The Castle (20 page)

FORTY-THREE

A
s soon as they announced Florence as the next stop, Dad woke up, like someone switching on a light. We got off the train and were met by two fit ex-soldier types who reminded me of the watchers at Naples station, except they were Dad's friends and greeted him like a brother, and Amina and me like two long-lost princesses. They seemed to create an invisible safety bubble as they shepherded us carefully through the throng.

‘Anyone here?' Dad asked the shorter, tougher-looking of the two, whom he introduced as François.

‘No sign so far,' François said. ‘But let's get you out of here anyway.'

Outside, a driver was waiting for us in a luxury car with the engine running. He moved off as soon as we got inside. By now the storm had passed and the evening sky was a muddy blue. The driver had Italian pop music playing quietly on the radio. We drove slowly through narrow streets, where shops and restaurants flooded the road with light and the pavements were full of people happily strolling. It was another world.

Beside the river, tourists crowded over an old bridge that seemed to be covered in houses. ‘The Ponte Vecchio,' Dad explained from the front seat, pronouncing it
Pont-eh Veck-i-oh
, in his new-found Italian accent. ‘It's famous. Those buildings on it are mostly jewellery shops. They were used as secret passages across the Arno River during the war.'

I smiled to myself. Dad was always great with his research, but between the Smugglers' Inn and the castle, I was probably the expert on secret passages now.

The city itself was like a living jewellery box, where every building, church and square looked like a work of art. As we drove beside a massive stone palace, François (a short French version of Dad, I was beginning to realise) told us that Michelangelo had worked for the Medici family here. He reeled off a list of famous local artists' names and I nodded sleepily from the back, next to Amina. I was just glad the place didn't seem to be full of people who wanted to kill me.

After a few more minutes, the built-up streets of the city gave way to a tree-lined road, bordered by larger houses and scraps of countryside. We drove on, passing fields and olive groves, until the driver took a sudden left turn up a hill, and stopped a few metres further along, in front of a pair of elegant wrought-iron gates. A gold plaque beside them said
Colombo
Foundation
in subtle black letters, just big enough to read. So this was it: Dad's secret headquarters. Dad explained that
colombo
was the Italian for
dove
– the dove of peace. I'd never experienced a less peaceful time than the last two weeks, but whatever. It had a nice logo of a bird anyway.

The gates opened as if by magic and we continued up a winding drive flanked by rows of tall, thin cypress trees. Amina gripped my arm as we rounded the last bend, and there, lit up against the darkness, was a long white villa. It was two storeys high, with square windows flanked by dark green shutters and a shallow, tiled roof. The front door was already open and a tall man stood framed against the light of the hallway.

As we got out of the car, he came forward to greet us. He was barefoot, I noticed, but wearing a loose silk shirt and a green embroidered jacket. He held his arms out wide.

‘Welcome! Welcome, both of you!' His voice was soft and his accent was American. ‘And welcome back, Mike. It's been too long.'

‘Hi, Henry. This is Henry Phillips,' Dad said. ‘Our host.'

He had a young-looking face, softened by a stylish, stubbly beard. His eyes were pale blue, framed with long lashes, and when he looked at you it was hard to look away.

‘You must be Peta. It's good to meet you,' he said, holding out his hand to me.

I shook it, stony-faced. He seemed very charming, but this must be the man who'd persuaded Dad to go to Baghdad, fake getting blown up, and then head for the castle, where I very nearly never saw him again. If my eyes said
You stole my father
, I wasn't going to try and stop them.

Amina, of course, was perfectly polite. Dad's glance at me said
Why can't you be more like your friend Amina?
My
glance back said
You wish
. He hadn't been in that churchyard. I had.

Inside, the villa was stuffed with silk rugs and antique furniture. Whatever else the American was, he was very, very rich. Modern paintings and sculptures provided flashes of colour against pale pastel walls. Every room looked good enough to feature on the cover of a magazine. It was impressive – some of it even looked comfortable – but it didn't make me feel relaxed. Money made me nervous now. I'd seen what people would do for it – including, it seemed, my own father – and people who had a lot of it made my skin crawl these days.

The American showed us to a small room where a round table was set for two, lit by flickering candles in silver candlesticks.

‘You must be hungry. Maria will look after you both. Please excuse us for a while.'

A friendly-looking housekeeper arrived and offered us all sorts of food, but after a simple bowl of pasta our shrunken stomachs couldn't handle any more. Disappointed, she went off to the kitchen to see if she could find something sweet to tempt us with.

