his head in and said, "A word?"

Richard slipped inside and settled on a block of stone near the head of Siegfried’s bedding alcove.

"I don't trust our former monarch," he murmured very softly. "I've been keeping him close, Siegfried. He's putting on a good act, but there are little things that I've noticed, like how he were with Mr Dobson. Looked at him like a freak. And, asking about the Travellers and the Chapman family. I do not trust the bugger. If he's what I think he is, he's playing us for fools and he'll deal with us as traitors. He'll sell us out to the Gerries. I'll hang. You'll hang and our women, too, if they're lucky."

Siegfried scrambled upright, thoroughly alarmed, but Richard motioned for absolute silence.

"I don't think 'Duke Edward of Windsor' ever really gave up the crown. No man has ever let it go by choice. I don't think he were on that train against his will, neither. I'm thinking our bonny Duke Edward is still our Sovereign and he were on his way to London to personally order an end to the resistance and give over our whole people to the new German Reich. If I'm right, it's the end of us and the end of freedom on British soil. He were going to order a total surrender, as our King, to save his own sorry hide and suck up to that mad Corporal, Herr Hitler."

Chapter Text

"Something feels off," James shouted as they patrolled the sleeping village of Dobrota. The night was cold and painfully windy. The erratic wind whipped the waters of the Adriatic into frothy disarray as it roared first one way and suddenly another.

They could hardly communicate, much less hear any approaching trouble. It had them both feeling extremely jumpy. James and Tristan had existed in a sort of truce with the locals of Dobrota. It was clear they weren't welcome, but at least they were not Germans and the lascivious old soldaten supposedly in charge left them to it. Even so, neither Tristan nor James could ever truly relax. It was stressful and a miserable way to exist.

"It's the bora!" Tristan shouted back, straining to make himself heard over the incessant howling.

The bora had come suddenly, out of a clear blue winter sky. A cloud bank rolled in over the village at mid-morning as an arctic cold front crashed into Mediterranean warmth, giving birth to these legendary winds.

The mountain peaks above Dobrota disappeared in a heavy fog and an impossibly strong wind punished the region in a roiling burst, sending trash and laundry flapping, cats and dogs running to hide and every brightly painted wooden shutter on every house and official building slamming tight shut.

Dobrota's narrow streets helped shelter the village from the worst of the fierce buffetting, but the narrow passages also raised the moan of the wind to a terrible trumpeting shriek as winds met impenetrable stone walls.

"Vesna warned me about it," Tristan explained. "She said people here go mad from it! Last year the former mayor ran naked through the streets, chasing a nonexistent thief. He fell into the water and nearly drowned."

"Vesna!" James shouted, ignoring the bizarre tale. "A local girl? Here, but they all hate us!"

Tris ducked into the shelter of a doorway and dragged James in close beside him. "We have our uses, old chap. Her name is Vesna Vuković!" He spoke it like something divine. "Big blue eyes, long blonde braids, thick as your arm. She's a goddess, Jim." He smirked and added, "She also works in the new Mayor's office and knows everything, I mean every single thing that goes on in this flyspeck of a festering cyst on the rump of Europe. She wants out, pal. We want out and she will take us along as her protectors."

"Orthodox?" James hissed, wondering which violent local faction would come after them if they helped Vesna Vuković run away. "Catholic?"

Tristan frowned and shook his head, "Practicing Catholic, but only on paper. James, Vesna is Jewish. When ugly rumors of Germans rounding up her people reached Vesna, she altered papers in the village files. Hers and others'. She stayed behind to forge travel documents to get the others in her secret congregation out before it was too late. She stayed too long. The underground Rabbi was a stubborn, self centered old man, the last to finally go. Now she's stuck and alone. Her name does not appear on either church registry. It's only in the village files. If some over eager official double checks who's who, Vesna is done for. She'll be sent east. She's got to get out and so must we!"

"When?"

"Maybe tonight," Tristan hissed back. "If this rotten weather holds."

