Herbert looked at him sharply. “For God’s sake, man, it was thirty years ago, and it didn’t happen anyway. The whole thing was abortive. The leader himself was captured, beaten, and shot. Most of the others escaped.”
“But Serafina Montserrat was involved?” Narraway persisted. “How? Are you skirting around saying that she was the one who betrayed the leader?”
Herbert was horrified. He glared at Narraway as if he had blasphemed. “No! She was all kinds of things: willful, reckless, arrogant at times-certainly promiscuous, if you want to call it that-but she would have died for the cause. It was only through a mixture of extreme skill and courage, and the loyalty of others, that she survived. And a degree of luck. ‘Fortune favors the bold’ was never truer of anyone than it was of her.”
Again Narraway wondered exactly how well Herbert had known her. Not that it mattered, as long as what he was saying was the truth, as far as he knew it.
“So she could be in danger?” he concluded. It was barely a question anymore.
“I don’t know,” Herbert said honestly, but there was more emotion in his eyes than Narraway could ever recall having seen there before. “It was so long ago, and from the standpoint of anyone in London, far away. Who do you know who gives a damn about Croatian independence now?”
“No one,” Narraway admitted. “But betrayals always matter. The time and place of them are irrelevant.”
“They do matter,” Herbert agreed. “Far too much to wait thirty years for revenge.”
Narraway could not argue with that. Almost certainly all the people concerned were dead, or too old to execute revenge anymore, just as Serafina herself was.
“Thank you.” He acknowledged the point. “Can you think of anyone else who might shed more light on the subject of why she is so afraid?”
“The current expert in that area of the Foreign Office is Tregarron. But you know that. And, of course, for northern Italy, with which Serafina was most concerned, it is Ennio Ruggiero, and for Croatia, Pavao Altabas.”
Narraway got to his feet. “I’m much obliged.” He held out his hand. “Thank you again.”
Herbert smiled. “It’s good to see you, Narraway. I always knew you’d do well.”
“You taught me well,” Narraway replied sincerely. “I hope to hell I taught my successor as much.” He hesitated.
“Why do you say that?” Herbert asked.
“Did you worry about me?” Narraway asked him. “Whether I would succeed, whether I had the steel, and the judgment?”
Herbert smiled. “Of course, but I had more sense than to let you know it at the time.”
“Thank you,” Narraway said wryly.
“Wouldn’t have done you any good,” Herbert replied. “But you caused me a few sleepless nights- unnecessarily, as it turned out.”
Narraway did not ask him about what.
Narraway went to see Ruggiero, as Herbert had suggested, and spent over an hour without learning anything beyond what Herbert himself had already mentioned. Ruggiero was an old man and his memory was clouded by emotions. Italy was now united, and he wanted to forget the frictions and griefs of the past. He especially wanted to forget the losses, the sacrifices, and the ugliness of fighting.
Narraway thanked him also. To have probed and argued, perhaps caught the old man in lies, not of intent but of wishful thinking, facts covered over by dreams, would have benefited no one.
Next he went to visit Pavao Altabas and found only his widow. He had died recently, and Herbert had been unaware of it.
The widow was much younger than Pavao had been, and she knew nothing of the uprisings. The name of Serafina Montserrat meant nothing at all to her.
Lastly, he went to see Lord Tregarron, not at the Foreign Office but at the club where both were members. It was the end of the day and Tregarron was tired and unwilling to talk. However, Narraway gave him no civil alternative, short of getting up very conspicuously and leaving.
They sat opposite each other in armchairs on either side of a huge log fire. Narraway ordered brandy for both of them. The steward brought it with murmured words of apology for interrupting them, although they were not as yet in conversation.
“Leave us to talk, will you, Withers?” Narraway asked him. “No interruptions, if you please!”
“Certainly, my lord,” Withers said calmly. “Thank you.” He bowed and withdrew.
Tregarron looked grimly at Narraway, waiting for him to explain his intrusion.
“Damned long day, Narraway,” he said quietly. “Is this really necessary? You’re not in Special Branch anymore.”
Narraway was surprised how deeply the reminder cut him, as if his position had defined his identity, and without it he had no standing with those who had so recently treated him with something akin to awe. He hid his hurt with difficulty. If he had not needed Tregarron, he would have found a way to retaliate, even though, at the same moment, he realized that any retaliation would betray his own vulnerability.
He forced himself to smile, very slightly. “Which removes the responsibility from me, but does not take away the freedom to meddle, if I can do it to the good,” he replied.
Tregarron’s dark face tightened a little. “Am I supposed to deduce from your last remark that you are justifying some interference in foreign affairs that I otherwise might object to?”
Narraway’s smile grew bleaker. “I have no intention of interfering in foreign affairs, justifiably or not. But my concern is with information about the past that may prevent an action in the present of which I am uncertain, and I need to know more.”
Tregarron’s heavy eyebrows rose. “From me? You must know that I cannot tell you anything. Do not keep obliging me to remind you that you are no longer head of Special Branch. It is uncomfortable, and ill-mannered of you to put me in a position where I have no choice.”
Narraway kept his temper with difficulty. He needed Tregarron’s information, and he no longer had any means of forcing it from him, as Tregarron knew. It was this aspect of having lost power to which he was finding it hard to accustom himself.
“I am not seeking any current information,” he said levelly. He found himself suddenly reluctant to explain his reasons to Tregarron. “It is the general climate of issues thirty or forty years ago.”
“Thirty or forty years ago? Narraway, what the devil are you playing at? Thirty or forty years ago where?” Tregarron leaned forward a little in his chair. “What is this about? Is it something I should know?”
“If I should come to believe that it is, I shall certainly tell you,” Narraway answered. “So far it is only rumors, most of which seem to me more like overheated imagination. I wish to prove, or disprove, them before I bother anyone else with them.”
Tregarron’s attention sharpened. “Regarding what, exactly?”
Now Narraway had no choice but to either tell the truth, or very deliberately lie. “Certain whispers about a woman named Serafina Montserrat,” he answered.
A shadow crossed Tregarron’s face. “How on earth could she matter now?”
Narraway changed his mind about what to say next.
“Memories, stories,” he said fairly casually. “If I know the truth, or something close to it, I can dismiss them safely.”
Tregarron tensed. “Who is talking about Mrs. Montserrat?” he asked. “This all sounds like gossip. But it could be dangerous, Narraway. Damage can be done that is hard to reverse. You did the right thing in coming to me. I have looked into her past since we last spoke. She worked mostly in the Austro-Hungarian sphere. She apparently knew a lot of people, and was regrettably free with her favors.”
“But all years ago,” Narraway pointed out. He was surprised how much he resented Tregarron’s implication, even though he had never met Serafina himself. She was Vespasia’s friend. He took a deep breath before he continued. “I imagine most of the men concerned are also dead, and their wives, who might have cared, as well.”
“Would you like it said of your father?” Tregarron snapped.
Narraway could not imagine it. His father had been rather dry, highly intelligent but remote, not a man who would have been accessible to a woman such as he imagined Serafina Montserrat to have been. He smiled at the
