What the hell?

He put his fingers behind his aviator sunglasses and rubbed his eyes.

Am I seeing things?

Shielding his eyes against the glare of the low sun, he looked down at the surface-and the long shadow cast by a fishing boat down there.

He tapped Darmstadter's shoulder. Holding his left index finger upright, he made a circling motion.

Darmstader immediately understood, scanned the sky for other aircraft, and stood the Gooney Bird on her starboard wing, putting her belly toward the sun.

That cut the glare, and when Canidy looked out the windscreen, his direct view was now that of the ocean surface.

"Well, I'll be damned!" he suddenly said.

He motioned to get Darmstadter's attention, then pointed at the ocean surface, signaling for him to take a closer look.

Darmstadter banked the aircraft a little more for a clearer look, then saw the shape of the small boat and its shadow. He nodded, leveled off, then pushed the yoke forward, the nose instantly dipping.

God does take care of fools and drunks, Canidy thought, Canidy thought, and I qualify on both accounts. and I qualify on both accounts.

Canidy got on the intercom.

"Can you get all the way down on the deck, Hank, so I can be sure?" he said. It was a statement more than a question.

Darmstadter made turns so that the Gooney Bird would approach the fishing boat from the stern, keeping to its port side so that Canidy, in the copilot's seat, would have an unobstructed view.

As they closed on the aft of the boat, brightly lit by the sun, Canidy could see four people at the transom. They watched the aircraft, and no doubt wondered what the hell it wanted.

"Not too close," Canidy said over the intercom. "Never know who has an itchy trigger finger."

Darmstadter raised an eyebrow and nodded.

They flew closer, and Canidy was sure he could make out the tall, solidly built man whom he knew to have an olive complexion, thick black hair and mustache, and a rather large nose. He'd last seen him five days ago, when Canidy and professor Arturo Rossi stepped off that boat and into the submarine.

In a flash, the Gooney Bird caught up to the boat and blew past. Canidy had just enough time to glance at the faces aboard-Yep, that's Frank Nola, in the flesh-and to read what was painted on the ship's bow just below the rusty anchor: STEFANIA STEFANIA.

Sweet Jesus, he thought, smiling. he thought, smiling. They did get out okay. They did get out okay.

Or at least look like they're okay.

Then he raised his left hand so that the palm faced down, rocked it left to right, then with his index finger poked repeatedly toward Algiers.

Darmstadter nodded in understanding.

He waved the wings of the Gooney Bird at the crew of the boat, then gained altitude before heading for the airfield.

[THREE].

OSS Whitbey House Station Kent, England 1655 2 April 1943 It had been a ghastly, mind-numbing day. The weather had turned dreadful and dreary-again-the gray-black clouds rumbling with the threat of rain. Worse, the day's paperwork had seemed endless. And as twenty-two-year-old Charity Hoche walked quickly down the wide corridor to her bedroom, heels tapping rhythmically on the parquet flooring, she knew that there was only one thing that could even begin to make up for it.

I've been working since five o'clock, she thought. she thought. I deserve this. Twelve hours is enough. I deserve this. Twelve hours is enough.

Charity Hoche was accustomed to getting what Charity Hoche wanted.

And no damn war is going to change that.

She unlocked the sturdy paneled door to the bedroom and entered, then locked the door behind her. After first removing her shoes, then her first lieutenant's uniform, she took care in slipping off the fine silk stockings, panties, and brassiere. Then Charity pulled on a thick cotton robe, lifted her shoulder-length hair out from under its collar and made a ponytail, then padded barefoot into the adjacent bathroom.

She went directly to the huge black marble bathtub.

She turned on the tap and water began to gurgle into the tub. Then she walked to a cabinet, opened the door, and removed a jar of Elizabeth Arden bubble bath crystals. She had brought two dozen jars with her when she had come over from the States, not quite two months ago. Her stockpile was down to eighteen, as she had judiciously given jars-and some silk stockings-to the other women at Whitbey House.

