House of the Lost (23 page)

‘Best not say,’ he said, with a wink. Then, half turning, he smiled, ‘Here’s my lady,’ he said, and Zoia saw the girlfriend come through the door. He got up from the bar stool, then looked back at Zoia. ‘I’ll tell you this, though,’ he said. ‘Before I switched off, I noticed the woman who was talking had one of the most attractive voices I’ve ever heard.’

‘Really?’

‘People don’t give the voice enough weight as an attraction, do they?’ he said. ‘But sedition or not, this one’s voice was an absolute sizzler. Her name was Elisabeth Valk.’

*

The next night in Annaleise’s apartment, Zoia and Annaleise spent almost an hour turning the dial on the wireless to find the wavelength of the October Group. Annaleise knew about them, of course. ‘They call themselves that because of the Russian Revolution of 1917,’ she said. ‘But it’s also an acknowledgement of the start of the Hungarian Revolution in October 1956. They think we don’t know they exist, but of course we do, although I’d have to admit we don’t know much about them. But,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘Elisabeth Valk is one of their number, is she?’

‘It looks like it,’ said Zoia. She was pleased it was Sunday and her day off so she could be involved, but Annaleise was inclined to be sceptical about whether this would lead anywhere. They did not know how far they could trust Zoia’s customer, she said. He might just be making mischief. As the wireless’s dial screeched its way along the various channels, her scepticism increased.

‘It’s the same time of the evening,’ offered Zoia. ‘He’d been listening before he came in, so it would have been about this time.’

‘Yes, but they might only have made that one broadcast. Or they might not bother on a Sunday. They might even have been discovered in the last twenty-four hours and closed down.’

Then, quite suddenly, between a blast of music and a discussion about farming, it was there.

‘The October Group calling,’ said the voice. ‘The October Group calling . . . Elisabeth Valk here, wishing a very good evening to all my friends . . .’

Elisabeth Valk. Zoia stared at the wireless. One of the most attractive voices I’ve ever heard, the man had said, an absolute sizzler. Infuriatingly and unfairly, it was a remarkable voice, like violet midnight or warm honey or newly spun silk. If you lay in bed with the owner of this voice you would feel as if your skin was being caressed by sound.

Elisabeth was talking about the meeting which Zoia’s customer had mentioned. She called it a rally, and said details as to time and place would be given soon on this wavelength. In the meantime, here were some things for their overlords to ponder. Why had labour camps been created and why was there vicious physical and psychological torture of prison inmates – many of whom had committed no crime? asked the beautiful voice. There were other references, more homely. Why was the food in the shops of the poorest quality but the most expensive of prices? Why was it necessary for bread to be bought with ration cards in an agricultural country? But most damning of all were the warnings she gave. A change of government was coming and there would be appalling restrictions of human rights, there would be censorship, and what was called relocation – people would be forced from their homes. Beware of it all, said Elisabeth. Fight against it, for it would ruin the country and other countries as well. When she bade her listeners goodnight and urged them to listen again at the same time tomorrow evening, Zoia saw that Annaleise’s eyes were blazing with triumph. She turned her head and smiled.

‘We have her,’ she said softly. ‘Proof positive and clear. If my people can track down where that broadcast is coming from – and that should be possible – then we have Elisabeth Valk tied up tighter than a caterpillar’s cocoon.’

She reached out and pulled Zoia hard against her. ‘It’s arousing, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘And so you and I are going to bed now, and I’m going to have you so many times, by dawn you’ll be crying for mercy.’

‘I would never cry for mercy with you.’

Annaleise smiled.

‘I wonder if you’ll still be saying that by the time dawn comes,’ she said, and began to tear off Zoia’s clothes.

Nothing happened for several days and Zoia began to think Annaleise’s people had failed to find the source of the broadcast. Or perhaps it had been found by others and closed down. She wished she had a wireless of her own so she could tune in to the October Group herself, but wirelesses were expensive and there was a waiting list of at least a year.

But a week later, Annaleise came into the bar where Zoia worked. This was something she had never done before, and Zoia’s heart leapt with a mixture of delight and apprehension.

