worn away, and another small table nearby holding a mahogany box about a foot square and eight or ten inches high. The box stood out amid the shoddy Ministry furniture because it looked as if the original owner of the house had left behind a canteen of cutlery.
The man now standing in front of the larger table was comfortably dressed in tweeds, round-faced and cheerful with sandy hair thinning across the crown, and he wore horn-rimmed spectacles with lenses so thick that they might have been made from the bottom of lemon pop bottles.
Blinking myopically he took a step forward. ‘One of you is Lieutenant Commander Yorke? I’m Jenson.’
Ned shook his hand and introduced Jemmy and the Croupier to the man, who seemed to be every cartoonist’s dream of an absent-minded academic but, Ned guessed, was a lot sharper than he looked.
‘You have a letter from some fellow in the Admiralty?’
Ned handed him the letter of introduction from Captain Watts and noticed that he glanced first at the signature before reading it.
‘Ah yes, it all seems straightforward. If you’ll just excuse me a moment…?’ He picked up the telephone and muttered into it: ‘Admiralty in Whitehall, ASIU, Captain Watts, please.’ He replaced the receiver and waited until it rang.
‘Ah, hello Henry, this is Rex. Shall we scramble?’ He leaned over to push across the lever marked ‘scramble’, and carried on talking. ‘I have three of your fellows here with a letter signed by you. Wait a moment — ’ he pulled over a notebook and scribbled a few words. ‘Right, can’t be too careful. Very well, Henry, cheerio.’
He put down the telephone, slid the ‘scramble’ lever back to its original position and pointed at Ned. ‘What are you usually called in your office?’
The unexpected question startled him but Jemmy growled: ‘He’s Ned!’
‘Ah,’ Jenson said and ticked off a name. ‘And you would be?’
‘Jemmy.’
‘After that famous Earl of Sandwich, no doubt.’ He looked up quickly, his eyes huge through the thick lenses. ‘No offence meant, of course; I have a crossword puzzle mind and you have a twitch.’ He turned and said: ‘And you, Lieutenant?’
‘I’m the Croupier. I pay when they want drinks.’
Jenson chuckled and then said: ‘Very well, that’s the first step. I’m sorry about the security but we have a lot of secrets in this Victorian pile. Now I’m the chap who is going to show you an Enigma machine, and explain how it works. I have managed to get a newish model for you — ’
‘A Mark III?’ Jemmy asked hopefully.
‘Good grief, no. I understand you are going to provide us with one of those!’ He walked over to the small table and gestured at the mahogany box. ‘This is a Mark II, the type used up to now by all the German services.’
Was it pedantry, Ned wondered, that prevented Jenson from saying ‘all three German services’? Out of curiosity, he asked him: ‘Who actually sends signals by Enigma?’
‘Oh, goodness me, who doesn’t! The Navy, Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe, of course; the Gestapo, SS — just about everyone, it seems. Our intercept people are almost swamped.’
He polished his glasses with a piece of toilet paper, torn from the remains of a roll which Ned saw he kept in a corner of his ‘In’ tray.
‘Captain Watts has just asked me to go over the German signals system to make sure you understand fully where Enigma fits in. Do you gentlemen know anything about codes and ciphers?’ When they all shook their heads, he clasped his hands like an earnest clergyman trying to explain a point of canon law. ‘Well, the words “code” and “cipher” are used very loosely by the layman, but there is a difference — hence the official name of this place, the Government Code and Cipher School.
‘A code is where a letter or number (or group of them) are used to mean complete phrases. For example, the figure seven sent by Morse could mean “The Fleet is to put to sea at
The man now standing in front of the larger table was comfortably dressed in tweeds, round-faced and cheerful with sandy hair thinning across the crown, and he wore horn-rimmed spectacles with lenses so thick that they might have been made from the bottom of lemon pop bottles.
Blinking myopically he took a step forward. ‘One of you is Lieutenant Commander Yorke? I’m Jenson.’
Ned shook his hand and introduced Jemmy and the Croupier to the man, who seemed to be every cartoonist’s dream of an absent-minded academic but, Ned guessed, was a lot sharper than he looked.
‘You have a letter from some fellow in the Admiralty?’
Ned handed him the letter of introduction from Captain Watts and noticed that he glanced first at the signature before reading it.
‘Ah yes, it all seems straightforward. If you’ll just excuse me a moment…?’ He picked up the telephone and muttered into it: ‘Admiralty in Whitehall, ASIU, Captain Watts, please.’ He replaced the receiver and waited until it rang.
‘Ah, hello Henry, this is Rex. Shall we scramble?’ He leaned over to push across the lever marked ‘scramble’, and carried on talking. ‘I have three of your fellows here with a letter signed by you. Wait a moment — ’ he pulled over a notebook and scribbled a few words. ‘Right, can’t be too careful. Very well, Henry, cheerio.’
He put down the telephone, slid the ‘scramble’ lever back to its original position and pointed at Ned. ‘What are you usually called in your office?’
The unexpected question startled him but Jemmy growled: ‘He’s Ned!’
‘Ah,’ Jenson said and ticked off a name. ‘And you would be?’
‘Jemmy.’
‘After that famous Earl of Sandwich, no doubt.’ He looked up quickly, his eyes huge through the thick lenses. ‘No offence meant, of course; I have a crossword puzzle mind and you have a twitch.’ He turned and said: ‘And you, Lieutenant?’
‘I’m the Croupier. I pay when they want drinks.’
Jenson chuckled and then said: ‘Very well, that’s the first step. I’m sorry about the security but we have a lot of secrets in this Victorian pile. Now I’m the chap who is going to show you an Enigma machine, and explain how it works. I have managed to get a newish model for you — ’
‘A Mark III?’ Jemmy asked hopefully.
‘Good grief, no. I understand you are going to provide us with one of those!’ He walked over to the small table and gestured at the mahogany box. ‘This is a Mark II, the type used up to now by all the German services.’
Was it pedantry, Ned wondered, that prevented Jenson from saying ‘all three German services’? Out of curiosity, he asked him: ‘Who actually sends signals by Enigma?’
‘Oh, goodness me, who doesn’t! The Navy, Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe, of course; the Gestapo, SS — just about everyone, it seems. Our intercept people are almost swamped.’
He polished his glasses with a piece of toilet paper, torn from the remains of a roll which Ned saw he kept in a corner of his ‘In’ tray.
‘Captain Watts has just asked me to go over the German signals system to make sure you understand fully where Enigma fits in. Do you gentlemen know anything about codes and ciphers?’ When they all shook their heads, he clasped his hands like an earnest clergyman trying to explain a point of canon law. ‘Well, the words “code” and “cipher” are used very loosely by the layman, but there is a difference — hence the official name of this place, the Government Code and Cipher School.
‘A code is where a letter or number (or group of them) are used to mean complete phrases. For example, the figure seven sent by Morse could mean “The Fleet is to put to sea at
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