Marian Rejewski

August 1940, London, Free France headquarters.

It rained heavily the day Lorraine returned to London.

He stood under the porch of the three-story brick house, soaked to the bone, his old suitcase still stained with mud from the south of France. From Marseille to Bordeaux, from Bordeaux to Lyon, then from Lyon around the Pyrenees Mountains into Spain, and finally boarding a British ship, he had spent four whole weeks traversing the entire occupied France.

The door opened.

The secretary stood at the door, glanced at him, said nothing, and simply stepped aside to let him in.

Loran went up to the second floor and pushed open that familiar door.

De Gaulle stood before the map, his back to the door. The exact same posture as three months ago, the exact same room, the exact same map of Europe. Only now there were more arrows on the map, and the red and blue lines were densely packed, like a gradually tightening net.

"You're back?" De Gaulle did not turn around.

"I'm back," Loran said, his voice hoarse like sandpaper.

De Gaulle turned and looked at him. Something flickered in those deep-set eyes. Perhaps it was relief, perhaps it was confirmation that this man had returned alive, bringing with him what he needed.

"How many people?" de Gaulle asked.

Loran took the list out of his pocket and placed it on the table.

"Seven cities, fifteen people," he said. "Thirteen are willing. Two are still hesitating."

De Gaulle picked up the list and looked at it line by line. The names, the addresses, the hastily written notes: "willing," "reliable," "needs time." His hand was steady, but Lorraine noticed that he was looking at it very slowly, as if he were memorizing every word.

"Thirteen," de Gaulle repeated. He put the list down, walked to the window, and looked at the rain outside.

"Do you know how many people have come to see me during my three months in London?" he asked.

Loran did not speak.

"Less than two hundred," de Gaulle said. "Two hundred soldiers, technicians, and volunteers. Two hundred people to rebuild an army, to unite the resistance movement throughout France, and to let the world know that France has not surrendered."

He turned around and looked at Loran.

"The thirteen people you brought back are more important than two hundred."

Lorraine stood there, waiting for him to continue.

De Gaulle walked back to the table, took another document from the drawer, and handed it to Lorraine.

"Take a look at this."

It was a copy of a telegram, dated yesterday: "The Vichy government announces that all French citizens continuing to fight abroad will be stripped of their French citizenship and their property will be confiscated. Their families will be held hostage."

Loran looked at those lines of text, a hint of sadness flashing in her eyes.

Strip them of their citizenship. Confiscate their property. Hold their family members hostage.

Those who were willing to fight were no longer French from that moment on. Their wives, parents, and children would be imprisoned in internment camps, becoming bargaining chips for the Vichy government to demonstrate its loyalty to the Germans.

He put down the telegram and looked up.

De Gaulle looked at him.

"You didn't just bring back a list from France this time. You also brought back something else: you know how much risk those people are willing to take, and you know what consequences their families will face."

He looked into Lorraine's eyes.

"So what you're about to do is even more dangerous than before. Because now, every time you go back to France, it's not just your own life at stake, but theirs too. If you're exposed, they'll die as well."

Loran did not speak.

The rain is still falling outside the window.

"You'll have three days off," de Gaulle said. "After three days, there will be a new mission."

He turned and walked back to the map, saying nothing more.

Loran nodded, turned and walked out of the room.

For the next three days, Loran hardly left that small dormitory room.

He slept, ate, spaced out, occasionally gazing at the British sky outside the window. The rain stopped and started again, started and stopped again. What he thought about most was the cell phone at the bottom of that old leather suitcase, now completely dead.

He remembered the list on his phone: "People you'd like to save during World War II, if possible." Those names, which he'd once only vaguely recognized, were now etched into his mind.

Marian Rejewski, a Polish cryptographer, fled to France in 1940 and later to Britain.

Hans von Halban, a French physicist and nuclear research expert, may have been captured by Germany.

There were also a dozen or so relatively unknown scholars and artists who, according to records, would perish in the war.

He hadn't had time to think about these names when he was in Stoney. He hadn't had the energy to think about them during his first trip across France to establish a network. But now, lying in this quiet dormitory, those names were starting to swirl in his mind.

Rejevsky.

He remembered some vague details: a Pole, a cryptographer, who had cracked the German Enigma code before the war. He fled Poland in 1939, first to Romania, then to France. If history hadn't changed, he would likely be somewhere in France, continuing to work for the Allies.

But where is he now? Paris? Toulouse? Or has he already gone to Algeria?

Lorraine didn't know. But he knew one thing: if Rejewski was still alive, if he could find this man, if he could get him safely to England.