Without preamble, Annaleise said, ‘Can you be ready to make a journey early tomorrow morning? Around seven o’clock?’

Zoia did not finish at the bar until one a.m. and it took forty-five minutes to get back to her apartment, so she would only get four or five hours sleep, but she would have gone without any sleep at all for Annaleise. She said, ‘Yes.’

It was a bitter, unforgiving morning as the large car jerked its way across the frozen countryside and a sharp frost rimed the hedges and the roofs. A man Zoia had never met was driving, with a woman, also unfamiliar, seated next to him. She was around forty, bony-featured and striking without being actually good-looking. Her eyes, as she turned to look at Zoia, were piercing.

Annaleise said, ‘Elena, this is Zoia Calciu. I told you about her.’

‘You did,’ said the woman. ‘We’re all very pleased with your work for the Party.’

‘This is Madame Elena Ceau
escu,’ said Annaleise. ‘She’s a very hardworking and respected member of our cause. Her husband is a senior member of the Politburo.’

Zoia had not expected to meet anyone so highly connected. Her sense of inferiority returned at the reference to the Politburo, but she tried not to appear intimidated and managed to ask where they were going.

‘Across the border into Yugoslavia,’ said Annaleise. ‘To Krivaca, then to a small village on its edge. It’s about seventy miles from here – we should do it in two hours.’

Before she could say any more, Elena said, ‘We’re going to find Elisabeth Valk. Annaleise particularly asked that you be there when we catch her – you were the one who provided the information, Zoia.’

‘What will happen to her?’ asked Zoia, aware of sudden pleasure that Annaleise had made this request.

A thin smile lifted Elena’s lips. ‘She will be dealt with,’ she said. ‘The Party has a very particular way of dealing with enemies of the state.’

The present

Well! thought Theo, sitting back and staring at the screen, no one can say I’m not importing real people into this book! Elena Ceau
escu, no less. Married to one of the greediest, most corrupt dictators of modern times – Nicolae Ceau
escu, convicted of genocide and shot with his wife on Christmas Day, 1989.

He did not know a great deal about Elena Ceau
escu, and he certainly did not think he had known enough to introduce her into the plot, but there she was. He got up to scan the bookshelves in a corner of the room, where a motley collection had assembled itself over the years. There were ragged paperbacks the cousins had brought to read during the holidays and forgotten to take home, cookery books belonging to Helen, ordnance survey maps and tourist books about the area which no one had ever consulted. But there were a few standard reference books as well, all foxed and faded-looking and among them was an elderly
Oxford Concise Encyclopedia
. Theo reached for it, bringing out a shower of dust and dispossessing several indignant spiders of their homes.

The encyclopedia turned out to have been published in 1933, and described Adolf Hitler as being Germany’s new Chancellor. Theo swore and returned it to its place in disgust, and was just thinking he would have to drive to the nearest library when he saw, at one end, a couple of books dealing with Eastern European history. Memory stirred and he remembered a summer when Guff had brought to Fenn House a young Ukrainian student, in England to improve her languages. She had, as far as the family was concerned, been one of Guff’s less worrying escapades, partly because she had not seemed interested in money but also because on the second night of her stay she had taken over the kitchen and cooked borscht followed by a truly inspirational beef stroganoff. She had also, in the wake of several bottles of Bulls Blood that evening, taught the younger Kendals several satisfyingly explosive swear words in Russian. Theo had no idea what had eventually happened to her, but it looked as if Guff, rather endearingly, had tried to acquaint himself with Eastern European history, either during or as a result of, the association.

He sat down on the floor and began to riffle the pages of both books. The first was of no help, but the second had a whole section on Romania. Theo began to read, working his way through various aspects of the country: its folklore, which included rusalkas and mild-mannered vampires; its many invasions by Goths, Bulgars and Turks and assorted marauding armies, and the complexities of its royal dynasties and rulers which he found confusing, largely because most of them had names ending in ‘escu’.

There was a brief section on Elena Ceau
escu near the end. Theo read it carefully.