But what about the family he was living with? She’d been prepared to stammer out an explanation of who she was here to see to whoever came to the door, but it remained closed, the house clearly empty.
Lily waited another minute before she started to turn to go back down the path, stopping after just a step. She couldn’t leave it at that. To work up all this courage only to walk away at the first hurdle…? She glanced again at the house, but, of course, she couldn’t see any lights inside, thanks to the blackout curtains. Still, it felt empty.
Then she noticed a wooden gate at the side of the house that no doubt led to the back garden. Hardly daring to believe she was considering it—she didn’t do things like this—Lily walked towards the gate. It was latched, but when she stood on her tiptoes, she was able to work the latch from the other side. A bit of back and forth and it slid free, pinching Lily’s fingers in the process, but she didn’t care.
She glanced around, but no one was about, and even if there was, they wouldn’t be able to see her. Everything was swathed in deep, blackout darkness. Holding her breath, she pushed the gate, and it swung open with a shudder and creak.
The narrow alley that ran the length of the house was darker still, and the paving stones were slick under Lily’s shoes. There was a faint smell of drains and when she pressed one hand against the brick wall to steady herself, she felt damp seep through her gloves.
What was she doing here? What could she possibly hope to find? Yet she kept walking, feeling her way along the wall, having no real idea why, only that she needed to do something, just as Sophie had.
The narrow alleyway emerged into the back garden, exactly like just about every other on the street, or Holmside Road, for that matter. A rectangle of muddy grass—it hadn’t been turned into a Victory garden, which was a bit surprising—and a back door that led into the kitchen. There was no blackout curtain, but the room was dark.
By the pale light of the slender moon, Lily was just about able to make out the bulky shapes of furniture—a table, two chairs, a sink, a range cooker, and a larder cupboard.
She turned away from the door, gazing blankly at the dark garden. There was no Anderson shelter, just an expanse of muddy grass, everything seeming unlived and unloved in a way she didn’t understand. Surely there should be a washing line, or a vegetable patch— or something. There was nothing.
There was no reason for her to hang about here, and it would look decidedly odd if Matthew came home and found her skulking about the back garden. Lily knew she would never be able to explain it, and her cheeks heated simply at the thought of having to do so. She needed to leave, immediately, before she was discovered by Matthew or a nosy neighbor.
She’d just started back to the alley alongside the house when she heard a noise coming from the opposite side of the garden—the sound of something alive, although she couldn’t have said what it was. Blinking through the gloom, she made out a rickety little shed against the garden wall.
Lily hesitated, her heart starting to pound. The horrid absurdity of the situation struck her forcefully—really, what had she been thinking, coming here like this, skulking about in the garden, looking for clues like some schoolgirl detective? And yet somehow, despite that, she found herself turning around and walking slowly towards the shed.
The sound came again, like a soft sigh, almost a moan. A strange sound, especially to come from a dilapidated little shed, that looked as if it should hold firewood or coal, perhaps a rusty bicycle or two.
Lily reached for the latch. It slipped out easily, and the door swung open. She stepped into the darkness, breathing in a sweetish animal scent. Rustling sounded all around her, and she heard the strange sigh again—it was a cooing, she realized. The shed was full of birds. They rustled again, louder, making her want to step back, yet she stood still.
By the pale sliver of moonlight, she was able to make them out—at least a dozen, all in wicker cages. They rustled and cooed and clucked, disturbed by her presence.
It wasn’t entirely out of place for someone to keep birds, Lily knew, although she’d thought pigeons had been requisitioned for the war effort years ago. Then she noticed that each of the birds had a small metal canister attached to one of their legs. These had to be carrier pigeons, meant to send messages into occupied Europe. She’d heard about such things, but only vaguely, and now, curious in spite of every instinct telling her to walk away, she reached into the cage closest to her and unfastened the metal tube from the bird’s leg.
It took a moment of fussing, and the bird tried to peck her hand, but for a reason she couldn’t articulate, Lily was determined. She unscrewed the lid of the tube and withdrew the paper folded tightly inside. She had to step outside the shed and hold the paper up to the moonlight to read it, but when she was able to make out the words—only just—her heart felt as if it had dropped right out of her chest. The message was in German.
At least, she thought it was German. The only German she’d seen was in newsreels about Hitler, but she thought she recognized the style, and some of the words. Der. Sind. Heer.
She stared at the message, desperately trying to think of a suitable reason why Matthew Lawson would have carrier pigeons in his shed, with messages in German attached to their legs.
A noise sounded from somewhere at the front of the house, the squeak of a gate, and Lily jumped. She darted back into the shed and, with shaking fingers, tied the canister back onto the pigeon’s leg; it pecked her hand, causing a hole in her glove, but she couldn’t care about that.
She’d had no time to roll up and replace the message, so she slipped it into her pocket, where it seemed to pulse in awful accusation. A message in German. What if someone found it? What on earth would they think?
What did she think?
She knew many Germans living in England had been classified as enemy aliens. They’d been rounded up at the start of the war, many of them Jews, and sent to internment camps as far away as the Isle of Man, although the public outcry since then had had the majority of them released. Still, people were afraid of spies, seemed to see them everywhere.
She thought of the posters she’d seen on her way to work, or by the Underground—“Zipp it! Careless Talk Costs Lives!” or “Bits of Careless Talk Are Pieced Together By The Enemy” with a picture of a jigsaw map of Europe and a hand moving the pieces with an awful swastika ring. Some people said there were hundreds—thousands of spies, all through the country, listening, watching, waiting for the right moment.
Another noise sounded from somewhere in the street
, and Lily knew she couldn’t stay here a moment longer. She hurried out of the shed, her legs watery, her hands shaking as she latched the door. Her mind was buzzing, a haze of thoughts she couldn’t bear to discern. Messages in German. The empty house. Matthew’s clipped, precise voice. The way Tom Reese had said he was strange, even mysterious, joining the regiment later than everyone else… She had to get out of here.
She walked as quickly as she could towards the alleyway, slipping on the damp paving stones and nearly falling. When she threw one hand out to the wall to steady herself, she scraped her wrist hard across the brick. Her breath was coming in ragged gasps, her heart thudding so hard it hurt.
Somehow she made it to the end of the alleyway, and, standing on her tiptoes, she did her best to force the latch’s bolt back in, but she couldn’t manage it. Lily let out a desperate, disbelieving cry, wondering if she should just leave the gate unlatched. Would Matthew even notice? If he was a spy, he would.
Finally the bolt slid through, and Lily let out a near-sob of relief. She whirled around, intending to sprint towards the street and safe towards home, when she caught sight of the figure at the front gate, one hand about to open it. Even in the dark, she knew who it was; she recognized the straight bearing, the set of his shoulders, and the cap on his head.
“Hello,” Matthew said in his familiar, clipped voice. He sounded surprised, and why shouldn’t he be? “Is that you, Lily?”