The Iron Storm by CW Browning (best fiction novels to read .txt) 📗

trousers and a cream shirt with suspenders. His gray eyes pierced into Evelyn’s before shifting to Jens. He looked to be a little older than her brother Robbie, but the lines at the corner of his eyes suggested that his life hadn’t been as carefree as her brother’s, at least recently. He looked very tired, and Evelyn wondered if perhaps it had been a mistake to come here.

“Marcel?” Jens asked.

The man nodded and looked from one to the other.

“We are friends of Luc,” Evelyn said with a smile, glancing at Jens. “I am Marie Fournier, and this is Jens Bernard. He said we should visit you as we were passing Marle on our way to Paris.”

Marcel raised his eyebrows in surprise and his face seemed to soften slightly. “Did he? Then you should come in.”

He stepped back and motioned them into the house, glancing out the door before closing it. The door opened into a small entryway with a corridor ahead of them and a door leading into a parlor to the left. He waved them into the parlor, following them.

“I’m sorry to intrude in this manner,” Jens said, turning to face him. He pulled the sealed letter from his inside pocket and handed it to Marcel. “I think this will help to explain.”

Marcel nodded and took the envelope, glancing at his name scrawled across the front.

“Please have a seat,” he said, motioning to a small couch placed under the window.

While they moved to sit, he tore open the letter and read it quickly. His face remained neutral, giving no indication of his reaction to what he was reading. When he was finished, he folded it and dropped it on a desk a few feet away.

“So you are escaped from Brussels,” he said, turning to look at them. “How bad is it?”

“It wasn’t when we left, but I understand it’s very bad now,” Jens said. “The Luftwaffe is bombing all the cities heavily.”

“So I’ve heard. I’m sorry. It must be very hard for you to leave your home.” Marcel crossed over to a chair and sat down, crossing his legs. “Josephine writes that you carry information with you. What kind of information?”

Jens hesitated and Marcel smiled faintly. “I need to know, or I cannot help you.”

“I work, or at least I did until the other day, for Belgian State Security,” Jens said slowly. “It seems strange to be telling you this. Please forgive me.”

Marcel waved a hand impatiently. “We all work for somewhere. It’s how we do what we do. Go on.”

“I’m a radio operator. My group worked on intercepting and decoding traffic between the Wehrmacht division command and Berlin.” Jens cleared his throat. “A few months ago I was approached by a man who said he worked for the Deuxième Bureau. He asked me to pass on any information that could help the Allies. I agreed. I’ve been sending information to him ever since.”

“And then the invasion happened.”

“That’s right. In the days leading up to the invasion, I was able to decode and copy several messages, much more than I ever had before, and they detail the command structure and, more importantly, the battle plans for the invasion of England.”

“What?!” Evelyn stiffened and looked at him in shock. “England? But they haven’t even got to France yet!”

“They’re not far off,” Marcel said dryly. “Where are these messages now?”

“I have them with me. When the invasion began, I fled to France with the intention of passing them on to my contact.” Jens flushed faintly. “Josephine tells me that that would not be a wise thing to do.”

“Who was your contact?”

“Asp.”

The first flicker of emotion Evelyn had seen yet appeared in Marcel’s face, fleeting and gone before she could be sure it had ever been there.

“I see. Josephine was quite right. It wouldn’t be a good idea at all. Asp is passing information to the Germans, and anything you give him will simply end up right back in Germany.”

“Can you get it to someone who will know what to do with it?”

“I can. But why don’t you take it directly to the British?”

“I wouldn’t know how to go about it,” Jens confessed. “I thought the Deuxième Bureau would pass it along.”

Evelyn bit the inside of her cheek to stop from displaying any outward reaction to that. Good God, if she had known what was in the messages, she could have saved them both a trip!

“Anyway, there are also points about the invasion of France and what demands the Germans will make upon the French government,” Jens continued, unaware of the inner struggle happening beside him. “So you see, it is pertinent to both France and Britain.”

Marcel nodded and was quiet for a moment, thinking, and Jens looked at Evelyn. She smiled encouragingly, still smarting from the revelation that she could easily have taken the information to Bill instead of sitting here in a parlor in Marle while Panzers rolled into Sedan.

“Have you contacted Asp since you arrived in France?” Marcel asked, breaking the silence.

“Yes. He’s expecting me.”

“Then you must go. If he suspects that you’re aware of his association with the enemy, it won’t be safe for either of you. You must go and take him the information.”

“But I can’t! You just agreed that I can’t!”

“You won’t be taking him the real messages,” Marcel assured him with a quick smile. “I’ll put together a false packet, including just enough fact to make it believable if he reads it. May I have the messages?”

Jens hesitated, then nodded and stood up, removing his coat. Evelyn and Marcel watched as he turned the collar inside out and pulled at the seam. It came away easily and he folded it back to reveal several thin sheets of paper pinned into the lining.

“I didn’t know how else to carry it,” he confessed, carefully unpinning each sheet. “If I were searched at the border, I would have been arrested as a traitor.”

“Very good thinking,” Marcel said approvingly, getting up and walking over to accept each sheet as