That would have a huge impact on the war.

Three days later, he arrived.

He pushed open the door, stood in the doorway, and held a folder in his hand.

"New mission," he said.

Loran sat up and took the folder.

Inside, there was a map, several photos, and a handwritten briefing.

The map shows a small town called Seine-Laye in northern France, not far from the coast. The photo shows several buildings, a dock, warehouses, and a substation. The briefing is short: "The Germans are building a radar station in Seine-Laye. Once completed, it will be able to monitor the movements of all ships in the English Channel. It must be destroyed before winter."

Loran looked up at the briefing.

"Me alone?"

Let shook his head: "Three people. You're the liaison, responsible for the contact and evacuation. The other two are explosives experts, borrowed from the Special Operations Unit. They're British."

Special Operations Division.

Lorraine had heard of this name. A secret organization personally created by Churchill, whose mission could be summed up in a single sentence.

"Let Europe burn."

"When are we leaving?"

"Three days later. Parachute in."

Three nights later, an unmarked bomber took off from a secret airfield in Britain, crossed the English Channel, and entered French airspace.

Loran sat in the cockpit, leaning against the cold metal wall, listening to the roar of the engines. Opposite him sat two men, one named Jack, the other Tom. They were Englishmen, dressed in the casual clothes of French laborers, their faces expressionless. Their crates contained explosives, detonators, and timers—enough to blow a radar station to smithereens.

Loran didn't know how long they had been flying. Maybe half an hour, maybe an hour.

The red light is on.

The hatch opened, and a cold draft rushed in, carrying the salty smell of seawater.

Jack was the first to leap out and disappear into the darkness. Then it was Tom's turn. Lorraine took a deep breath and followed suit.

The world suddenly went silent the moment the parachute opened.

There was no roar of engines, only the sound of the wind and his own heartbeat. Lorin looked down; below lay occupied France.

He landed in a forest.

The parachute was hanging in a tree. He cut the rope, jumped down, and crouched motionless in the darkness. After a long time, he heard two hoots of an owl.

He followed the sound and found Jack and Tom at the edge of the woods. The three of them crouched together, opened a map, shone a flashlight on it, and then turned it off.

"There are still four hours until dawn," Jack said in a low voice. "We need to find a hiding place before daybreak."

Loran nodded. He pointed to a spot on the map: "Here. Three kilometers away, there's an abandoned farm. Our contact will be waiting for us there."

They began to walk in the darkness.

As dawn approached, they found the farm.

The farm was more dilapidated than Loran had imagined. Half of the roof had collapsed, the walls were covered in moss, and the yard was overgrown with waist-high weeds.

The contact was a farmer named Old René, in his sixties, with a wrinkled face and missing half an ear. He didn't say a word, but simply pointed to a haystack in the corner of the barn. A cellar was hidden beneath it.

For the next three days, they hid in the cellar, only coming out after dark.

Jack and Tom studied the photos and maps repeatedly, determining the route and timing of their operation. Lorraine was responsible for observing the surrounding movements, sneaking out every night to lie in ambush in the woods for several hours, noting the patterns of the German patrols.

The operation began on the third night.

They crept to the perimeter of the radar station and lay in ambush in a thicket of bushes. The radar station was just two hundred meters away; three massive steel frames were being erected, surrounded by barracks, warehouses, and anti-aircraft gun emplacements. The Germans had assigned an entire company to guard it.

Loran crouched there, motionless. He could hear his own heartbeat, the buzzing of mosquitoes in his ears, and the distant footsteps of the changing of the guard.

Jack nudged his shoulder and pointed to his watch.

Two o'clock in the morning.

They began to move.

Jack and Tom disappeared into the darkness like shadows. Lorraine stayed behind to observe and provide backup. He watched the two men climb over the barbed wire, across the open ground, and disappear into the shadows of the radar station.

Ten minutes. Twenty minutes. Thirty minutes.

There was no movement.

He started sweating.

Ten minutes later, two muffled thuds suddenly came from the darkness—not explosions, but the sounds of silenced pistols. Then came more sounds: footsteps, shouts, and alarms.

Then an explosion occurred.

Orange flames rose from the direction of the radar station, illuminating half the sky.

In the bright light, Loran saw two dark figures running towards him.

"Let's go!" Jack shouted.

They started running. They ran into the woods, across the fields, onto the pre-selected escape route. Behind them, the sirens still wailed, and the beams of searchlights swept across the darkness, chasing them.

They ran for a long time.

As dawn approached, they finally shook off their pursuers and returned to the abandoned farm.