She carefully poured two scoops of crystals into the running water, adjusted the taps, then returned the jar to the cabinet. When the tub was about half full, she dipped her right big toe in the water to test the temperature. She winced-it was quite hot at first touch, but then she became accustomed to it-and slid off her robe and stepped both feet into the tub. She slowly lowered herself in the water, the layer of bubbles swallowing every part of her body but her head.

"Ahhh," she said, contentedly.

A rumble of thunder rattled the windows.

As her body warmed and her muscles began to relax, her mind became less cluttered with the day's mundane tasks that had driven her to numbness-and settled on the one thing that dogged her.

Charity desperately wanted to be of the frame of mind not to give a damn about what people thought of her.

Like Dick Canidy does, she thought, reaching for the oval bar of Pear's Soap and the facecloth next to it. she thought, reaching for the oval bar of Pear's Soap and the facecloth next to it. He couldn't care less. He couldn't care less.

But Charity-reared on a twenty-acre estate in Wallingford, one of the plusher suburbs of Philadelphia, and educated at Bryn Mawr-couldn't bring herself to do that.

I do care.

And she did not think that having a socialite's image and being taken seriously had to be mutually exclusive.

It's not either-or, dammit.

She felt tears welling, told herself they were from exhaustion, and wiped them from her cheek. She rubbed the soap bar in the facecloth, creating a lather, then softly began soaping herself.

Initially, when talk began of her coming to England, it was thought that she would simply do for Whitbey House what she had done so well for the House on Q Street in Washington, D.C.

The House on Q Street was used as an OSS safe house, as well as a hotel of sorts for transients the OSS could not put up elsewhere in D.C. Charity had run it and its staff-while acting as a sort of superhostess-with the precision of a Swiss timepiece, and there was no reason to believe that she could not do the same at Whitbey House.

And Whitbey House-and Bob Jamison-would soon desperately need the help.

First Lieutenant Robert Jamison, a pleasant, red-haired young man, was adjutant, working directly for Dick Canidy. He handled the requisitioning of everything for the OSS station from bedsheets to plywood sheets, laxatives to explosives. And he handled all the paperwork. All Canidy had to do was scribble his name in the signature block authorizing said requisitions-hundreds of them each month. Sometimes, Canidy didn't have to do that; Jamison occasionally signed Canidy's name in his absence. Canidy encouraged him to do so, having explained that that was in keeping with the true nature of his job, relieving Canidy of all the administrative burden that he could.

Bob Jamison had performed superbly-perhaps too well. While he was grateful to work for someone as decent (if demanding) as Dick Canidy, he wasn't exactly thrilled to be stuck ordering laundry soap and such. He longed to contribute something more to the war than being what he called a chief clerk.

He wanted to go operational.

Both Dick Canidy and David Bruce thought that Jamison had the brains and talent for that. He had demonstrated it recently in the setting up of a target for a test of the B-17 drones. That mission had required working with regular military elements (army and navy) who did not have the Need to Know why they had been sent to build massive wooden frameworks on a remote English coastal cliff, nor how it was that almost to the minute the last nail had been hammered home a B-17 "accidentally" crashed into the framework, the aircraft's "pilots" having safely parachuted out before impact.

Jamison had come up with plausible cover stories-in fact, had put together the whole project for the test of flying an aircraft by remote control into the phony "sub pen." No one ever questioned the crash as anything but what Jamison had explained.

As more and more such OSS operations were mounted out of Whitbey House Station, someone had to procure-through channels or other unconventional methods-the materiel to carry them out. Jamison, of course, was the man, and, being damn bright, had over time put the details of so many missions together into a larger picture.

And that that was what had ruined his chances of going operational. was what had ruined his chances of going operational.

The Rule One was that no OSS personnel with knowledge of OSS plans other than their own could go operational. And Jamison knew too much about what was going on in and out of Whitbey House Station-the very things that the damn Nazi Sicherheitsdienst gladly would carve him apart, little piece by little piece, in order to learn-and so he was left to do what he did best.

