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“Did they mention Hitler?”
“Yes.” She found she was shivering, as if there were no warmth in the room. “Yes, everyone spoke of him. Sooner or later his presence was there with the young men, almost as if he were there himself.”
“Did you hear anything about money? And please be careful; I don’t want you to say anything but what you are certain of. It matters, Margot.”
She looked at his face, its ascetic lines, the steady calm blue eyes. She had known him all her life, loved him and trusted him, certain that he loved her. And yet, at this moment, she was deeply afraid of what she believed he could see, and what she had newly glimpsed. She had respected Paul as a soldier, and her brother also, of course, but this side of Lucas was a previously undiscovered territory. He knew the secret war that had begun before the soldiers mobilized and that continued, even now, after it was over.
“Yes,” she whispered, her voice dry in her throat. “Do you know about this already?”
“A little. I’m learning more.” He put his hand out and covered hers for a moment. “Don’t talk about this to anyone at all.”
“I told Father a bit about it, but he said not to worry. I don’t know whether it was to comfort me or that’s what he really believed.” She stopped, hoping he would tell her, and yet dreading it. “I think Hans Beckendorff, Cecily’s new husband, belongs to an elite group, maybe even the Gestapo. I’m not certain. I…I think Roger suspects it.”
“Very possibly,” Lucas agreed. “I don’t know, either,” he added. “There are things we try not to know. People tend to believe what they need to, what will keep them safe and support all the things they love and want. We’re all like that. Somewhere inside ourselves we will fight to believe the world is as we thought. Please tell me, but stay safe. You must go home and carry on with your life. Don’t try to find out any more, please.” He was very earnest. “Your grandmother and I lost a friend a couple of days ago. We have to take care of his affairs. He had no one else.”
“Can’t I…” she began. She saw the refusal in his eyes and suddenly she felt included, a Standish, like Elena, trusted. “I will, Grandfather,” she promised.
His smile softened and he sat back in the chair just as Josephine came in carrying a tray of tea and biscuits.
CHAPTER
16
After the escape from the club, across the rooftops and eventually to the ground, Aiden and Elena parted from Gabrielle. Hers was the hardest and most dangerous lot, but she had no choice. Perhaps she would have gone deeper into the slums, where it was easier to hide, but for her child. She would never leave him, unless it was to save his life. She did not need to explain that, at least not to Elena. She trusted that Aiden understood it, too.
“Be careful,” Aiden warned Gabrielle. There was a momentary tenderness in his face. It flickered across Elena’s mind to wonder if Gabrielle and Aiden had once had a different kind of relationship, and if Aiden was Franz’s father.
“You, too,” Gabrielle murmured in the darkness. She touched his cheek and then turned to Elena. “Safe journey,” she whispered, and then she was gone as silently as one of the shadows across the street.
“Come on,” Aiden said briskly. “She’ll probably be all right. She’s good at this, and there’s nothing we can do to help her anyway. We need to disappear. We’re a danger to others, as well as to ourselves.” He took her arm and pulled her along the pavement at a brisk pace. An actual run might draw attention to them.
“Where are we going?” Elena asked, struggling to keep up without breaking step. She had on higher heels than she usually wore, and the silk dress was designed with dancing in mind, not racing along a dark street with uneven cobblestones and occasional heaps of rubbish.
“Where they won’t look for us,” he replied, without turning to face her. “The splinter faction in the Fatherland Front is going to strike before the main group can. Ferdie’s part of them and they won’t let us live to tell anyone. We would have been shot and dumped if Gabrielle hadn’t rescued us. Whoever the other players are, they’ll be mad as hell.”
Elena slowed down, trying to think. What Aiden had said made only partial sense. Which side was he on? Or was he on neither? It was not the time to ask. And more than that, she could not disentangle the lies from the truth, if there was truth in any of it.
“We’ll have one more chance to find out about Max,” he said. “It would help to know if he’s still alive, poor devil. And on the practical side, what he told them. But we must
get the information back home. It’s urgent,” he said. “At least, you must. Gabrielle is French, so God only knows which side she is on, if it comes to the pinch. Her own side, I suspect: anything to protect Franz. I wish to hell my mother had cared that much about me.” There was pain behind his voice when he said it.
At another time, or another place, she would have liked to comfort him, but now it would risk both of their lives. And she was not sure she could even reach whatever the pain was, never mind actually help. He had never spoken of his childhood to her. But no one wanted pity, least of all Aiden. He had probably not even meant to let that slip.
She turned all her attention to keeping up with him, avoiding the chipped cobblestones and concentrating on not breaking a heel or twisting an ankle on the curb.
Once or twice he stopped to check which way to go. She thought they were moving steadily inland, away from the harbor and all the main canal outlets to the sea. The alleys were getting narrower and were smelling less pleasant.
“Who betrayed us?” she asked, trying to catch up as she struggled to keep pace.
“Maybe Ferdie, maybe Marek,” he answered.
“Why?”
“For God’s sake, Elena,” he said impatiently. “Every man’s got his own reasons. Money, love, hate, patriotism to anywhere—Italy, Serbia, Austria, Hungary. Maybe a hostage to fortune, fear, bloody stupidity? None of us knows what we’d do with a knife at our throat. The only one who’s got any right to say is the man who’s got a stake in this. I’m still trying to work out exactly what stake Gabrielle has.”
“Who is Franz’s father?”
“God knows. I don’t.” He stopped suddenly, halfway along the street. “It’s not her who betrayed us, Elena. She got us out.”
