Notes from the Grey Tower

Chapter 28

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It was dark night outside the glass windows of the corridor, and the orange gas lamps on the street were already on. The building housing the Cabinet Operations Office was still brightly lit. In this suffocating war, people came and went with paper bags, hurrying like cogs in a machine.

C helped me open the office door: "I'll send a car to take you back."

I wanted to agree, but suddenly I heard someone behind me say, "No, I'll take Alan back."

I turned around and saw Andremon. He leaned against the corridor wall with his arms folded, as if he had been waiting for a long time. The black dress contrasts with the dark yellow and old wallpaper, casting an elegant darkness on the pale complexion.

"I came back from the Congress Hall and just passed by." He smiled at me, looking very relaxed: "Alan, you go out first, Peter is waiting for you in the car. I have something to talk to C."

I don't know what he and C talked about, only that the conversation went on for a long time. The Rolls-Royce Phantom stopped under the steps of the small white building. It was a long time before I walked out of the hall, and the guards on both sides saluted him.

He looked tired after the conversation. The Rolls-Royce glided through the quiet street like a ghost. After driving for a long time, he said to me: "Alan, I told you before, you can't completely trust C."

"I know." I asked, "What did you just talk to him about?"

"We just came to an agreement, Alan."

"About what?" I asked.

Andemont looked at me sideways, with a half-smile: "About you."

I reached out to hook his chin: "Baby, give me a kiss."

I missed Peter's deadpan turn.

I scratched the back of the front seat: "Kiss one, I guarantee that the code-breaking rate of Office No. 1 will be doubled."

Andemon shook his head: "Alan, you look terrible."

He asked Peter to park outside a bar. It was a pub full of old pictures of London, and I still remember the bitter taste of the stout. I don't remember how much draft beer I ordered, but I just drank it one by one until closing time, and the bartender rang the bell at the bar and shouted "Last oder".

Anderson didn't stop me from drinking, nor did he drink himself.

He just sat by and looked at me.

The bar was empty when we went in, he may have abused his position again. Because we never came in new guests after we went in.

I repeated to Andrew what C had said to me.

Speaking of my mother finally working for Berlin, he stood up and hugged my waist gently from behind.

He should have known these stories before I did.

He didn't speak or comfort me, but just hugged me tightly for a long time.

Oh my Andrew.

The next morning, Raphael came to me with a gloomy face: "Alan, what is that pile of things on my desk?"

"The information on the 'Mi' decryption machine. The current work progress of me and Andymond."

"Why is it on my desk?!"

"Because you will be transferred to Office No. 1 from today to be responsible for the research and development of the decryption machine... Prime Minister Churchill asked us to manufacture the decryption machine by the end of June, and Andremund has no time, so he can only rely on you and me."

"I told you I'm Jewish."

I smiled and patted him on the shoulder: "I'm the person in charge of Office No. 1 now."

"Alan, what are you doing?"

"Before you make the decryption mechanism, I guarantee that Office One has the same password-breaking speed as the decryption machine."

Raphael took a step back: "Alan, you are crazy! It's impossible!"

Raphael is right, it's impossible. The manual deciphering speed of Office No. 1 is only dozens of ciphertexts per day, and the goal of the decryption machine is to make the number of ciphers deciphering more than 300 ciphertexts per day. And that's just a tiny fraction of the thousands of ciphertexts we've intercepted.

I deciphered the code during the day, and went to Office No. 7 to study the decryption machine with Rafael at night.

It was a day as pale as hell.

The war is clouded. No one thought that the German mechanized troops would pass through the Ardennes to go around the Maginot Line, and the Allies were caught off guard. The Nazis almost trampled on France, and Belgium surrendered ten days later. Our troops retreated in the direction of the British mainland. Full-page newspapers celebrated the "Evacuation of Dunkirk", yet few realized that this meant the war was approaching on British soil.

People are eagerly awaiting new news. I got the news through "fans": Hitler's victory banquet, the people's parade of the Third Reich, anti-Semitic slogans and racial theories.

The brain has never worked so fast. The word sleep has lost its original meaning. I learned to drink black coffee like Andymon, cup after cup, unshaven and unkempt.

I can only try my best to dig out the weakness of the "fan" to shorten the decryption time.

The codes of the German army have certain rules, and the same information is often sent at about the same time—for example, the weather forecast will be sent at 6 o’clock in the morning. With words like "aircraft" and "reconnaissance".

