China Blue (The Dudley Sisters Saga Book 3) by Madalyn Morgan (top 100 novels of all time TXT) 📕

about spring jackets and short sleeved dresses. She went into Selfridges to get out of the cold. In the main entrance was a huge framed photograph of the famous signature window that was smashed when the store was hit by a high explosive bomb and several incendiaries in September 1940. The damage to Selfridges was substantial. John Lewis, further along Oxford Street, had been completely destroyed.

On the way home she bought more eggs, half a pound of cheese, and a jar of pickle. She fancied a cheese and pickle sandwich for lunch and an omelette with a few chips for supper. As potatoes weren’t rationed she bought two pounds.

Back at the apartment Claire made a cup of tea, took a sheet of paper and a pencil from a drawer in the sideboard, and settled down to work on her French cover story, which she had begun in Cullercoats when she stayed with the Marron family. At the top of the page she wrote her code name, China Blue. Several young men had remarked on her blue eyes, but fancy Colonel Smith noticing. I bet he was a charmer in his day, Claire thought, and she chuckled. Underneath she wrote Claire, and then LeBlanc – White was her mother’s maiden name. She added the names of her parents: Thomas and Lily; her father’s job: groom; and the names and ages of two sisters: Élisabeth, thirteen and Marguèrite, twelve. If they were still at school she didn’t have to invent jobs for them.

She was born and brought up on a farm just outside Tours and went to school in Tours itself. She added the names Mélanie Rolland and her brother Éric as friends. Reading through what she had written, she realised it wasn’t enough, but it was a start. She left the piece of paper on the table to come back to later and stood up. A chill rippled down her back and she shivered. Stretching, she went over to the window and looked across Portman Square. It was getting dark; taxis and buses already had their sidelights on. Pulling the blackout curtains, she felt her way along the wall to the modern standard lamp and flicked it on. It shed a soft light.

She shook out her shoulders and, feeling cold, fetched a box of Swan Vesta matches from the kitchen, struck one and put it to the paper and sticks at the base of the laid fire in the small grate. Her stomach rumbled and she glanced at the clock. It had gone four and she hadn’t eaten since breakfast. While the fire took hold she sliced and buttered a couple of pieces of bread and put them on a place with a wedge of cheddar and a spoonful of pickle.

She had just begun to eat her belated lunch when the telephone rang. It was the first time anyone had telephoned her and she looked at the thing for several seconds before answering it. ‘Hello? Yes, this is Claire. Hello, Miss Halliday. Yes, I’m fine. I went for a walk along Oxford Street earlier and bought a few things on the way back. I hope it was all right to go out?’ Claire held her breath… ‘Oh good,’ she said, relieved. She listened carefully to what Colonel Smith’s P.A. told her and when she’d finished said, ‘Nine o’clock tomorrow morning. I’ll be ready. Goodbye.’ Claire put the telephone’s receiver back on its cradle and took a sip of her tea. It was cold. ‘Oh my God!’ Somewhere between wanting to scream with excitement and feeling more nervous than she had ever felt before, she went to the kitchen and made another pot of tea. On her way back she took the folder the SOE had given her from the drawer, sat down and read through the file labelled “Intelligence Training”. On the first page in capital letters it said: DO NOT TELL ANYONE WHERE YOU ARE GOING.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Claire was waiting on the steps of the apartment building when the car taking her to Beaulieu pulled up. The driver took her suitcase and opened the nearside rear door. While he stowed her case in the boot, Claire threw her handbag and gas mask into the car and dropped onto the back seat. ‘Argh!’ she squealed. ‘Captain Mitchell? I’m – I’m sorry, sir,’ she stuttered. Her cheeks crimson with embarrassment, Claire gazed at her belongings wedged between the seat and the captain’s right thigh. ‘I didn’t--’

‘No damage done, Miss Dudley, though it might be worth remembering I’m not the enemy,’ Captain Mitchell said, laughing. He took hold of Claire’s gas mask as she made a grab for it, and let go of it at the same time as she did. ‘Stalemate!’ Captain Mitchell said. They both laughed. ‘After you.’

Claire carefully moved her belongings from the captain’s legs.

‘Did you enjoy the parachute training, Miss Dudley?’ Captain Mitchell asked, as they began their journey through London.

Claire thought it odd that he didn’t address her by her rank, but then she wasn’t with the WAAF now. ‘I did. I was nervous in the beginning, but after the first jump I enjoyed it.’ Remembering the feeling of excitement, she said, ‘If I’m honest, I loved it, Captain Mitchell.’

‘I knew you would, Miss Dudley.’ Claire sat back in her seat, surprised and delighted that the captain had that much faith in her. ‘Would it be okay if I call you Claire?’

‘Yes, sir.’ She felt her cheeks colour again.

‘And I’m Alain, but my friends call me Mitch.’

‘Alain? You pronounced it the French way.’

‘C’est la façon dont ma mère se prononce. Je suis Canadien Français. Mes grands-parents maternels sont Français.’

The captain is testing me, she thought. Right, you clever... “‘That is the way my mother pronounces it. I am French Canadian. My maternal grandparents are French?’”

‘Well done, Claire. A perfect translation.’

‘Your pronunciation and accent were perfect, so it