CHAPTER NINETEEN

The rope tightened, and Arkady’s head appeared, like a jack-in-the-box, at the top of the wall. He nodded to Samuel; the two understood each other without words. Arkady heaved the rope up one side of the wall and dropped it down the other; Samuel braced himself, and Arkady grabbed the rope and slid down it, wincing as the rope burned his hands.

The dogs were almost on him. They were German Shepherds, one brown and grey and one solid black, both tall as Arkady’s shoulder and moving fast. The black one was closest, and its teeth were so white and so many that they seemed to precede the dog itself by several inches.

Arkady swallowed, and for one second his smile faltered, but then he forced it back, determinedly, and stepped towards the dogs, one hand outstretched towards the open jaws. He whispered in Russian as he went.

The dogs halted. The black dog stood, growling, two paces from Arkady. Its hackles rose along its back. Arkady continued to talk, and he added his whistle – the whistle that could summon a murder of crows out of a neighbouring rooftop. The brown dog whined, and the black dog’s growl became less sure of itself. Arkady stepped closer, palm held upwards.

Too close. The black dog snapped at it in earnest and gave a sudden volley of barks. Vita closed her eyes in one long, bleak blink of horror.

‘Nyet!’ said Arkady sternly. ‘Ya znayu, ty ne takoi. I know you’re better than that.’ And he whistled, again, long and low, and laid one hand on each of the dogs’ noses.

When Vita opened her eyes, the black dog was lying on its side, and Arkady was kneeling at its head, rubbing it between the ears, while the other tried to lick the inside of his sleeve.

He looked at the collars. ‘This one’s Viking, and this one’s Hunter. You can come down. Don’t burn your hands on the rope.’

They crouched, hidden among bushes, looking out at the garden. It was huge, and ornate, though it had run wild now, and there was ivy growing everywhere they looked. Paths stretched in every direction from the back door of the house, some of them small and winding around flower beds, some lined with gravel. A small walled garden lay on the west side of the lawn, an array of rose beds to the east. The last winter roses were still hanging from the bushes, overblown but still a strange, bloody midnight red in the moonlight, intermingled with creepers.

‘I can’t see the fountain,’ whispered Silk.

‘No,’ said Vita. ‘It’s in the walled garden – over there, see?’

They crossed over the lawn, Viking following Arkady adoringly and Hunter’s tail wagging against the boy’s leg.

Silk glanced across the lawn at the back door. ‘Is that the door with the unpickable lock?’ she whispered.

‘Yes,’ said Vita. She looked at the house, rising up and up into the night sky. ‘They all are. It’s a fortress.’ Vita reached the walled garden ahead of the others. There was a small black wooden door in the wall, just as the plans had shown. She pushed it. It was locked.

A hand moved her aside.

‘Let me,’ whispered Silk. She slipped her length of wire into the lock. ‘It’s not an easy one. Just a second.’

It took her less than a minute, but each second felt like a week. Silk let out a hiss of relief as the lock clicked open.

They filed in, Hunter and Viking barging among them, and closed the door behind them.

Vita’s breath came out in a great wave of relief.

‘What now?’ said Arkady.

Vita gestured at the fountain. It stood dry, but the skeletons of roses grew up high around it. Age had chipped away at its beauty, but had not destroyed it: it was a statue of a laughing boy. The boy looked, Vita thought, a lot like her grandfather might have, once. She pulled her trowel out of the bag. ‘We dig,’ she said.

They began to dig in earnest. The ground was icy, and soon Vita’s hands were numb. But she shovelled and shovelled, her trowel occasionally clashing against Silk’s, and all of them were soon filthy up to the elbow.

The hole grew bigger. Six inches deep … a foot deep.

Vita felt her blood speed faster and faster through her body. Would it work? Would the plan work?

And then it came. Footsteps, running. The others dropped their trowels and jumped to their feet, but Vita kept hold of hers, and moved to stand, ready, in front of her friends.

The wooden door in the stone wall flew open, and a man came bursting through, sweating and panting and contorted with anger.

‘What the hell’s all this?’ The guard was tall and wide, and there was nothing kind in his face.

Vita didn’t let herself hesitate. She charged straight at the man, her trowel held out in front of her like a bayonet. She felt his arm catch her across the shoulder, and tripped sideways, spinning to hit out at his chest. She felt both his hands close on her upper arm.

‘Run!’ called Vita. She turned to the others, who stood straight-backed, clench-fisted, watching.

‘I mean it!’ she cried, and a sudden white-hot panic rose in her.

They had to run.

‘What are you doing? You swore you’d run!’

But they didn’t run.

And now the guard was gripping her wrist with an agonising grasp and was reaching out to catch Samuel, who stood there, unmoving.

‘No!’ said Vita. ‘This isn’t the plan! Run! We had a pact! RUN!’

A second man appeared and stood in front of the door.

‘Stand still,’ he said, and pointed a rifle at Silk’s heart. ‘Don’t move, or there’ll be an accident.’

They were led in single file up through the garden, across the lawn, through the back door, with the rifle bringing up the rear. The windows were all barred in thick, ugly, black-painted iron.

The kitchen door was bolted from the inside; the guard went round and unbolted it. Vita saw Silk looking from out of the corner of her eye at the locks.

Silk shook her head. ‘It really is a fortress,’ she whispered.

Vita held her bag tight under her coat; nobody had yet demanded it.

They were led through an empty kitchen, painted a bright cobalt blue, then down a hallway to a wooden door, which opened on to stone steps and a large wine cellar.

The cellar was open at the bottom of the steps, and then stretched away in aisles of shelves, a library of wine bottles, a few shelves of whisky, one or two of rum. Someone had been tasting them recently, and a few half-drunk bottles stood on a shelf near the stairs.

Those are my grandfather’s, not Sorrotore’s, thought Vita, and a further surge of anger rose in her. Thief.

The floor was of stone slabs. There was no light.

The guard pushed the four children until they were standing with their backs against the wall of the cellar. Then, still pointing the rifle, both men retreated.

The door closed, and Vita turned to stare at the three faces in front of her. She was breathless, desperate, but they only stood, waiting for her to speak, Arkady smiling slightly.

‘Why didn’t you run?’ she asked. The words were strangled; her chest was thumping hard enough to choke her.

Arkady grinned. ‘You never thought we were actually going to, did you?’ And he laughed.

Samuel smiled his odd, hidden half-smile. ‘We never actually promised.’

‘Think back,’ said Silk, ‘to what we actually said.’