I found a principle of "fan": this word cannot be encrypted by itself. That is to say, you cannot encrypt A into A, and B into B. In this way, if I guess that there is the word "aircraft" in this ciphertext, I can compare "aircraft" with the original ciphertext from the first line, and exclude all the same letters and the letters near them.

I told Andremon this method, and he just smiled. There is a contact person from the Ministry of the Air Force in Plimpton Manor, and from then on, the flight records of the Air Force will be sent over every day for us to decipher.

There are many similar things, such as perforated paper that reduces the number of calculations, one by one, and the letters left in the holes are the keys. These things may seem ridiculous now, but we had no other choice under the urgent circumstances at the time.

In June, France surrendered.

On the last day of June, the decryption mechanism was successfully produced. The blueprint adopts the design of Anderson, which is very simple, but can greatly increase the speed of password deciphering.

Raphael told me that when the deciphering machine was successfully operated, all the energy in his body seemed to be drained.

He supported me: "Alan? What's wrong with you, Alan?"

Andmond took me away from Plimpton Manor to rest for a week at his villa in downtown London. I sleep most of the time because I haven't slept in a long time.

Andremon locked the door firmly and said, "Forget 'fan', Alan. You need to rest."

I haven't been here for a long time.

The furnishings have barely changed, exactly as they were when we first started our relationship. The sofa covered with a dust jacket, oil paintings by famous artists, the study room, and the white grand piano in the empty reception room on the second floor.

I walked to the piano and saw my own shadow reflected on the smooth body of the piano.

His face was sunken and colorless, his eyes were black and blue, and his beard looked like it hadn't been shaved in a long time.

I held the piano in my hands and looked at it for a long time, feeling depressed: "Like a ghost."

Andymond was by my side. He nodded in agreement, stripped me naked and threw me into the bathtub, washed it and threw it on the big bed, brought a basin of water, and then walked over with a blade and soap.

I hugged the sheets tightly: "Honey, what are you going to do?"

"Close your eyes."

"Oh baby! You can't do this."

"Do not talk."

After a while he asked, "Pain?"

I took a breath and reached out to scratch the back of his head: "Nonsense, it's bleeding. Honey, haven't you ever shaved someone before?"

He was very frank: "No."

"You you... what are you doing?"

"abnormal!"

Andmon didn't speak, he lowered his head and licked my cut from the razor. I could feel the soft, warm touch of his tongue. It's not so much a kiss as it is a nasty lick. This kind of crisp|itchy feeling is very uncomfortable. I lay on my back on the big white bed, and he was right beside the bed, with his knees half-kneeling on the side of the bed, pushing my legs apart.

Anderson's whole body covered mine, and the fresh mint smell of his shirt enveloped my senses.

It wasn't until he toweled my face off and started pulling on my belt that I realized I wasn't in the right position.

However, it was too late.

Andrew gave me two options.

He kissed my forehead: "Alan, do you want me to handcuff you and fuck you, or do you want to be obedient?"

I rested for a week at the villa in Andermont. My leave was approved by Andrew himself, but I don't know who approved his leave. He stayed with me in the villa for 4 days out of 7 days, during which we tried various sex positions - on the bed, in the bathtub, on the piano. Anderson taught me to play "Fur Elise," and when I played he kissed me from behind, all the way down my spine. The kiss made me tremble all over, and I didn't know what button my fingers pressed. Once I saw Andymond playing the piano. He lowered his head slightly and played very intently. I don't know what tune he played, but I just think the melodious melody is beautiful with his slender neck. I walked up behind him and started kissing his back through the fabric of his shirt, thinking that if he resisted, I would just say it was even. Unexpectedly, Andemon stopped playing right away, stood up, turned around, threw me on the piano, and directly spread my legs and pressed it.

The piano is very narrow and I have to straighten my back and put all my strength on him. With every movement of Andmon, the keys of the piano roared. I vividly remember the pain and pleasure when he entered the body, it was almost unbearable.

London is starting to heat up in June. Every morning in my pajamas, I open the window to get some air, and I can hear the sound of car horns on the street in the distance. Gasoline is now in limited supply, and most of the vehicles driving on the streets are military vehicles or government vehicles delivering supplies.

Only then did I feel the imminence of an external war.

Andemon would come out of the kitchen with his shirt on, hand me a cup of coffee, put his arms around my waist and say, watch the street scene with me: "Alan, it's okay, I'm still here."

I suggested to him: "Honey, sometimes you can be down there. It's actually quite comfortable down there."

He thought for a moment, then turned around and threw me back on the bed: "I will make you more comfortable."