9

THE FIRE WAS burning low at Hendre Gorfelen, but Frank Griffith seemed not to notice. Charlotte studied his lined and narrow face as he read, the hollowness of his eye sockets and the prominence of his cheek bones exaggerated by the flickering shadows of the fading flames. Beside her, exhausted by the long drive from Kent, Derek sat asleep in his chair, his chin sunk upon his chest. But Charlotte felt as if she would never sleep again. Her anticipation of Frank’s response to his dead friend’s tale kept her senses alert, her thoughts at a jangling pitch. To her it was a fragment of a past she could not hope to understand. But to this old man it was a whisper from yesterday. The gnarled fingers clutching the pages had once squeezed the trigger of a rifle trained on the enemy at Teruel. The eyes peering at the posthumous words had once gazed at their author as he walked to his death in the hills of Aragon. But only now had they touched the truth and glimpsed its meaning.

Charlotte looked up at the clock and was surprised to see midnight had come and gone, though she could not recall hearing it strike. It was Saturday the third of October and already, she knew, she should have acted decisively upon her discovery. But instead … She looked back at Frank and started with surprise, for he was gazing across at her, the pages folded in his hands. He had finished.

‘Why did you bring this to me?’ he asked, in a voice scarcely raised above a murmur.

‘Because Vicente was your friend. He died for you. You had a right to—’

‘A right?’ His face creased as if in pain. He closed his eyes for several seconds, then said: ‘Beatrix knew me too well. Perhaps she knew all of us too well. Her decision was the correct one. It would have been better for Vicente’s story to remain untold. But for your brother …’

‘It would have done. I realize that. Maurice was a fool. He had no idea what he was meddling in. But none of us did, did we? Except Beatrix.’

‘Except Beatrix,’ Frank echoed, sliding her letter to Isabel Vassoir from beneath the other sheets of paper and glancing down at it. ‘I loved her, you know.’

‘Yes. I think I do know.’

‘But she didn’t love me. Cared for me, of course, liked me, helped me. But her affections were too … too universal … for what I wanted. Besides, love implies trust. And she had too many secrets to keep. Too many by far.’

‘Frank, about my niece—’

‘You believe this is why she was kidnapped?’ He tapped the pages with his forefinger.

‘Don’t you?’

He thought for a moment, frowning in concentration, then replied. ‘Yes. It has to be.’

‘Delgado?’

‘Maybe. If he’s still alive. Or somebody who inherited his knowledge. Or came by it. Clearly, they only found out recently that Beatrix had been keeping what they wanted all these years. Maurice must have attracted their attention in some way. Otherwise—’

‘Does it matter how they found out? The point is they did.’

‘It may matter. It may not.’ He stared at her. ‘What are you going to do, Charlotte?’ It was the same question Isabel Vassoir had asked – in exactly the same words.

‘I’m hoping you’ll tell me.’

‘Me?’

‘You were there, in Spain. You knew Vicente. You heard him talk about Delgado. You’ve a better idea than I have how such people think.’

‘Have I?’ He grimaced and reached down for his glass where it stood on the floor beside his chair. But it was empty. With a grunt, he levered himself upright and crossed to the desk, where the vodka bottle was waiting.

‘Don’t you think you’ve drunk enough?’ said Charlotte, instantly regretting her presumptuousness.

‘I know I haven’t,’ he growled, pouring himself a substantial measure. ‘I can still remember, you see. The smile on Vicente’s face. The fatalistic shrug of his shoulders as he left the barn and scrambled down the slope to surrender. And a question Tristram asked me in Tarragona as he lay dying. “Was the patrol that picked up Vicente one of Delgado’s, Frank?” I didn’t know, of course. And I couldn’t see why it mattered.’ He swallowed some vodka. ‘Until now.’ Then he turned to face her. ‘If I had known – if Vicente had trusted me instead of Tristram – would I still have let him give himself up?’

‘I … I can’t say.’

‘No. And neither can I.’ He returned to his chair and lowered himself wearily into it. ‘I’m no use to you, Charlotte. I wasn’t any use to Vicente either. Don’t ask me what to do.’ Wounded pride and a troubled conscience were curdling inside him, sucking him down towards introspection and despair. Suddenly, Charlotte realized she had to shock him free of self-pity.

‘I am asking you! I’m asking you because there’s nobody else. Help me, Frank, for God’s sake!’

Derek woke with a sudden jolt and looked round at her. ‘What … I’m sorry, I must have …’

‘You’ve been asleep,’ said Frank. ‘But not as long as I have.’

‘You … You’ve read it all?’

‘Yes.’

‘What … What do you think?’

It was at Charlotte that Frank stared as he replied. ‘I think you have three choices. And they may all be wrong. The most obvious is probably the wisest. Go to the police. Tell them everything. If Delgado’s still alive – or if Cardozo is – the Spanish authorities should be able to find him. But whoever’s organized this is no fool. He won’t be waiting obediently with the girl trussed up in his drawing room. She’ll be well hidden. And his tracks will be well covered. It’s more than possible the police may fail to locate him before the eleventh. Or, if they succeed, they may simply frighten him into … desperate measures.’

‘You mean he’ll kill Sam?’

‘It’s a risk. It’s bound to be.’

‘But the police are experienced in this sort of operation,’ put in Derek. ‘They know what they’re doing.’

Frank’s eyes were still fixed on Charlotte. ‘What’s the second choice?’ she asked.

‘Place the advertisement in the International Herald Tribune. When the kidnappers make contact, explain your problem. Try to persuade them the map is out of their reach – and everybody else’s. Appeal to their powers of reason. But remember: you’ll only have one chance at most. When the advertisement appears, the police will see it as well as the kidnappers. And they may respond more quickly. The second choice may become the first choice against your will.’

‘Then surely the sensible course of action is to make a clean breast of it straightaway,’ said Derek. Out of the corner of her eye, Charlotte could see him looking at her, but she did not shift her gaze from Frank.

‘What’s the third choice?’

‘Assume Delgado is responsible. Then find him yourself. Negotiate with him personally. Make him understand that killing the girl will trigger a scandal destroying his reputation. A good fascist cares about honour more than money. Pray Delgado isn’t an exception.’

‘But we already know he is,’ said Derek. ‘Otherwise he wouldn’t have tried to keep the gold for himself. He’d have donated it to the cause.’

‘True,’ conceded Frank.

‘And we can’t be sure he’s guilty. The real culprit might be Cardozo. Or somebody else altogether.’

‘Also true,’ said Frank.

‘Besides, we have no idea where Delgado is and no means of locating him. We don’t even know if he’s still alive.’

‘Not true,’ said Frank, his stare at Charlotte intensifying. ‘I think I can find out if he’s alive and, if he is, where he lives.’

‘You can?’

‘Yes. The question is: do you want me to?’