The pair continued their patrol without further discussion. Both were lost in thoughts of possibly getting out of Dobrota and how they might somehow manage to reach home. James imagined himself greeting Helen. Tristan pictured the look of pride and shock on his brother's face at such a coup.

As conscripts, they'd been issued rifles, of course, but only one bullet apiece. Their uniforms were hardly fit for a cross country trek in winter, not even the relatively mild winter along the Mediterranean. There was the question of transport, food, maps, and on and on. Tris might dream up an escape, but it was James’s nature to worry about every detail to ensure they would survive such a madcap gambit.

Hours later, while they lay awake in their guard shack, a rap came at the door. At first James ignored it, thinking the wind was rattling the door. But the sound continued and, after a while, James crawled out of his blankets, pulled on his great coat and opened the door.

He swung open the door. It tore out of his grip to crash against the shack.

Vesna Vuković stood on the threshold, holding her flapping scarf and collar tight against the storm. Together they fought the door shut.

"Come in," James blurted, grabbing up his trousers from the back of a chair.

Tristan rolled out of his covers and dressed, welcoming Vesna with a shy grin. "I hoped you might come," he said. "Such a perfect evening for a stroll."

James heated the kettle and brewed a pot of wildflower tea and the three huddled around the tiny coal stove to talk.

"I am leaving tonight," Vesna stated. "I have a small fishing boat and enough water and tinned food for a week,, two weeks if we're careful. I warn you, it will be very dangerous. If you prefer to stay behind, I understand. I must go."

"Now seems ideal," Tristan countered. "The Gerries will never expect it."

"That is because sailing during the bora is very dangerous," Vesna replied, "regardless of the skill of the crew. I am a good sailor. I've known these waters my whole life, but you have not. The high chop will make navigation nearly impossible. The wind will fight us if I try to follow a route. I plan to let the bora choose our destiny. It blows out to sea and generally to the west. I think we might make Trieste if we don't sink. Tiny droplets lifted by the wind create 'sea smoke'. It will hide us, but it also blinds us to every danger. Old men have a saying: 'When the bora sails, you don't!'"

Tristan looked to James. "What do you say, Jim?" he grinned. "Fancy a cruise?"

James nodded and grinned, "Sounds absolutely perfect."

Vesna gazed from one grinning fool to the other and sighed, "You wonderful Englishmen are both certifiably mad!"

Richard gripped Robbie's hand as the B-17 angled into a sharp descent.

"Hold tight," she hissed.

Richard wasn't sure whether she meant he should squeeze her hand tighter, but he decided to risk it. The feel of her fingers clenched against his palm was perhaps the best possible way to face death.

The aeroplane swooped and bucked. It fell suddenly before leveling out, leaving Richard's stomach somewhere far above. Then, with a bone shaking jolt, the wheels hit the tarmac and the engines screamed. Richard smelled hot rubber and wondered if they'd caught fire.

Somehow they rocketed to a shuddering halt and Robbie yipped, "We're down!" making Richard wish he could kiss her smiling face. Instead, he stood and offered to carry her case, just as if they were man and wife. She gave him a saucy wink and murmured, "We're on, Mr Warrick.

Richard replied, "After you, Mrs Warrick!" and they staggered off the rocking plane and into a stormy night, wind whipping and rain drenching them both before their feet even touched the ground.

Robbie led the way across the dark landing strip toward a little shack. A faint glimmer through the blackout curtains and the storm was the only clue of the shack's existence. As they approached, however, the throaty thrum of a powerful engine penetrated the rain and wind.

A motor car became visible. It bounded across the rutted field and, for a moment, Richard stopped and stared, unbelieving. Then, too excited for explanations, he ran to the green Rover calling out, "Mr Farnon!"

When a lady and a gentleman far too old and wizened to be Siegfried Farnon emerged from the Rover, Richard clapped his mouth shut and peered around, as if hoping to find his friend, but no. Siegfried Farnon didn't appear from the darkness.

