“Oh, that. Yes, I just wondered if that’s where we were going today, but clearly not.”
“I don’t understand. What did you mean?”
Bright looked at the paper again. He pushed Millie’s hand further away as if to try and focus on it.
“Coordinates, aren’t they? Lat and long.”
Millie looked back at the digits.
15105550114922
15105550114810
“Really? I don’t recognise them.”
Bright shrugged. “Well, maybe not. At least I’m not sure what the ‘1’ at the beginning is. But ‘51 05 55’… What’s that?” He tilted his head up toward the ceiling. “Somewhere north of here? Midlands? And… He studied the paper again. “‘1 49 22’. That’s west. Maybe Cheltenham? Trust me, Millie, I’m a navigator and I know latitude and longitude when I see it.”
Millie stared at the figures.
“I see. But like you say, there are too many digits.”
“It’s your note, Millie. Can’t you ask whoever gave it to you?”
He wasn’t sure what to say, and so said nothing. Bright smiled and took the sheet from his hand, scrutinising it.
“Look, there’s a ‘1’ at the start and a ‘1’ in the middle before the long. No idea what that means, sorry chap.”
He handed the paper back to Millie, leaving him alone, staring at the numbers.
More people arrived from the bar and he pocketed the sheet before heading to his car.
As he drove up to the central road that ran through the station, another car pulled alongside him.
Steve Bright motioned for Millie to wind his window down. He leant across and wound down his own passenger side window.
“Probably the hemisphere!” he shouted.
“What?”
“The ‘1’s on your sheet. Probably represents north, south, east or west. Maybe ‘0’ would be south and the opposite east or west?”
“Right.”
Bright laughed. “Normally there would be letters to show the hemisphere. North, south, east, west. But maybe your example uses numerical labels. Where did it come from, anyway?”
There was a beep behind them as someone else pulled out of the mess car park.
“Never mind,” Bright finished and wound up his window before pulling ahead.
BY THE TIME Millie arrived home, even Georgina seemed to notice his raised mood.
“Good day at the office, dear?”
“Something like that. Don’t look so surprised. They do still happen, occasionally.”
He took her hand and pulled her close.
She laughed. “Millie, whatever’s got into you?”
He kissed her and tilted his head. “Shall we go down to the Railway Hotel for dinner tonight?”
This time she raised both eyebrows. “Well, I had a pie out, but it’ll keep.”
“Excellent. Saves on washing up.”
“Are you going to let me know what we’re celebrating?”
“As you note, my dear, just a good day at the office.”
10
THURSDAY 16TH JUNE
Each time he approached the main gate, Millie studied the security officers as they busied themselves with the car in front. The routine involved a cursory look into the boot, but occasionally he saw a man lean in and give a more thorough search.
The same went for the interior of the vehicle itself.
He simply couldn’t risk transferring the tapes through the checks. There had to be another way.
At TFU, he took his seat at the meeting to help tighten security even further.
“We need to be certain our system is watertight,” Kilton began. “No papers going astray, everything accounted for. The cabinets, for instance. How secure are they?”
“They’ve got padlocks,” Speedy Johnson offered.
“They look weak. Beef them up.”
Speedy added a line to his to-do list, and Millie made a mental note not to answer questions in case he got lumbered with an impossible task.
But Kilton looked directly at him. “And what about the lockers?”
“What about them?”
“Are they secure, Millie? What do people keep in them? We need to do an audit.”
“An audit?” His heart thumped.
“Yes. Search them all. Make sure there’s nothing compromising and remind people they’re for unclassified jumpers and hats, not secret project paperwork.”
A familiar prickly heat crept up his neck.
Kilton stared at him.
“Well?”
“Well what, sir?”
“Wake up, Millie! Can you carry out the audit?”
“You want me to? To search people’s lockers?
“If it’s not an inconvenience. Yes, please.”
“Yes, boss. No problem at all.”
“Right, have I missed anything?”
“What about when we fly out?” Millie said.
“What do you mean?”
“Land-aways for instance? We carry secret equipment and its paperwork all the time. What do we do at another airfield? I mean, it’s unlikely, I know, but one of us might accidentally carry classified documents to another station, leave them in a meeting room, or even on the aircraft while we brief or…”
Suddenly, he saw it: the only way to get the reels out of West Porton and avoid the security forces at every gate.
He could fly them out.
Except, like the world’s most colossal idiot, he had just alerted Mark Kilton to the option. The only loophole he could conceivably have exploited was about to be closed.
Kilton looked impatient. “You OK, Milford?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, you’re absolutely right. We need a procedure in place. From now on, all land-aways must be authorised by me personally. A security officer can sign classified material out of the building and back in again. Excellent idea.”
“Won’t the chaps resent this, boss?” Speedy asked. “They might feel like they’re being spied on?”
“I don’t care what they think. This is for their own protection. To ensure they don’t make a mistake that could cost us, and them, dear.” Kilton stood. “Right, well, let’s be getting on with it.”
The meeting broke up; Millie stayed in his seat.
He thought back to the recent land-aways. He’d been to Oakington for a meeting with Red Brunson and Wyton a few weeks earlier. He and Rob flew to Warton in the Canberra. On any of those trips, he could so easily have carried an extra bag.
He could have packaged the tapes into a parcel and posted them to his own home address, or directly to Belkin.
But that door was closed now.
And he had closed it.
SUSIE LISTENED INTENTLY. She needed to remember every detail.
Since the gas bomb had dropped, the camp felt galvanised and ready for action.
And she was part of the raiding party. A team of just six.
Megan paced the wigwam.
“We now know what they’re hiding.”
The room went quiet. David stood up.
“Sampson has extracted vital information for us.”
So, the mysterious blond man had a name. But how could he have extracted the information?
“The secret squadron occupies the large green hangar on this side of the airfield,” David continued. “The collection of old aircraft on the other side is a maintenance facility. Much less interesting.”
Megan spoke again. “Sampson has befriended a serving member of the squadron. This man has unwittingly passed on some very interesting information. There’s something fitted to a white Vulcan. A Top Secret project. He believes the project is called Guiding Light. He claims not to know any more than that. He’s probably telling the truth. That’s how secret Guiding Light is. Even people inside TFU aren’t aware of the details. So, we’re going to blow it wide open”