Page 96 of Never Tear Us Apart
‘Why?’ he asks, puzzled.
‘Danny, I need to tell—’
‘Champ, old feller.’ A pilot claps Danny on the back. ‘How’s your evening going?’
As Danny turns to him with a mixture of good humour and genuine annoyance, I feel a soft hand on my arm. Looking up, I see a young woman in a pretty gown, her soft blonde hair styled like a movie star. There’s something familiar about her, and then I realise where I have seen her before: in the typing pool at HQ.
‘Where there is life, there is hope, is there not, Miss Borg?’ she asks me pertly with a lift of her chin.
My God, but she is young, her tightly laced nerves evident under her film-star make-up. Do I really want to deliver this child to the military police? The answer is that I don’t, but it’s too late now. The wheels have been set in motion. This afternoon, I went to see Mabel Strickland with everything I learnt about the count.
She had regarded me from across her desk for a long thoughtful moment. When she picked up the phone, and asked to be put through to HQ, I thought for a moment that it was me that was in trouble. But she spoke to the general and told him everything I had discovered.
‘Very well, Maia,’ she said, her expression very serious. ‘The story is yours to write, after the count has been arrested. Agreed?’
‘Agreed,’ I nodded.
‘And good work,’ she said. ‘Very good work indeed.’
It hardly felt real until this moment. Now the trap has been set, and this young girl will be the first casualty.
‘That’s what I always say,’ I reply, using the phrase the count gave me. ‘Follow me, please.’
‘Maia?’ Danny calls after me, as we make our way through the densely dancing crowd. I glance back, showing him my five fingers to signal I’ll be five minutes, but as he looks round the room, he is noticing what my contact has not: several sets of eyes following our every move. Danny knows something is off, and he’s not about to let me go quite so easily.
‘Maia.’ He catches my wrist, glancing at the girl, who flutters her lashes at him, and smiles sweetly. ‘Where you two going?’
‘Just to powder our noses,’ I say with a fixed smile.
‘Do you two know each other?’ Danny notices the four or five men who are also leaving the room. ‘Maia, what’s going on?’ he asks, catching my hand.
‘Danny!’ I laugh. ‘Let me go – I’ll be back in a minute.’
‘Sure, but it’s just that—’
Out of options, I grab him by the lapels of his uniform jacket and kiss him hard.
When I pull away, he looks a little stunned, but he doesn’t move to stop me when I grab the girl’s hand and pull her towards the doors out of the dance hall. Once we’re in the hallway, I lead her to the back of the building, where I know there is a small empty kitchen.
Glancing up the stairs as we go, I see pairs of feet waiting in the dark at the top of the stairs. A door to our left is slightly open, and a shadow moves under it. Danny hasn’t followed, thank God. I’m starting to wonder if I should have explained all this to him to start with.
Once we are in the kitchen, I pull the door to. ‘I didn’t expect to see you,’ I say, playing for time. ‘You work at HQ, don’t you?’
‘Yes, for now,’ she says airily. ‘Been an army baby all my life, dragged out here a few years back by my dad, and somehow got stuck here through all of this. I’d rather be anywhere but here. And I’m never going where my dad tells me to ever again. So I’m saving up, going to get myself a nice place when all this is over and stay there for as long as I want with whomever I want.’ She crosses her arms like a petulant teenager, and I think she might actually be one.
‘Who’s your father?’ I ask her, my heart sinking. ‘Are you sure you want to go through with this?’
‘What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. Look, can we get this over with? I spent ages getting ready, and I want to dance with my boyfriend.’
She doesn’t hear the footsteps on the stairs or the movement in the hallway. She has no idea that in the next few minutes, the future is about to be ripped from under her feet.
‘Look, don’t tell me anything,’ I say. ‘You don’t have to.’
Her perfect, red-painted mouth falls open. ‘I want my money! Anyway, it’s not like what I’m going to tell you is going to change anything, not really. I never tell him anythingreallyimportant. All I do is sell a little bit of information here and there, just things I pick up and overhear. This time, he just wants to know some details about the relief convoy, and I happen to know what he’s after – that’s all. The Germansand Italians will know within a few hours anyway, so what difference does it make really?’
‘Quite a lot, actually.’ It’s a military police officer who speaks, opening the door. ‘I’m afraid you have made a terrible mistake, Miss Grayson, and I am going to have to take you for questioning.’
The small room is suddenly crammed full of military police crowding around the slight, foolish girl.