"Do you know Mr Farnon?" the lady asked, drawing Richard back from his dark thoughts of his friend's fate.

"That's his Rover, isn't it!" Richard replied. "Yes, I know him. I consider him my friend, my best friend, in fact. Can you tell me, please, is Mr Farnon alright? Is he alive? In good health?"

A thousand more questions struggled to spill forth, but Robbie took Richard in hand. She said, "Millie Warrick," extending her hand. "This is my husband," she began, hoping to remind the babbling civilian that they were supposed to be on a covert mission, but Richard interrupted.

"My name is Richard Carmody. I've maintained a long and fruitful correspondence with Mr Farnon and I've come back from America in order to make sure he's alright! He hasn't been in touch for nearly a year!"

Robbie rolled her eyes, their cover blown, and amended her introduction to, "Lieutenant Willis, actually. I am in charge of getting Mr Carmody to his friend, at the request of his employer, MP Winston Churchill."

This time it was Marjorie Pumphrey who gaped and stammered, "You? You actually know Winston Churchill? Oh, thank the Lord!"

Audrey scratched at Siegfried’s curtain. There was no answer, but she peeked inside and saw he was awake, clearly lost in thought.

"Cuppa?" she asked and he straightened in his covers and nodded.

"Thank you, Mrs Hall," he murmured with a half smile.

"I want a word," she plunged in. She had seen through this man's polite self control on that day when he lost his sense of duty as a gentleman and behaved merely as a man lost in the rigors of love. "You aren't my boss anymore, not since you fired me and tried to ship me off to Halifax."

Siegfried looked decidedly uncomfortable, but said, "True. I only hoped to keep you safe. I am grateful to have you here, instead."

Audrey nodded and said, "Good." Gathering her courage, she continued, "There were a line you mentioned some years ago between an employer and employee ..." Her words ran out as his expression turned funny.

"Go on ... please," he rasped.

Audrey took his teacup from his trembling hands before he spilled hot tea over his bedding. "I don't work for you now ... or for anyone with Mrs Pumphrey gone. So, it seems odd to keep calling you Mr Farnon, like a stranger, when you are my best and truest friend ... Siegfried."

She hadn’t expected his reaction. Happiness or a joke to deflect any awkwardness, were what she'd thought likely, but never the dark look of desire that flared in his gaze. His eyes burned as he gently took her hand, raised it to brush a kiss across her knuckles and murmured, "How I have hoped ... longed for this ... Audrey. I hope with all my heart to be more than your best friend, my dear dear girl." Then he turned her hand to kiss her palm and press it to his heart.

Chapter Text

Marjorie Pumphrey climbed the narrow metal ladder into the American aeroplane. They'd discussed options huddled inside the little hut, while the men replenished the machine's fuel. She had chosen to accept a seat on the return flight, abandoning the original far more risky and complicated gambit of taking an Irish fishing boat across the North Atlantic to Halifax through winter storms and German patrolled waters .

Mr Johns had objected but, when he saw she would not waiver, he requested his lady's permission to remain. He would join the fighters holding the Welsh barricades. The newly arrived youngsters had taken possession of the Rover's keys. The Lieutenant knew the way to Darrowby and, though she didn't elaborate, insisted she had ways and means to deliver her charge, Mr Carmody, safely to his friend.

Marjorie had taken that lad aside for a quiet word. She explained that Siegfried Farnon had been injured, that he was in hiding and being cared for, but had officially closed his practice. She explained how Richard might get word to his friend through a farmer named Mr Dobson.

So, Marjorie would go on alone. She turned in the doorway for one last precious look at the people clustered at the far edge of the field. They were mostly strangers to her, except Mr Johns. Still, she felt she knew them. That pair of youngsters, so brave and naive. The brave and steady men who ran the airfield, despite the danger. Yes, she'd only must spent an hour with them,, but they were her people, the fruit of her island, her world. It stood on the brink of defeat and, on some level, she was leaving them behind to carry on. A swell of emotion swept through her at the sight of Mr Johns and the others waving her off. They would do their duty and stay.

