A Plot Conundrum - Long winded.

The WIP is set during WW2 and one of the MCs is an Agent with Special Operations Executive (F-Section - France). For a brief while his wife was sent to Grendon Hall, which was where F-Section had their 'listening' station. While she was there a sabotage mission was nearly compromised, one of the agents went missing and another was killed. The husband, Andrew, was brought back to England for a debriefing and also to be assigned a new code poem. While he was home on leave, his wife, Katya, confronted him because she worked out his identity and that he was the agent whose mission went tits up.

Anyway, Andrew has been sent back into occupied France and, about 5 months after, Katya receives a telegram telling her that he is Missing in Action. Because she knows he's with SOE, she realises that's all she's ever likely to know.

She is pregnant and doesn't want to settle for that. She wants to know what happened. Before he left, Andrew told her the name of the woman who handles all the agents' affairs, gives them their pre-departure briefing, etc. Her name is Vera Atkins and she was a real person who, although, officially, Assistant to the Head of F Section, was considered to be the person who ran it. (She was the inspiration for Mrs. Moneypenny).

I was thinking of Katya taking a little trip to SOE HQ and demanding to see Vera Atkins, because she wants to know what really happened as well as getting a message to Andrew. SOE used to send messages via the BBC to agents, with family news. Family members rarely knew, until years later, that their loved ones worked for SOE.

Do you think this is a feasible plot development?

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Melia said:

I'm no WWII espionage expert, but as a reader this part would be a red flag to me. I don't think he would tell her a name. Could she find out another way?

I also don't think if Katya found out the name, Vera Atkins would speak to her at all. Vera would have no idea if Katya could be trusted, and she would be compromising many people's safety to admit anything she did for the war effort. One possibility would be to put the scene in, have the talk end in total frustration for Katya, and then have Katya find out information from a friend of Andrew's who was with him. That scenario would ring true to me.

That's just my opinion. I'm a fairly harsh judge of spy fiction, because I love to read it.

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Aw, Melia, that's brilliant!

Yes, Katya could've found out the name another way, because she'd worked in F-Section. I like that idea.

The friend scenario is an interesting one. However, his best bud is, actually, keeping a discreet eye on Katya at Andrew's request. He was invalided out of the Army after Dunkirk and Katya doesn't know him, yet. She's about to start getting paranoid about seeing the man with the cane around the town, who appears more often than coincidence should allow. I suppose, after he's forced to reveal his identity, he could give her the information. But, that begs the question, how would Andrew get word to him in the UK, when he's gone to ground in France?

Hmmmmmmmmm...interesting.

pdr said:

in fact, SOE would not even admit he was theirs. And they never talked to families about what had happened. They even had the power to lock anxious rellies away if they were held to be a nuisance.

Your MC must do all the discovery work and info digging herself.

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Aye, I guessed as much, hence the lack of personal accounts of the day to day operations of SOE. I think most everyone took their secrets/experiences to the grave with them.

I didn't know that about the 'anxious rellies'!

It's been a fascinating but frustrating exercise in terms of finding stuff.