House of the Hanged (31 page)

An hour later, Yevgeny and Fanya were also woken – by six armed men bursting in on them. Commissaire Roche was happy to let Leonard and Walter conduct the interrogation right there in the bedroom while he and his men retired downstairs.

‘Leonard was so mad,' said Walter, ‘I thought he was going to shoot them both.'

‘So did they, which is why we were sure they weren't hiding anything. They didn't know where you were being held.'

Leonard had figured that Pyotr was their only hope, but it would mean persuading him to play a very dangerous game. Pyotr hadn't hesitated, apparently, and they had worked out his story during the short drive from the monastery to Collobrières, where he had called his controller in Paris from a bar.

‘He was adamant that the lie had to contain as much of the truth as possible,' said Walter. ‘And whatever he said, it sure as hell worked. There was a car there to pick him up within the hour. All we had to do was tail it without being spotted.'

Leonard laid his tea cup aside and took Lucy in his arms, just holding her for a moment before pecking her on the forehead. ‘I know someone who would be very happy to hear from you.'

‘Mother . . . where is she?'

‘At Klaus and Ilse's house. I imagine she's sitting right beside the telephone.'

‘And an overflowing ashtray,' said Tom.

Lucy said she didn't want privacy, so they were all present in the entrance hall when the operator put her through and the receiver was snatched up at the other end.

‘It's me,' she said simply, quite calmly.

But her face suddenly crumpled and the tears came. ‘I know,' she sobbed into the phone. ‘Me too. Me too . . .'

The hospital was a grand Victorian building, a former private residence put up by some duke or other just south of Hyères on a pine-clad slope facing the sea. Long verandas took up two of its four floors at the front, and these were ideal when it came to giving the less mobile of the patients a dose of sunshine and a breath of salt air. Those more able to get about had access to the manicured gardens, whose main pathways had been laid with tarmac to smooth the passage of wheelchairs.

Irina was permitted no such luxuries. Her room was on the top floor of the hospital at the back, and there were two gendarmes seated on chairs flanking the door.

Lucy remained outside with them in the corridor when Tom entered the room.

* * *

Irina was dozing, propped up on pillows. She looked pale and remarkably peaceful, despite the livid bruise on the side of her head, which had leaked round and discoloured her eye. In repose, her mouth had lost its iron anatomy.

She stirred as he pulled up a chair, focusing on him with tired eyes. The bullet had passed clean through her thigh, but it had carried a small piece of cotton from her trousers deep into her leg, where it had gone un detected until the infection had started to rage. The surgeon had assured Tom that all was well now, that there was nothing to fear.

Irina held out her hand, palm upwards, inviting him to take it. After a moment's hesitation, he did.

‘What's going to happen to me?'

‘Well, you're not going to lose your leg.'

‘Just my head?'

He smiled. ‘Only if I have my way.'

‘I mean it, Tom. Am I going to be . . . killed?'

He leaned forward in his chair. ‘You've spent too long with the wrong people. That's not how we do things. Anyhow, you're too big a prize.'

Leonard had grown quite excited at the possibilities opened up by Irina's capture, so much so that Tom had begun to wonder if he hadn't been used as bait by his old friend over the past days to draw out such a valuable Soviet asset. He certainly wouldn't put such skulduggery past Leonard.

‘So?' Irina asked. ‘What happens?'

‘It's not for me to say, but you know how these things work. It's a horse trade. Your government has people we want back.'

‘Were you lying about our man in the Secret Intelligence Service?'

‘No. We have him now.'

‘Then use him to get them back. You can't send me home, they'll execute me.'

‘I thought you were quite happy to take your chances with Zakharov.'

‘Not now. Not after this.' She paused. ‘If you send me back you'll never know about Alexei.'

‘Alexei?'

‘Your son. Our son.'

‘Oh, so now he's definitely mine, is he?' He didn't attempt to conceal his scepticism. He also released her hand.

‘Of course I couldn't say before, it would have been too cruel.'

‘This is desperate stuff, Irina.'

‘What's your middle name?'

Tom hesitated. ‘Alexander . . .'

Irina's dark eyes bored into him, and the hardness had returned to her mouth. ‘If you let them send me back you will never know where he is.'

‘You can tell me now.'

‘And why would I do that?' she replied.

He'd had enough of her threats and her games. Getting to his feet, he said, ‘I'll come and see you again.'

‘I would like that. Maybe we can talk about . . . nicer things.'

‘I very much doubt that. Goodbye, Irina, or whatever it is you call yourself now.'

‘Natalya.'

It suited her; it had something of the dark prophetess about it.

He was placing the chair back against the wall when she asked, ‘What happened to Pyotr?'

Tom turned to face her. ‘He didn't make it.'

There was nothing in her expression to suggest what she felt about this.

He knew Lucy could see that his time with Irina had unsettled him, but she didn't probe, quite happy to walk with him in silence back through the building.