She must do her duty and go.

So, with two letters and a ducal ring to deliver, Marjorie Pumphrey allowed the aeroplane crew to get her settled into a canvas and metal seat, adjusted straps against the rough weather and whispered a heartfelt prayer for her home and her people as the aeroplane engines sputtered and began to turn over, rapidly growing into an all consuming roar that drove all rational thought out of Marjorie’s mind, leaving only worry and fervent hope.

Then there was a sudden drop in the roar and the aeroplane stopped its swaying forward motion. It still rocked side to side, but then the little entry door swung open. A cold blast of wind and peppering of rain preceded the surprising return of Siegfried’s young friend, Mr Carmody.

He wiped his dripping mop of hair back off his forehead and slumped wetly into the seat beside her. "I realized that knowing Mr Farnon is alive has achieved my main purpose, to ensure his welfare, " the young man stated. "I would have relished seeing him again, but I find that I cannot allow you to travel all on your own, Mrs Pumphrey, simply for the pleasure of seeing Mr Farnon again. If you'll accept my help, I shall escort you and make your introduction to Mr Churchill."

" You have come a very long way, young man, only to turn back around," she smiled, patting his damp sleeve. "Why would you choose to do this, Mr Carmody?"

He answered shyly, "It's a matter of a gentleman's honor and I truly believe that Mr Farnon would want me to give my help to his good friend. He would never give the keys to his Rover to a mere acquaintance. You must be a cherished friend to him."

Robbie Willis stood at the edge of the airfield and watched the B-17 rev its engines to a mighty roar. She'd been sorry to have Mr Carmody bolt with a hurried farewell, but not surprised. Richard Carmody was an odd one, full of contradictions. It had only taken a moment for him to realize that his Mr Farnon would want Mrs Pumphrey to be supported in her mission to connect with Mr Churchill.

Richard Carmody seemed a man to never let down a friend. Robbie watched the B-17 take off into the growing storm and she hoped she'd meet that odd gentleman with the piercing gaze again someday. If they ever met again, she hoped to count among his very good friends.

"We need to go slow, Siegfried," Audrey stated firmly, stroking his dear face. "I am a divorced woman. I were your housekeeper for years, not in your class, but living largely unchaperoned under your roof. Things are changing with this war, just as they changed a bit at the last I think, but slowly. So, let's not get too far ahead of ourselves."

Siegfried nodded, both crushed and committed to doing as Audrey saw fit. She was right, of course. Not that he gave a damn about local gossip and rural mores. The fact that folks would wink and look the other way if he'd simply bedded her, but might refuse to hire him if they wed, well the double standard wasn't lost on him. The costs to the Practice and to Audrey’s standing in Darrowby could be significant.

And yet ... except for Audrey’s feelings, Siegfried couldn't make himself care. Yes, in their narrow little world, he approached the status of 'gentry,' of a sort, but he was hardly a Lord to the Manor Born. He was merely educated and a hard working professional. He worked for men deemed his 'betters' by accident of blood, nothing more. Many of those men were idiots, others were venal, cruel and self-serving. How such people could be elevated above this kind, intelligent, moral, lovely woman, a pinnacle of womanhood, mystified and angered him.

Of course, he'd been raised understanding social rules, but Siegfried Farnon was observant enough that, long before he was out of short pants, he'd seen the flaws in such a preordained, unchanging hierarchy. That royal fascist enjoying their hospitality was living proof of the problem. In fact, the concept that any one person or family or bloodline or race might be deemed automatically superior smacked of the foul philosophy undergirding Herr Hitler’s rise to power.

