have been going at all. Frank might have been under interrogation now, or even dead. Churchill had made his decision partly because Frank had touched his sense of honour; he wondered if that had been the deciding factor, the turning point. He looked at the back of Frank’s head; like the other three men he wore a dark, heavy coat and black bowler. He still found it incredible that Frank had stood up to Winston Churchill, actually told him to his face that he wouldn’t reveal his secret.
‘What did ye think of Churchill, then?’ Ben asked the company. ‘I could’ve fallen off my chair when he came in.’
‘He is very old,’ Natalia said. ‘I saw him in the corridor yesterday and it brought it home. Old and very tired.’
‘He’s almost eighty.’ David thought she was right, he had looked ancient, desperately burdened and weary.
Ben said, ‘It’s working people that carry the burden of getting rid of these Fascists. One of our leaders should be in charge, Attlee or Bevan. Or Harry Pollitt.’
‘Churchill has been a leader against Fascism since the thirties,’ Natalia replied quietly.
‘To preserve the Empire. Though even he knows that one’s lost now.’
‘He understood,’ Frank said suddenly.
Ben looked at him. ‘What d’ye mean?’
‘He understood me.’
There was silence; nobody quite knew how to answer. The car crested a hill and in the distance, across miles of undulating downland dotted with sheep, David saw the sea, blue and sparkling under the wide sky. Frank leaned forward, stared at it and smiled.
They arrived at the hotel, parking the car outside. They got out and took their suitcases from the boot, looking carefully round the narrow street. The weather was very clear and cold, no wind. The sea was at the end of the road, blue and dead calm. Ben came and stood beside David, leaning close. He said, very quietly, ‘There aren’t going to be any problems involving your wife and Natalia, are there?’
David turned, frowning. Ben met his gaze firmly. ‘You ken what I mean. She’s probably waiting for you inside. We can’t afford any problems among ourselves, not till we’re safe away.’
David picked up his suitcase. ‘There won’t be any,’ he said stiffly.
There was no sign of Sarah in the gloomy little reception hall of the Channel View Hotel, only a weary-looking middle-aged woman behind the desk. David gave their cover names in low, serious tones, appropriate for mourners. He knew the woman was with the Resistance but you could never be sure who might be listening. She leaned over the desk, smiling nervously. ‘It’s all right. Our last commercial traveller has just gone. And we’ve taken no bookings for tomorrow. Though you need to keep to your cover identities, just in case.’
David asked, ‘Is my wife here?’
She smiled again. ‘You’re her husband? Yes. She’s fine. She’s here under the name Mrs Hardcastle, a widow. She doesn’t know you’re coming, we were instructed not to tell her in advance. She’s gone out for a walk. She often goes for walks during the day, it gets her out of her room. She’ll be back for lunch.’ She smiled. ‘We’ve been a bit lax, letting her come and go. But we didn’t want to keep her cooped up here, she looked so sad.’
Ben asked, ‘Do you know how long we’re staying?’
‘My husband has just gone out. He’ll be back soon, he might have some more information. Go upstairs and unpack, I’ll call you when he gets back.’ She handed out keys from a pegboard on the wall behind her. ‘I’m Jane, by the way.’ She smiled again. ‘I think you’ll all be away very soon.’
They carried their bags up the dark, creaking staircase. Frank was beside David. ‘How are you?’ David asked him.
‘I’ll be all right.’ He nodded with a kind of wonder. ‘The sea. I’ve always liked the sea. It made me think, we’re nearly there, after everything. We might just do it. Mightn’t we, David?’
David had been given a key with the number 16 on it, for him and Natalia. The two of them stopped outside the room, while Ben and Frank went into the one next door. Natalia smiled at David uncertainly.
‘I suppose we’d better go in,’ she said.
The room was small and dingy, the window giving a view of the backs of neighbouring buildings. It was dominated by a large double bed with a candlewick bedspread in an unpleasant shade of yellow. David put his suitcase on it and looked awkwardly at Natalia. She smiled tightly. ‘So, Sarah is out.’
‘Yes.’
‘How do you feel now, about seeing her again?’
David sat on the bed. ‘I don’t know. Scared, I suppose.’ He laughed sadly. ‘Ironic, isn’t it, according to our papers you’re my wife now.’
‘You will go back to her, won’t you?’
‘We’ve been through so much, I’ve put her through so much. She needs me. But . . .’
Natalia sat beside him, looking at him with those slightly Oriental, green eyes. ‘You will go back to her in the end,’ she said sadly. ‘Because you are loyal.’
‘I don’t know.’
She didn’t answer. He asked, ‘If we get to America, have they planned anything for you?’
She looked at him, the sun shining through the window on that lustrous brown hair. ‘They told me, before I came to join you at Chartwell, that I am to go to America with you. I need to rest. Perhaps I will do some more painting. I have been doing this work for a long time. They said I am in danger of becoming burnt out.’
‘Are you?’ His heart leapt at the thought that Natalia was coming too.
‘This mission has been different,’ she said. ‘You know, all these years since my husband died I have had nobody. Oh, little affairs here and there but nothing serious, just work. But then I met you.’ She stood up. ‘People like me are especially useful to the Resistance. People without nationality, identity, family. I have been full of hate, anger, it has been all that’s kept me going for years.’ Tears came into her eyes. ‘Now – yes, I’m tired. Meeting you helped me realize that.’
‘I’ve realized a lot since I met you.’
She smiled. ‘Perhaps you are a little in love?’
‘Yes, yes I am.’
‘I used to look forward so much to seeing you, those evenings in Soho. Your people, you especially, seemed so – honest. Many of those I have had to deal with these last seven years were not, they wanted money and power. You just wanted freedom, the end of all this evil.’ There were tears in her eyes. She leaned over and took his hand lightly. ‘But your wife was in the way then, as she is now.’
A knock made them both jump. They looked at each other. David went and opened the door. He feared it would be Sarah, that she would see Natalia with him in tears, but it was Ben. He looked at them sharply. ‘Jane’s husband’s back. He wants to see us. We’re all next door. Come on through.’
‘Give us a minute.’
Ben shut the door. Natalia went over to the little washbasin and quickly washed and dried her face. ‘He’s worried, isn’t he? About – complications?’
He reached out his hand but she only shook her head and walked past him, touching his arm gently before opening the door.
Ben and Frank’s room was identical to theirs except that there were two single beds. A fat man in shirt sleeves, a lick of brown hair drawn across his bald head, stood by the window. He looked at David and Natalia with a touch of impatience. Frank and Ben were sitting side by side on one of the beds. Opposite them, on the other bed, a large map of the coastline was spread out.
The man said, ‘I’m Bert. We need to get on at once. I don’t like leaving Jane downstairs alone, not when there’s something like this on.’
‘All right, pal,’ Ben said soothingly.
‘This is like any war, there’s periods when it’s quiet and nothing’s happening, but everyone needs to be ready at a moment’s notice. Just like that.’ Bert clicked his fingers sharply, then looked at David. ‘Where’s your wife?’
‘Jane said she went out for a walk.’
Bert sighed. ‘All right.’ He sounded annoyed. ‘We’ve all been waiting for days, with no word from London about when you were coming, then everything goes mad yesterday. You’re on your way tonight.’
