Free Echoland by Joe Joyce Page A

when he saw Duggan. ‘Man of the future. Not like you fucking has-beens.’
    Timmy had recovered his hail-fellow-well-met demeanour and led Duggan to a quiet corner of the bar. ‘What’ll you have?’ he asked. ‘Brandy seems to be the order of the day.’
    ‘Glass of Guinness will be fine,’ Duggan said, pretending to ignore Timmy’s broad wink. His heart sank, hoping Timmy hadn’t dragged him here just to pump him for information about the latest German spy. Timmy called to the barman and raised his almost empty glass for another whiskey.
    ‘Somebody’s happy with his day’s work today,’ Timmy said in a disapproving tone. ‘Must’ve been laughing their heads off when they saw the black smoke coming out of the departments’ chimneys this morning. On a boiling hot summer’s day.’
    The barman gave Timmy another glass of Paddy and put a half-pint glass of water beside it. Duggan waited for him to explain what he was talking about, knowing he didn’t need to ask, he’d be told.
    ‘Caused a right old panic,’ Timmy tipped the remnants of his old glass into the new one and topped it up with a splash of water. ‘Herr Brandy’s arrival. Had them burning files all over the place. Until wiser heads prevailed. Realized what it was all about.’
    Duggan said nothing, remembering the bags of documents marked ‘BURN’ in the Red House. Timmy tasted the whiskey and nodded and put it down on a coaster. ‘Brandy,’ he said slowly, ‘is a plant.’
    ‘A plant?’
    ‘Fucking Brits,’ Timmy said. ‘You can’t be up to them. Just the sort of trick they love to pull.’
    ‘Brandy is a British agent?’ Duggan looked at him.
    Timmy gave him a solemn nod. ‘Some of us are too long in the tooth to be fooled by this kind of trickery. Might have worked once upon a time. Not anymore.’
    ‘I don’t know.’ Duggan thought of the array of material seized from Held’s house. The money, the military insignia, the transmitter, the code book, Plan Kathleen.
    ‘Take a step back,’ Timmy took an unconscious step backwards. ‘Think about it. Who benefited from all the panic this morning? Sensitive files being burned in some places. The Germans coming, moryah. Parachutists raining down on us any minute.’ Timmy gave a snort, dismissing the idea as ludicrous. ‘Whose interest was all that in?’ He nodded at Duggan as if he had answered him. ‘Right. The Brits.’
    The barman put the glass of Guinness in front of Duggan and Timmy dug some coins out of his trouser pocket and put the price of the drinks on the counter. Duggan took a sip of the stout.
    ‘Result was a right old panic,’ Timmy continued. ‘Everyone on high alert. A step away from falling on our knees and begging the British to come over the border and save us.’
    Timmy put down his drink and took out his cigarette case, finished . He offered Duggan a cigarette but he said he’d have one of his own. Timmy lit both of them and inhaled a lungful of smoke with satisfaction.
    ‘Do you think Held is a British agent too?’ Duggan asked.
    ‘Who knows what Held is?’ Timmy gave an expansive wave with the hand holding the cigarette.
    ‘He’s half German.’
    Timmy conceded that with a nod. ‘But do you know who’s living with him?’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘A woman who’s not his wife,’ Timmy said. ‘A woman who’s the wife of an RAF officer.’
    ‘Really?’
    ‘Really.’ Timmy said with satisfaction, resting his case.
    They sipped at their drinks, pulled on their cigarettes, thinking their own thoughts. If Timmy only knew about G2’s contacts with MI5, Duggan thought. And that MI5 had added to the overnight panic with a warning of an imminent German invasion.
Unternehmen Seelöwe
and
Unternehmen Grün
. Straws in the wind? And the ties that bind them together? The code book, he thought. That’d prove who Brandy worked for. If it deciphered other encrypted German messages.
    Timmy looked around the bar. It wasn’t full but it was getting to the stage