The Paris Agent(107)
“Last one,” Dad announces. He sits one final box down on top of a stack of others, then motions toward Wrigley and his new rescue greyhound, Spot, who are snuggled up on a rug near my new dining room. Both dogs look at Dad, then drop their heads back down onto the rug. “Come on, you two!” he says, playfully impatient as he gestures toward the dogs. “We better give these lovebirds some privacy.”
Dad has gradually recorded an extensive oral history with Professor Read’s team over the past two years, turning to face his own past fully for the first time. I choose to believe my mother’s intentions were good in hiding those letters from Professor Read to Dad over the years, but as difficult it has been for my father to delve into those memories, it’s all also been restorative.
A few months ago, he finally retired—properly, this time. He now volunteers at an animal shelter three days a week. I can’t help but wonder if there’s space in my father’s future for a third great love of his life, because he and the shelter’s director Catriona seem to be awfully fond of one another. We visit Drusilla and Quinn for a roast dinner every Sunday, and lately Dad has been bringing Catriona along.
It’s an odd kind of family, but that’s exactly what this group of strangers has become over the past two years. We share a secret knowledge of uniquely powerful legacies and that has bonded us in a way that’s hard to describe.
“Thanks, Dad,” I say, standing to hug my father. He wraps his arms around me and squeezes gently, then releases me as he clears his throat. My eyes are misting over, and I can see from the way he’s blinking that his are too. “For everything.”
“You’ll only be forty minutes away,” he says stiffly. “I expect to see you once a week. If not more. You too, Theo. My door is open anytime.”
“Yes, sir,” Theo says. Dad extends his hand as if to shake Theo’s, but Theo throws his arms around Dad anyway, and Dad chuckles as he returns the embrace. “And we’ll see you Saturday, of course.”
I’ll drive back to Liverpool Friday night so that I can dress for the wedding at home. Theo will get ready with some of his friends here at our flat. It won’t be a big wedding—just our closest friends and family gathered in Dad’s beautiful garden while a celebrant officiates.
Dad nods curtly and whistles. This sound tells the dogs he means business and they both run to his side, and Theo and I follow them all to the front door. As Dad steps over the threshold, he turns back to look at us one last time.
“I’m proud of you,” he says unevenly, then he glances at Theo. “I’m proud of you both. It means something to me that I’ve been able to watch you both blossom together over these past few years.” He pauses, then adds gruffly, “Actually, it means everything.”
“I love you, Dad,” I say.
“I love you too, Lottie,” he murmurs.
Theo slides his arm around my shoulders. Dad helps the dogs up into the body of the truck he borrowed to help us move. He reverses from our driveway, and we watch until the taillights disappear around a corner. Theo turns me gently to face him. We stare at one another in the fading purple-pink light of dusk.
“Time to start our new life together,” he whispers, smiling softly.
Our future stretches out before us, full of unknowns, but also full of promise, built on a foundation of freedom we will never take for granted. We can thank people like my dad for that, and Eloise and Giles Watkins, and Jocelyn Miller.
And whatever we do with the freedom we have been gifted, whether our achievements and our struggles are big or small, we will do it in honor of those who gave so much so that we could live in a better world.
A C K N O W L E D G ME N T S
Firstly, thanks to Susan Swinwood and the team at Graydon House for publishing this book in North America. Thanks to Rebecca Saunders and the team at Hachette Australia, and to Kate Byrne, Anna Boatman, and the team at Piatkus Fiction UK. Thanks to Amy Tannenbaum and the team at Jane Rotrosen Agency. It is a pleasure and an honor to have my books in the hands of such remarkable teams.
Thanks to Mindy Hollamby and Demelza Pringle for the “sanity read” when I finished a round of edits, and to Lisa Ireland, for helping me make sense of tricky plot problems. And as always, thanks to my family and friends for support and love as I worked on this book.
I found the following resources useful in the writing of this story:
Her Finest Hour, The Heroic Life of Diana Rowden, Wartime Secret Agent by Gabrielle McDonald-Rothwell
Violette, The Missions of SOE Agent Violette Szabo GC by Tania Szabo
Carve Her Name with Pride by RJ Minney
Violette Szabo, The Life That I Have by Susan Ottaway
How to Become a Spy, The World War II SOE Training Manual published by Skyhorse Publishing
SOE In France 1941-1945 by Major Robert Bourne-Patterson
Mission France, The True History of the Women of SOE by Kate Vigurs
I Heard My Country Calling: Elaine Madden, SOE Agent by Sue Elliott
The Women Who Lived for Danger: The Agents of the Special Operations Executive by Marcus Binney
The Heroines of SOE: F Section: Britain’s Secret Women in France by Squadron Leader Beryl E. Escott
SOE in France, An Account of the Work of the British Special Operations Executive in France 1940-1944 by M. R. D. Foot
It should be noted that any errors are entirely my own.