It would probably take a bit longer that way, but no numbers rioted about within her to say that two extra minutes would make a difference, so she nodded. “Two. Five. One.”

He flipped to the second page, found the fifth line. Read her the first word in French. Je.

She wrote the English translation on the blank sheet of paper awaiting her pen. I.

A few minutes later, the short message looked back at them from the expanse of white.

I regret to have to use you lovely ladies for this purpose, but I have my orders. My superiors are in need of your codebooks. Acquire them however you must, if you want to see your friend alive again. Tell her brother to come with them at midnight. Deposit them at the crossroad below, in the rubbish bin at the mouth of the alley. I will signal him, and he may then proceed to the address below to collect his sister.

The final words on the page weren’t in code. They were just there at the end of the list of numbers. Two directions to somewhere in Woolwich. An hour’s ride on the tube.

Margot felt as though she were breathing for the first time in an hour. “It doesn’t sound as though he’s hurt her. If he’s being truthful.” She looked up. “Is he after the codebooks or revenge, though?”

“Both, I daresay, if he can get them. It’s a smart plan. Have me drop the codebook in one location. While I’m fetching Dot, he could fetch that and be away before I could then catch him. Assuming he doesn’t have some sort of trap planned for me, which I’m not willing to assume.” Drake checked his watch. “We have plenty of time. I can let Hall know. He can give me an outdated codebook, perhaps—”

“Oh, he’ll give you a new one.” Her lips turned up in a ghost of a smile. “We’ve long been prepared for this. In the first days of the war, he had us create a false code to pass along if necessary. I still have the original in my desk here. . . .” Sucking in a breath, she remembered again those letters, out of order.

She never should have taken that original home—why had she? But she’d wanted to improve it, have a second version. And surely the German hadn’t found it, or he wouldn’t still be demanding it. Right? She dropped to her knees, pulled out the lowest drawer of her desk, and reached up to where she’d hidden it.

Still there. Her fingers brushed the paper, gripped the stack, pulled it out. A relieved sigh shook its way out. “There. We can simply get Hall’s permission to use it.” She stood again and dropped the false codebook onto the top of her desk.