With Canidy disappearing now and again-Canidy being the exception to any rule that Canidy chose, including Rule One-Jamison had simply carried on with his own duties while filling Canidy's as he was able. What he could not handle or did not have the authority to handle, Lieutenant Colonel Stevens took care of either from his office at OSS London Station or from personal visits to the safe house.

Charity Hoche's arrival at Whitbey House, with the grand if somewhat vague title of "Deputy Director (Acting)," only served to solidify in Bob Jamison's mind the fact that he was stuck as chief clerk.

Charity had sensed some friction from the start, particularly when she came to understand that the early word had quickly circulated through Whitbey House that she would be working for Jamison "taking care of the women."

What followed was a subtle, behind-the-scenes tug-of-war between them for control.

Officially, Canidy was in charge. And, officially, Charity was his acting deputy. Not Jamison. But she made a very real effort-sometimes successful, sometimes not-not to push it. She was smart enough to know that the much-liked Jamison could just as well make her job difficult as he could make it easy.

Charity Hoche and Bob Jamison had gotten along reasonably well as he had showed her the ropes. She liked him, and not only because he hadn't made things even more awkward by making a pass at her. He was a nice guy, outgoing and agreeable.

And, over time, she came to understand his frustration, especially when he'd told her about being turned down to go operational, and why.

How awful, she'd thought. she'd thought. I wouldn't want to be told I've done so well at my job I can't do anything else, then have someone brought in above me. I wouldn't want to be told I've done so well at my job I can't do anything else, then have someone brought in above me.

She understood that that was the source of the friction, and so was a little afraid-if that was the right word-that it might turn to resentment for her being put in charge of Whitbey House in Canidy's absence, even though they both understood how the system worked.

Her rank of first lieutenant did not help. It was an assimilated one, and only recently made, meaning that First Lieutenant Jamison had far more time in rank and thus was technically her superior. But he had also pieced together the information that she held some supersecurity clearance-he had no idea it was on par with that of Lieutenant Colonel Stevens's Top SecretPresidential, but he knew it was up there-and that the way the OSS worked was, Jamison could bloody well be a major general, but if Donovan said she was in charge, then, by God, Major General Jamison-or whoever-was going to cheerfully carry out her orders, even if Donovan had to have her made a lieutenant general for that to happen.

Jamison had been around the Office of Strategic Services long enough to know anything was possible, no matter how the real military world operated.

While Charity took care not to abuse her power, she did understand that there was a distinct difference between being in charge and disliked and being in charge, liked...and ineffectual.

You can't make everyone happy, she thought, holding the facecloth under the running faucet and rinsing it. she thought, holding the facecloth under the running faucet and rinsing it. You have to break eggs to make the omelet. You have to break eggs to make the omelet.

From Day One at Whitbey House, she'd been determined to prove herself, just as she had accomplished proving her worth in Washington to Wild Bill Donovan. He initially had had his own doubts about her when she first arrived at the House on Q Street. And, clearly, the Philly socialite had earned the Boss's respect.

David Bruce had let Charity read the personal note that Donovan had written to him. In it, the director of the OSS explained how Charity had come to get that security clearance ("I needed a clerk-typist and file clerk with the intellectual ability to comprehend the implications of the project, and to deal with the people involved," he'd written) and how she came to be in England ("As a result of growth in the project, we cannot risk that something might slip past Ed Stevens's attention. My decision is to send you Charity, who, on my authority, has the Need to Know on anything there").

"The project," of course, was the most important one of the war-the Manhattan Project, the pursuit of the atomic bomb.

She knew that she certainly could "comprehend the implications of the project." Beyond the simple fact that whoever built the nuclear device first would win this maddening world war, many would die in the quest to achieve it-some of whom she very likely would know.

And would love.

And that brought up "the people involved."

Quite a few of these people, at one time or another, had come through Whitbey House.

Like Jimmy Whittaker, Charity thought, as she adjusted the faucet and added more hot water to the tub. Charity thought, as she adjusted the faucet and added more hot water to the tub.

She knew that Captain James M. B. Whittaker, U.S. Army Air Forces, had been pulled away from Whitbey House and sent on an OSS mission to the Philippines-but not before getting romantically entwined with the Dutchess.

