A Question of Betrayal Read online

  He loved the complexity of it, the intellectual rigor of working through all the possibilities. He dreaded and yet was excited by the unforeseen; the tragedies made the victories more precious. Some enemies he hated, some he despised, others he respected, on occasion even admired.

  He was afraid of physical pain—he believed any sane person was—and yet it also made him acutely aware of the joy of being alive and what was to be valued: the smell of new-turned earth, the glory of a sunrise over cliffs on a clear day, the flowers of the hawthorn, the drift of cherry blossoms, scarlet poppies on the edge of a field of corn. Poppies always reminded him of grief, as they did every Englishman he knew. They were the symbol of sacrifice: too many young men to count, leaving their blood and their bones in the fields of Flanders, as his elder brother, James, had done. He had that in common with Elena, though he had never mentioned it to her. It was still a raw pain because too many things had been left unsaid. Had he ever let James know how much he admired him? Wanted to be like him? Even though, to their parents’ chagrin, nature had cast them utterly unalike.

  He was moving more quickly without realizing it, his sense of purpose, whatever Bradley said, energizing him. Peter would rather not have had to fight against Bradley, but if the wretched man made it necessary, then so be it.

  He turned in at his own gate at half past six. The sun was lowering and there was a shadow of dusk in the air, the noise of starlings coming home, a warmth in the light. It was comfortingly familiar, with the late roses in bloom or deadheaded, so nothing looked careless. He liked this time of year, a season of harvest, the survivors’ scarlet and purple and rust, fulfillment of promises kept and anticipation of winter and sinking back into the earth.

  He put his key into the front door lock, and it opened easily. He should thank Pamela for caring so meticulously that everything was cleaned, oiled…whatever it needed. Somehow it never seemed the right time to say so.

  “Hello!” he called from the hallway. Absentmindedly he looked at the post lying on the silver tray, a memento of university days, some prize or other. There was nothing but the usual bills and receipts, a letter from an old acquaintance.

  Pamela came into the hall. She looked exactly as she always did, cool and elegant. He had often thought she would be able to walk the length of a room with a pile of books on her head and not lose any of them. A useless attribute, but it gave her a degree of unthinking grace that never let her down.

  He kissed her smooth cheek automatically. She smelled of something pleasant, a flower of some sort. “Have you seen this?” he asked, holding up the envelope.

  “Yes, it’s Ronald Dashworth, reminding you of the anniversary dinner, as if you’d forget.”

  He had forgotten, on purpose. “Oh, yes,” he said noncommittally. “What night is it again?”

  “Sunday,” she said, moving a step away from him. “Did you say you had something else on that night? Because you do not.”

  There was no answer that would not provoke an argument. He did not want to go, but he owed it to Pamela. It would be a full-dress affair, glamorous, very formal; he should make an effort.

  “What are you going to wear?” He tried to sound interested as he admired her honey-colored hair, classic features, blemishless skin, even at forty-three, a year younger than he. They should have grown comfortable with each other. Why hadn’t they? Because the most important thing in his life was his work. It had his interest, his loyalty, his triumphs and disasters, all his depth of emotion, and he could not share any of it with her.

  Not that he had tried. Or would try. He could have told her at least the nature of it; he could have shared parts that were not secret. He could have let her know the pain of his failures. She did not need to know the exact cause, the names and faces of the men he had lost, the memories of those wounded most deeply. What could he have said? I lost a friend today? Can’t tell you the details, but it hurts? Terribly? I hurt, and I feel guilty? Even though I could not have prevented it?

  And beyond those failures, it was as if his elder brother, James, had walked out of the door last week, leaving Peter behind. He had understood what he did and why. Major James Howard was an officer at the head of his men, the first over the top. He died at the Somme in 1916, leaving behind a grieving mother, a father who covered his grief in pride, and a younger brother feeling desperately alone, working secretly.