Siegfried would go slow for Audrey’s sake. He would do anything she asked, but it was long past time for change. She had taken her first brave step toward personal emancipation by leaving her husband and her next momentous step in getting a divorce. He felt in his hopeful heart, there'd be another moment of brave clarity when she came to see that others' opinionsof their relationship meant less than nothing, particularly compared to the depth of his love and respect, if only he were allowed to show her.

Chapter Text

"You carry two letters I'm told, Mrs Pumphrey?" Winston Churchill rumbled. "Mr Carmody explained your serendipitous meeting in Wales and your dual mission. It is Fate. Fate is on our side, for once, that fickle temptress."

Marjorie had endured a harrowing flight into Halifax and a swift car trip south across the border through mountains and forests to finally follow the Hudson River Valley to pass by New York City and then arrive in Washington DC rumpled and travel worn. She had followed Richard Carmody into The Presence, watched as her young escort handed over Fredrik Alten's letter, completing her promise to her German friend and confidante.

Now, she stood in Churchill’s presence, watching his every move. She hardly knew what to make of the man who paced the room, his hands linked behind his broad back, Alten's letter untouched on his table.

Winston Churchill was a very public figure, reviled by many and respected or feared by serious people in the halls of power. Her late husband had been active in politics and admired this man. So much so that he had given his life in an ill fated invasion plan, master minded by Churchill. Her son had died for him, as well, in a later deadly incident that didn’t even rise to the level of battle. Though it had all happened a lonely lifetime ago, standing in Churchill’s presence evoked an avalanche of emotions, ill suited to her mission.

Instinctively, Churchill suddenly turned and fixed his gaze on Marjorie. His face and tone softened. "You lost someone very dear, madam, someone under my command, I fear." It was not a question.

Marjorie nodded slightly and stated quite clearly, "Two dear ones, Mr Churchill. My husband first, lost at Gallipoli. My son a year later in Palestine. I am left alone. We had no other children."

Churchill sat, heavily, as if the weight of responsibility bore him down. "So many tallied to my account, each so dear and promising." He lifted his hands helplessly, at a loss for words. His expression conveyed the regret and shame better than any apology or condolence.

In that moment, Marjorie knew her husband and son had died in service to a humane leader, if guilty of human flaws. She also knew Churchill hoped to read both letters, although Edward Windsor had not intended the letter entrusted to her for anyone but his brother.

Marjorie stepped forward to carefully place the second envelope, the one bearing Edward VIII's personal seal, on a small table beside Churchill’s armchair. "Would you care to sit?" he asked. "Perhaps a sherry, Mrs Pumphrey?"

"If you'll excuse me," she demurred, "it has been a tiring journey. When you have finished, please return the letter. I did promise to personally deliver it to the the King’s brother, Mr Churchill."

"And so you shall, madam," he replied. "And so you shall, with my most humble gratitude for your understanding and trust in my discretion."

As she turned to leave, he asked, "Before you go to rest, would you tell me their names, please, Mrs Pumphrey?"

Marjorie felt her eyes swim with tears, but she turned to face him. Her voice was clear and steady as she answered. "My husband was Walter Pumphrey, Colonel Walter Pumphrey. He served under Major-General A G Hunter-Weston and he died at Krithia. The 127th Manchester Brigade had been ordered on a sapping mission, during a full moon on June 2nd. Fifty men fell that night, including my dearest Walter."

Churchill nodded his brows knit and murmured, "Yes. In our bleak days attempting a break through at Helles. Hard days, very hard. Our men acquitted themselves heroically against the Turks, but it was an impossible venture."

After a heavy silence, he prompted, "And your son?"

"Jonathan Pumphrey," Marjorie’s voice cracked, but she rallied to say, "a nineteen year old Lieutenant seconded to Intelligence in Palestine. There was a bomb on a road in that desolate place. Three were killed, including my son."

Churchill heaved himself out of his chair and advanced on her like a great bear. Marjorie held her ground, seeing only grief and regret, no threat in the lumbering man. Still she was taken off guard when he took her hand and lifted it to his bowed forehead, sighing, "Mothers and wives carry the most grievous weight of war and claim none of the glory."