And likely in this very marble tub, Charity thought, reaching up to undo her ponytail and begin washing her hair. Charity thought, reaching up to undo her ponytail and begin washing her hair.

Captain the Duchess Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Stanfield, WRAC, was the liaison officer of His Majesty's Imperial General Staff to OSS Whitbey House Station. The enormous property belonged to her-and to her husband, an RAF wing commander shot down and more or less presumed dead.

Whittaker-who was wealthy beyond imagination, and, in fact, owned the OSS safe house on Q Street-could, and did, did, address President Roosevelt as "Uncle Frank." Whittaker had attended St. Mark's prep school with Canidy and Eric Fulmar, and all were like brothers. address President Roosevelt as "Uncle Frank." Whittaker had attended St. Mark's prep school with Canidy and Eric Fulmar, and all were like brothers.

These latter two, Charity also knew, had been operational more than once in support of the Manhattan Project. Last she'd heard, they now were operational in preparation for the invasion of Sicily-oddly enough, something about running with the mob, Canidy in Algeria and Fulmar in New York City.

Then there was Canidy and Eddie Bitter. They had been in the Navy together, as instructor pilots at NAS Pensacola. Bitter was a cousin of Ann Chambers-My God, what about Ann? Where the hell can she be?-and it had been with Ann at her family's plantation in Alabama that Charity had met Canidy and Bitter. It was right before they had gone off to join what she later learned was the American Volunteer Group in China and Burma, the "Flying Tigers."

Now, she knew, Commander Edwin Bitter, USN, was over at Eighth United States Air Force, Fersfield Army Air Forces Station, with elements of the OSS hidden in the 402nd Composite Wing that was a cover for the explosives-packed B-17 drone project.

And Bitter and Canidy had been Flying Tigers with Doug Douglass-who now was Lieutenant Colonel Douglass, commanding officer of the 344th Fighter Group, Eighth United States Air Force, Atcham Army Air Forces Station. He had just returned from flying temporary duty on an OSS mission to Egypt.

Using a definition of "love" that was an intense feeling of tender affection and compassion an intense feeling of tender affection and compassion, Charity Hoche knew that these "people involved," as General Donovan had written, did love one another.

And that she loved them.

There was, of course, another definition of love, a deeper one-a passionate feeling of romantic desire and sexual attraction.

This Charity saved for Doug Douglass.

Doug, twenty-five, was slight and pleasant-looking-Canidy ribbed him by calling him a West Pointer Boy Scout, each of which he'd been at different times-but Douglass's intense intelligent eyes revealed something far more.

For one, he was a natural fighter pilot. Painted on his P-38F's nose were ten small Japanese flags (each "meatball" signifying a Japanese kill), six swastikas (for the killing of six German aircraft), and the representation of a submarine (he'd bounced a five-hundred-pound bomb into one at the German pens at Saint-Lazare).

And also there on the nose of the Lockheed Lightning, in newly painted flowing script, was Charity. Charity.

Doug Douglass officially was not in the Office of Strategic Services. But with the mission to Egypt, that door appeared to have been just now opened to him. Charity expected it to happen any second-between Dick Canidy bending his own rules by letting Douglass hang out at Whitbey House and Doug's father being Wild Bill Donovan's number two in Washington, and now this TDY, he certainly qualified for membership, honorific or otherwise.

And I don't know if I like that or not.

Because I don't know how it is going to affect us.

At the House on Q Street, even in the presence of Donovan and Doug's father, Charity had made no effort whatsoever to conceal the fact that she had her eyes locked on Doug Douglass. She had thrown all of her energy into getting assigned to be closer to him.

Charity Hoche was determined to marry Doug Douglass and then take him home and make babies.

Not necessarily in that order.

She had hoped that that in fact had happened back in early February-"I think we made a baby," she'd told him lovingly-and had gone on to explain that a woman's desire to carry a man's child was the single most heartfelt indication of love that there possibly could be.

While a baby had not then been begun-There'll be other opportunities for that-she had succeeded in sowing another seed.