  No one was untouched by something of that sort, although it took people in different ways. Some could share very little of the pain inside. There was not much one could put into words. If you took the bandages off at all, it was in private.

  Pamela had stopped talking. As had happened far too often, he had not heard what she said. “You will look beautiful.” He tried to catch up.

  She smiled blandly. “Peter, I could have said I would wear the sitting-room curtains and you would have said I would look beautiful.”

  He met her eyes this time. “You have a flair for it, and blue suits you.”

  “They’re green,” she told him, referring to the curtains.

  “No, they’re not, they’re blue. Blue like the sea, not the sky.” That was one thing he noticed, color. Shape was the bones of a thing, color was its spirit. He said so…again.

  She looked at him with surprise. “Did you just think of that?” she asked. For once it was as if she wanted to know, beyond just filling a silence.

  “No, I’ve always thought it. You can’t capture color, can’t hold it as you would a shape.”

  Suddenly her smile was natural, warming the classic perfection of her face. “Sometimes, you amaze me.”

  He smiled back, but it was tentative. He was afraid he had revealed too much.

  CHAPTER

  3

  Lucas Standish sat in the familiar chair in his study, gazing through the French doors into the garden. The late roses were losing petals, but still rich and sweet-smelling in the motionless air. The low sun made bright patterns on the carpet, showing where it was worn from years of pacing back and forth, thinking, waiting. The walls were lined with bookshelves and, of course, family photographs, so many of people who were gone now.

  Toby, Lucas’s golden retriever, sat on his master’s feet, leaning hard against him. It was what Josephine called his “heavy disobedience.” Lucas put his hand on Toby’s head. “You’re too early,” he said. Toby thumped his tail on the floor and leaned even harder.

  “Are you arguing with me?” Lucas asked.

  Toby thumped again, then stood up and lifted one foot, preparing to climb onto Lucas’s lap.

  “No!” Lucas said firmly.

  Toby subsided, ears down, eyes reproachful.

  Lucas rose to his feet. “Oh, come on, then. Doesn’t matter if we’re early. You can go and look for rabbits.”

  Toby started to jump and dance around. He knew a lot of words, and “rabbits” was definitely one of them.

  “Down,” Lucas said firmly. “Come on.”

  Toby followed him into the kitchen to fetch his lead, turning round and round like a dancer pirouetting.

  Josephine was standing by the sink, fitting flowers one by one into a vase of water, mostly early bronze chrysanthemums but also a couple of yellow roses. She looked up at Lucas and smiled. She was not a big woman, of average height and still slender. Her hair was now completely silver, but she had kept it long, as it had been when she was a girl, and she knotted it at the back of her head. It looked totally casual, but Lucas knew it was not. He still enjoyed pulling the pins out and watching it uncoil and slip loose.

  “Just going for a walk,” he told her casually. “Toby’s keen…”

  “Of course he is,” she agreed with a smile. “You’ve been watching the clock and fidgeting for the last hour. He can read you like a book, my dear.”

  “He’s a clever dog, but he doesn’t read books.”

  “Yo
u do, and no doubt you will tell him all he needs to know,” she replied, unperturbed. She found one red rose and put it into the left side of the vase and stood back to regard it. “Right, Toby?”

  He barked sharply.

  Lucas held him still for a moment and fastened his lead. “Come on, you’re getting too excited.” He touched Josephine lightly on the shoulder, then went back into the hall and out the front door to the car, where it stood beside the curb. He opened the door to the backseat and Toby sprang in and sat down immediately, shivering with anticipation. He had heard the magic word: “rabbits.” Anywhere was good.

  Lucas got in behind the wheel and pulled the car out onto the road. He was going to meet Peter Howard, at Peter’s request. They met every so often at their favorite places in the woods at any time of the year, but especially when the bluebells were flowering; across the fields when the hawthorn was as thick as snow in the hedges or in the harvest fields when, as now, they were shaven gold, edges grazed with scarlet poppies, the stocks standing in barbaric splendor. No one needed an excuse to be walking, most of all a man with a dog.

