The Firebird (58 page)

And his gaze briefly travelled between them before he went out again, closing the door.

She did not move.

The ship rolled with the current and she somehow kept her balance, but it was not such an easy thing with Edmund standing suddenly in front of her, and her own father having done a thing she could not fathom.

Yet with all the things she did not understand, the one thing she could say with utter certainty was that her father never would betray the King. Which meant that her perception of his actions must be wrong; that she had somehow missed the movement of some small but vital piece upon the chessboard.

She cast her mind backwards, while Edmund stayed silent and watched her.

She had not acknowledged him, did not dare look at him. Everything round her – not only the timbers beneath her, but everything – felt at that moment as if it were moving and in the wrong place, and she feared if she let herself focus on Edmund she might lose whatever small hold she still had on the things that were real. Anna wanted him there and she wanted him gone and she wanted, above all, to know what was happening.

‘He gave you the letters,’ she said, well aware there was no need to actually say it, for it was self-evident, but she was working things through in her thoughts. Then she met Edmund’s eyes and her thoughts grew confused, and she simply asked, ‘Why?’

‘Because they are my burden. I’m the only one can carry them.’

She dimly saw the missing piece then, though she could not fully comprehend the purpose of its move. ‘You are no traitor.’

That he did not answer. But she knew.

She said, ‘Vice Admiral Gordon and Sir Harry – they
want
Deane to read those letters.’

Edmund smiled faintly in the shadows. ‘Christ, your mind is quick.’

‘But why?’ And even as she asked the question she believed she knew the answer. ‘They are trying to deceive him.’

‘He was sent here by the English as a spy, in search of secrets. We are giving him a secret. That it happens to be false,’ he said, ‘is more your fault than anyone’s.’

‘My fault?’

‘Aye. When you trapped me with your ruse upon the chessboard,’ he reminded her, ‘that evening at the general’s, and he told us of the crossing of the river at Poltava, it did set him thinking of a clever way to deal with Deane.’

She thought back to that evening, and the general’s reconstruction of the way the Russian army had convinced the Swedes they planned to cross the river in one place, while all unseen they made their crossing in another.

Edmund said, ‘The thing is, here in Russia, as in Spain, the English always have their eyes upon us, waiting to thwart any new attempt King James might make to claim his throne. And the general knew that when they learnt that Captain Hay had come here, and from Rome, they would not rest until they learnt the reason why.’

She did not ask what Captain Hay’s true business on behalf of King James might have been, for even had he known it she would not have asked him to share such a confidence. But she remembered what she’d heard from Charles, that painful day. ‘You said to Deane yourself, I’m told, that Captain Hay had come to give Sir Harry new instructions to buy ships here, with the backing of the Spanish and the Pope himself.’

‘I did.’

‘And that was all a lie.’

‘A lie the English would believe,’ he said, ‘because it was exactly what they thought we would be doing. Misdirection, Mistress Jamieson, can be a useful thing.’

She gave a nod towards the letters. ‘And so those are meant to misdirect Deane further?’

‘More to misdirect his masters in the government of England. When I meet Deane in Amsterdam and we do break the seals together of these letters, they will tell him most convincingly of how the Duke of Holstein and the Empress have conspired to send ships to Spain. I don’t doubt he’ll believe it, for in truth did he not see three ships himself, just heading out as he came in? So he’ll believe that there are surely more to follow. In those letters, there will also be a good account of how we plan to so alarm the Danes by our manoeuvres in the Baltic, that the Danes will beg the English to assist them. Deane will further learn that, once the English fleet has thus been lured to Denmark’s aid, King James will deal a blow from Spain with his new fleet of Russian ships, while Empress Catherine strikes them from behind, and Sweden from above.’ He gave a half-smile. ‘’Tis in truth a cunning plan.’

‘And false, as well?’

He shrugged. ‘I would myself know little of such things, for I am not a naval man. But Deane is.’

‘Captain Deane,’ she said, ‘is many things.’

‘But not a fool. He is a naval man of long experience, and when he came to Cronstadt he’d have seen within the space of half a day how things do truly stand.’

‘I do not follow.’

