“Almost ready!” Noreen chirped to Maggie when she returned. She pulled papers from her purse. “Now, here are your passport, identity card, proof of Aryan descent, and your ration card. Put them in your wallet. You’ll need to sign them, as Margareta Hoffman, of course. Let’s see, and clothing coupons and some more Reichmarks. Don’t spend them all in one place.”
Maggie accepted the fountain pen, a Lamy, and practiced her new signature in German script a few times before actually signing her name. “Did this actually come from Germany?” she asked as she signed numerous documents and official papers.
“It’s German, but it came from the Lower East Side of New York City.”
Maggie finally finished signing everything. Her stomach was doing flips in nervous anticipation.
“Goodbye, Margareta,” Noreen said, kissing her on both cheeks. “We don’t say ‘good luck’ in this business, so I’ll just say ‘cheers.’ We’ll see you soon.”
Maggie took a shaky breath as her heart thudded in her chest. “Don’t worry about me,” she said, kissing Noreen back. “Piece of cake.” It was now time to board the plane.
This moment was exactly what she’d trained for. Still, now that she was climbing the narrow ladder to the Westland Lysander’s hinged door, she was having second thoughts. I’m stupid, I’m so ridiculously stupid—why couldn’t I have stayed a secretary? Or a governess? I was actually good at those things … Maggie reflected as she took off her shoes and put them in her suitcase. Then she bandaged her ankles, rolled up her skirt, zipped up her padded jumpsuit, and pulled on heavy boots.
It’s just like training, it’s just like training … she repeated to herself, like a mantra.
“Your parachute’s up there.” The RAF sergeant, a young man with high color, low voice, and a Scottish accent, wore a shearling jacket. He helped her up the ladder through the trapdoor in the midsection of the plane, a converted Halifax bomber, with the underside gun turret removed and replaced by a hatch. The belly of the beast, Maggie thought. Her nostrils flared as she detected the scent of oil.
The RAF sergeant boarded behind her; he would be her dispatcher when they reached the drop zone. Her folded-up parachute was at one end of the plane. Her suitcase, now packed into a crate, was attached to another parachute.
The engines started up with a roar. Maggie strapped herself in next to the sergeant, in the walled-off area that was just behind the nose, where the flight crew sat. “You doing all right there, miss?” he said. “If you need to be sick, there’s a bucket in the corner.”
“I won’t need it, Sergeant,” Maggie assured him. At least I really, truly hope not.
The plane began moving, slowly at first, then gaining speed as it finally achieved liftoff, and Maggie could hear the wheels being retracted with a loud crash and a corresponding tremor.
“Now, I have some hot tea,” the sergeant said, pulling out a green-and-silver Thermos. “But I also have some gin if you’d prefer.”
“Tea, please,” she said, thankful for a civilized beverage in strange circumstances. “Just a little,” she amended, realizing the plane had no toilet.
“We also have some cheese sandwiches. Oh, look, a bar of chocolate!”
Maggie’s stomach turned a few somersaults. “Really—you have it.”
“Nervous?” he asked, not unkindly.
“No. Well—maybe a little.”
“It’s good to be nervous,” he said, clapping her on the shoulder. “Means you’re alive. Now, we’ll be flying over the Netherlands and then into Germany. Might try to get in a catnap while we’re up here. They’re going to turn the lights off soon, anyway.”
Maggie finished her tea, crossed her legs and arms, and closed her eyes. She internally recited Canto III of Longfellow’s translation of Dante’s Inferno—it seemed appropriate, after all—
Through me the way is to the city dolent;
Through me the way is to eternal dole;
Through me the way among the people lost.
Justice incited my sublime Creator;
Created me divine Omnipotence,
The highest Wisdom and the primal Love.
Before me there were no created things,
Only eterne, and I eternal last.
All hope abandon, ye who enter in!
She was sure she’d never sleep on the plane, but before long her eyes had closed and her mind was filled with images of burning swastikas and the sound of howling wolves. And then she felt the sergeant poke her arm. “Wake up, miss,” he said. “We’re almost there.”
Maggie was so groggy and dazed by her nightmare that she didn’t have time to panic as she stood and let him help her on with her parachute. “Now remember what they taught you in training,” he told her. “Keep your legs together when you jump and tuck your chin. And, most important, bend your knees when you land.”