  Lucas was not as talkative as usual. He was happy with silence, apart from the rustle of the wind or the cry of birds. But he knew Toby liked to be spoken to, so every now and again he made a remark. He remembered when Elena was little. She, more than her sister, Margot, was always asking questions. What is that? What is it doing? Well, why? He smiled as he remembered her, aged about three, asking Josephine very seriously, “Well, if God made the world, what was he standing on when he did it?” It had taken Josephine a couple of moments of sober silence to come up with an answer. “God doesn’t need to stand on anything. He can fly in the air.” Elena had thought about this for a moment or two. “Oh…by himself?” When Josephine said, “Yes,” Elena had said soberly, “I wouldn’t like that.” Josephine had agreed, “Of course not, you would have to have somebody to talk to.” Elena knew that was funny, because Josephine had laughed, but she didn’t know why.

  Elena had demanded Lucas’s love in a way that no one else had, and her constant interest in everything he said or did, her implicit trust that he loved her, had won his attention and kept it. She had listened solemn eyed to his explanations of war and peace, the nature of the stars, the logical perfection of mathematics, as if she understood all of it. That was when she was four. At twenty-eight, she probably didn’t remember any of this, but he was certain she still knew unmistakably that he loved her. And not just as his grandchild, but as a person.

  Toby began to fidget and whine. They were nearly there. Lucas pulled the car onto the gravel patch under the trees and climbed out. He let Toby out of the back and put his lead on again.

  “Just till we’re off the roadway,” he explained, as if Toby did not know. Together they walked along the path to the edge of the trees, through the gate and into the sun again, and across the broad sweep of the field. There were cumulus clouds towering up into the air, like mountains of light too dazzling to look at, casting occasional shadows on the land. The land was dull gold, with occasional dark, plowed fields here and there. All the flowers were gone from the hedges, but their places were taken by berries. He could not see them, but little flurries of birds told him where they were.

  He removed Toby’s lead and the dog began following his nose around in circles. When he looked up and saw the figure of a man far away, on the opposite corner of the field, he stood rigid, then suddenly leaned forward and started to run as fast as his legs could carry him, leaping a few stalks of corn still standing, like a surfer riding the waves.

  “Toby, you don’t even know it’s him!” Lucas called out, but Toby took not the slightest notice. Lucas shook his head, smiling, then walked round the edge of the field toward the corner, where they would meet. He had gone at least another hundred yards before he could clearly recognize Peter Howard’s figure, kneeling on the ground, arms around Toby, who was wriggling and jumping.

  Then Toby saw Lucas again and turned and came careering back, Peter following after him. Peter was within a few yards of Lucas before Lucas noticed the pallor of his face and the lack of spring in his step. He did not immediately ask what had happened; Peter would tell him soon enough.

  They started to walk gently up the slight slope of the ground. The wind carried the bleating of sheep from the distance. Other than that, there was silence. The skylarks belonged to the spring; this was autumn, the fulfilling of the year. Another month and the trees would begin to turn color, then one by one shed their leaves to stand with limbs naked against the sky. In some ways, Lucas found that the most beautiful time of all, the ever-enduring strength without the garment of leaves.

  “The situation in Austria is getting worse,” Peter remarked. His voice was casual enough. The men could have been mere acquaintances at a cocktail party.

  “Dollfuss?” Lucas questioned.

  “He’s not up for this much pressure,” Peter replied. “He’s too new at the job, and he has no real grip on it. He’s there rather more by chance than design. He’s a very young man, and no one takes him seriously. It doesn’t help that he’s already beginning to be very ambitious with his authority. It’s a sign of weakness, and his enemies know that. They smell fear, as a dog does.”

  “Give him time.”