Edmund said, ‘The Russian squadron is not fit for sea, and ill provisioned, and things are not in the order that they would have been in had the Tsar not died. However much the Empress and the Duke of Holstein may support King James, this year is not the one to try to set him on his throne again, and all of us do know it. But we cannot let the English know it, else they might make use of their advantage. They could do much damage while we try to build our strength. Unless—’

‘Unless they do not see that we are weak.’ She gave a nod, to show she understood. At least, she understood that part of it. She looked away and asked him, in a different voice, ‘Why you?’

He did not answer for a moment. It fell quiet in the cabin, with the rolling of the ship beneath them and the half-light in which she could not have read his eyes if she’d been looking at them. Then he asked, ‘And who else was there?’

‘Anyone.’

‘None else Deane would believe could turn a traitor to his kin.’ The hard and mocking edge had crept back in his tone. ‘Your Mr Taylor offered.’

She did bring her head round then, and looked him in the eye. ‘He is not mine. And if he offered, why did you not let him do it?’

‘Because whoever carries these damn’d letters into Amsterdam will lose his reputation altogether, Mistress Jamieson. A month from now, when I am well away and none can fetch me back or stop me, there’s a harlot in St Petersburg will swear that, while I lay with her, I told her of my plans to meet with Deane, and after that there will be none, except a very few, who do not know me as a traitor.’

As he faced her, she could see his closed jaw lift and set again at a defiant angle, as though he were waiting for her once again to strike him, but instead she kept her gaze on his and asked him, very calmly, ‘Would this be the harlot who did live next door to you? The one whose husband beat her?’

Edmund stared at her.

‘I’d think,’ said Anna quietly, ‘a woman who is grateful would say anything you asked her to. Would she have told the same lie about Mr Taylor, then, if he’d been carrying the letters in your place?’ She knew the answer to that, also. ‘So you would not let him bear that shame, yet you yourself would shoulder it?’ She studied him. ‘You need not always stand and take a whipping you do not deserve.’

He went on staring at her, saying nothing, as though he could not believe he’d heard her properly. And then he left the shadows; took a step towards her, cautiously.

‘I am always as I am. People will see me as they want to see me. But never before in my whole life,’ he told her, ‘have I had a person who wanted to see me as good.’ He stood and looked down at her, searchingly. ‘How do you know I’ve not lain with the harlot?’

She answered him honestly. ‘You would not take such advantage of someone who had been so wounded.’

He shook his head slightly, his eyes never leaving her own. ‘How would you know how I deal with wounded things?’

‘You healed the bird.’

‘How do you know? You never saw me let it loose. For all you know I killed the thing and had it for my dinner.’

‘You did not.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because you told me.’ All this talk about the bird reminded Anna she still held the silk-wrapped carving from the Empress, and she looked now for a place to set it down. There was a table just beside them, with a chair where Edmund had sat earlier and waited for them, playing at some single-handed game whose object seemed to be to end with all the cards arranged in their four suits.

She lightly touched the cards. ‘What game is this?’

‘It goes by several names. Some fancy it can tell your fortune, tell you if you will succeed or not in what you venture.’

Anna asked him, ‘And what have these cards told you?’

‘Their advice is undecided, for the deck is incomplete.’ Not content to stop their argument, he cornered her again with, ‘Why is my word enough for you?’

There was no way to answer that, thought Anna, not in speech, because the words did not exist to tell him why. She found another way to do it. Reaching deep into her pocket she drew out the cards he’d sent her, and she set the ace of hearts face-up upon the table, in amongst its fellows.

‘I am happy to return you this,’ she said, ‘for I believe that it is yours, and has been for some time, and very likely always will be.’ As his eyes found hers she forced herself to finish. ‘But if I may,’ she told him, ‘I should like to keep my knave.’

He raised his scarred hand to her face, and touched her very softly. ‘I’m not good with fragile things,’ he said. ‘I’m careless, and I break them, and I lose them, but I …’ He broke off, as though to gain control of some emotion, and when next he spoke his tone was gentler than she’d ever heard it. ‘I’d take care of
you
.’