Meanwhile, Dad had disappeared with his mates from the Foundation. They'd arrived, one by one, at the door of our little dining room, to introduce themselves while we ate, before heading off to join the gang. There seemed to be about a dozen of them: men and women, all different shapes and sizes, from the lean, fit soldier-types to the soft, shy boffins. Some were English, some French and Italian, and the rest I wasn't sure, but all of them – each and every one – reminded me of Dad's best friends from his army days. They had a certain glint in their eyes, and you could just tell they were up
for danger. They seemed friendly enough, but kept saying that we must be tired, and they wanted to leave us in peace.

They didn't want to leave Dad in peace, though: they wanted to hear his adventures, and I could just about make out their voices from a distant room. This was how it must have been for Mum, I realised. You think you've got him back, but you haven't: he's sharing his war stories with people he's closer to than you.

Back in the dining room, Maria, the housekeeper, persuaded Amina and me to try some home-made strawberry ice cream, which was, to be honest, the most delicious thing I'd tasted in my life. ‘And now, your bedrooms,' she said. ‘You're sleepy, I bet. Let me show you where to go.'

She took us upstairs. My room was white, with a carved wooden bedhead and painted furniture. Next door was a white tiled bathroom, which I shared with Amina. Her bedroom was similar to mine, but decorated in blue.

After inspecting the shop-fresh summer clothes that had been laid out for me to choose from in the morning, I found Amina sitting in the corner of her bedroom, arms clasped round her knees, rocking. I knew that feeling from the boat, and it wasn't a good one. A part of her was still stuck in that tunnel, screaming for her brother, and no amount of pasta, ice cream and candlelight was going to make it better.

‘Go to bed, Amina,' I said gently.

She looked over at the king-size bed and shook her head.

‘Then come with me.'

I put her in my bed and curled up next to her to keep her company. Having sworn she couldn't use the pillows and soft white duvet, she was asleep before I'd even turned out the light.

I sat up next to her for a while, flipping through a guidebook that had thoughtfully been placed on my bedside table. I could see why Dad liked it here. Florence was perfect Dad country – full of history and adventure. Through the open window, I could hear the strains of laughter from downstairs. His voice was one of them. He
was
home, I realised: back with his friends, where he belonged.

FORTY-FOUR

I
n the morning, the house was quiet. The space beside me was already empty. So was the other bedroom. I went to the window and saw Amina down in the garden, staring up at a distant olive grove in the hazy morning light, as if staring far enough could bring her brother back to her. I decided to go and keep her company.

Among the smart summer clothes laid out for me to try, someone had thoughtfully added some soft sweatpants and a comfy T-shirt. I put these on and wandered downstairs. It took a while to find a room with an unlocked door to the garden. As I was about to step outside I heard a gentle cough behind me.

Henry Phillips was standing there, dressed this morning in a floor-length blue robe that brought out the colour of his eyes. They reminded me a little of Parissa's eyes, but hers had been sapphires, whereas his were more pale turquoise.

‘Good morning,' he said.

‘Hi.'

‘Would you like to see the grounds?'

‘Don't worry – I'm fine.'

‘Perhaps I can show you my sculpture garden.'

The man couldn't take a hint. I sighed, but I didn't seem to have much choice. He led me down a series of paths to an area enclosed by tall hedges, where abstract sculptures sat among rills of running water and low, dense bushes carved into geometric shapes.
Karim would have loved it here
, I thought bitterly.

‘I guess I should apologise to you,' the American said.

‘For what?'

‘For what happened to your father.'

‘Oh. OK.'
That
was a surprise.

He sighed. ‘I'm sorry. I really am. But I must tell you, Mike Jones is the very best at what he does. I wouldn't have asked for him if he wasn't. He's the only man that could have taken on this job with the Wahools. Did he tell you what he was trying to do?'

‘No he didn't. Dad likes to keep his secrets.' I didn't try and hide how I felt about this.

‘I think he was just trying to keep you alive,' the American said with half a smile. ‘You see, according to what he told me last night, his cover was blown at the castle.'

‘I know. There was a man who recognised him from his army days.'

‘Correct. Even so, Mike had almost managed to convince
them that he was still Wahool's loyal servant. He said he'd faked his death in Iraq so he could work for people like Wahool and earn some decent cash. Wahool's the kind of man who'll believe that people will do anything for money. But this man Johnson – do you know him?'

I nodded. ‘I've seen him. Yes.'

‘He found out about you. He decided to pull you in and use you to get the truth out of Mike, once and for all. If they'd caught you yesterday and thought you knew anything about his real mission, they'd have killed you. No question.'

I listened to the sound of water trickling through the rills by our feet, and doves cooing in the distance somewhere. Perhaps Dad didn't keep his secrets purely to be annoying, although it felt that way sometimes.

‘You said Dad's “real mission”,' I said eventually. ‘So he
was
a spy, then?'