They left the main staircase at the first-floor landing and made for the administration offices. Here they found two more gendarmes on guard by a door. This time, Lucy didn't wait outside.

They had visited Pyotr together before, but this was to be the last time.

‘Why?' asked Pyotr.

‘Because you're officially dead.'

‘Oh.'

‘There's going to be a burial and everything.'

‘Can I come?'

Lucy laughed.

‘I'm afraid you'll be in Marseilles by then. They're transferring you to another hospital there tonight.'

‘So this is goodbye?'

‘And it's going to be quick. I hate goodbyes.'

‘He does,' confirmed Lucy.

‘I've brought you something.'

Tom handed over a small package wrapped in gift paper. Pyotr tore off the paper and prised open the box. He frowned. ‘It's Russian?'

‘Yes. It was given to me by a woman the day after you and I first met.'

Pyotr held up the jewelled locket, dangling it before his face on its gold chain. ‘What happened to her?'

‘I don't know. But the man she was with that day went on to be knighted by King George V for bravery . . . so it seemed appropriate.'

Tom found a route through the tubes running in and out of Pyotr and stooped to hug him. ‘Thank you,' he said.

Lucy was next, kissing the Russian on both cheeks. ‘I owe you my life.'

‘Maybe one day I will come and see what you have done with it.'

‘I hope so.'

Pyotr clenched the locket in his fist and shooed them away with his other hand. ‘Go on, go . . . I have to practise being dead.'

Tom was following Lucy from the room when he remembered something.

‘Oh, any particular epitaph you want on your headstone?'

‘Have a guess,' replied Pyotr.

It was an unusual sight: Leonard and Venetia arm in arm. They were strolling across the lower lawn of the hospital gardens.

Lucy avoided the main steps, steering Tom towards a pathway that looped down through a scattering of palm trees, buying them a bit more time alone together.

‘Are you all right?'

‘She says he's definitely mine and his name's Alexei.'

They walked on a short way in silence.

‘Do you believe her?'

‘It makes no difference. Even if she changes her story and swears he isn't, I still have to know for myself. I can't not know.'

‘If he is, he's going to be as handsome as a god. Yes . . . and almost my age,' she added, wickedly.

‘Do you really think I'd let my son fall into the hands of a young hussy like you?'

‘You're a fine one to talk . . . seducing your own god-daughter in her hour of need!'

‘A little louder,' said Tom. ‘I'm not sure your mother quite caught that.'

Lucy glanced through the trees at the lawn below them, where Leonard and Venetia were now examining a flower border. ‘Oh God, imagine . . .'

‘I'd prefer not to.'

‘Don't worry,' she said. ‘Our secret.'

‘And a very fine one it is.'

Lucy smiled and slid her hand under his arm.

It was such a simple gesture, and yet it seemed to carry with it the full weight of their history. She was, he realized, the only true constant in his life. Even when he had revealed the worst of himself to her, his rotten core, she had barely flinched. It gave him hope for his uncertain future.
She
gave him hope.

The events of the past days had changed everything. Nothing could ever be as it once was, not while General Ivan Zakharov was at large. With any luck the Soviets would resolve the matter for him. Stalin didn't tolerate failure, and Zakharov's private vendetta had cost the country dear: four agents apprehended, four killed.

Leonard would do everything possible at his end to ensure that Zakharov didn't dodge the blame, but if by some miracle he survived Stalin's wrath . . .

At that instant they cleared the palms and the view opened up before them: the salt marshes of the Presqu'île de Giens, with its twin sandy spits thrusting out to sea, where the islands shimmered in the brassy glare of the high noon sun.

It was an ageless vista that cared little for the foolish ways of men, and for a moment it laid a finger on the lips of all that was wrong with the world.

Not for the first time, my thanks go to my peerless agent, Stephanie Cabot, and to my editors, Julia Wisdom and Jennifer Hershey, whose unwavering encouragement is a vital tonic. Many thanks also to Anne O'Brien for her scrupulous copy editing.

I would also like to thank my good friend, Ben Airas, who not only suggested that I read
Operation Kronstadt
by Harry Ferguson, he then went and bought the book for me. This expert and gripping account of Britain's involvement in Russia around the time of the Revolution proved invaluable in my research.

About the Author

Mark Mills
graduated from Cambridge University in 1986. He has lived in both Italy and France, and has written for the screen. His first novel,
The Whaleboat House
, won the 2004 Crime Writers' Association Award for Best Novel by a debut author. His second,
The Savage Garden
, was a Richard and Judy Summer Read and a No.1 bestseller. His third,
The Information Officer
, was shortlisted for the 2009 CWA Ellis Peters Historical Fiction Award. He lives in Oxford with his wife and two children.

www.markmills.org.uk

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Also by Mark Mills

The Whaleboat House
The Savage Garden
The Information Officer

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Copyright © Mark Mills 2011

Mark Mills asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-0-00-727691-2

EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780007346493

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