David took a deep breath. ‘This is something big, isn’t it?’
Jackson nodded. ‘Potentially. Our instructions come from the very top. It’s not dangerous, not in the early stages.’ He smiled, a crinkly, confiding smile. ‘They’re showing a lot of confidence in you.’
David laughed mirthlessly. ‘The man on the spot.’
‘It happens. Once you join us. Do you think you can do this?’ Jackson asked.
‘What about my wife?’
‘She doesn’t need to know anything, any more than she does about what you do for us at work. You’ll just have to make something up to explain your absence on Sunday.’
David thought of Frank facing some SS interrogator. In the last two years he had sometimes thought of facing that himself. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’ll visit Frank.’
‘Thank you.’ Jackson stood up. ‘I must make some calls. And I’ll speak to Drax tomorrow. I’ll meet you both at the club tomorrow morning.’ He smiled, genuine gratitude in his eyes, as he pulled on his gloves.
‘Geoff didn’t know Frank nearly as well as me. He might be surprised to see us both.’
‘You could say Geoff offered to drive you, say your car is broken down.’ He turned to Natalia. ‘You could pretend to be Drax’s girlfriend. Good cover. It would help to have a second view about how he is.’
Jackson turned back to David. ‘Don’t ask Muncaster about what happened with his brother, just encourage him to talk and see where he goes. That’s important. Assess his state of mind. Natalia, by the way, is in operational charge on Sunday. If anything unexpected happens, you take orders from her. She will have a gun, just in case of trouble.’ He smiled. ‘And she’s a crack shot.’
David looked at Natalia; she nodded quietly.
‘Everyone all right, then?’ Jackson spoke with forced cheerfulness. ‘See Muncaster, then take a look at his flat, our man will get hold of the key. Then phone me from a call-box.’
‘All right,’ David said. ‘Poor old Frank,’ he added.
‘Indeed.’ Jackson nodded. ‘It’s up to us to help him, sort this out.’ He paused, then spoke again, changing the subject. ‘I see Beaverbrook met with Speer and Goebbels in Berlin today.’
‘But not Hitler,’ Natalia said.
‘No.’ Jackson smiled grimly. ‘Last year, I went with an FO delegation to Germany, visiting the opening of the Führer’s new art gallery at Linz. All this wonderful stuff, art treasures looted from all over Eastern Europe. Someone told me Hitler had been for a private view the day before, they saw him trundled along in his wheelchair, shaking so much from his Parkinson’s disease he could hardly focus on the pictures properly, let alone give the Nazi salute.’ His face clouded. ‘I met him once, you know.’
‘Hitler?’ David asked.
‘Yes. I was with the Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, when he visited him in 1937. He had terrible bad breath, and kept breaking wind. Loathsome man. Big mad eyes. Could see him using them to work a crowd, though.’
‘Maybe he was ill even then.’
‘Yes.’ Jackson smiled tightly. ‘And badly ill now. And we have Stevenson elected in America. Perhaps things are starting to change at last.’ He walked to the door, got ready to leave; they always left separately. ‘It’s very cold again. I do hope we don’t get bad fog this year. Well, goodnight.’ He went out and moments later David heard his heavy footsteps descending the stairs.
David stood up. He had never been alone with Natalia before. She said, ‘Mr Jackson is so English. Always a comment about the weather.’
‘Yes. He is. Very public school, as we say.’
‘His life is extremely dangerous.’ She must have caught the note of dislike in David’s voice.
‘Yes.’
‘I am sorry for your friend. I knew someone who was ill in that way. He lived in great pain.’
David sighed. ‘Frank wasn’t always unhappy. He just didn’t—’
‘Quite belong in this world?’
‘Yes. But he has a right to be in it. All of us do. That’s what we’re fighting for.’
‘Yes, it is.’ He saw a tear form in the corner of her eye and he had a sudden urge to go over to her, take hold of her. Then he thought of Sarah, waiting at home; he had told her there was a flap on at the office and he had to work late. Now he would have to tell her yet more lies. He looked away from Natalia, to the picture she was working on. ‘Where is that?’
‘Bratislava, in Eastern Europe. Once the city was ruled by Hungary, then it was part of Czechoslovakia, now it is the capital of Slovakia. One of Hitler’s puppet states.’ She looked at the painting, the people trudging along the narrow streets. ‘When I was growing up there the city was cosmopolitan, like most of Eastern Europe. Slovaks, Hungarians, Germans. Many people were some mixture of all three, like me.’ She smiled her sad, cynical smile again. ‘I am a cosmopolitan. But then the gods of nationalism rose up.’
‘Were there many Jews there?’
‘Yes. I had many Jewish friends. They are all gone now.’ Then David said abruptly, ‘I must get back to my wife.’ Natalia nodded her head slowly. He turned and walked out.
Chapter Eleven
ON WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON, Frank had had another meeting with Dr Wilson. Ben walked him over to the Admissions Block again. He had come to like the young Scotsman more, he was kind to him, and Frank had seen enough of him to realize there was nothing of the world of Strangmans in his make-up. Yet there was still something about Ben, something he couldn’t put his finger on, that Frank didn’t trust.
In his office the doctor was working on some files. He motioned to Frank to sit down. ‘How are you?’
‘All right, thank you.’
‘The police have been in touch.’ Frank’s heart lurched with fear. ‘There’s still no decision about whether to prosecute. They can’t get hold of your brother, either. The case seems to be in limbo. If it does come to court,’ he added reassuringly, ‘we can make a defence of insanity. But I wish your brother would contact us. We can’t think about transferring you to the Private Villa until we have a trustee appointed to deal with your money. In the meantime you’ll have to stay on the ward.’
‘I understand,’ Frank said bleakly.
Wilson looked at him curiously. ‘I hear you’re still very withdrawn. Not interacting with staff or patients.’
Frank didn’t reply. Wilson sat back in his chair, picked up a pen and started fiddling with it. ‘Did you and your brother play together as children?’ he asked suddenly. ‘Perhaps together with your mother?’
Frank looked at him. He mustn’t be drawn into talk about Edgar. ‘Our mother wasn’t one for – playing.’
‘Did she prefer Edgar?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Did you feel she did?’
‘I don’t know.’
Wilson sighed. ‘I’m going to put you down for electric shock treatment, Frank. They’re booked up next week, but the week after. We must get you out of this depressive state.’
Ben took Frank back to the ward. The weather had turned colder, and there was frost in the air. Frank was terrified by the thought of shock treatment. He wished he could get away. He had been sent a get well card, of all things, from his colleagues at Birmingham but apart from that had heard nothing from anyone. And Edgar had probably decided to have nothing more to do with him. He was probably drunk somewhere in a bar in San Francisco, trying to forget it all, slugging whisky like Mrs Baker. Frank hated drink, it loosened people’s inhibitions and inhibitions were the only things that kept them from savagery. ‘Drunks,’ he muttered aloud.