‘That is not true,’ she told him, and before he could misunderstand, she carried on, ‘You’re not so rough with fragile things. You carried twenty painted eggs within your pockets just to please a child, once,’ she reminded him. ‘And I am not so breakable.’

She saw his dark eyes glisten in the instant just before he closed them, tightly, as though warding off a pain. And then she raised herself on tiptoe and she kissed him, and his arms came round her as he kissed her back. It did not matter that the world was all unsteady then, because with Edmund holding her she knew that she was safe.

He raised his mouth a little from her own, though she still shared his shaking breath and felt the warm curve of his smile.

‘Your father is a fierce man,’ Edmund said, ‘and he did warn me if I were to lay a hand on you I’d lose the hand.’

She moved her hand to where his own was tangled in her hair, and closed her fingers round his larger ones, and felt the hard line of the scar beneath her palm. ‘Ye’ll not,’ she said. ‘Ye’ll never take a punishment because of me.’

‘You’re fierce as well, then, are you?’

‘Aye. All fighters are, I’m told.’

The second kiss was deeper than the first, and lasted longer. When he broke it this time he drew back to look at her. ‘I must still go to Amsterdam.’

‘I know.’

‘As long as Deane believes he pulls my strings, I must pretend to dance to them.’

‘I know,’ she said. ‘I’ll wait.’

‘It might be months.’

Why was he talking? Anna wondered. Reaching up she kissed him lightly on the hard line of his jaw. ‘Ye’ll have your pardon, as Deane promised, will ye not?’

He gave a nod, his own mouth lowering.

‘Well then,’ she said, ‘I will return to Ireland with my mother and my father, and I’ll wait for you,’ she told him, ‘to come home.’

And that, to Anna’s satisfaction, was the last thing Edmund let her say for quite some time.

The sun had set, the wind was blowing strong across the Strelka, and in front of me Rob stood against the waist-high granite wall and turned his gaze towards the river where the fortress lay in floodlights. There were lights, too, coming on all down the line of the Embankment and across the long green bridge, reflecting in the water of the Neva, but Rob’s face was half in shadow.

‘What did he say?’ he asked me as I pocketed my mobile.

‘He was angry.’ Then, as he looked round, I added, ‘That I hadn’t told him earlier. Apparently I could have saved him time and money, telling him what items were worth bidding on at auction.’

‘And what did ye say to that?’

I shrugged and smiled. ‘I told him what I do will never be accepted as a true authentication.’

‘Not the now, at any rate,’ said Rob. ‘I’d not say never.’

As I joined him at the wall, he changed the angle of his body slightly so he blocked the worst part of the wind, and told me, ‘But you have your job.’

I gave a nod. ‘It seems that way.’

‘That’s good, then.’

When I nodded for a second time, not answering, he slanted a quick glance at me and asked, ‘So why the frown?’

‘I’m disappointed. I was really hoping we could prove the Firebird had come from Catherine, but I don’t see how we can. Can you?’

He thought a moment. Shook his head. ‘No.’

‘And that means, after all this, Margaret Ross won’t get her cruise.’

Rob shrugged in his turn. ‘Well, I’d not assume that, either. She could always sell her books.’

My frown grew deeper. ‘What books?’

‘The James Bond books in the bookcase in her sitting room,’ said Rob. ‘Did ye not see them?’

Thinking back, I had a memory of Rob bending to examine Margaret’s bookcase, and the vintage hardbacks with their garish covers. Her father’s books, she’d told us.

Turning round myself so that I faced him more directly, I asked, ‘What about them?’

‘Well,’ he said, in that calm, nonchalant tone that I knew by now was anything but innocent, ‘a first edition James Bond hardback sells for a fair bit at auction. First editions of the very first book sell for nearly
£
20,000. And she’s got the entire set, all signed by Ian Fleming.’

I was staring at him and he knew it. I could see the faint suggestion of a smile that he took care to straighten out again before I asked him, ‘Does she know this?’

‘Well, she will after you tell her.’

‘Rob.’

‘This place,’ he said, ‘is growing on me. I can see why it’s your favourite spot in all St Petersburg.’