‘I prefer to think of him as a campaigner for justice,' the American said. ‘But they would have called it spying. You see, he's uniquely talented, your father. An elite soldier and also a great IT man. That's exactly what I needed. I heard about him, found him in Afghanistan and told him I was trying to help six million people. I asked him to join me, and he agreed.'

‘Six million people. That's not the population of Afghanistan?'

‘No.'

‘Marvalia, then?'

‘Clever girl.'

‘You didn't organise the Blue Revolution, did you?'

‘Oh no!' he laughed. ‘They did that by themselves. I don't do revolutions – I mostly do money.'

Money.
That word again. No amount of money was worth what Dad had suffered in those dungeons, or what I'd gone
through, missing him.

The American waited for me to ask him what he meant. When I didn't, he carried on anyway. ‘Yeah, well . . . money. You've probably noticed that some people have far too much of it, and millions don't have enough. When Wahool and the ex-president went into exile, they smuggled billions of stolen dollars out of the country, some of it in gold, some of it in secret bank accounts. They were living the billionaire lifestyle, while back in Marvalia the people had no money for food, or farms, or even machinery to work the copper mines. That made me angry. I was working with the new government to try and get some of the money back. Then I discovered we had a bigger problem.'

He waited for me again. This time I couldn't help myself.

‘Which was?'

‘Wahool was using a chunk of the stolen money to plot a coup, so the Grandfather could go back to Marvalia and take over again. If he did that, it was game over.'

‘Oh! So
that's
what Mr Wahool wanted the guns and missiles for.'

‘You know about the arms deal?'

‘Uh-huh. I heard him talk about it.'

Henry Phillips looked astonished. I had his full attention. ‘Is it happening soon?'

‘I think so. It sounded that way. The dealer was at the castle.'

‘You're a fascinating person, Peta. We need to talk some more.'

‘And . . . Dad?'

He considered for a moment, obviously wondering exactly how much to tell me. Then he seemed to decide that I knew a lot already. Besides, we were safe now.

‘We could have just alerted the authorities about the coup, of course, but we had a better idea,' he said. ‘Mike was posing as an IT security expert so he could monitor the bank accounts Wahool was setting up to fund it. He was supposed to intercept the money online, before the arms deal took place. That way, we could stop the coup
and
give the Marvalians some of their money back. It was always a dangerous mission, working at the heart of Wahool's household. That's why I needed someone with Mike's survival skills too, in case there was a problem. And, of course, there was.'

His sigh was brisk, but heartfelt. He obviously felt very bad about what had happened to Dad. As he should.

‘How much?' I asked.

‘Excuse me?'

‘How much money was Dad trying to intercept?'

‘Oh, I see. Two hundred million dollars. That's what Wahool had set aside for the coup. But the Grandfather and his cronies had stolen at least ten times that. The Marvalians could have used the coup money to find the rest. '

Two hundred million times ten was . . . twenty billion dollars.
More money than you can imagine
.

So Dad hadn't changed. He still saved the world every day. Or at least he tried.

‘Peta?'

‘Sorry, Mr Phillips. I was distracted.'

‘Anyway, that's what I wanted to tell you. You've earned the truth, Peta. I don't believe in secrets between friends. But I've kept you too long. Come and let me feed you up. And call me Henry.'

He led me back inside, through a suite of rooms hung with wall-sized paintings. The all-out luxury everywhere still
bothered me.

‘How did you get all this?' I asked, indicating the art and antique furniture.

He smiled. ‘You're very direct.'

‘I s'pose.'

‘I inherited some of it,' he shrugged, ‘and I made some money on the markets. I created a little company that made computer games . . .' He named it – it was a super-famous internet giant. Luke was addicted to their games. ‘And that did OK, so I created another one.' Same story, except the second company was bigger. ‘Money's a burden, Peta. If you're not careful, it owns you. In Florence, it owned the Medicis. Half of them ended up murdered, or mad. I want to make my money work. Some people give theirs to charity but I'm . . . I get bored easily. This is what I do.'

At first I thought he meant the villa, then I realised he meant the Foundation.

‘It sounds interesting, but not exactly . . .' I searched for the right word ‘. . . legal.'

He nodded thoughtfully. I noticed he didn't disagree.

‘Legal usually takes time,' he said carefully. ‘If we only did what's strictly legal, Marvalia would stay poor for decades. I shouldn't be telling you this. All I can say is, I try to be ethical, and I know that's a different thing. I'm not asking you to join us – I just want you to understand.'

I thought about it. He'd persuaded Dad to balance my happiness against the lives of six million people. For six people, I'd have been pretty hacked off at losing him, but for six
million . . .
In a weird kind of way, I was proud to have been a part of it. And anyway, I had Dad back.

He'd said that if I knew what he was doing, I'd understand. Perhaps I did.