The three men slumped down in the barn, panting heavily. Jack and Tom were covered in mud and sweat.

"It's blown up," Jack said. "All of it."

Loran nodded.

Three days later, Jack and Tom returned to England via another route. Lorraine did not go back.

He still has one more thing to do.

Old René got him a set of old clothes, a fake ID, and a new identity called "Pierre Durand." Just like last time, but this time the destination was different.

"Where are you going?" old René asked.

Loran hesitated for a moment.

He remembered the list on his phone. Those names hovered in his mind like ghosts.

Rejewski. A Pole. A cryptographer. He should still be in France right now.

But he didn't know his exact location. He only knew vague information: he fled Poland in 1939, first going to Romania, then to France. After the fall of France, he might have remained in the "Free Zone," or he might have gone to Algeria. Or perhaps...

They may already be dead.

"The South," Loran said. "I want to go see the South."

Old René looked at him, an indescribable expression in his cloudy eyes. He didn't ask why. He simply nodded.

“There’s a route,” he said. “First take the train to Toulouse, then head south from Toulouse. There are more mountains there, and the Germans are less strict about it.”

Early the next morning, Lorraine boarded a train heading south.

The train was slow. It stopped for a long time at each station, sometimes an hour, waiting for who knows what. The carriages were packed with people: refugees, soldiers, vendors, and silent passengers like him. No one spoke. Only the sound of the train wheels grinding against the rails, one beat after another, like a heartbeat.

Loran leaned against the window, watching the scenery flash by. Destroyed bridges, scorched fields, abandoned villages. Occasionally, he could see people working in the fields, bent over, like a group of slowly moving black dots.

He got off the train in Toulouse.

This is a strange city. The streets are filled with refugees and fleeing people. The cafes are packed, but no one speaks. Posters on the walls are stacked one on top of another: Vichy government decrees, German notices, and resistance leaflets torn in half.

Lorraine found a small hotel in an alley. The landlady glanced at his ID, asked nothing, took the money, and gave him a key.

He stayed in that small hotel for three days.

During the day, he wandered around the city, looking at the streets, the people, and the posters plastered on the walls. At night, he sat in his room, listening to the distant train whistles, thinking about those names.

He didn't know how to find it. He had no clues, no contact persons, only a name.

Marian Rejewski.

A Pole. A cryptographer. Possibly still in France.

It's also possible that it's no longer there.

On the fourth day, he made a decision.

He bought a train ticket to the south and continued south.

The train crawled along the winding mountain road. Outside the window, the peaks grew steeper and the valleys deeper. Occasionally, small villages, a few stone houses, and the spire of a church could be seen nestled in the valleys.

In the afternoon, the train stopped at a small station called "Fowa".

Loran got out of the car.

This is a very small town with only one main street, a few shops, and a market. In the distance, the outline of the Pyrenees Mountains can be seen, their peaks still covered in snow.

He stood on the platform, unsure of which way to go.

Then he saw a person.

He was a man in his forties, wearing glasses and an old suit, standing at the other end of the platform. He was carrying a worn-out leather suitcase and looking at a map. Sunlight shone on his face, revealing the deep weariness in his eyes.

Loran looked at that person and suddenly had a strange feeling.

He couldn't explain why. Maybe it was the glasses, maybe it was the ill-fitting old suit, maybe it was the focused expression on the man's face as he looked at the map—it all exuded an aura that suggested he was no ordinary person.

He walked over.

"Sir," he said, "do you need any help?"

The man looked up at him. There was a wariness in his eyes, and a sensitivity unique to someone who had been on the run for a long time.

"Thank you," the man said. His French had a heavy accent. "I'm looking for a hotel."

"There's one on the corner," Lorraine said. "I've stayed there. It's cheap and clean."

The man nodded and put the map away.

They walked out of the station together.

The sun was shining brightly. Several children were playing in the street, and some elderly people were sunbathing. In the distance, the sound of church bells could be heard, one slow, drawn-out chime after another.

The person walked beside him without saying a word.

When they reached the hotel entrance, the man suddenly stopped.

He looked at Loran, a strange expression in his eyes.

"Are you British?" he asked.

Loran was taken aback.

"The Frenchman," he said.

The person shook their head.

"No," he said. "Your French is very good, but I can tell from the way you walk and the way you stand."

Loran remained silent, speechless at the speculation.

The man looked at him and remained silent for a few seconds.

"Don't worry," he said softly. "I'm a fugitive too."

He stretched out his hand.

"Marian Rejewski," he said.

Loran stood there, looking at the hand, at the tired face, at the fleeting light in those eyes.

