The Spy by Marc Eden Page B

pants.
    Twilight came, and the hope of deliverance, but night arrives with a bang ! Hamilton decides to squeeze in an extra hour of night firing. Ears ringing, she skips the late supper, and sleeps in her clothes.
    She dreams of guns.
    Sunrise.
    In the dining room the radio is blaring.
Deutschland wird entweder eine Weltmacht werden, oder nicht! Die Welt ist nicht eingerichtet fiir feighe Nationen!
    roared the Reichmaster, leaning into the ganglion of microphones and nodding three times between sentences.
Starke liegen nicht in der Verteidigung, sondern im Angriff!
    â€œAccording to this morning’s BBC report, quoting the Home Office, more than 30,000 people were killed last night in one of the worst raids on London. His Majesty, the King, traveled to the East End to comfort some of the grieving people. From the Northern Registers, the temperature in the Highlands is 81 degrees, as of midnight, with clear skies expected. In other news, following last Wednesday’s meeting of the House of Lords...”
    Hitler again:
Unser Feind Nummer Eins ist England! England kann uns nicht widerstehen! Amerika wird uns nicht widerstehen! Das Grosse deutsche Reich...!
    â€œOh yeah? Fuck him ! Who, the King? Fuck him, too!” An American Ranger turned off the radio. It was on a shelf, at the end of the dining room. Hamilton was telling the man’s officer what a great sport the King was. Sinclair looked at her tray: any meal could be her last.
    It was her fourth and final day of training.
    â€œSo then!” said Hamilton, arrived at the site. Behind him, hot sunlight welled along the crag. “Come over here, Lloyd—that’s a good fellow. Now Valerie, this ‘German’ has a gun. You need it. How are you going to get it? The moon is full and our friend here is on guard duty. McGinty?”
    McGinty, the Senior Trainer, showed the girl what could be accomplished with a large stone if the intended victim were unsuspecting and no other weapon were available. He went through the method of obtaining the gun from the German, over and over again. Then a dummy was used to enable her to hit with the stone so that it would put the victim out. How to hit in another, a vital spot, to kill him. The difference, it was explained, was the Geneva Convention. It was further explained that following the Commando raid on Vaagso, in Norway, code-named ARCHERY, Hitler had directed that all Commandos be shot on sight.
    So much for the Geneva Convention.
    â€œThe choice of one is not a choice,” the Trainer explained, and he ran her through the demanding exercise until her legs trembled, and her body staggered from the overkill. At last, Hamilton and the Trainer were satisfied. Stewing in her own sweat, she stank like a Brighton whore.
    â€œWell, Sinclair,” said the Commander, “I think you are nearly there. Do you not agree, Sergeant-Major?”
    The lass will be a fighting man yet, sir” the Trainer acknowledged, grudgingly.
    Valerie glared at them both.
    Lunch was canceled; the world was a blur.
    The blur was the sun in her eyes and the place was a wide ring where the heat shimmered upwards from the dust. Spectacles were put away and watches were removed from wrists. It was the hand-to-hand combat zone, the “dessert” of the death camp, and the customers looked hungry:
    It was her on the plate.
    It began simply enough—slowly and carefully—how to encircle, where to grab, the mechanics of the throw. The chops, in slow motion—the rock-hard repetition. By late afternoon, she was half-blind from the sweat and half-choking from the dust of the ring. “Have it now, do we?” asked the Trainer.
    She nodded numbly, fumbling with her belt.
    Hamilton had been bothered by the girl’s words in the dining room: I’m not at all sure I could bring myself to kill anyone . The words stuck in his craw. It just wouldn’t do. Thinking about it, he tapped deftly with his riding crop