The Oslo Affair (Shadows of War, #2) by CW Browning (read after .txt) 📗

“Å gud! I completely forgot! A telegram came for you not ten minutes after you left!”

Evelyn’s head snapped around. “What?”

“Yes. I have it here.” Anna opened her purse and pulled out the telegram. “I didn’t want to leave it in the hotel. I thought I was being silly at the time, but now I don’t think I was.”

Evelyn took the telegram and tore it open, scanning the message.

Upon consideration, story not worth expense. Return to London ASAP by all means available. Repeat: LEAVE STOCKHOLM.

She stared at the message, her blood going cold. Did he know about the two agents? Or was there something else? He’d used the code that only the two of them knew, warning her that her life was in danger. But then he’d followed it with very clear instructions to get out of the city. He wanted there to be no misunderstanding. She was to get out of there.

Through the blood pounding in her ears, she heard Anna talking and struggled to focus on what she was saying.

“If they know I’m not in the room, will they break in and search it?” she was asking. “That’s what they do in the books. If they do, I’m even more glad I didn’t leave that in the sitting room. What does it say? It’s not good, is it? Is it from Daniel?”

“No. It’s from London.” Evelyn took a deep breath and turned away from the water, shoving the telegram into her absurdly large handbag. “It says to leave Stockholm and get back to London.”

“Well, I agree with that, but how are you going to do it?” she demanded. “How are we going to get our things from the hotel and arrange a train back to Oslo without them finding you?”

Evelyn was silent for a long time, then she lifted blue eyes to Anna’s face.

“We’re not,” she said. “You are.”

Anna stared at her. “What?”

“I can’t go back to Oslo, but you have to. You’ll take a train home.”

“But what about you?”

“I’ll find a way back to England.”

Anna shook her head vehemently. “Oh no. I’m not leaving you. You don’t speak Swedish, you’re all alone and you have the Gestapo on your heels. I can’t just leave you!”

“It’s too dangerous for you not to,” Evelyn argued. “It was wrong for me to ask you to come. Now you’re in as much danger as I am.”

“You warned me it was dangerous, and I agreed to come anyway. Now we’re in this together. We’ll find a way out of it, but we’ll do it together.”

Evelyn looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, then she pursed her lips.

“Actually,” she said slowly, “there might be a way.”

“Well?” Anna demanded when she didn’t continue right away.

Evelyn was silent, then her lips curved into a slow smile.

“How’s your acting?”

––––––––

Paris, France

Bill walked down the hall quickly, his shoes echoing on the tiled floor. His brows were creased into a furrow as he went, his lips pressed tightly together. It was past noon and he still hadn’t received word from the radio room regarding the telegram he sent to Jian. He didn’t even know if it had been delivered.

When he’d received the message from Daniel the night before, Bill realized immediately that somehow, somewhere, Evelyn’s carefully constructed cover had been blown. Whether it was here in London or there in Oslo was immaterial. The fact remained that this Herr Renner not only knew of her, but had found her in Oslo. There could be no doubt that he was an SS or SD agent. The only question was how he knew about Evelyn.

Bill frowned thoughtfully. It was possible that her run in with Hans Voss last year had made more of an impression than they had originally realized. They had moved quickly at the time to minimize the damage and create a back story for Evelyn that would pass even the rigorous SD and Gestapo checks. Even so, Bill admitted now that it was entirely possible that the Germans had realized who, and what, she really was. But how on earth could they have known that she was going to Norway, of all places? It was hardly a hotbed of intelligence activity at the moment. Yet something had clearly drawn the German agent to Oslo.

Bill thought for a moment. He supposed it could simply be that this Herr Renner was in Oslo to keep an eye on the German scientists from Berlin. After all, the Nazis were known to keep a strict watch on their people. They were kept on a very tight rein when they ventured outside Germany. He supposed that would go double for the scientists. If that was the case, it could just be that Renner had been in Oslo and recognized Evelyn from the description given by Hans Voss last year. They hadn’t bothered to change her appearance. There had seemed to be no need. Perhaps this whole situation was simply something as innocuous as being recognized in the wrong place at the wrong time.

As wonderful as that might be, Bill had a sinking suspicion that it wasn’t the case at all. There were two agents in Oslo now, who had not only recognized Jian, but had proceeded to make their pursuit known. That couldn’t be a coincidence.

Someone was feeding information to both the Soviets and the Germans.

Bill came to a door at the far end of the corridor and reached for the handle. He stepped inside a small room and looked around. There were four desks, two of which were occupied by men with headphones over their heads, wired into large square radios. The only sound in the room was the hum of the radios themselves, and the occasional tapping noise as the radio operators decoded new incoming messages.

Bill closed the door behind him softly and moved forward to lay his hand on the shoulder of one of the radio operators. The man turned his head in surprise and removed the headset from his head.

“Any word yet?” Bill asked