He suddenly remembered the sentence on his phone: "Polish cryptographer Marian Rejewski fled to France in 1940 and later to England."

This is the person.

With disbelief in his eyes, he reached out and grasped that hand.

"Pierre Durand," he said.

Rejevsky looked at him and nodded.

They went into the hotel.

That evening, Loren sat in Rejewsky's room, listening to him tell his story.

In September 1939, Germany invaded Poland. He and his colleagues escaped Warsaw at the last minute, taking with them their most important research findings—all the data on the Enigma machine. They first went to Romania, then to France, where they continued their work from a secret base outside Paris.

In June 1940, France surrendered. They fled again. Some went to England, some stayed. He chose to stay because his wife was ill and could not leave.

Now his wife is dead. He's all alone and doesn't know where to go.

"Do you know what I do?" Rejevsky asked.

Lorraine nodded, then quickly shook her head.

Rejevsky looked at him, his eyes holding a complex expression.

"The code," he said. "The German code."

Loran did not speak.

Rejewsky continued. He told him what the Lorran Enigma was, how they had cracked it, and how important these findings were to the war effort. As he spoke, his eyes shone with a light, the kind of light that comes from a researcher discussing the culmination of their life's work.

Then the light went out.

"But it's all useless now," he said. "The Germans changed the code. All our previous work was wasted."

He looked down at his hands.

"I am nothing now. Just a Polish fugitive, a widower who lost his wife, a useless old man."

Loran looked at him and remained silent for a long time.

Then he spoke.

"If there were a road," he said, "to England, would you go?"

Rejevsky looked up at him.

"U.K?"

Loran nodded.

"There is a road. From France, cross the Pyrenees Mountains to Spain, and then take a ship from Spain to England. It's very dangerous; you might die on the way. But if you make it, you'll meet those people, your colleagues, those who have already gone to England."

Rejevsky looked at him, and something was struggling in his eyes.

"Why?" he asked. "Why are you helping me?"

Loran remained silent for a few seconds.

"I guess," he said, "that you'll play a significant role in this war. Much more significant than you realize."

Rejevsky didn't speak, but he seemed to have found a kindred spirit, his hand trembling excitedly in mid-air.

Outside the window, the night grew deeper.

Three days later, Loran left Fuva with Rejewski.

They traveled south along the mountain path, hiding in the woods during the day and traveling at night. Rejevsky was in poor health, needing to stop and catch his breath after every few steps, but he never considered giving up.

On the fifth night, they crossed the last ridge.

Spain is beneath my feet.

Loran stood on the ridge and glanced back.

Rejewski stood beside him, also looking back.

"Will I come back?" he asked.

They continued walking.

Two weeks later, Lorraine stood at the door of that three-story brick house in London and pushed it open.

Let him stand in the corridor and watch him.

"You're back?"

Loran nodded.

Let him look at her and remain silent for a few seconds.

"General de Gaulle is waiting for you," he said.

Loran went up to the second floor and pushed open the door.

De Gaulle stood in front of the map, his back to him.

"I heard you brought someone back," de Gaulle said.

"Yes."

De Gaulle turned around and looked at him.

"Polish. Cryptographer."

Loran nodded.

De Gaulle walked to the window and looked at the gray sky outside.

"The British are very interested," he said. "The Special Operations Service has taken him away. They want to ask you how you found him?"

Loran did not speak.

De Gaulle turned and looked at him. In those deep-set eyes, there was an expression that was hard to describe—not doubt, not approval, but something deeper.

"You won't tell, will you?"

Lorraine shook her head.

De Gaulle nodded helplessly.

"it is good."

He walked back to the table, took another folder from the drawer, and handed it to Loran.

"Next task," he said.

Loran took the folder and opened it.

Inside was a list, longer than the last one. Twenty-three names, spread across eleven cities. Each name was accompanied by a note indicating the assistance they could provide, hiding places, fake identification, food supplies, and intelligence sources.

He looked at those names, at those unfamiliar addresses.

De Gaulle walked up to him.

"This road," he said, "will get longer and longer. And you'll take more and more people with you. Pilots, agents, resistance fighters, Jews, and those being hunted by the Gestapo."

He looked into Lorraine's eyes.

"One day, this road will become a thorn in the side of the Germans. They will track you down, set traps, and send their best men to capture you."

He paused.

Will you regret it?

Loran looked at the list, at those unfamiliar names.

He recalled the eyes of Rejewski when he stood on the ridge and looked back at France.

"No," he said.

De Gaulle looked at him and nodded.

"Then let's go."