  “I’m not sure we’ve got any time.” Peter still faced forward, as if seeing something ahead in the bright distance. “I’m waiting for word from someone I have embedded. The Fatherland Front is getting stronger. I’ve lost my best news from there, at least most of it.”

  Lucas stopped. “What’s happened?” He did not guess; it was too serious a matter to stab at in the dark.

  “His handler has disappeared, so I can’t reach my man.”

  “Do you know anything?” Lucas asked. It was a situation they had faced many times before. Too often, the answer was tragic.

  “Very little,” Peter answered. “I think he’s still alive, but I have to assume his cover is blown, and I’ve got to get him out.”

  “Send someone…”

  Peter stared across the shaven fields. There was a small place where the harvesters had missed the poppies, scarlet as a splash of blood. Perhaps they had fought in the trenches, and the poppies were left on purpose.

  Lucas waited.

  “If I send someone…” Peter began, watching where he was putting his feet, rather than facing Lucas.

  “You’ll have to be very discreet,” Lucas thought aloud. “If your man’s cover really is blown, it will be dangerous to contact him. Don’t send anyone…” He was giving a warning he realized was too late. “I hope it isn’t anyone who will draw even more attention to your man.”

  Peter walked in silence for a while.

  Lucas kept pace with him, waiting for him to continue. “Why did you want to tell me?” he asked finally. “I don’t know that area very well. I don’t think I’ve got anything useful to add. Are you expecting something bad to happen?”

  Peter looked up at him quickly, surprise in his face.

  Lucas shrugged. “I listen to the news. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that Hitler has his eyes on Austria. It would be natural. He is Austrian, isn’t he? From Linz, or somewhere?”

  “Yes, near Linz, but like anyone who doesn’t really belong, he’s more German than the Germans, God help us.”

  “You’re evading the question, Peter.”

  “I sent Elena.”

  Lucas stopped walking, his body tense. “And how is she going to know this agent of yours, in deep cover?” He was puzzled. “Photographs are hardly enough. He should have altered his appearance to some degree. How long has he been there?” He resumed walking.

  “About six years. Just after you left. He’s good…”

  Lucas frowned. “You’re saying he wasn’t clumsy? That he was betrayed somehow?”

  “I don’t know.”

 
Lucas was concerned now. “Elena’s bright, but she’s had very little training. Aren’t you expecting too much of her?”

  “She’ll know him,” Peter said with certainty. “And he’ll know her, and trust her.”

  Lucas caught Peter’s arm and forced him to a stop, causing him to turn round. “What are you not telling me, Peter?”

  Peter met his eyes, unflinchingly now. “It’s Aiden Strother. He was never a traitor to England. He was a deep plant when he left. We branded him a traitor and gave him steady information to leak to the Germans. Harmless, or false, but we got good material back, a little at a time. That’s how we know how bad the situation is. There’s a strong pro-German tide in Vienna that is rapidly getting stronger.”

  Lucas froze inside. “You…sent Elena to find and rescue Strother?” He could hardly believe what Peter was telling him. It was as if he had suddenly ripped off a mask and found somebody totally different underneath.

  “She’s the best person to do it,” Peter said. He did not flinch; he looked straight at Lucas, but there was pain in his eyes. “It’s very important that we get this information, even vital. It could have to do with the rise or fall of Dollfuss, and the fate of Austria. Not to mention getting him out safely. She’s the only person we’ve got who knows him by sight.”

  “She knows him as a traitor!” Lucas said hotly, his memory going back to that awful episode and Elena’s grief that he could do nothing to ease. He would have taken on her suffering himself if he could, but that was never possible.

  “She knows now that he is not,” Peter interrupted his thoughts.

  “And she’s going to go?” Lucas could scarcely imagine it. He ached inside as if he could feel a physical pain, and he remembered how she had wept when Strother had fled in hideous disgrace. There had been no warning. Lucas had not liked Strother, but he had tried to accept him for Elena’s sake. Now his feelings were mixed, surprised, and still angry.