He straightened and squeezed her hand. "You are owed so much more than my eternal gratitude and my inadequate apology, Mrs Pumphrey. Gallipoli was declared a blunder, my blunder. That is all I have to offer you. If I could attone, I would, but what ever can I do that might suffice to balance what you have lost for our country? Nothing. I shall carry your family's sacrifice and your's, Mrs Pumphrey, on my soul until my death and very likely to the great beyond."

Overwhelmed by a wave of anger and something very like disgust, Marjorie whispered, "Excuse me, please." She left swiftly, almost running, and did not pause until she reached her rooms where she flung herself across the bed and wept, like it had all just happened, the memories of her lost loves too suddenly fresh and their deaths too terrible.

Tricki-Woo did his best to comfort his mistress, snuggling close and licking away her tears, until they both fell asleep, exhausted by their travels and by grief.

Winston Churchill returned to his treasure and studied the envelope, wondering what he was about to learn. Then, taking a deep breath to steady his hands, he carefully pried open Edward Windsor's letter, taking great pains not to fracture the King’s hardened sealing wax. He unfolded the single creased piece of paper and his eyes raced down the handwritten page.

Bertie,

I am in fine form. I remain your King, despite rumours I've purposefully planted that I abdicated. That was necessary to save myself. These northern people are cowed and largely placid, but not amenable to our blood ties to Herr Hitler.

You see, I was enroute to London to pronounce the end of all resistance and reinforce friendship ties between the United Kingdom and the New German Empire. As Aryans, Bertie, with bloodlines running straight back to the ancient German House of Wettin, the most venerable of European dynasties, it is only right and entirely natural for us to unite as one superior people with dominion over the lesser races. Simpson agrees and assures me that America will join us in due course. She's spokento Lindbergh who, of course, has the ear of American Industrialists, like Ford and Roebuck.

My trip was unfortunately interrupted when, unbelievably, a lone local horse doctor impudently blew up my train. The man killed my entire escort. Only I survived. He'd no idea who was on board. Neither did he did care! His entire purpose was merely to prevent our German comrades from delivering a train load of requisitioned horses to the fighting in Scotland.

Imagine it! On such inconsequential acts of nonentities, the fate of empires might turn. How's it go, Bertie? 'My kingdom for a horse!'? In this instance several hundred horses, but I was not killed. The fool who 'rescued' me, in fact, required my help, having blown himself up as well as my train. He now keeps me 'safe' from our German forces, while his little group plots sabotage. So, I will linger and do my best to scotch their plotting. I do not intend to lose my kingdom (or forgive him for his treason).

But, I ramble.

These are your orders, brother. I feel certain you are to receive emissaries urging you to declare yourself King, as my heir. The woman who carries this message believes I wish you to rule in my stead.Some think me dead or incapable of reigning due to being held prisoner, others believe I've renounced my crown. The thought of you as my replacement, however, is beyond impossible. Imagine the impression you would make greeting H-H-Herr H-H-Hitler! Absurd. You would be lucky not to join the other cripples and defectives in the German camps. Fortunately, I shall be your protector.

They'll urge you to take up the sword against our friends. Do not. Remember your solemn oath to obey as a British Officer and the fielty you owe to me, you elder brother and crowned Sovereign.

Rather, send trusted people to a farmer known as Dobson here in the wilds outside of a village known as Darrowby. Dobson is the key to saving me from these rebels.

Turn that key, Bertie. Turn it hard. If necessary, turn it until it cracks, if that's what it takes to rescue me from my rescuers.

Edward VIII

Churchill read the letter through twice more. He stood and paced the room, before taking it up and reading it through once again, his hand shaking in anger at the bald treason written in the brief message.

"Carmody!" he roared, "Get me Mr Carmody!"

When Richard arrived, they set to work, the second vital message from Feldwebel Alten forgotten.